When Timeout fails

Tonight, when Mia was sitting around figuring out a fun way to pass the time, she came across the idea of basically beating me and Meggan as if we stole something. We were all on the floor playing when the attacks began. We issued a fairly stern timeout warning to try to scare some sense into her. She quickly responded by hitting me in the head with her favorite chair. My first thought was either to throw her chair into the fireplace and make her watch it melt or to smack her with a newspaper, tell her she'd been a bad girl, and throw her in the back yard. Considering the fact that I don't particularly believe in psychological torture of children, I opted against the chair thing. Additionally, recalling that Amelia is indeed not Sophie, I opted against throwing her in the yard. Enter timeout...punishment of punishments...for parents not quite far enough at wit's end to stoop to beatings. Occasionally, timeout will pretty much break Amelia's spirit and correct all problems. However, tonight, it was about as effective as fighting off a group of ants by pelting them with sugar cubes. She quickly tried to turn it into a game of chase by repeatedly running off her timeout mat. After a few runs, I have to admit, the newspaper and back yard plan was coming closer to being in the picture. Instead of allowing Mia to become the puppet master, we decided to completely ignore her. She then kept herself in timeout for a bit before making an attempt to get our attention. We held strong on acting as if she did not exist and after a few moments of tears, cries, and sorrow, Meggan had a talk with Amelia explaining that she can't hit people. They had a little mommy-daughter hug and all was well again. I guess we'll just have to wait and see if timeout regains its luster. If not, we'll have to figure out something new. So far, Sophie has suggested boarding Amelia for the weekend at her usual pokey.