One of the things that we have tried to foster in our children is a positive self image and a healthy dose of self confidence.  Most days I think that we are doing a decent job.  Neither of them is what I would call overconfident, they know their limits, and they aren’t cocky. We know they are young and things could change, so watch them to see how they develop.

It seems of late that Woo has become aware of how he can sway opinions and get his way if he projects confidence.  I noticed it at first with Goosie.  He can get her to do or say anything, so long as he is confident in his delivery.  He delights in getting her to be naughty, knowing full well that she will get in trouble for her misdeeds!  It only took me half a dozen or so such misdeeds to realize that they were immediately preceded by Woo saying “Goose, do this…”.

Now that he gets in trouble for leading her astray, he has focussed his attention on getting her to back up his rich fantasies.  I frequently get these awesome tales about the completely implausible things that he they saw or did.  His latest is that he sees eagles everywhere.  Not just birds that he thinks are eagles, imaginary eagles.  Each sighting is described to me in detail, and verified by Goose.  “It landed in the back yard, RIGHT Goose?!” or “It flew by our window and looked in, RIGHT Goose?!”.  She blindly agrees, regardless of whether she was looking in the right direction, or even in the room with him.

At first I passed this off with a little bit of hero worship from a little sister to big brother, until I started to notice that he’s doing it to others too.  Last night Willy came downstairs and told me that Woo was having a quiet time before he slept.  I knew that this should not be so as woo had not had a nap yesterday, and usually face plants at 7:00pm on “no nap” days, but Willy he reported that Woo insisted he was not tired and told him so.  Fast forward twenty minutes and Woo is melting down because he so tired, and I am wondering how he ever convinced Willy, who is pretty good at detecting tiredness, that he wasn’t.  It’s not the first time that he has gotten his way with Willy in this manner.  He also does it to his babysitter, who he regularly gets to let him do crazy things, or have special treats by saying, with authority, “My mom lets me…” I keep telling them and myself that he is only four!  What happens when he starts to work it on me?!