Yesterday . . .

Kurt watched the kids ALL. DAY. LONG. so I could attend a Power of Moms Retreat. It was held in the home of my favorite parenting authors - Richard and Linda Eyre.  Their daughter Saren, and her friend April, are the co-founders of Power of Moms. 

It was FABULOUS!!

And I came home to everyone alive and well, and already eating dinner :) 
Thank you Kurt!

Parenting

Parenting is challenging. All the time. Just when I feel like I get it down, something changes, like dealing with 4 girls waking up at night instead of just the one I was expecting.

Last month when my sisters were here for a visit we talked about parenting, specifically getting babies to go to sleep on their own. My sisters exclaimed about my expertise. Ha. My expertise is sometimes more a matter of talk than real life application. My sweet Sophie prefers to sleep next to me or in my arms like any other baby in the world. She hasn't been napping well, but I think its a ploy so I will hold her more and so I do, which means nothing else gets done. And did I mention 4 girls waking up at night? I had 3 unexpected night time visitors who climbed into bed with me - Kurt is out of town and I was too tired to resist. As proof of their recent sleeping, or more correctly non-sleeping habits , I was grateful they came in while I was already awake nursing Sophie otherwise my night would have had so many more interruptions. Then Olivia and Nyah were up by 6:00 a.m. demanding eggs and sausage. Even Dade (our dog) wanted his breakfast. I just want to sleep. I don't know why they aren't sleeping, except that they were very hungry this morning. Note to self: taking kids to the park in the evening so they are tired at bedtime also apparently means they need to eat more before going to bed. As if I don't already spend most of my waking hours feeding everyone.

Anywho, anyways . . . don't go feeling sorry for me. I'm not trying to complain, merely point out that I, with 5 kids and 9 parenting years, I find parenting challenging. The point of this post is to share some articles I've recently read that have helped me. They have all been swirling around in my head, helping me reach new heights in my parenting skills.

Here they are:

Compression, Expansion, Illumination - Challenges help us grow.

Irritation is an Invitation - an amazing look at what causes irritation - gives new meaning to feeling irritation towards your kids.

Solving Sibling Squabbles - while I don't agree with all of Raising Olives parenting advice, I thought this articles was a very practical how-to for handling all those squabbles kids get into. Of course it happens in my house. All the time. Sometimes I squabble too.

Keeping the Peace - why forcing kids to share doesn't work. At our house we try to respect other people's possessions and we take turns with community toys.

Hope you have a beautiful Saturday!! I hope I get to take a nap later.

My Greatest Fear as a Mother

All right, its time to reaveal my greatest fear about being a mother with 4 kids. Wait. . . . maybe you are wondering WHY? Because I woke up after a nightmare at 5 a.m. and couldn't go back to sleep, it involves an activity we are doing practically every day so I think about it every day, and I need to vent it all out to hopefully get it off my mind.

Yesterday we were at our pool. Austin and Nyah had jumped in- they sort of know what they are doing. I'm walking down the stairs with Jolie when I turn and realize Olivia has already jumped in without her arm floaties. She is an arm's length away, underwater with a huge grin on her face, and (of course) has no idea she is on her way to drowning. Thankfully I'm right there and snatch her up before she even knows, only to have her demand I let go. This prompts yet another rule for ME!! for going to the pool-- Olivia and Jolie have to have arm floaties or life jackets on before they can even go through the fence to the pool. I wish they could wear them and fit into their car seats, because that would be easier for me.

My nightmare: I'm at a river with my kids, Nyah decides to jump in and Olivia follows. I have to decide who to save. I jump for Olivia. I am reaching for her but I can hear Nyah calling for me behind me. And then I wake up. I do the little game of day-dreaming my nightmare into a happy ending, but it doesn't really make me feel better.

Water activities are my kids' favorite activities. Water and kids is my nightmare.

So, what do I do?

First, talk to Kurt about swim lessons- we had talked about giving them to the kids on our own (Kurt grew up by the ocean and I did swim team), but we haven't had time so maybe its time to find out about other options. He gives me weird looks until I tell him about my dream, then he chuckles at me (which is okay with me because he knows how I get), and then says to look into it, but that maybe we can find the time after this weekend because he's going to be gone the whole time.

