The exorcism has been scheduled.

Ben woke up last night screaming and crying his adorable curly head off.

Well, I guess technically it wasn't last night. It was this morning. 1:30am, to be exact. I had been sleeping for a grand total of 2 hours, since I stayed up too late to finish reading Wicked.

Ben: WHAH!!!! MOMMY! (repeat several times)
Me: Ssh, shh...
Ben - has arms outstretched to me, and since he's not calming down....I picked him up. And broke the cardinal rule of toddlers.

Ben: DADDY! WHAH!!!!!
Me: Daddy's still sleeping...
Ben: DADDY!
Me - I took him to see his Daddy. The whole time Ben is screaming like we refused him his Elmo fix or something. We thought maybe he wanted to sleep with us, but he just kicked and whined and cried the whole time, so I took him back to his room.

And rocked, and read a story.

And tried to lay him down again, which didn't go over well. But I was tired, darn it.
Me: Be quiet now. It's time to go to sleep.
Ben: UP! WHAH! MOMMY! DADDDY! WHAH!!!!!
Me: Now go to sleep! I'm not coming in here again.

And I didn't, and by the time I was in bed, he was quieting down. Which is why I shouldn't have picked him up in the first place.

And THEN...there was breakfast. After, of course, the ceremonial Ben-wakes-up-10 minutes-before-he's-supposed-too-and-whines-the-whole-time. After all that fun.

Breakfast was a blast in itself. After double checking that he really did want Fruity Cheerios, and not the Frosted Shredded Wheat that Leah was having, I finally put milk on the Oh's in the bowl. And then gave him a few Wheat's to put in the bowl, too.

And then all kinds of crazy broke out, wherein Ben changed his mind again... and seemed totally unhappy and dissatisfied with his current breakfast option. Instead of just letting him fuss and cry while ignoring him, I took Aaron's advice. I told him "NO!" and that he should stop or get a time out. Which he got, and then received a little extra disciplinary action for not staying in timeout. AND REPEAT. Four or more times, in fact. Finally, he sat in his chair and ate the d*** cereal. Plus a second helping. Of both. Mixed together.

I was reporting this episode to Aaron at lunch, and Ben helped. He pointed at his bottom with one hand, and the time-out room with the other...Daddy got the idea.