It probably wasn’t my finest motherhood moment. We had been traveling for several hours, and now that we were home it was bedtime. The kids were riled up and wanted to play, and I wanted to go to bed.

My youngest, the four year old, was very adamant about staying up later than usual and I was very adamant that he go to bed.

So I counted.

“1…2…”

He interrupted: “What comes after 2, mommy?”

“A spanking,” I said.

He looked at me quizzically. I’m not big on giving out spankings and he must know it, but I was tired! (Secretly, we both know I wasn’t going to give out that spanking which is why idle threats do not work with children.)

Next he asked: “What comes after spanking?”

And then he raised those beautiful brown eyes and gave me the most innocent smile.

“Hugs and kisses come after spanking,” I said.

It was still another hour before he actually went to sleep, but his sweet innocent questions helped calm me down when I thought I was too tired to handle anything more that day.