Second, breakfast conversation with Austin & Nyah- what to do if you are in trouble, what to do if you see someone in trouble, its important to know that anyone Olivia's size or smaller shouldn't be under water for more than a second, where I keep my cell phone in our swim bag, calling 911, getting a grown-up, never get into the pool without a parent around, stay where you can touch unless you have a floatie or noodle and hang on at all times, stay with me- if I'm in the big pool, spa, or eating lunch at a table then you should be with me, and so on. I hate coming across as the paranoid mom I am sometimes, but it helps me feel better, and its good to review our family rules before we go swimming anyways.

Then, we go swimming- sometimes (or is it always?) I blow things out of proportion and I have to face it. At 5 a.m. my resolution was to never go near a body of water again. Not exactly a realistic plan. At the pool, Austin and Nyah mostly followed our rules, and there were no mishaps with the little two.

Finally, share, i.e. blog, i.e. pour out all my mental drama in a cathartic attempt to get it off my mind- I can't get Olivia's face, underwater with a huge grin on it, along with the thought "this is how it happens," out of my mind.

Yuck, aren't you glad you stopped by today? I'll post some happy thoughts later.

Sigh.

Why can't kids throw up after eating buttered bread or plain noodles or white rice or white anything? Why does it happen after they eat watermelon or spaghetti? Or in tonight's case, strawberries, blueberries, raspberries, and mandarin oranges?


AND why does it always happen when Kurt is working late? What's up with that?

Mother's Day

I had a lovely Mother's Day! In Primary, the kids did these fun cards for their Moms. I enjoyed helping my class fill out their cards. One girl said her mom had to be 21, because otherwise she would be a kid, and then she decided her mom was a little more grown up- 52!

Here are mine:

Austin's

Nyah's

May the Force be with You

Nothing like a family lightsaber duel to work up an appetite for dinner.
"Size matters not, ... Look at me. Judge me by size, do you?" -Yoda

Jolie demands sustenance.

Dinner last night was lasagna, and my favorite

quote from the dinnner table was by Austin:

"I didn't even feel like I was going to throw up,

like the last time I ate lasagna"

Yes, thank you for sharing. He has a selective dislike of hamburger, and sometimes he eats it without a problem as in last night, and sometimes he decides to be picky as in the last time I served lasagna when there was plenty of tears, refusals, and gagging.

2 minutes is a long time

Seriously, the magnitude of messes that can be created in 2 minutes never ceases to amaze me. I'm thinking of writing a rating system similar to the Fujita Scale for tornadoes.

My first mess I would rate a F3 for messiness, but a F5 for shock. Jolie in my bathroom drawer, both hands in the petroleum jelly, all over her face, clothes, hair, the cabinets, and floor. What? How kids even get into these messes I don't know. Actually I do. I left the room for 2 minutes, she was in the closet so I thought I was safe, but really I should know better. I had to stick her in the bathtub while I cleaned up. Dry paper towels work best, but everything still looks slightly shiny, and her hands and face are weirdly water resistant, even after warm water and soap.

Olivia's mess involved puzzles, tangrams, the Othello game and a deck of cards. She has never gotten into our game cupboard before, but there is always a first time and this is typically the result. I said, "What are you doing?" and she simply replied, "Mess."

How innocent she looks now, so deceptive.

Actually, the sunscreen tubes have me a little worried.

Where did they come from?

Because its spring break we are having a down day. The kids are listenting to The Two Towers, and acting it out. See how innocent they look? I better watch out.
While I was taking the picture of Austin and Nyah look what was going in the background! Digging in the trash, with her best buddy on his way for any dropped tidbits. Lovely! So it begins again.

Making Hard Boiled Eggs

Does anyone else think its creepy when your boiling eggs, and the air is escaping from the end of the eggs, and it sounds like a chick chirping?


Very disconcerting.

Our week

What? Today's only Thursday? What's up with this week draggin by? Usually there is so much going on around here I feel like I'm living life in fast forward.

