hate it when that happens!

Have you ever had one of those parenting moments when you realize you have been disciplining the WRONG child for an offense they did not commit and to make the situation even better you did not believe even one of their desperate please for you to believe them??
This wonderful experience happened to me yesterday....UGH!
So for about 3 months now (yes, 3 months!) I have been finding food wrapped up in napkins hiding in various places of the kitchen and dining room. Some of these lovely packages have been found by a wandering toddler, a curious puppy, of by the search and find mission when a nasty horrific smell begins to take over the area. (I hate it when that happens it never ends well!!) When this first began to happen I questioned each of my little angels and of course found all to be completely innocent. So I THOUGHT I knew which one would be guilty of such behavior and began questioning and disciplining the behavior as it occurred. That child quickly developed an attitude issue and started dinnertime behaviors to go along with the hiding of the food thing. Finally we had gone a few weeks with no new packages (at least none have been recovered eeeeekkkk!) Until last night that is....I let the puppies in to play after dinner and found one of them eating a napkin filled with noodles from dinner. and guess what???? The assumed guilty child was not hoe for dinner!!! And my heart dropped into my stomach as I realized that child WAS in fact innocent and undeserving of the discipline they had been given repeatedly. I performed a new investigation and found the real culprit. Who looked me in the eye and replied to my questions of WHY DID YOU DO THIS???? with a wide eyed "I don't know". Now listen....I am an educated mom I understand in my head why kids answer such direct questions with I DONT KNOW. but last night....that response was the LAST response I wanted to hear. I wanted to know WHY. WHYWHYWHYWHY?!?!?!?! the best I got was....I didn't want to get in trouble so I didn't tell the truth. Yet another thing I understand but did not want to deal with last night. COME ON kid. you are old enough now.....you have been through things like this enough to know a lie gets you DEEPER in trouble RIGHT?!?!?! then I get the lovely blank stare. You know....the one where you cant tell if you have grown horns and spots and they are shocked at what they see of is suddenly they have lost their ability to understand English.....so finally feeling weary from the battle and terribly guilty for nailing the wrong kid I waved my white flag and surrendered. I gave up the fight. what a shame! I hate it when I suck!