Defiance of Peristence? + Not Me! Monday!

Maybe some of you can offer up some advise or encouragement or wisdom. Here we go...
#1. We were swimming at the pool, she took her life jacket off to dry off. She started to walk towards the pool, I said, "Audrey, you don't have your life jacket on, don't get into the water" She then turned and looked at me one more time and the jumped right into the pool. After she was rescued (almost choking on a mouthful of licorice) I did not yell out, "What in the freaking hell were you thinking??!!" Instead of hugging her being thankful that she was OK. No, not me!

#2. We were leaving viewing, I'll post about that later. We were walking out to my car with my mom and as we were about to get to the parking lot I just told her to stay close to me because a truck was coming. She started to walk faster and she walked right into the street, the truck slowing down and me running and grabbing her arm so she couldn't go any further.

#3. EVERY day we tell her that she can't pick Bradley up, and every day she continues to do so. EVERY day she gets in trouble for picking him up and carrying him. On Saturday Bradley was crawling on the tile floor and Audrey picked him up, didn't have a good hold of him and then dropped him on the tile on his head. He was SO sad, I was SO mad and she didn't really care.

#4. As most of you know Audrey cut off her hair when Bradley was about 8 weeks old. At that point she got her scissors taken away and hasn't been able to use them since. That is until yesterday. She wanted to do a project, so I got them out and we did a project with scissors, tape and a stapler, three of her favorite things. We were done with the project and I was making dinner. Audrey was playing with Brad in his port-a-crib( I use this now as a play pin while I'm cleaning or making dinner now so she can't carry him around ) All of the sudden I look over at them and she has the scissors to Brad's head. WHAT? Yeah, I know. I sent her to her room until dinner was ready and she was screaming and throwing a fit! Well, while she was in her room I notice that there were three holes in the netting of the port-a-crib, that she had cut.
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I know it sounds like I must not be watching them very close, but honestly I do. I'm only on my computer when they are asleep or not home. Our kitchen/family room is like "-----" big. (meaning really small). She just is being SO naughty and I've had it up to my eye balls!

I read my friend Laura's blog today and this is what she wrote about her little guy's personality. "Seriously, is this defiance or persistence??? It is often said that our biggest weaknesses are our biggest strengths and vice versa. Hopefully, we can corral this kid's trait in question toward the persistence side and make it a good thing in years to come!"
It made me want to try to think of a positive way to think about all of these occurrences of the past week. To try to switch my focus of thinking she is being a bad kid into something else.
Now, don't get me wrong, I don't think she is an over all bad kid. Audrey is, well, she's Audrey. She is her own person and I believe she has big things in store for her. She has always had such a unique personality from the beginning. I just need to find a way to steer her into becoming the best person she can...HELP!