Bully and the Beast

I knew it was coming and in all honesty it took longer than I thought. Abby has become a bully - and her favorite target is her brother. I have to say a majority of the time he deserves what he gets, but this week Ethan has been the victim of random 2-yr-old acts of violence. Last night they were walking up the steps and she turned around and bit him on the arm. Hard enough to leave marks. Today she just randomly smacked him - numerous times. So we've started time out for Abby. She is such a different child from Ethan - even when he was very young and we first started him in time out he would yell and scream and wiggle around the entire time he was sitting in the spot. He still does this. Tonight I put Abby in time out after she once again hit Ethan. I sat her down and told her she was in time out for 2 minutes. I set the timer and sat down at the kitchen table to finish dinner. She sat there quiet as a mouse with her hands on her lap the entire time. I could see the wheels turning in her head - I think she was plotting her revenge. When her time was up I asked her if she knew why she was in time out. She said "no", so I explained to her it was because she hit Ethan and that it wasn't very nice. She looked at me - then at Ethan - and back at me and said "but he's fine Mommy and I love you". Hard to argue with that logic;)