Parenting Compliments

As a parent you question how you are raising your child and you hope at the end of this journey your child grows up to be a well adjusted, contributing member of society.  My child didn't arrive with an instruction booklet or a pair of glasses the see into the future.  So I don't know if what I'm doing now will result in a positive thing or negative thing.  My daughter is going to turn 2 in two months and she is a Toddler with a capital "T".   There are days that she makes me so frustrated that I need to take a moment to myself to regroup.  While other days my eye get misty and my heart skips a beat because I feel so thankful I'm her mommy.

Since the "terrible twos" and the "toddler tantrums" have made an appearance in our household I've tried different tactics to see what works best with my toddler.  I definitely did not want my daughter to think it was okay to scream, whine, or throw a tantrum to get what she wanted.  I made it a point from the very beginning, that she had to say "please mommy" if she wanted something.  As her vocabulary increased I helped her through simple sentences to ask for what she wanted.  For example, "More milk please mommy." 

These days she's been using the whine/scream/tantrum tactic first and it's been tough to shake her from that bad habit.  Now in the face of all that screaming I keep saying, "You have to use your words, mommy doesn't understand you when you scream like that" until she gives me enough hints to figure out what she's screaming at.  Once I figure out what she wants and she starts to calm down then I prompted her to stand in front of me, cross her arms and use her words to ask mommy nicely for what she wants.  I tell her "It's NOT okay to scream at mommy like that, when you want something you need to use your words and ask mommy nicely."

I really think whatever I'm doing is really working.  We were at that vet today and she started whining.  We went through the steps, stand in front of me, cross her arms, ask nicely, and follow up with thank you.  The vet gave me the BIGGEST COMPLIMENT on my parenting.  She said she's never seen a child with such good manners.  She really liked how I handled it and even said she wants to use that when she has children.   How awesome is that! Toddlers are tough and I'm sure I have more white hair from the stress but that little pat on the back gave me the validation that I just might be doing the right thing after all.  :)

Have you received any comments that made you feel the same?  What were they?  Have you given anyone else positive parenting comments?  What did you see to make you share that compliment?