If you mop it, they will spill.

Ha ha, let me be honest, the truth is I only mop a few times a month, once a week at best, and my kids, Olivia in particular, spill their drinks and food way more than that. I've actually mopped twice this week- Olivia had a day when she spilled her hot cocoa, water, yogurt drink, and lemonade. I broke with the lemonade- that stuff is just too sticky and it splatters everyewhere. And today we had too many mud tracks from the back door to ignore anymore.

Don't these projects look so nice? Well, there was boat-loads (I couldn't help myself!) of drama involved in making these simple boats. We started a study of Japan today, and one of the things we talked about was origami so I decided we would try a simple origami boat. It is so simple I'm amazed its considered a boat, but anyways Austin, Nyah, and I folded our boats, and out of nowhere Nyah declares hers is horrible (it looks just like the others), tosses it on the floor and starts having a major tantrum over it- crying, pouting, slamming her arms on the table, the works!! I'm totally at a loss, but she recovers after a minute, declares she's going to make a fish kite (no idea where that idea came from but its cool with me). She draws/colors a fish on a paper, cuts it out, declares its horrible, crumples it, throws it on the floor, and we're back to tantrum. Olivia sees Nyah do this, grabs the origami boat on the floor, crumples it, rips it up, and throws it away. Nyah perks up long enough to ask where her boat it, I tell her, and she's back into the tantrum. So I send Nyah to her room to cool down. Austin is happily making more origami boats when 10 minutes later I see he has his head in his arms and he's crying, because he can't get one fold right. Deep breath and try not to be a jerk. I help him with his fold. Nyah comes out, and declares she is going to make a raft from sticks. Yeah, because that's so much simpler than the origami boat. So I have her do it on the kitchen counter where I can watch and help before she launches into another tantrum. Thankfully she is pleased with the results and doesn't try it out in water, because I'm pretty sure it would sink. This is ONE hour of our day.

Yeah, I rescued the fish, cause look at it- its a darn good looking fish. I don't know what she was talking about.

Enough drama, on to the cuties:

This is how Jolie tells me she wants me to pick her up. She chases Dade off his bed at least a dozen times a day.
Yummy, fiber.

Seriously, Jolie is obsessed with Dade.From our walk the other day: Always wonderful to see Nyah's beautiful smile.

How Erkel is this guy? All he needs to do is pull his pants up to his chin.

The lovely Olivia-

Morning hair-

I don't want to cut her hair. I prefer for it all to grow out and keep it out of her eyes with a barrette or ponytail, but Olivia pulls all of these things out of her hair, and then complains when her hair pokes her in the eye. Just like a kid. The last few days I have been waging the battle- I've been doing her hair repeatedly each day in the hopes that she would get tired of pulling the hair things out, but iI don't know why I would think such a ridiculous thing. So, I've lost, or given up. I'm going to cut her some bangs and win the war!!!

Nyah & Olivia

Olivia is usually treated as the annoying little tag-along sister, a sad but true fact of life for the 3rd child, but today she was treated better than a queen-- like a sister and friend by her big sister, Nyah. This was due to Austin being preoccupied with listening to The Hobbit and Return of the King in his bedroom and so he was unavailable to play with Nyah, but hey, we'll take it for whatever reason.

Nyah orchestrated the whole morning-- They played a game on the computer side-by-side with Nyah asking for Olivia to pick some of the things they did. Nyah made toast and grabbed cups of water with straws for a "water tea party" under the kitchen table, and they also read books and colored pictures under there together. Nyah put Olivia's shoes on and took her for a walk in the backyard. They played hide-and-seek, ring-around-the-rosies, and chased each other around the house (waking up Jolie, but what am I going to do? can't win every time). They also both decided to come to church with me (Kurt & Jo are still sick). It was wonderful to watch and listen!!

