Parenting: Lesson 2

This is Sebastian:

See that light around his head?  That's not just the picture, it's his halo and he carries it with him wherever he goes.  Sebastian is my second baby.  He is going to be 11 in July.

If Sebastian had been born first, the two of us would have strolled around, arm in arm together, feeling extremely pleased with ourselves.  Sebastian is a linear thinker.  I can give him a list of assignments or chores, and he will meticulously work through them with attention and diligence.  He has a very strong sense of justice and right and wrong.  He would very much like it if everyone else, particularly his siblings, had such clearly defined ways of doing things as he does.  The upside to this frustration is that he regularly gets to practice the realization that the only person he gets to control is himself and that often in life you will be frustrated with others' shoddy work or poor decision making.  By the time he is an adult, I imagine he will have this concept down cold....he'll be able accept the fact that not all people can live up to his standards in his sleep with the kind of practice he's getting!

Sebastian is a leader.  Last Summer he was the "project manager" on a lemonade/cookie stand.  He sold over $70 worth of product.  After paying for his supplies and giving a fair wage to his "employees" he was able to keep around $25 for himself.  He has leadership and delegation down, but his is also willing to work hard and put in the time to earn money and he will save up towards various goals.

Sebastian is generous and kind-hearted.  Even when he is saving up for something he wants to get for himself, if one of his siblings has a birthday coming up (which, lets face it, is pretty often) it is important to him to get them a present with his own money.  Sometimes we even have to give him a spending limit because if he sees something he thinks his brother or sister will love, he's liable to spend every dime of his hard earned money just to bring one of his siblings that joy.

Sebastian is fun to be around and has a great sense of humor.  Other kids enjoy his company and he makes friends easily.  He jokes around a lot and is fun to talk to.  He and his daddy together can really get going with their "joking" and "playing"...yeah, they kind of drive me crazy sometimes.  He is pretty much the mini-me of his father in almost every way.  I'll let you do the math to determine for yourselves how much good and how much not-so-good that is.

And, I wasn't going to mention this, but if I let Sebastian read this post I don't think he'll ever forgive me if I don't declare firmly to the world that he is completely, utterly and in all other ways obsessed with Sonic the Hedgehog.

I love my sweet sweet Sebastian and I'm so glad he's in my life.

Parenting: Lesson 1

For all of my dedicated fans (ha ha), feel free to skip my next several posts as they are written more for me than for you.  It's time for me to talk about my kids and dote on them in a way that only a mother can.

This is Isaak:

He is my first precious baby.  He is almost 12 and a half years old!  This idea that I'm going to have a teenager soon is more than a little frightening.  Isaak has taught me, and continues to teach me so much about ...everything.

I always wanted kids.  It was my single and highest goal for my life.  I thought I knew a lot about kids and would know a lot about parenting.  I had younger siblings...I babysat.  I also thought I new a lot about homeschooling.  I was home-schooled   Almost everyone I knew was home-schooled   What a perfect candidate for going on to home-school my own children!  Or so I thought.  It turned out that, much to my surprise, I didn't get my mom's children, and I didn't get the children that I babysat...I got my very own wonderfully individual child.  My precious Isaak, who was made to be my child, and if anyone can believe it, I was made to be his mother.

Isaak challenged nearly every single "brilliant" idea that I thought I had about motherhood and homeschooling.  And thank God.  Imagine how undeservedly self-satisfied I would have been if he followed along all of the steps I had planned.  I have made so many mistakes, especially as he was younger, trying to get him and I both to conform to what I thought was the "right" way to be, the "right" way to school, etc.  It took me along time to learn to respect his individuality and his own path for development.  I now look back at my "failures" and the times I "gave up" on the traditional educational path and realize that "letting go" instead of pushing was not a "failure" but rather exactly what he needed.  I just hope that I didn't put too many obstacles in his natural path those intermittent times that I tried to force him through before he was ready.

