brainfizz

I think my brain is deteorating. This is mostly why I haven't been posting... sometimes interesting issues come up, but then I can't think through them or something. This is what too many diapers will do to a person. Or maybe it's the volume of the screaming; maybe it's not just my eardrums it's damaged, but my actual brain cells too. I'll buy that.

Recently I made a new friend, a childless friend who is a PhD and new faculty here. She uses her brain on a regular basis for more than estimating the fullness of a diaper or how many snacks are necessary for a given outing, and while talking with her I felt like I was sprinting to keep up. It was pitiful. I need to take a class or something.

We are in transition. (We are actually all in transition all the time, but some transitions move more earth than others...) For one thing, school just started for Frances. We visited for a bit on Wednesday and then she had regular school days Thursday and Friday, though Thursday afternoon I was rather shocked to realize she was going again the very next day. I felt like it should be once a week or something....

Wednesday morning was going along fine, everyone wearing their own clothes and generally behaving, then Frances started losing her shit. "Is she hungry?" I asked Mitch. She cried about the toy Clark was playing with. She cried because the 6 page paperback book she was reading 'pinched her finger'. "Did she not sleep?" I asked. "Is she nervous about school?" And she was. It took awhile for her to admit it, or discover it, or something. She appears to be blessed with my complete inability to know what it is I'm feeling while I'm feeling it. I'm trying to help her with this, which is hard since I don't know how to do it in the first place.

So I told her about my scary first day of school, embellishing with all kinds of real and possibly real details. I reminded her I was going to be with her at the school--this was just a visit, not the actual first day--and then I realized she might not remember being there before, so told her what the school looked like, about the play kitchen and the dress up clothes and the baskets of rocks and wood and the chickens in the back. She calmed down, and when we were there she had a lovely time.

Thursday morning at the beginning of school they had a ceremony with this rainbow bridge, where the children, holding flowers, stood on one side of the bridge with their parents and the teacher stood on the other. One by one the children kissed their parents and crossed over the bridge where they gave the flower to the teacher who collected them into a bouquet. It symbolized their spirits going from their parents to the care of the teacher while in school, and at the end of the year ceremony they will walk over the bridge in the opposite direction. It was very very sweet. Frances had no issue at all with it and marched right across the bridge. Later in an email, the teacher said Frances had a really good day and was so confident. How funny to me that she is. The school is a Waldorf Kindergarten which is mixed ages, 4-6, and she's the youngest there. I worried a little that this would show and she would feel out of her element somehow, but I guess not. She's already attached to one other girl whose name is Francesca, interestingly.

So there's that. We've been getting along so well the past few days and Mitch suggested it's because she has school, something of her own away from me, something to make her feel independent. Or maybe we're just in the next (and much improved) stage.

But Clark! The stage we're in now is not so fabulous. I know I've said it before but since I think it every third minute of the day, it can bear repeating here: I cannot WAIT until no one in this house is two. Just the noise level alone is enough to put a person over the edge. I've taken to putting tissue in my ears first thing in the morning. (earplugs seem to be a bit too effective.) It does help with my patience.

There's the sitting in his room until he falls asleep thing; I worried we were creating a monster and indeed here it is. Now he's waking up in the night and wanting us to sit with him until he falls back asleep. Actually, that's after all the arguing; last night he was up from 4-5:30, wanting to go downstairs, wanting snacks, wanting different pajamas. Every time I told him no, explained it was the middle of the night, he screamed. A being attacked 5 alarm kind of scream. I think we're going to have to pick a night, a couple of nights, and just let him scream. It's going to suck. But he's old enough now to understand it, old enough that it will probably only take one night of that kind of hell for him to realize what it means.

Oh when there are no more two-year-olds. But he's so charming and sweet when he's not screaming. When he's not out of sorts he is lovely to be around. I remembered this last week when Frances was in school and I had him all to myself. When they're together they kind of rile each other up, but alone with me he was only joy. Except when he was screaming, as I've said before. I swear I think he's louder than most children.

Yet! Tomorrow! Tomorrow is the first day with both of them in school. I drop Frances off at 8:45, then Clark at 9. What will I do with myself? And then! It will happen again on Thursday! Oh blessed day.

toddlerland

Lots I want to post about; no time, no time. Which is mostly because I've been spending all my time helping Clark with his outfit changes. Seriously. We go through probably 8 different outfits by 10 am. It's currently the way he's attempting to assert 2-year-old control over his out of control world. I can't remember how Frances did it, though I do remember trying to come up with ways for her, things like letting her choose which sippy cup she wanted. Clark has come up with this all on his own and it's simply impossible (or at least unadvisable) to fight. His clothes, her clothes, doesn't matter. It even extends to pajamas. Last night Mitch put him down and when I got him up this morning he was wearing three shirts and two pairs of shorts over his onesie. We don't have air conditioning; he had to be hot, silly guy. 

