Children's Book Review: My Dog is as Smelly as Dirty Sock & Found Object Collage Art

The other day my son happened upon the book My Dog is as Smelly as Dirty Socks at the library. It is told from the perspective of a little girl who is asked to draw a picture of her family but doesn't feel that pen and ink quite do her family members justice. Instead she decides to use found objects to create collage-like portraits of them that show their personalities. For example, she uses a small wooden spinning-top for her dad's nose because he is fun loving. The book inspired my kids and I to create our own collage faces from a bunch of miscellaneous stuff in our craft cabinet that I just knew we would have a use for SOMEDAY.

Sammy made this one--it's me!

I helped Abby create this self-portrait. Since she is only two, I spread glue for the hair and shirt and gave her sequins and old puzzle pieces to stick on. She also selected the googly eyes and stuck them on.

Sammy and I worked together to make this one of Jeff. It is the only one where we really concentrated on making the objects match the subject's personality. His eyes are number 40 because that was his number when he played high school basketball, and basketball is still one of his favorite hobbies. We used a map for his shirt because he used to be a social studies teacher and enjoys studying maps. The bell nose is because he is musical and is teaching himself to play the guitar.


I made this one of Sammy.

We really got in the collage making mood. The animal one was a collaboration between Sammy and me. Some of the cutouts are from an old calendar created by the same people who made How Are You Peeling, another really fun children's book. The final one was all Sammy's doing.

Boys and (Violent) Toys

After Sammy's swim lesson yesterday, I decided to pop into Target and buy some diapers and cleaning products. I thought that since we were there, it would be a good idea to peruse the toy aisles and get an idea of what the kids might like for Christmas--big mistake! First of all, I guess I didn't explain thoroughly enough that I wouldn't actually be buying any toys (apparently I needed to repeat it multiple times). Second, every toy for little boys had some sort of weapon attached to it. The one exception being the cars, which might explain why a certain friend of my son's doesn't seem to own any other toys other than cars.

Even most of the Playmobil sets, which I know Sammy really likes, were trying too hard to be realistic (pirates with guns and swords, knights with swords, etc.). Sammy got the Playmobil firefighter for his birthday and loved it so much that he bought the policeman set with some of his birthday money. I didn't pay too much attention to the accessories it came with until we got home and realized that along with the laptop computer, walkie-talkie and flashlight, there were two guns.

I'm thinking maybe Sammy won't get any toys for Christmas. He already owns a plethora of different building toys--legos, tinkertoys, wooden blocks, magnetics (all of which I consider good investsments, by the way). He also has a bucketful of cars, an extensive wooden train set, and a huge collection of dinosaurs (a favorite of his for two plus years now). Beyond all that, what could a boy wish for? However, I do want to get him gifts for Christmas, but what?

Sammy told me that if I buy him the pirate Playmobil set he will throw out the guns, but still wants to keep the swords. I have a done a little reading on the web and have found that while many experts will say that no violent play or toys should ever be allowed, many others believe the context and pervasiveness should be taken into consideration and not all violent play is necessarily bad. For instance, if children are pretending to be a policeman or knight or something of that variety, it is more acceptable than if they were pretending to be say a drug dealer or gangster that they saw portrayed on adult tv shows/movies. So maybe I could get the Playmobil pirates afterall--the only probably is whenever I see him play in a violent way, even when he is just making his dinosaurs attach eachother, I get a pit in the bottom of my stomach. Here are links to a few of the article I found, should anyone be interested:

Violent Toys and Their Effect on Children

Violent Toys

Why is it that violent toys are only targeted at little boys, while the worst that is aimed at little girls is Bratz? Are the messages sent to little girls through toys just as harmful? For example, that appearance is paramount (think Barbie) and they need to be rescued by men (Disney Princesses)? I can worry about that some other year, I guess. Abby is only two and she is getting a play kitchen for Christmas.

Fun Fall Crafts & More Fall Pics

First, Happy Birthday to my wonderful husband, Jeff!

Now, is that not the biggest leaf you have ever seen? On Wednesdays, my son gets picked up for preschool by another co-op mom and friend of mine. When she brought him home last week, he had a fistful of these giant leaves. Apparently, my friend's mother-in-law has a tree in her yard that does not usually grow in this part of the state.