And when I look at my sweet boy today, I'm so proud of him.  I'm proud of myself too, for (mostly) letting go of my ridiculous ego-inflating pride (if that's not too much of a contradiction).  He is not "well ahead" of his peers.  In some areas, if we were to go by some arbitrary, cookie-cutter, anti-individual national standard, he is probably "behind".  To which I say, who freaking cares.  He is progressing.  He is learning new things and facing new challenges in his life and in his school work.  He is showing diligence and care in his learning.  He is facing new challenges with greater confidence and ability than if I had forced them on him before he was ready.  I am still tempted from time to time to seek approval and wish for praise for my mad skillz (ha ha) at parenting and at teaching.  But then I remember the Litany of Humility that I prayed in college with much squirming and fear and pray for the grace and fortitude to have meant it then and to mean it now.

Other things I love about Isaak...He is truly sweet and caring.  He cares about how I feel.  If I look upset he makes a point to ask me if something is wrong.  My habit is to tell my children that everything is fine and not to worry about it because I do not want to burden them with my moods, but I recently decided that at his age it might show more loving respect to his maturity to share my worries while still not burdening him.  Last time he asked, he said, "You look troubled, Mom, is something bothering you?"  So I told him, "You are sweet to ask, I'm just a little concerned and stressed out about a work deadline, but I'm sure I'll get it managed," and he came and gave me a hug and offered to entertain the kids so I could focus more.  We've been working on loving communication in our household lately and he has been right on board.  He has been speaking so much more kindly lately and doing random acts of kindness and service.  He comes for hugs several times a day.  I hope that doesn't end in his teen years.

He loves to read.  He loves to build things and invent with his legos.  He's quite the engineer.  If I can't figure out how something is supposed work or fit together, he's my go to guy.  He's quick with a grin and has many good ideas, although he can be kind of quiet around others.  He makes me coffee in the morning.  He loves to make others happy.  He is a hard worker, though sometimes a bit distracted by all of his wonderful thoughts.  He is my precious child with whom I'm well pleased.

Embracing Who You Are

The title of this post is misleading.  I don't suggest that you, I, or anyone else embrace themselves or anyone else....I mean, you CAN, but don't blame me for the outcome.  I'm just saying that neither I nor my blog are in the business of doling out advice - and if I ever do, I strongly advise that you disregard it.  Now there's a conundrum.

Moving on...

I'm currently reading a book by the Popcaks called Parenting With Grace.  Incidentally when I told my husband I was buying the book, he said, "Who's Grace?"  Funny guy.  Anyway in the beginning of the book it is talking about the different learning styles: kinesthetic, visual and auditory - and how these translate into communication style, and from there how knowing these things about your children can lead to more effective communication. My Isaak is definitely kinesthetic, Sebastian is more auditory and Alexandra is a bit all over the map.  Apparently younger children tend to generally be more kinesthetic and grow into more specific learning styles as they get older.

I knew about these "styles" before and how they apply to learning, but I had never really given much thought as to how they can effect so many more aspects of your life. As far as learning goes, I would categorize myself as highly kinesthetic, secondarily visual and I pretty much suck at auditory learning.  Maybe that's also why I am phobic of talking on the phone.

As I look at my daily life though, I'm starting to wonder if I might even be less visual than I had previously thought.  Supposedly visual people feel better when their surroundings look better - clean, neat, orderly, etc.  I don't know if this is true across the board, I'm no expert, just repeating bits that I've read.   When I look around at my house and my goals and the things that I care about in my home and day to day living, I see little to no evidence of me being a visual person at all.  I am all about function.  I have a freaking office in my family room.  No really...I think you'd have to see it to understand what I mean...cubicle desks and everything.  It allows me to work and have an off limits work space while still being completely with the kids to manage school and chores and such.  I LOVE the functionality of it despite how utterly non-aesthetic it is.

On most issues, as long as it meets a functional need, or doesn't impede my functioning, I seriously couldn't care less how it looks and don't even notice - UNTIL *bum bum bummmmm* (that is ominous music in case you are wondering) someone is going to see it...or alternatively and less direly, someone is going to see me.  (Oh yeah, and until the HOA starts threatening me.  Apparently leaving a wheel barrow on the front lawn for weeks is frowned upon (as well as long grass, bushes not trimmed just so, dead Christmas trees camouflaged as part of the natural foliage well into Spring, certain sticks that grow out of the ground near the tree we are allowed to have, paint peeling off of the basketball hoop post, pick up trucks, magnetic advertisements on cars, etc.)...whatever.)

