Oh Boy Oh Boys

I keep starting this sentence and going back and deleting it because I just don't know where to start.  I am frustrated.  The boys are so rambunctious and play so rough that it crosses the line into violence way too much for my taste.  I get scared for their safety and rightly so.  Today Noa is sporting a big goose egg on his head from Ian hitting him with a trowel and Henry has a welt over his eye where Noa hit him with something.  If anyone has any ideas as to what would dilute their little vivacious personalities I am willing to listen.  Do you think a puppy would make them more loving or is this something that only time will cure?  (Like we need another mouth to feed!) On days when it is bad I wonder if Aaron and I somehow contribute to this?  Both of us having been guilty of temper tantrums of our own and the occasional angry spank.  Both of us hate how we feel like we are constantly yelling at them.  (Although I think that has gotten better since our lives have become less stressful.  You know, having a place to live and a job.)  Anyway does our anger teach them to respond in anger?  Are we teaching them good anger management?  I am suspicious that these are totally normal feelings of parenting.  Where is that balance of not coddling your children or being too restrictive?  I feel like I bounce between the two extremes and then I am 'inconsistent' - supposedly the biggest sin!  Such a tough job, this parenting thing...

On a better note.  We are happy to report the boys now have real beds.  Up off the ground, mattresses, box springs, frames, bottom and top sheet, kind of real beds.  Their room looks like a nice, cute, messy, little boy room and they love them!  Hopefully this will help quell some of the bedtime battles and shenanigans that have been going on.  It is hard to set boundaries like staying in your own bed and not bouncing when there is no physical boundary between your bed and the floor.  Ok, just to clarify, they had mattresses of a sort, they were just on the floor.  We couldn't set the bunk bed back up that they had in Chicago, because they now have an attic bedroom with little ceiling clearance.  We have also taken the change of routine as a good time to put the foot down with Noa and tell him he will be going to sleep by himself now.  Daddy will not be laying in his bed anymore since there 'just isn't room'.  I am downstairs now and listening to how it is going and I have to say there is a big difference tonight.  Fingers crossed it isn't just a fluke!  Once and awhile we get something right!

Ok, I have to go to bed now myself.  Thanks for listening!