The Happiest Baby on the Block and The Happiest Toddler on the Block 2-Book Bundle pdfdrive com

“You can catch more flies with honey than with
vinegar.”
—Old adage
Main Points:
• Yellow-light behaviors are annoying things kids do, like
whining, pestering, and dawdling.
• You can curb your toddler’s yellow-light behaviors with four
smart parenting skills:
1. Connect with Respect: Using the Fast-Food Rule and
Toddler-ese (plus a few other tricks) to help you detour
around potential conflicts.
2. Make Your Limits Clear and Consistent: Easy ways to
help your child know when you mean business.
3. Forge Win-Win Compromises: Using your toddler’s sense

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of fairness (and a little smart bargaining) to turn a won’t-
won’t into a win-win … so both you and your child can feel
triumphant.
4. Enforce Mild Consequences: Clap-growl warnings and
kind ignoring are two persuasive ways to show your child
that annoying behaviors are a dead-end street.
The Terrible Almost-Twos and Tantrummy
Threes
Toddlers are fun with a capital F! They’re lively, silly, and
curious. But by 18 months an unmistakable shift occurs; they
become more demanding, rigid, and aggressive.
No wonder a common question doctors hear at the two-year
checkup is “How bad are the terrible twos going to be?”
Nervous parents who have just narrowly survived the 18-month
struggles worry, Is this going to get even harder?
Fortunately, a toddler’s screaming meanies usually peak at 18
months. By the second birthday the “terrible twos” are almost
over.
But even if your child is past his second birthday … don’t
break out the champagne just yet. Shortly after the third
birthday, many kids have a spurt of demanding, disrespectful
behavior—the “tantrummy threes.”
Interestingly, older toddlers (three to four years of age) have
a lot in common with … tumultuous teens. Teens get emotional
whiplash as they swing between wanting adult rights (“Everyone
else can stay out late! ”) and reverting to childish
irresponsibility (“I hate cleaning my room!”). Similarly, older
toddlers swing between demanding the rights of “big kids”
(“Let me do it!”) and clinging to infantile excuses (“No, it’s
yucky!”).
Your upset toddler is as much the victim of his intensity and

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immaturity as you are. But the skills I teach in this chapter will
help you discourage his yellow-light behaviors … fast!