Clark is the same age now as Frances was when she was tantrumming in full. There was a stretch months that were very loud and volatile, plus an enormously long couple of weeks when she tantrummed about once every 30 minutes. All day long. Sometimes the tantrums would last 20 minutes, which meant only 10 minutes or so of reprieve between. It was seriously exhausting. 

It's that age where they are so proud to be big (Clark tells us all the time, "I a BIG boy.") but also want to still be a baby. Being big is exciting and wonderful--to realize you have power and are ultimately separate--but they also are frustrated by how little actual power they have. After all, I make most decisions for him all day long: where we go, what he eats, when he eats, when he watches tv, when he gets his diaper changed, whether we get to go see the train in the grocery store though he begs and begs and begs. He wants to make some decisions. His clothes have taken the focus. 

But being separate can also be scary, all exposed and vulnerable in the big world. He's back in his crib now, wanted to be in it rather than the toddler bed, and he wants me to carry him everywhere, from room to room, up and down the stairs, to the car, through the parking lot, which is a problem since he's a full 30 pounds now. "Uppy! Uppy!" he says, and I try to explain that I will hold his hand but I can't carry him, and he loses his mind. It's not just the wail of not getting his way; it's a lament of deep sorrow, keening, stamping his feet, tears. Sometimes I just give in and pick him up, but my back is suffering for it. I can't do it much longer. 

I'm struggling with my headaches again, a thing that puts me out of commission on the blog completely. Hopefully they'll let up soon. I'm trying to post at least twice a week but clearly have not been meeting that goal lately. Yet! Next week Frances starts school! Four mornings a week! Clark starts the week after that--two mornings. Which means I'll have two whole mornings to myself!! It may be a whole new world. 

boys will be girls

Clark is all boy. Climbing, jumping, running, tumbling, car-zooming, rocket-blasting, tiger-growling, monster-roaring boy. But he also LOVES his big sister and wants to do whatever she does, which these days means wear her clothes.

"Sissy's clothes!" he says, and pulls open her drawer. "Princess dress!" It started with the dress up clothes, pink tutus and velvet leotards, but now it's Frances's actual clothes he demands, usually a skirt and tank top. His favorite tank top is orange with a bejeweled pineapple on the front. It's lovely. 

        

I let him. Everyone thinks he's a girl, of course, what with his long hair and stick on earrings. I don't correct them. (The stick on earrings were a big thing for a while and looked particularly funny with his regular boy clothes, but now that Frances has her ears actually pierced he's not interested in the stick ons anymore, I assume because she's not.) It occurs to me that it's a good thing his hair isn't buzz cut short--I'd really have to deal with comments then. He looks so funny to me dressed in poofy pink while zooming cars all over the family room floor and walls. I try to squint and see him as a girl but I can't--he just looks so boyish, despite the frills. Handsome as he is, he would not make a pretty girl. 

Salon recently did an article on this, from the point of view of the dad who was much more distressed about it than I am. His son was four and in school, and he was worried about whether the other children would tease him. We start school in about 3 weeks and we'll see then if it's still the fad. I might make a we-wear-our-own-clothes-to-school rule. Then again, I might not care.

My mom was here recently and she bought him a spiderman shirt for dress up. I think she hoped having some dress up of his own would mean he would abandon his sister's. He loved it. He accessorized with a wand and fairy wings. Very nice. 

time for bed

Finally, FINALLY we've got a new functional bedtime system. (All parenting is about systems, isn't it?) For ages bedtime around here was pretty easy. Clark was a dream: plop him in his crib and wave goodnight as you close the door behind you. Frances sometimes argued and negotiated but you can't have everything.

Then a couple of months ago everything changed. It's all Clark's doing--we moved him into a toddler bed and he literally could not stay in it. It was like his feet were physically pulled to the floor. There was lots of carrying him back to bed, back to bed, back to bed, discussing with him, possible threatening, then more simple repetition. Finally we moved him back to the crib, which helped for about 2 days. (For a split second I really thought we were onto something there--that maybe he didn't feel safe in the toddler bed or something, and that being in the crib would solve the problem.) Then he just climbed out of the crib over and over.

