Ember gets those moods. It sometimes sounds like Ember and Madoc were cut from the same cloth. But she has never tipped over a table (yet, anyway).
Ember does these things less often now, partly because she is mellowing as she ages, but also because I realized that my reaction seemed to encourage her to act out for attention. Even if I didn't say anything to her, if I sighed or if my body language showed annoyance, it seemed to give her satisfaction. It's as if it wasn't just attention that she wanted, but attention that caused me discomfort or frustration. I might be reading this wrong, or putting too much psychology into it, but it seemed like she was engaging in a power display of one upmanship. I'm the one who decides feeding time, gets the food, does the grooming (brushing her), comes and goes at will while she stays inside. So she seemed to be trying to take me down a bit by asserting herself in ways that annoyed me.
So, I started laughing when she knocked things down. I patted her head and then walked away like it was nothing. Cleaned it up later (if it was safe and reasonable to wait), and generally treated the knock it down habit as either amusing or insignificant.
She has toned it down quite a bit. Saves the knocking things down act for when she is especially annoyed, like if I'm late in filling her dish.
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