Do anyones' kids take a looooong time to unravel after the holidays? With all the excitment I was wondering if my dd is just trying to unwind being as fresh as she is. She is 3years old and has really been diffiant ever since Xmas. I actually had to take all her new toys away and tell her that santa wants them back because she has been so fresh. I hope this is quick....it seems like we just solved her not listening problem and here we are back to square one....and worse!

Nobody has this problem, huh? Thats hard to believe. Thanks.

I am kind of going through this with my 6 year old. Ever since she got what she wanted for christmas she thinks she can get away with anything. She is fresh. I can understand this. Hope she calms down for you.

Don't look at her issues as problems, she is simply learning. We all make mistakes when learning something new.

If the child is defined as a failure he will almost certainly fail, at any rate in the things which defines value; and perhaps later he will hit out very hard against those that defined him
Donaldson, M.
Praise her efforts when she achieves something no matter how small, even if it is for sitting quietly playing. This is the hard one because we either dont notice or we don't want to disturb them.

The early observable fact is that children are passionately eager to make as much sense as they can of the world around them, are extremely good at it and do it as scientists do, by creating knowledge out of experience. Children observe, wonder, find or make and test the answers to the questions they ask themselves. When they are not actually prevented from doing these things, they continue to do them and to get better and better at it.
Holt, J.

Allow her the experience of learning for herself, stand back and watch and try to think why she may be doing something you do not agree with. She is probably trying to make sense of it.