Finally he impressed upon us that he wants someone to sit in his room until he falls asleep. Some new fear / insecurity that he's developed, also probably related to his insisting that all the lights stay on like it's daylight in there. (For a short time I would sneak in after he'd fallen asleep and turn them off, leaving a closet light with plenty of light to see by, but he'd just wake at 3 am and insist that the lamps be turned on too...) So these days someone sits in the armchair by the crib until he falls asleep. We'll only stay if he doesn't talk or sing or bang on is crib in an effort to keep himself awake. Now that he trusts we'll be there, doesn't have to argue with us and chase after us, he actually falls asleep pretty quickly. I bring reading material--it's certainly bright enough to read, after all. I have Frances read to herself on her bed while I sit in Clark's room; I tell her I'll come back and lie with her for a few minutes after. And sometimes by the time Clark's fallen asleep, Frances has too.

So. Whew. It's funny the way things move in stages with kids. So often it's hard to spot; you think this new thing is some personality flaw or parenting failure, something you need to address and fix, only to discover a month later that it was a phase and just passed on its own. It would be so much more helpful if the phases would announce themselves.

For now, though, bedtime is no longer a 2 hour ordeal. So happy.

brave big girl

Frances got her ears pierced. She's been asking for a couple of months and decided she wanted to do it when my mom was here visiting last week. I told her it would hurt, tried to impress this upon her so she would be prepared--she is a big wimp when it comes to pain, the tiniest scratch can bring hysteria. Some random person told her it would be just a "little pinch" and she kept repeating this to me. I said, "It's going to be more than a little pinch, Frances. It's going to hurt." "Just a little pinch," she said. So we went.

She was beside herself with excitement while they drew the dots where the piercing would go. They use two folks for the actual piercing so that both ears are done at once (thank goodness) and it was only when they told her to look straight at me and hold very still that she realized it was serious business and nervousness crossed her face. Then the guns clicked and she looked stunned for a moment. Her face crumpled and she leaned into my chest and cried very softly. She tried not to cry, tried so hard to be big and brave. I said, "it's okay to cry, honey," and she did only for a minute. Afterward there were lollypops and she was so proud. She's shown them to every single person she's come into contact with, strangers in the grocery included. And she's very into taking care of them, reminds me when we're supposed to clean them. What a big girl she's getting to be. 

it's not a competition

Saw a friend of mine last weekend at a birthday party and she said she had a question for me. She had read my blog post that mentioned Frances' writing the alphabet and wanted to know if it was something we'd worked with her on, if she initiated interest herself, etc. My friend had recently taken her son for his 4-year-old check up and the doc scolded her because her son wasn't writing yet. Later in the visit when they discussed some other developmental strength, the doctor said, "See? You're doing some things right."

Ack! This makes me nuts. It's a wonderful example of the pressure we put our kids under. WHO CARES if he's not writing yet? He's only four! If he were eight and not writing, then perhaps someone should take a closer look at what's going on. But it's not a competition!!!!! It's the very same thing as parents who brag that their kid walked at 7 months. WHO CARES?!

Kids are different. They develop at different rates. I have a friend whose son didn't walk until he was 22 months old. (He's now four and walks just fine.) When I asked her if this had worried her at the time, she said no, that he was very verbal and she just trusted that he would do things in his own time. She's a wise woman, and an exception, I think. There's so much pressure for our children to be successful in the very same ways, and so much assumption that we parents are doing something wrong when they are not. (This doctor, someone who should know better, pointed this out to my friend specifically--"See? You're doing some things right!" Funny that she'd meant it as an encouragement, because it actually was a condemnation. Which, now that I think about it, pisses me off even more--even if this child were delayed somehow, the doctor assumed this was the fault of the parent, and not the result of many many different and complicated factors that make up this particular child.)

I just wanted to put that out there. It made me wish I hadn't mentioned Frances's alphabet writing in the first place. And for the record, her dad has been working with her on it, and she did initially show interest that led him to work with her (mostly she wanted to use the computer, so they started spelling things on it, which led her to writing...) and at her school they do no letters or reading at all, which means she's felt no pressure from that direction. I mention the school because I firmly believe that teaching letters and reading in preschool is a detrimental thing for those many children who are not yet interested. It just makes them feel pressure and many times eventual dislike for reading and writing. Frances will be attending a Waldorf school in the fall and the Waldorf philosophy specifically holds off on any reading until age seven. I'm for it, but maybe it's easy for me to say that since my kid loves to read and write.