These thoughts and points were all brought to the forefront of my mind with 2 recent events and one upcoming event:

1) I'm in a supper club and it was our turn to host a few weeks ago.  When I joined I thought it was a great idea (to be clear, I still do and we had a great time) and would be lovely to have new people over to our house.  I want to have welcoming hosty sort of home.

As the date approached I suddenly began to "see" things that normally aren't even my radar.  Several of the tiles around the kitchen sink have come off and it does not look nice at all underneath.  We have no curtains on our front windows (and several other windows), which, by the way, are filthy.  My lamps don't have lampshades.  Most of the foot rests on my couches don't actually work and the ones that do are all cockeyed.  The couches have claw marks from the cats and some of the seams are coming apart and stuffing coming out from the...using them.  Several spots on the wall have the paint pulled off of them from where things were taped up and subsequently removed.  There is a cabinet door missing where the pots and pans go.  And more....so so much more.  Of course I KNEW about all of these things but I certainly don't notice them until we are about to have people over.

To compound things, one of the awesome and lovely couples asked if we minded if they brought their 20 month old son, figuring that he could play with our children who would be primarily banished to the basement with movies and pizza.  And OF COURSE their son was welcome.  But that brings us to the basement...and the ugly stairs that we ripped the carpet off of that you have to take to get down there.  And the gigantic hole in the wall that is actually large enough to eat their child that you have to pass while going down the stairs.  And the same wall that at SOME point SOMEONE (or ones) thought it would be fun to throw eggs at, and despite being scrubbed still kind of looks like it had eggs thrown at it.  And all that peril just to get to the unfinished basement where we ripped up the carpet to find grooved cement floor with carpet glue gunk all over it that we intend to tile at some point.  I tried and tried a way to figure some clever way of telling this couple, "Of course your son is welcome, but the basement is off limits to adults so I will have one of the older children whisk him away on your arrival and if you want him back I will call to have one of the kids bring him back up, but you can't go down there," without sounding creepy.  I was telling a dear and extremely non-judgmental friend about my conundrum and she said, "Well, Brianne, maybe this would just be a good opportunity to really embrace you are."   I can't say that any embracing happened but I did suck it up and accept that "it is what it is" with minimal panic and hysteria at the idea.  And they were very very nice.  They assured me repeatedly that it was fine (of course they did, I told you that they were very nice people) and even after taking the stairs of horror to get him down to the basement, they appeared to be comfortable enough to leave him in the den of chaos.  In the end everything was just fine.

2) Our parish is making a picture directory.  Initially we were not going to sign up, but I thought about it and convinced my husband that it might be nice to have a professional family portrait.  The day came and I was SO NOT up for it.   Had it just been up to me I might have even called and cancelled.  My husband is amazing.  His commitment to following through with all of my "brilliant" ideas is impressive to say the least.  He got up early that day to make sure that we at least all had clean clothes.  While I was sitting there in my pajamas still trying to ponder if there was anyway to get out of it he was trying on his suit.  That was actually what did it for me.  He looked so damn good in his suit, and I was so moved by his commitment to my dumb plan I decided I'd better get with the program.

Of course, AS I'm begrudgingly getting dressed and helping dress the kids it occurred to me that some sort of outfit coordination is something that people do when they are having pictures taken.  I don't mean identical outfits or anything so extreme as that, but perhaps similar color tones.  Oh well.  Coordination would be an inaccurate representation of our family anyway.  So the kids are all ready and Josh is getting them in the car and I'm still trying to put my make up on.  Trying being the key word.  In my mind, eyeliner is a good look on me.  I have some liquid eyeliner that I hadn't used in awhile so I got it out and discovered that the tip or brush part was broken off.  I figured I could probably still use it by pressing the "stem" or the stick part across my eyelid.  I tried that and merely succeeded putting a big wet smear on my eyelid as well as the side of my face.  It's waterproof, but I moved quickly enough to clean it off of my cheek.  To try to "correct" the problem on my eyelid I tried to use the broken tip like a pen to spread it out...and stabbed myself in the eye.  Gently.  I'm pretty sure that the pain was primarily from the large amount of eyeliner that I put in it rather than the actual stabbing.  And when I recovered enough to look, yes, part of the white of my eyeball was actually stained black.

