The Incredible Restraint of DaBoy

We went to a 4 year old's birthday party yesterday. DaGirl adores this little boy and will sometimes run around the house with his picture. I never hear the end of it if his father comes over to do some work to our house "S____'s dad was here. You like new door? You like new windows? S____'s dad did it." That can go on for a bit.

So back to the party. They rented a bounce house since there were several kids under 5 there from S____'s preschool and they all got along well. Well....enough. There was no way I could ever keep DaGirl out of it and once DaBoy figured out what big sis was up to, he wanted in.

I guess I'm a "bad parent" for putting a 15 month old in a bounce house but I know what he can handle (read The Fall Guy). He tried to climb in on his own and with a little help from me to get up the steps he dove right in and loved every moment of it. He couldn't stand up when the other kids were bouncing, but he loved being tossed around on a floor that wouldn't stop moving.

They had balloons in there for the kids to toss around while bouncing and DaBoy found it best to stay along the side and play with these balloons and avoid anyone crashing into him. All of the kids were great and left him alone, but one. DX.

DX wanted whatever balloon DaBoy was holding. He would just snatch it right out of DaBoy's hands. Well, I started getting more than a bit annoyed by this, but there were enough balloons that DaBoy would keep grabbing another and not be phased by DX's aggression.

Meanwhile I'm thinking "DaBoy is getting tired, you keep taking his balloons, I'm not going to stop him when he bites you.... I'm bad parent..... If I were DaBoy, I'd have clubbed him by now."

DX's mom caught him swiping the balloons and took him out for a chat. DaBoy didn't care at all and went right back to playing with his balloons. For all of their aggressive tendancies (that I'm sure they got from me) DaKids are pretty good when out in those types of functions. DaMom told me afterward, DX has some issues and how second children are used to things being taken away by older kids.

Kudos to him for showing restraint.
If I were 15 months old, I would have decked him.

g