I wish I coud take credit for the idea of making the leaf man, but my friend suggested it when I was wondering out loud what we could do with Sammy's booty of leaves. We used hot glue to attach the leaves to a piece of cardboard that I had been saving forever because I knew it would come in handy for an art project someday (see, sometimes it pays to be a pack rat). We used smaller leaves for the mouth and nose and tiny pinecones for the eyes. By the way, I pulled out the hole punch to attach the yarn to hang our creation from the banister and ever since Sammy has spent a lot of time entertaining himself by punching holes in construction paper. This might be a boy thing--he used to love cutting paper up into tiny pieces and I know other moms who said their boys do the same thing.


This turkey craft is pretty self-explanatory. The key is to find a good pinecone that will sit down properly. Again, not my idea--Sammy made one in co-op last year.


These final pictures are from our last bike ride of the year. It was one of the best and most scenic rides we have ever gone on, so I guess it was good one to end on.

Unattended Child In Cars Laws

After I finished my post last night, I went and read up on "unattended kids in cars" laws to see what might have happened to me if the aforementioned busybody actually used the cell phone she was wielding threateningly (okay, just holding in her hand). The laws in Washington state that a child under 16 years of age may not be left in a running car and a child under 12 years of age may not be left in an unattended car in front of a tavern or other establishment that serves liquor. So I would have been safe had the police been called seeing as I didn't leave the car running nor was I drinking my lunch. Washington's laws seem to me the most lenient out of all the fourteen states that have such laws on the books, but I think that I would have actually been okay in any state since my children weren't technically unattended since I could see them out the window of the restaurant. And now I will let this issue die and never speak of it again.

In My Face

I feel like as a whole American parents live with a great deal of fear about all the terrible things that could happen to our children. There are a few books out there that touch on how the media creates fear by sensationalizing the rare instances where a child is abducted by a stranger or attacked by a shark or whatever (Freakonomics, The Mommy Myth, The Culture of Fear). I am as guilty of falling into the trap of false fear as anyone--I have an alarm system in my home so that I can sleep at night knowing my son is sleeping on a different level of the house from me. But when I leave my children in my car for five minutes outside of Subway, while I grab a quick sandwich for my son to eat in between his sister's physical therapy and the start of his preschool, I don't expect to be humiliated by some busybody barging into the store demanding to know if anyone has a white car. "You left your children in the car?!" she said after I affirmed that I had a white car. "Yeah, I'm keeping an eye on them (I could see my car out the window and had been watching them nearly the whole time I was in line) and I'm only gonna be in here for five minutes I replied," and hastily paid for my sandwich, only to find her standing by my car outside. As if I was going to sit down and enjoy a leisurely lunch while my kids sat starving in the car. I should add that it was a cool fall day and it was neither too hot for them to get heat stroke nor too cold for them to devlop hypothermia. I would never leave my children in the heat or the cold, and I would never leave them in a car where I couldn't see them out the window of whatever place of business I was in for that matter, but even if I couldn't see them out the window, what did that busybody think was going to happen? Does she believe that there are child abuductors on every corner? And that one was going to break into my car in broad daylight in a busy shopping area and pull my children screaming from the car? Did she think they might spontaneously combust?

Maybe I am the one that is off base here, maybe I should be thankful that there are people like that watching out for children. But I don't think it was the fact that she was concerned that bothered me, I think it was her approach. She acted like it was a life or death situation and that I needed to be reprimanded for my supposed offense. If I saw two children in a car unattended and felt concern for them, I think I would just keep and eye on them and see if their parent didn't return in a reasonable amount of time. If that woman would have waited two minutes, I would have been back to my car and she could have seen for herself that I was not neglecting or abandoning my children.

Mothers put enough guilt on themselves everyday: I'm not giving them enough one-on-one attention, I shouldn't have let them eat so much Halloween candy, I should have gotten up earlier so I would be rushed and grouchy with them, I shouldn't swear in front of them or argue with their father, etc, etc, etc! We sure as heck don't need it heaped on us from total strangers.