It was at this moment that I started asking myself, "What were you thinking signing up for something like this??  You know you can't do these things!" and at the same time my husband called up the stairs, "How much longer do you think you have?" and I remembered my friend's advice to "embrace who you are."  So I did my best to cover up some of the horror with foundation (not IN the eye, of course), laughed at myself and decided to just hope that somehow  my glasses would hide my terrifying eye make up at least to some extent.  I *think* the pictures turned out okay.

Helpful tip: If you are going somewhere where you might be faced with a sales pitch or aggressive marketing, bring a screaming baby.  They will move you right along.

3) My daughter is receiving her First Communion in a couple of weeks.  I like to make a big deal out of First Communion.  Bigger than birthdays.  So, I invited everyone I know and certainly all of my local Catholic facebook friends to come to my house for a big party.  I did include a disclaimer on the invite about things like my house being a mess and the backyard being off limits due to the year long deck demolition-in-progress and the exposed nails and what-not to try to stave off the inevitable freak out that I will experience when it gets a little closer.  Maybe I'll get a better handle on this embracing who I am concept before then, but I've got margaritas as a back up plan for when I am almost certainly kicking myself for coming up with such a ridiculous idea as hosting a party.

Which communication/learning/living type are you?

Tie-Dying Easter Eggs

About three years ago I stumbled upon a blog about using ties to dye Easter eggs.  I believe it was this one: http://www.mommyknows.com/silk-tie-dye-easter-eggs-tutorial/.  If you just google "tie dye Easter eggs" you can find all sorts of tutorials.  I thought it was brilliant, so for the past three years we have been doing it ourselves.  I wouldn't really consider this a tutorial, just a post about our egg dying fun.

Every year I say that we really need to prepare better, buying ties throughout the year, because even at $2-$3 a piece, it really adds up when you are buying several at once for several kids.  This Monday it was the twins day to go shopping with me, so we went to the thrift shop to buy silk ties.  I don't know why, but for whatever reason, the ties need to be 100% silk to work.  I think last years selection was better, but we had lots of fun picking out a number of ties that we hoped would make good patterns on the eggs.  As we were finishing up and I was nearing the end of my patience levels for picking ties with 6 year olds, I noticed a rack full of scarves.  It occurred to me that I couldn't imagine any reason why a silk scarf would work any less well than a silk tie.  Unfortunately, most of the scarves didn't seem to have lables on them indicating if they were silk or not.  But we picked a pretty pink one that felt like silk to test out.  The thrift shop people looked at us like we were nuts as we brought handfuls of ties up to purchase, so I evangelized them on the awesomeness of tie dying eggs.

There's no way to tell by looking at the ties ahead of time how they will come out on the eggs. Some that seem like they will be awesome are faded and boring.  Others that don't seem like much are vibrant and exciting.

Next we dismantled the ties.

I have to confess I coerced several of my children into putting on shirts, but Jane was having none of it.  So then we separated the colorful silk and the white lining inside the ties.

Next for the wrapping.  We moved over to the carpet for this part as last year we broke several eggs as we tried to maneuver them around on the table.  I cut egg sized pieces of silk from the ties so that you can get a few eggs out of each tie.  I have found that if you wet the silk it makes it easier to wrap around the egg.  Oh look, Jane acquiesced to the shirt!

The tutorial I read involves winding lots of string around the egg after you put the cloth on.  When we did this we found it extremely awkward and difficult to manage.  I think the main point is to make sure that your fabric is pressed firmly against the egg.  For our method we wrap it tightly in a fabric pouch and twist the ends shut and secure them with a rubber band.  As far as I can tell it works just as well.

Next you are supposed to wrap them in a white cotton of some sort.  At the recommendation of the blog I linked above, we just use the inserts from the ties themselves and secured them with rubber bands. 

