That'll show me.

Despite plenty of warning, the announcement that nap time was upon us elicited a meltdown of somewhat uncharacteristic proportions. It suddenly became impossible for her three year old legs to support the rest of her body, and she crumpled to the floor like a pile of limp spaghetti.

"Go to a different place!" she shouted, shrilly. "I want my mommy to go away to a different place!"

After briefly pondering the merits of a mystical Different Place wherein I am not wrangling a three-year-old who doesn't realize the absolute wonder of a time of day designated specifically to relax and do nothing, and also possibly where I might have the opportunity to shower/brush my teeth/put on deodorant before 2:00 in the afternoon, I instead suppressed a smile and informed Bug that I was not, in fact, going away, and that it was indeed still time to go to bed.

Furious, she voiced her displeasure repeatedly until we got to the bathroom, where the mandatory pre-nap potty time was initiated. Her eyes sparking with fury, she looked right into mine and angrily spat, "Mommy, I'm keeping my pee IN ME!"

That'll show me.

Barely able to stifle my laughter, I looked up at the ceiling until I could force the smile off my face and set my lips into a stern, resolute line.

"Bug, " I said, in real life using her full first and middle name--international Mom Speak for 'you are in deep trouble, Missy'-- "if you do not put your pee in the potty, you will not get to have Wubby in nap time. He will hang out with me, instead."

Now there's a statement I somehow never envisioned escaping my mouth.

Bug jammed her thumb into her mouth with an obstinate sort of sass, glared at the floor, and breathed hard through her nose in a way that made her snort like a little Spanish bull. She was irate.

I took such pride in the little tinkling sound that obediently, if reluctantly, followed.

Our Bug on her first day of Sunbeams this past Sunday...

...and, somewhat ironically, modeling the most obedient way to sit with her class.