Hi. My husband and I are trying to undeerstand why our daughter just colored on our house. My husband cought her red handed and right then was upset and took her to her room. We are not sure why this behavor is happening, maybe she needs our attention more or something, we are not sure. Then my husband went to ask her why he was so upset and why she is in her room. She said she didn't know.
Normally she is not like this at all.
Any advice or help would be greatly apprecated.
7 yr old sometimes just do things to see what will happen. My son did the same thing to a house that we were living in,at 4, I didn't catch him, the babysitter did! His consequences were to get a rag and a bucket of soapy water and stand there for a while "washing" the wall. He thought twice about doing that again.
ONe time I caught my son coloring with a crayon on our little pine night table. I was so mad, we did not have much furniture and now my house looked like a preschool. I sent him to his room. Finally when I calmed down I had him come out and I showed him the table and said..."Please tell me why you did this." He told me the spot looked like a pirate's eye patch and he was finishing the picture. HE was talking about the brown knot hole in the pine. I looked at him and looked at the table and realized he was right, it did look like a pirate patch. So I instructed him to ask me before he colors on any furniture again. but to him he was not doing anything wrong he was finishing the picture. I am not sure of the extent of the 'damage' but in the overall scheme of things it isn't that big a deal. If you need to paint over it have her help you but otherwise I would suggest you both relax about it.
K....I think all kids will do this some time or another. I actually remember doing it myself. My 3 yr old grandson has already tried this on his bedroom wall.
After I thought about this...I think she is definitely old enough to take a toothbrush and scrub it off. After a few times of that...I don't believe she will attempt that again. Especially if it is during a time that she wants to be playing. Remember there are crayons that only color on paper surfaces...you may want to only keep those in the house. You probably just have a creative little artist on your hands! Good luck!
S.
It doesn't sound like she was misbehaving -- it sounds like she didn't know she was doing something wrong. Kids aren't born with an understanding of what's against the rules. Had you set the expectation that this is unacceptable before you caught her doing it?
Kids don't look at things and put a price with it like we do. They don't look at the furniture and think that cost x amount of money so we need to keep it nice and make it last a long time. They just don't have that concept yet because they are so young. I was never told not to color on the furniture so I drew on my Dads wood desk, it just seemed like a big enough area for the picture I wanted to do, LOL! My son drew pictures all over his bedroom walls when he was young. He also did this with a black permanent sharpie which was very hard to cover up! But he didn't realize what it cost to fix his error.
I hope this makes sense and I am explaining myself well enough. Try sitting her down and talking to her about it. Explain to her what she did and what it is going to cost to fix it (assuming it doesn't wash off). If it was me, I would then tell my child that if they drew on anything that wasn't paper or without permission then they would do chores to work off the cost. :-)
I do feel for you, good luck in whatever decision you make!
Ya know sometimes predictable kids just are not. When my oldest was six he was outside playing with his little brother and I thought nothing of it. The next morning I went out to put him in the car to go to school, started backing up and what do I see? Our phone number on the mail box, at least 4 times. I said hmmm, you are going to talk to your dad about this when he gets home. After work I went out to the car, put something in the trunk, and there it is again, the number, twice. I am driving all over town with my phone number on the trunk of my car. At home my hubby asked him why he did it, to which he responded "it was not me, maybe TY did it", who is his 3 year old brother. I said I don't think so, So he said "maybe daddy did it". At wich point I gave him a scrubby, and a small bowl of water and made him clean it. He was an A+ student, got 100's on all his test, was already the california state champion in karate, I don't know must have been a brain fart or something, we laugh now, but it was not funny at the time. He is seven now, still an A+ student, placed high at Nationals, he still is a good kid, and now we have a funny story for the grandkids.
Feeling for you
R.