At the risk of sounding like a Waldorf advertisement (which I don't intend to be), I'm going to include a response from the website linked above about the question of why Waldorf teaches reading so late (I just happen to agree with them strongly here...):

"There is evidence that normal, healthy children who learn to read relatively late are not disadvantaged by this, but rather are able quickly to catch up with, and may overtake, children who have learned to read early. Additionally, they are much less likely to develop the "tiredness toward reading" that many children taught to read at a very early age experience later on. Instead there is lively interest in reading and learning that continues into adulthood. Some children will, out of themselves, want to learn to read at an early age. This interest can and should be met, as long as it comes in fact from the child. Early imposed formal instruction in reading can be a handicap in later years, when enthusiasm toward reading and learning may begin to falter.


"If reading is not pushed, a healthy child will pick it up quite quickly and easily. Some Waldorf parents become anxious if their child is slow to learn to read. Eventually these same parents are overjoyed at seeing their child pick up a book and not put it down and become from that moment a voracious reader. Each child has his or her own optimal time for "taking off." Feelings of anxiety and inferiority may develop in a child who is not reading as well as her peers. Often this anxiety is picked up from parents concerned about the child's progress. It is important that parents should deal with their own and their child's apprehensions.


"Human growth and development do not occur in a linear fashion, nor can they be measured. What lives, grows, and has its being in human life can only be grasped with that same human faculty that can grasp the invisible metamorphic laws of living nature."


My truest hope is that I am able simply to see my children for who they are, to allow them to be who they are before the pressure of who they are told, by other people and by my own expectations, they must be. One of my jobs, as I see it and hard though it may be, is to protect them from those expectations and to remind myself--and them--that they are more than the sum of their abilities. They are worlds unto themselves. 

perspective from below

My son is in love with a pinata. It's a Dora pinata (rather large) and he drags it everywhere behind him by a string.

And I'm depressed.

Those are the main news items coming over the reel.

I hate that I get depressed. It's just a part of my life, something that comes and goes, and these days as long as it doesn't hang around for too long, I can ride it. I've been so tired, so tired all the time. I thought at first it was because I hadn't been exercising, but then several days of 40 minutes on the elliptical at the gym didn't seem to change much.

I'm having trouble keeping in perspective that I won't have a 2-year-old forever. One day, no one in this house will scream at the absolute top of his lungs anytime he disagrees. Somedays I feel like this, this, is my world forever and ever, packing snacks and cajoling into carseats, wrestling hollering toddlers to the ground simply to change a diaper, pulling dimes out of mouths to screams of protest.

But then there are clear moments when I can see my life in a long flat plane, and I realize that This Time--with babies--is a distinct phase, and one day (and not that long from now) I'll look back on it as some previous lifetime. When I think this way it all feels so sweet, their chubby little cheeks, their tight hugs, the way Clark smashes his entire face into mine. There are people, certainly, who are best cut out for this work, who in previous eras served as wet nurses and nannies for an entire career lifetime. Though I sometimes wish I were, that's not how I'm built. And, frankly, I suspect most women aren't built this way. Isn't that the trouble, though? That we all expect ourselves to be good at all the jobs, or at this one in particular? We think we are somehow less if we can't easily do this mom thing.

But all that is another issue. For now, I just try to see them. (They are both so sweet. Yesterday Clark brought Frances his own cherished blanket when she hurt herself, because we were at a friend's house and it was the only blanket available. He tucked it under her chin and then patted her back.) I focus and feel my smile every single time Clark says "No dis going," the cutest phrase ever, which means several things from "this toy isn't working" to "I can't get the lid off the applesauce." Cute cute cute stage (except when it isn't), even when he's mad. One of my favorite moves of his right now is his hollering: MOMMY! BAD! GIRL! when I lose my cool and holler at him for hollering at me. Nothing like being called flat out on your stuff.

here.

I feel like the summer is going by too fast. I know that's crazy anxiety talking, but anxiety about what? Frances is going to camp this week--9-12 every morning--and I'm all flubbered about that too. What's my problem? It's like I fear summer will be ripped away, my time with them gone, my children suddenly grown and I missed it. Is it just all those people (ALL. THOSE. PEOPLE.) who KEEP telling me that it goes faster than you realize...?

I KNOW THAT. Life goes faster than you realize (unless you're a prisoner of war, then it moves much too slowly).

