Stealing

Hey ladies, quick question. How do you deal with stealing? My gruesome twosome just made 1 a month ago. Gavin steals everything Allison has! Allie doesn't seem to mind often but when he takes her sippy cup or food, we have a problem. Hiw do you stop this? Any advice would be great. Thanks

 

With stealing, I would tell the offender not to steal and at times would separate them, if the stealing did not stop.

 

The times she doesn't seem to mind I would just let it go. When it upsets her I would take the item off him and give it back to her, telling him firmly "No snatching. That's Allison's cup/food" and then give him his ("This is your one"). As he gets older you can make him hand the item back himself.

 

Ditto. Just keep in mind that at this age, he has no idea what "stealing" (or "snatching" or whatever you call it) is. He just sees something, wants it, and reaches for it. The goal is to teach him not to take things that someone else is holding or using -- it's not a moral issue.

If it's a toy that you only have one of, they are not too young to learn about taking turns. Don't expect them to get it right away (and you will have to be right on top of them enforcing it for at least another year), but they can start learning. Due to their experiences at daycare (where they constantly had to share things and take turns), "Amy's turn" and "Sarah's turn" were among the first two-word phrases they said!

 

All you can do is tell them over and over that is isn't theirs. Distraction works well, when they just won't get over it. Sometimes I would let mine figure it out themselves. I defintaley have a dominant twin, and she is always taking things from the other. Funnily enough, I watched the non-dominant one figure out how to trick her sister. Whenever she wanted something back she would make a move to another toy, her sister of course would want that one now. When the dominant one beelined for it, she went back to the original toy she had wanted. And would be free to play with it, having distracted her sister. They are smart! Mine are now 22 months old and understand taking turns and that's not yours. It's only been in the last 2 months that they have really gotten this concept. So you have a ways to go.