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In other news: I voted for McCain, because as much as I wanted to say that I cast my vote for our first president of color, I just couldn't come to terms with Obama's socialist policies. I'm afraid of what will happen to our country with such a liberal president and a democratic congress. I think it is best for everyone when there is some give and take in government and compromises reached, but I fear that Obama will get a green light to do whatever he wants. However, I am proud to see a person of color electeed to the oval office and I hope that I will see a woman reach the same heights in my lifetime.

Today's weather: cloudy and raining hyperactive kids--whatever am I going to do this winter? I fear I will be drinking a lot of Orange Juliases while my children play on the indoor playground at the mall.

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Overheard in my backseat:

Sammy's friend: Babies only drink milk, they don't eat hard foods.

Sammy: Yeah, that's kind of weird. They get their milk from right here.

Friend: Yeah, those are called breastes.

My Most Favorite Season of All

Where Were You When?

I was just a kid whent the Berlin Wall was torn down, but I remember my dad calling me into the living room and making me watch it on TV with him because he said it was going to be one of the most historic moments of our time or something like that. I also remember my grandmother talking about how everyone of her generation remembered where they were the day JFK was killed. I don't remember anything else about what I was doing the day the Berlin Wall started coming down, but I can tell you more about what I did on 9/11 than almost any other day in my life, except maybe my wedding day and the days my children were born.

Intersting that the events that seem to shape our country's history and identity are usually catastrophic, while the events that have shaped my personal history tend to be cause for celebration. Maybe it is not like that for everyone, I haven't experienced a lot of loss in my life, aside from my parents' divorce. I suppose as I get older, that may change.

I do hope that this recent crash of the housing market and downturn of the economy will not be one of the events that I look back on as shaping my life or our country's history. I desperately want for it to be a temporary setback, a bump in the road that gets quickly flattened out.

When I was in high school, I had to interview someone and write a report on it (it may have been for freshmen english, but I can't say for sure). I chose to interview my great-grandmother about what she could recall about the Great Depression. She's 96 now, so she must have been around 82-years-old at the time, but she clearly remembered a time when her and her family had to stay in bed under the covers because they didn't have any heat or any food either. Her grandmother finally came and brought them something to eat--potatoes, I believe.

I'm not saying any of this to scare anyone or because I really believe we are about to play out the sequel to the Great Depression or anything like, but I do think that the next president we choose will be key in determing how this period of time goes down in history. Will it be a sidenote or will it demand its own chapter?

I watched the debate last night and I'm still not sure who I am going to vote for. I like Obama, I think change would be good for our country, but I don't know if I'm ready for that radical of change--I'm not prepared to become a socialist. However, John Mc Cain's plan to buy up all these mortgages that are in default and renegotiate them seems ludicrous! I don't think our country can afford to buy up another $300 billion in bad debt on top of the $700 billion we already have. In fact, just as TIME magazine pointed out about the bailout, John Mc Cain's new plan is a pretty socialist thing to do too. Thinking about it is starting to make me a little apathetic--I mean either one has got to be better than George Bush, right?

I hate being apathetic--I'll let you know how I feel after the next debate.

Teaching Them the Classics

It all started with Jeff desperately wanting to spend at least part of the weekend vegging on the couch. Not an easy task with two kids heavily demanding his attention whenever he is home. His only defense was to get a movie that they could watch while snuggling with daddy on the couch and eating bowls of homemade popcorn. So mom was dispatched to the video store where I ended up buying the Goonies. Sammy was totally into it, even though he was a little scared (in a good, fun way). Abby was totally into the popcorn, so it worked out well.

About a month later, Sammy had a cousin spend the night and we decided it was time to continue our course in classic '80s movies, so it was back to the video store for The Never Ending Story. This time we blew up the air mattress for the kids (which is almost as good as having a bounce house in your living room) and made popcorn, of course. Jeff and I had a good time taking a trip down memory lane and it was good to see the kids enjoy the movie even though all the special effects were really bad. Afterwards we had a scholarly discussion about our favorite parts of the movie, which character we would want to be, etc.

