It was very easy. I told the both of them that if they got up from the table with food in their hands, meaning wandering around and eating, they would have an extra ten minutes of practice on their respective instruments (J-- viola, P-- piano). This was a rule I set up while watching over them yesterday morning/afternoon while my sister was at work trying to get the school's computer system up and running before the semester starts and the teachers freak. (My poor sister.) They spent their lunch popping up from the table and running about the house, dropping bits of food all over the place. I'm not that patient with that sort of behavior. (S-- doesn't act that way and never has.) So I reminded the both of them of the rule as they sat down to eat their lunch today. Of course, being who they are (meaning, not half as well-behaved as S--), they broke the rule. When I told them they both had an extra ten minutes of practice for breaking the rule, the elder (J--) nodded his head in almost a "It's a fair cop" kind of way, but the younger (P--) went back to the table and cried. Please note that while J-- generally has fifteen minutes of practice (now twenty-five), P-- has thirty minutes, which has now been pumped up to forty. Forty minutes of playing the piano. I suppose I can see why he sat and wept while he ate the rest of his soup, but, still, a rule's a rule, I warned them not ten minutes before, and he knew what he was doing. Maybe I'm evil, but I'm fair and balanced in my dispensation of punishment. They are punished the same amount of time for the same action. Not my fault P-- already had fifteen more minutes of practice than his brother.