Kids do stuff like this all the time. Who knows why. I just feels like the right thing to do. My solution to this was to give them the hall way. Yes the entire hallway. I stood them on a chair had them reach as high as they could and them taped butcher paper 3" above the measured height. They had to only color on the paper anything they wanted. When the paper was full I took it down rolled it up and put it in a tube to save. Wonderful art murals. Butcher paper is cheap at Costco. Or a lot of newspapers sell the end of their rolls that are to short to get a decent amount of papers out of for about 5.00. and for wall art there is a lot of paper on them. And paper and scotch tape is not labor intensive. By the way, with the hall being theirs they never colored the other walls or the furniture. Use waxed butcher paper with the wax to the wall for magic markers.
Did anything in your daughter's life change lately? Sounds like she might be upset about something but doesn't know how to express it or is afraid to. Very normal.
Because she said she didn't know why she was sent to her room, might again be fear of not answering the question correctly. I would give her some choices including the right one. That way she can't just say she doesn't know. Reassure her that you still love her no matter what but that now she has to have a consequence for doing something that was wrong. Ask her where is the right place to draw so you are sure she understands that drawing is not bad.
This is a good opportunity for her to learn that you are upset with her behavior but that you still love her.
If she does tell you something she is upset about, be sure to validate it even if it doesn't sound rational. Be sure to tell her how you understand how she could be upset but that you and Daddy can help make it better.
maybey it was one of those things I wonder how this color would look on and befor she knew it she colored on the house.Kinda like the time i colored my moms jewelery box with a black marker with my frist attial on it of course.dont get mad you both need to just realx and remember what you were like when you were kids or the things you all did when you were her age not that an excuse. just try and remember age 7 and what your thinking at that age?
I think every child has colored on the walls. I did this when I was young. My kids have done this as well. Most likely she did not realize that she was doing anything wrong. Kids love to express there creative side. Sometimes the walls are so tempting. Once I explained that they should not write on the walls calmly and not yelling and getting mad. They never did it again.
If after taking this approach and she still does it, sense she is 7 and not 5. You might want to look into if she is going through any stress in her life. Kids react to stress more then we think. But getting mad and yelling will only make it worse from my experience. The walls can always be painted over. A childs mind and heart can't be painted over
The same thing happened with our oldest 3 kids, they were smart, bright, intelligent kids untill they turned 7, then it was like they just went "stupid" all of a suden...kinda like that movie Baby Geniuses. I think it had more to do with that particular growth spurt, like their bodies stretch out and their brain control doesnt quite reach the end of their limbs lol. the oldest 2 seemed to outgrow it but he time they were almost 9, its like a second terrible 2 stage or something. Unless there has been a major stress factor in your family, I wouldnt worry about it too much, just keep an extra close eye onm her to make sure you notice if she seems to be spacing out, it coul be a more serious medical problem or mental problem. My Ped. told me they would just outgrow it once their body/brain proportions were more ballanced.
she is an artist - give her all sorts of medium and see what she can create instead of being angry that she has artistic impulses - when she is grown you can still have what she did to your house - and if your house is more important to you than your daughter - shame on you - or your husband - a house is just a house - it doesn't have feelings
My daughter went through a phase where she wrote her name on the walls, furniture, sheets, carved it in fruit, you name it there was her name. She did a lot of cleaning up of the name, and she never was able to adequately explain (to me) what was up. But made sure she had lots of other outlets and worked with natural consequences and it didn't last too long. The systems children have for evaluating whether something is a really big deal or not such a big deal are not the same as adults...I think it accounts for a lot of the things they do that make us wonder what they could possibly be thinking.
Your 7 year old may have thought she was being creative and redecorating the exterior of you home ....
Maybe bored and thought it was a good idea ...
When my little angel was 5(and then again at 6)she decided to "decorate" the walls in her room and in the living room. I asked her why she said don't know. I put her in time out and had her help me clean it up. The magic eraser sponges work awesome for almost anything. DEFINATELY worth the extra money for stuff like this. I think truthfully most kids go through this. My youngest brother took markers(yes permanent) to my moms walls. That's when she decided to repaint the house:p I mean how else are you going to learn that coloring on things is not all right...or learn right from wrong if we don't make mistakes?