Up next on our syllabus:

• 
  
  The Princess Bride


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  The Labyrinth


• 
  
  Honey, I Shrunk the Kids

Not To Be Outdone By His Little Sister

Sammy has recently reached what I would consider a developmental milestone, which is drawing figures that actually look like something versus the abstract drawings he was making only a week or so ago.

These are bats if you couldn't tell. Some are flying and some are hanging upsidedown from an invisible tree. Oh, crap, I think the picture is upside down because all the pumpkins are in the sky and not on the ground like he drew them. Oh, well...

This one is two trees and two ghosts with a row of pumpkins. Do you notice a theme here?

This is exciting for me because I love doing art projects with kids and this has opened up a lot of possibilities for us. It also reaffirms my belief that as much as possible you should let your kids develop at their own pace and not push them too much. Drawing has come quite naturally to Sammy and he really loves doing it so far, but I could see it being something stressful and not fun if I had pushed him into it.
Which gets me thinking about how much our current school system scares the daylights out of me. And how if I could fix the lottery in our school district so that my children were guaranteed a spot in the montessori program, I totally would. To quote Angela from The Office last night, "I have a very nice comforter and very soft pillows and I usually read a few chapters from a book--that's how I sleep at night!"

Happy Fall and Here's to "Being in the Moment"

Well, Monday was the first day of fall, and I did promise to return to more regular blogging once the summer was over. There have been some changes around our house recently. The most exciting is that my daughter, Abby, is now officially a walker!!!!! Yes, that really did deserve five exclamation points. She started taking her first steps in late July, but like everything with her, really took her time getting comfortable and didn't really start taking off until a few weeks ago, shortly after her second birthday. She had an Abby-Cadabby party, by the way. I am not really into anything with character plastered on it, but the name got me. My son, Sammy, turned five right after his sister and feels so big. He had his first party where we invited friends from preschool.

The other change around our house has been more subtle, but has really contributed to more of a feeling of peace and contentment in our home. Over a year ago my friend, Michelle, and I read a book together called Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves. The parenting philosophy advocated by the book was a little too soft for my style overall, but I did take some good things away from it, especially where the author encouraged parents to "be in the moment with their children." Or in other words, to not be thinking and/or stressing about what else they could be/should be doing when they are supposedly paying attention to their child. The author said if you can't stop thinking about the weeds that need pulled in the garden, then go take care of what needs doing, so that you can enjoy your time with your child. That really struck a chord with me, because I am one of those people who lives inside my head way too much and sometimes feel myself acting irritated with my children when they interrupt my thoughts. So, I had been trying to "be in the moment" on and off for close to a year, with little success. Then this summer I read another book, a novel this time, called The Cure for a Modern Life. It talked about living in the present and even said that might be the key to real happiness. The concept was also mentioned in Practically Perfect. Then Michelle started talking about another book, Beyond the Rainbow Bridge, where being in the moment and focusing on the task at hand is emphasized. So there are four sources where I have heard about this concept. My husband, Jeff, says that if you hear something from three sources, or can triangulate it, then it is usually true. Well, I have just quadragulated this ( and created a new word:)!

However, reading about something in a book and feeling like it is probably a good thing to do and actually putting it into practice are two different things. I have been working on doing it more, though, and have noticed myself having more fun with my kids and being more tuned in to them. When I am tuned into them I can experience joy and wonder through their fresh little eyes and hearts. There are two reasons I think I have been able to do this more. One, Michelle is trying to do it too, and having a partner in crime always makes things more doable. Two, I have gotten to know some other really great moms locally that have shown me that "just being a mom" is a great job to have. One of them, my friend, Michele (different Michele, notice the one l), works part time at a big corporation, but I hardly know what she does there (and I have asked) because she is so focused on being a mom when she is not at work, that she hardly even wants to talk about it. She says that her other job is so secondary to being a mom. I love that! I think having a community of moms around has made me not feel so isolated and helped me to feel that what I am choosing is perfectly acceptable and even desirable to more people than just me. I am not the only stay-at-home mom that I know anymore!

Surprisingly, I am not the only one in our household practicing being in the moment. Jeff has been doing it too, although I doubt he would call it that. But he has been trying to let work go and enjoy his time with his family when he is home. He has seemed a lot more happy lately and has been more like the fun person I know he is deep down than he has been in awhile. I also don't ask him "how was work?" anymore, because really he doesn't want to talk about it when he is not there, either.