I read somewhere last year that using a ceramic pot made for better color transfer, and when I experimented with it then, it really did seem to make a difference, so we used one of Josh's Le Creuset pots.  Then we just followed our regular hard boiled egg recipe.  

Unwrapping is the best part as you get to see how everything transferred.

We picked that last one solely for the butterfly print.  The rest of the egg is kind of boring, but it was exciting that the butterflies transferred.  

The scarf ended up having the most vibrant and exciting transfer!  Not only that but scarves are significantly easier to use than ties as there is not so much dismantling involved.  Next year I think we will do primarily scarves and maybe one or two ties if there are some particularly promising looking ones.  I also suggested silk boxers, thinking of some of the fun prints they have on boxers.  However, since we get these items from the thrift shop, Josh was quite hung up on the idea of wrapping our eggs in in material from another man's nethers....so I guess we'll skip the boxers.  

I have lots of tie bits left, so when the kids go to bed tonight I'm going to try to get "creative" with mixing and matching.  

I hope you all enjoy your Easter!

A Few Qualms

So, in the past couple of weeks I've been reading various random blogs mostly just out of boredom.  I have no justification for my boredom:

1.  My business is inundated right now, mostly due the fact that I ran a Groupon that just expired and a bazillion people turned in their orders last week.

2. My husband just started school which requires him to go to school and do homework in addition to doing all of the driving for our business.  Altogether, this really cuts down on his ability to enable me to sit around while he meets all of my needs doing all of the cooking and cleaning and chore managing.  Fortunately, I 'm not pregnant any more and I can walk again, so theoretically I should be able to manage all, or at least some of these things.  Except for the fact that he is so much better at running a household than I ever have been but I'm working on it.  We take turns making dinner now which for me requires putting it down on the calendar way in advance and receiving several notifications leading up to my turn.  At the high recommendation from my little sister I am making this beef stew on Tuesday.  I'm pretty excited about it.  I love beef stew.  (Disclaimer: I did somehow manage to feed everyone every day while my husband was working out of town half the time, but it seems that I spoil very quickly, and having stay-at-home chef husband for a few months definitely spoiled me.)

3. I try to do some schooly things with some children every day.  If that sounds sketchy to you, well fine.  I probably have a different educational philosophy than you and no plans of explaining or defending it here.

4. I have a little tiny baby, although really, tiny babies sleep a lot, and if they aren't sleeping they are nursing allowing ample web surfing time (aha!  I've found my justification!).  And she's not really tiny.  She's fat.    At 8 weeks (a few days ago) she weighed in at at 12lbs. 10oz.  She has multiple chins and great wobbly jowls.  We just watched Madagascar 3 the other night and there is a circus bear - a big fat circus bear with a little tutu riding around on a tiny little tricycle.  She looks just like that bear.  Seriously, I was quite stricken by the resemblance.  Perhaps I can find a picture.


Granted this picture is a little blurry, and you can't quite see all of her chins, but I think you get the idea.  And don't she and the bear look alike?
(Disclaimer - I enjoy hyperbole and I realize the she's not actually that fat.  Just humor me.)

So, as I said, I've spent a bit of time aimlessly surfing the web recently - mommy blogs, Catholic blogs, forums criticizing blogs, debate message boards, etc.  I came away with mixed feelings.  On the one hand, I was terrified at the notion of blogging again.  Apparently "successful" blogs are surrounded by controversy and criticism.  There are whole websites devoted just to the trolling and trashing of bloggers.  I think I'd be much happier to not achieve that level of success.  At the same time if one does something, surely one hopes to be at least a little successful?

Which leads us to the other hand.  On which I found that I missed blogging and wanted to start back up and do a little bit better at it than I have been.  Honestly, I have no idea how to do all of the technical stuff that is supposed to make for a good blog.  I've heard that good blogs are supposed to include lots of links...for some reason.  Which is pretty much the only reason I included links above....well that and shameless promotion of my business, the website of which also needs a ton of work, if only I knew how.

So, with some reservations - qualms, if you will - I may start blogging more often.  Then again, I may just plan on it and go dark again for months.  Oh yeah, and I've completely forgotten how to use commas properly.