In My Father's House

So the poem and story I posted in yesterdays post started me thinking about a book I'm reading now, called In My Father's House by Corrie Ten Boom. For those of you who haven't ever heard of/read her first book The Hiding Place it is about when she and her father, and other family members hide Jews in their home during WWII. They are eventually caught, imprisoned, and then sent to concentration camps. Her father and sister, Betsie, die, as well as a couple other family members. The book In My Father's House is about her life growing up prior to the war and a very poignant look at how her life growing up prepared her for the challenges and sacrifices she would make in WWII. It made her a person who was willing to sacrfice for others. In My Father's House there are many wonderful stories about Corrie Ten Boom about being raised a good christian, but others stories like sneaking into a lecture as a teenager because she wanted to listen to/meet the speaker. When she became a religious teacher she saved her money to buy two toilets and a bathrub for their house. She tells of how neat her sister Betsie was, even when imprisoned she carefully lined up the contents of her red cross package. She tells when their family cared for german children in their house following the first worrld war. She tells of the love the family shared with each other, and others all around them, really whoever they could reach. What a wonderful example of a loving family!!



As a parent it is interesting to think about my children in the prospect of what I do with them now helps develop their personalities into the people they will be when grown up. Its actually very reassuring, for the most part--I make plenty of mistakes that leave me thinking I've scarred them for life, but sticking to the positive . . . I know that (for the most part) I'm trying to teach them, lead them, guide them into being good people. This gives me the hope that in the future when they are grown, they will remember who they are, and be good people, not because they are "made" to, but because they choose to.



Does that make sense? I don't know. Its all still jumbled inside my own head a bit.

Repetition Revisited

I have been reading a book (Tending the Heart of Virtue: How Classic Stories Awaken a Child's Moral Imagination by Vigen Guroian) about how fairy tales, and other such fantasy tales, teach children morals. It is really fascinating, though I've only read through the third chapter so far. The author looks at such stories as Pinocchio, The Velveteen Rabbit, Bambi, The Narnia Chronicles, and others. But something that has really challenged my outlook of my children is a section in the introduction that addresses repetition. The author (Guroian) is quoting another author (Chesterton) so hopefully it isn't confusing.

"Chesterton observes that when we grow up we tend to think that repetition is a sign of deadness, "like a piece of clockwork. People feel that if the universe were personal it would vary, if the sun were alive it would dance." To the contrary, "variation in human affairs is generally brought into them, not by life, but death; by the dying down or breaking off of their strength or desire. A man varies his movements because of some slight element of failure or fatigue." Whereas repetition, far from signifying monotony and deadness, may signify delight, desire, and vitality. "A child kicks his legs rhythmically through excess, not absence of life. Because children have unbounding vitality, because they are spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, 'Do it again'" because there is such delight in that thing or activity. "It may be," Chesterton concludes "that God made every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be He has the eternal appetite of infancy, for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we. The repetition in Nature may not be a mere recurrence; it may be a theatrical encore." (Quoted from Gilbert K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy)

The idea that variation comes through personal fatigue, or the death of one's desire, is really challenging my thinking. That repetition is a sign of life and vitality, versus my own ideas of monotony of doing the same thing over and over. The idea of repetition bringing joy? WOW!

As a mother of 4 I've come to know children like repetition, but I admit to seeing it as somewhat annoying to have to read the story over and over or play the same game time after time. I'd never thought of repetition happening because the thing or action delights, energizes, and makes one happy. So this past weekend I really payed attention to when my kids wanted repetition-- Olivia wanted to be a part of every bath or shower anyone was taking because she loves being in the water; Austin telling Kurt and I about the highlights of playing his Lego Star Wars Wii game over and over because he's excited about the things he's been able to do; Nyah playing--jumping in her moon boots, running round and round the hall, sledding over and over the same place even though its not a big hill because she loves to be active and moving; Jolie wanting to be held and played with because she loves that time with me; and (my favorite) reading a picture dictionary book with Olivia, laughing as we point back and forth "Horse, Zebra, Horse, Zebra, Horse, Zebra, Horse, Zebra."

Now, I haven't quite worked out how this applies to laundry or dishes. Certainly there is the satisfied feeling with work being accomplished for a time, but hardly "delight." But I think I'll appreciate my kids desires for repetition, and I'm going to challenge myself to providing opportunities for repetition by being willing to particiapte--reading that story again and again.