I will leave you with a picture of my little girly-girl, pushing her doll stroller around:

Wall-e Review: Moses meets Wal-Mart

Going to the movie theater is a big deal in our house--we consider it a luxury or a special occassion. So the whole family was really pumped when we went to see Wall-e last night. My son was fascinated throughout. My husband and I were both intrigued by the social commentary that was going on. In the beginning of the movie you find out that planet earth was at one time taken over by one corporation, Buy-n-Large, that not only provided for every consumer need from electronics & groceries to gasoline & banks, but also was the reigning worldwide government. Obviously the similarities to Wal-Mart are undeniable, but it also sort of reminded me of the book of Revelation where one power rules the earth. Except in Wall-e all the humans escape earth via cruise spaceships that take them on what is supposed to be a five year vacation while the earth is cleaned up by droids, but it turns into a 700 year exile. Maybe it is a wierd combination of Revelation and Exodus, but heaven is place that humans go to become fatter and stupider and the promised land is a garbage dump.

After watching the movie, I read a few reviews on-line and was surprised to find that many critics thought the plot was lacking and that the only great thing about the film was the animation. I was also surprised that the creator said he had no agenda or message concerning taking care of the planet--please.

I don't normally review movies on my blog, but thought this one was worth mentioning and also worth watching with your kids. I like movies that are smart and unique. The fact that the girl got to rescue the boy in the end was pretty cool too :)

Simple Pleasures

Here is my beautiful, blonde-haired boy thoroughly enjoying himself by pushing his bubble mower through the grass while the sprinklers were going. He was soaking wet and smiling from ear to ear by the time he was done. I sat watching him and what I ended up wishing was that he will always find this much pleasure in doing things he loves throughout his life. I hope that his love of learning continues through elementary and high school and into college and that he finds joy in studying subjects that fascinate him. I want him to find sports or activities that he does purely for enjoyment. I also hope that he will still find pleasure in the simple things, like a summer evening or a sunset or the smile on his child's face.

Let Your Kids Take the Lead

Being a former teacher, I think I have the tendancy to want to plan things with my children as if I were planning a lesson for my students. I will have a great idea for an activity or project, but then when I present it to my son, he has no interest in doing it. In a classroom with 30 kids, at least some of the kids will be interested in an activity, so it is never a complete flop, but with one kid it is a little different.

I have had to work at letting him take the lead in areas where it is appropriate for hime to do so. I believe that giving kids as many choices where you can makes it easier for them to accept the times when they simply need to do what they are asked. One thing that has worked well for us lately, is for me to keep a bunch of items that aren't accepted in our city's recycling and would normally be throw away, like used yogurt cups, empty cereal boxes, egg cartons, etc. in a cardboard box at the bottom of our pantry. My son knows that he can use these materials to create whatever he wants. Mainly he makes boats and sees whether or not they will float. I helped him a little with this one by taping the sails to a skewer he found in a kitchen drawer. He cut the sails himself and poked the skewer through what I believe is an empty sour cream container.

My two nieces spend a lot of time with me during the summer since both their moms work full-time. The other day, the younger one was in the grocery store with me and asked if we could make fruit salad. It sounded like a geat idea to me and her and my son had lots of fun cutting the fruit themselves (they actually used cheese spreaders which are quite dull but can still cut soft fruit easily) and then adding it to plain yogurt.

I know these aren't revolutionary ideas for activities to do with kids, but they have been keeping my brood entertained. Please share any extraordinary or ordinary ideas you have, the teacher in me is always looking for ideas, of course just for those times when my kids don't come up with great ones of their own :)

You Say Tomato, I Say Tamoto

So there seems to be a buzz in the air lately about immigration, or at least in my ear. Yesterday I decided to listen to some am radio while I made dinner. When I turned on the radio the first thing I heard was Mike Savage from The Savage Nation ranting about how today's immigrants don't know how to use a toothbrush or know what toilet paper is for. Apprently Laura Bush's speech on World Refugee Day set him off. He went on to say that his grandfather was an immigrant, but his grandfather came here to work and started a business, instead of raising the next generation of gangbangers. Excuse me? Besides being offensive and racist, he is also ignorant to think that none of the immigrants of earlier generations ended up in a life of crime. Hasn't he ever heard of the Italian mafia?