But the truth is that even after her week in camp, and then a week with my mom visiting, there will still be almost 4 weeks of summer. (School here doesn't start until nearly mid September. Don't know why.) It's like I somehow think this is the only summer I'll get to have with them... and I suppose that's true to some degree; this is the only summer I'll have where F is 3 1/2 and C is 2. But--comeon!--that's not such a fabulous thing. Summers to come will be better, more fun, filled with more activity and less screaming. (Oh I can't wait to move past the screeching stage. It's hard on everyone for a household member to be 2.)

the little things

Who knew how much enjoyment could be provided by a construction paper balloon on a yarn string?

We were unpacking (finally... I know...) the stuff from Frances's school at the end of the year, and in the bag was a construction paper balloon with her name on it that decorated the classroom door. Clark nearly lost his mind with excitement about it and Frances got very upset because she didn't want it torn, so I got out the construction paper and let him pick a color for his own balloon. We taped on some yarn just like the school balloon. Frances wanted another one of her own so I made a second and they ran around with them for something close to an hour. For a while they flew them in the fan wind, and then dragged them around outside behind their trikes. Sometimes I feel like there is a secret book of tricks like this to entertain them when it's late and they're hungry and waiting for dad to come home. Where is that book? It took me all of 30 seconds to make these balloons. (I waved aside their suggestion to help me cut it out, though I suppose that could be a project in itself...)

Summer here is fabulous. Have I said that before? Really really lovely. We can be outside all day, every day, very few bugs, not too hot but hot enough for the sprinkler or kiddie pool. And cicadas. I missed them out west. They make everything sound like summer.

only kid blues

Would you look at this child's art space?! Officially jealous. And trying to remember that a year from now I will not only have children old enough to do projects without pouring the paint on their heads, but also a couple of days a week when they're both in school to organize such a thing. Gotta give myself a little slack and try to keep my story in perspective.

That said, we've done a couple of fun things lately--Did this art project a few days ago. We only had a few minutes to fill and so just did the muffin tin, not the pie plates and other larger items. I painted the paint on the back of the tins (she told me where to put which color) and then I had her draw in the paint with Q-tips. She made some pretty nifty designs but some of them were lost when we did the print.

We also did this art project with coffee filters, markers, and the rain. I loved it and so did Frances. It was particularly fun because it was multi part (meaning we colored the filters, then waited days for it to rain, then left it out and watched the colors run, then had to wait for them to dry)--it sort of kept the fun going. Will post a picture of the result soon.

Note that I did the above things with Frances alone.... while Clark was napping, or playing with his trucks.

While I'm here I might as well bitch a bit, because I do that so well. SO MANY of the art activities in the blogs linked above would be SO MUCH FUN if I only had one kid. Really. Much of my life, in fact, would contain less stress. I sometimes imagine my days would be filled with patience and connection and love and sunshine. I know it's ridiculous. And I know why I had more than one kid--it was on purpose, and because I'm likely to fall into some of the traps of the parent of an only child. (None of my friends with only children are likely to do this, of course.) I fear I would attach too firmly, unhealthily. I suspect I would put even more pressure on myself for the child's success in whatever area. I am an only child; I know the burden. 

So I've got a little of the wish-I-had-only-one-kid blues. My friend D (who ironically desperately wants more more more but her husband won't have anything to do with that idea) is spending the summer with her 4 year old son, going to farms and playgrounds and swimming pools, having a great time. I'm refereeing screaming toy ownership and trying to keep people from dashing out in front of cars in parking lots.

Oh yeah, and to enter a drawing for a kids craft book giveaway, I'm linking to the post on Paint Cut Paste about using bubble wrap to do ocean themed prints, which is pretty cool. We've done bubble prints before, but not used them as ocean or any other specific thing. This is the same blog that did the coffee filter flowers above. It's a GREAT source for art projects, my new favorite. That one and The Artful Parent (where the post about the fabulous kid art space came from) are where I get most of my kid art ideas these days. 

There are a lot of blogs out there with great ideas about things to do with your kids, and I love reading them. They give me great ideas, but they also produce a good bit of I-should-be-doing-more-with-my-kids guilt. Then it occurred to me that--I'm pretty sure--every single one of these blog moms has only one kid. Or they have one kid with whom to do the projects, and one baby--at least 4 years apart. Why didn't anyone tell me about having them close together? 

Okay, enough of that. It's what I've got, and it's got its plusses too. And everyone says the plusses grow in number as the kids get older. I'm holding onto that idea with something akin to hope.