Not Unless it is His Idea

Nolan stuck in a clothes basket.

 Nolan is my sweet, lovable, seven year old boy that makes us all want to pull our hair out.  It is hard to believe that all that sweet goodness can co-exist with all that drama and orneriness inside that one little body.

Nolan is simply flying through his school work. I need to challenge him more, but he is pretty content to breeze through. (A subject for another time perhaps.) This week, I've been using his down time for reading (of his choice.) Today he had about 30 minutes before lunch, and I said, "I would like you to read until lunch please."

You would have thought I asked him to clean out the chicken house or something. According to his reaction, accomplishing the task before him was torture . You'd never know that this is a kids who really does enjoy reading. His comment to me, "I already read well enough. Why do I have to read now?"

After a few minutes of his protests, I, trying to avoid the battle (and the drama,) asked, "What would you like to do until lunch?" His response, "I think I'll find a book."

And at this point in the story I smile nicely and say, "Ok honey," and pound my head on the desk as soon as he turns around.

He read a book about dinosaurs until I called him for lunch.