Mondays are also the day that Time Magazine arrives in my mailbox and the cover story this week also happens to be about immigration, more specifically the very costly fence that is going up along the US/Mexican border. I had to laugh because the Time reporters were able to easily find people simply climbing over the fence, including a 10-year-old boy and a senior citizen. Seriously though, the fence has cut down on the number of illegal crossings in many areas, but only causes them to go up in areas where there is no fence. It makes me wonder though, why are we spending billions of dollars creating a fence that is not even impermeable, not to mention the cost of all the man-power needed to patrol it, when we could use that money to better the lives of our Mexican neighbors, thereby making it less appealing for them to try and cross the border in the first place. Another alternative would be to spend that money on our education and health care systems that illegal immigrants are supposedly overtaxing.

Then this morning I remembered a documentary I saw awhile back called A Day Without a Mexican. What I got from the film was that our country couldn't operate the way it does without Mexican Americans, legal or otherwise, and that many of them are filling jobs that others simply won't do. But to me, the issue of whether immigrants drive down wages or create challenges in our health care or education systems are really moot. This country was created by immigrants, it's who we are--a nation of immigrants and their decendants. So, who are we to say that our gates our now closed? I once heard that America is not so much a melting pot, but a tossed salad--so what's wrong with a few more tomatoes anyway?

Hodgepodge

Happy First Day of SUMMER!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have been very spotty with my blog latley. I have been busy helping host the Little People On the Road Summer Swap, helping my husband with his business, and trying to make some friends in the community I actually live in (opposed to in the blogosphere). So, anyway, I thought I would give anyone who actually still visits my blog a few of the highlights of what I have been up to lately:

1) The other night I joined a group of moms at a local martini bar for our bi-monthly parenting book club. We discussed Practically Perfect In Every Way by Jennifer Niesslein, which was pretty disappointing to everyone, especially those of us who have read Brain, Child, which is edited by Niesslein. I think the general consensus was that Niesslein was just trying to be too cool for school, and while she was funny, she never let herself be vulnerable or dig too deep into anything. However, we did have a great time, and I was so impressed by all the amazing women I found myself sitting with--smart, funny and resilient women. I was sort of the baby of the group at 29 and was struck, and excited, by how much I still have to grow and how much I can learn from these women.

2) My daughter finally had her appointment at Shriners Hospital on Monday. She was seen by a pediatric orthopaedist and a general pediatrician. The orthopaedist said he was curious as to why she isn't walking yet, but not really worried. He said some babies just take longer to reach the finish line than others, but there is no reason to think she won't walk eventually and that once she crosses that line, there's no reason to believe she won't be fine. I wanted a quick fix like special shoes or braces to get her up and walking right now, already! The orthopaedist said that is an out-of-date practice because in the long run it won't solve anything--her feet would just turn outwards again as soon as they were off, and even her physical therapist said that they can actually weaken the muscles and cause more problems down the road. My friend Michelle was good at reminding me that my and my husband's intuition all along has been that our daughter is just a late bloomer, that she will be fine, and we should just never look at any developmental charts or pick up any parenting magazines.

3) Today was the official beginning of summer and I kicked it off by taking my two kids and my two nieces to the brand new aquatics center that was built a stone's throw from our house! It is sort of like a mini-waterpark with a big waterslide, a lazy river, and a water playground for younger kids complete with a waterslide that is their size. I plan on packing as many outdoor activities into the next 2.5 months as possible--park days, bike riding, swimming, camping, etc. I still think I am meant for living in a warmer climate, but I will make the best of what I have right now. As for this blog, I plan to keep things light over the summer and will probably post lots of ideas for crafts and activities to do with kids.

