Sticker supreme

Yesterday's morning went extremely poorly. Matt had to leave at the crack of dawn, so all of the morning readiness was up to me. Things were OK with breakfast, but then Cooper took an active resistance role in getting dressed. At one point when he was almost completely dressed, yet angrily screaming and tearing at his clothing, I put him in his room to cool off so that I could get Grant in his car seat without losing my mind. I opened the door about 3 minutes later to an almost naked toddler in the middle of the room- standing in a small tornado style array of tiny clothing bits- that proudly, angrily, declared while looking me in the eye "I NOT WEARING UNDIES OR SHIRTS."

The next five minutes of my life are best forgotten, but nobody got hurt, and Cooper indeed was wearing fully coordinated, weather appropriate, clothing as I hauled him kicking and screaming across the icy yard.

During the workday I talked to Matt about it on the phone, and we agreed that something had to be changed, because nobody benefits from that sort of interaction. And right around dinner time, I came up with an idea.

Me: "Cooper, tomorrow if you can get dressed for daycare without being sad, you can put a horsie sticker on the calendar."
Cooper: "I want a sticker!"
Me: "You can have one! Tomorrow you just have to get dressed without getting sad."
Cooper: "Yeah! My love stickers!"


When Cooper woke up this morning, he asked me (essentially) if the horsie sticker offer still stood. I told him it did, and further, if he also got his boots and jacket on, and then got into the car, without getting sad, he could also have a horsie sticker on his jacket to show Shane.

And with that, after breakfast was over, Cooper happily picked out his outfit. He put on his undies and pants all by himself, then asked for help with his teeshirt and sweater. The first sticker was a lovely white horse, carefully placed on the calendar to cover the 1 of December 1st. Then, he selected some socks, asked me to put them on, got his boots, put them on, and then calmly asked if he could wear his blue hooded jacket today, which I told him sounded great. And then he walked out to the car, got in his car seat, and asked nicely for a sticker on his jacket. A brown horsie this time, please.

Why didn't I think of this, like, a month ago?