Extreme Parenting

Have you ever felt like parenting makes you a little crazy? Like maybe you obsessing too much over all the choices you have to make for your children? I feel much more sane after running across these two cases of Extreme Parenting, each from a totally different end of the parenting spectrum, I might add:

1. The Bumper Bonnet by One Step Ahead--a helmet for babies to wear while learning to crawl or walk. I'm all for baby gates and outlet covers, but seriously, are there really parents out there that are that overprotective? I don't feel too bad making fun of this, because I am planning on buying their embroidered swimming cover-ups for each of my children. I consider the sun a real threat, but on the other hand, I have been razzed for being a little too neurotic on that count.
2. Preschool Proms--I never knew such a thing existed until my friend Michelle from The Mama Chronicles was telling me about how there was one at her neighbor kid's preschool. I was shocked when I googled "preschool prom" at how many hits came up. I even found one site where it was mentioned that some of the preschoolers took a limo, and another that talked about the boyfriend troubles one little attendee had on the big night. I had heard of Baby Loves Disco before, but the the emphasis on those events seems to be children and their parents interacting and having fun together, not on forcing children to become mini-teens. My kids' preschool had an end-of-the-year ice cream social and all the kids performed songs like "5 Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed."

I realize I am coming off as a tad bit judgemental here, so I apologize if I offened anyone. If you have a different take on either of these items, feel free to let me know!

Love and Logic

Awhile back, my son's co-op preschool offered a seminar on Love and Logic. The speaker was Winfield Kline, the son of Foster Kline--one of the co-authors of the book, which I guess has morphed into a whole movement of sorts. I had read the book a few years ago and really liked the idea of having logical consequences and giving children the freedom to make choices and mistakes. The book talks about how the price of a mistake is much lower when your children are young, and how you don't want to wait until they are sixteen to give them their first experience with making decisions. The love part comes in by adding empathy to all your dealings with your children, even when enforcing a consequence. For example, you might say, "I'm really sad for you that you can't have your friend over because you didn't get your chores finished in time."

The seminar was a good refresher for me because it reminded me of the things I did like about the book and has gotten me thinking about how to use them more in my parenting. I feel like too often I slip into just yelling because that is the easiest thing to do. It makes me feel bad though and really doesn't set a very good example of how to act when you are frustrated. In the seminar, Winfield Kline said that when you show your frustration and anger, you are letting your children push your buttons and control the situation. So, I am trying to take a step back and instead of getting upset over things, giving my son a choice between doing what he is asked to do or receiving a consequence. The problems with this is that 1) I'm not giving him real choices--choosing between doing what you were told and being punished is not much of a choice at all, and 2) I'm having difficulty coming up with logical consequences. I usually end up threatening to take away his tv time, which works pretty well, but is not giving him a feel for what making poor decisions is like in the real world. So I decided to to check out the Love and Logic website for some tips. I found two articles there:

Love and Logic Generic Consequence

What To Do When an Appropriate Consequence is Hard to Find

Both of them basically said that you should use household chores in place of a more logical consequence. As much as I like the premise of this method of discipline, I don't think it will work for me all of the time or in every situation. But, I guess it is like that with most parenting books and techniques. There is no one magical solution that will work for everyone all of the time or else everyone would be using it. You have to take what works for you and create your own recipe for raising your kids.

I recently finished reading Practically Perfect In Every Way , and the author, Jennifer Neisslein, talks about how self-help books (she includes parenting books in that genre) don't really work for most people, but I think that is only true to a certain extent. They may not work if you try to follow the book, which amount to someone else's philosophy, to a T. However, I think that you can take bits and pieces of them and improve your life in a way that is meaningful to you. For me, approaching parenting like I would any other challenge in life, means educating myself as much as possible. I will continue to do that, not because I think I will find the parenting bible, but because I think the more I know, the better able I'll be to find my own style.

In related news:

1) I did find one really great article on the Love and Logic website (it is really more of a poster or reminder sheet): Self Concept Builder and Stealers.

2) Check out my book review of Practically Perfect on Meg and Mag's Bookshelf.

Little People on the Road Summer Swap

Q: What is the quickest way to let your blog die?

A: Don't post anything for two weeks.

Q: What is the quickest way to revive it?

A: Host a swap!

My friend at The Mama Chronicles and I are hosting another swap for kids. It is going to be a travel themed swap for summer and it is going to have some neat twists, so check out the Little People on the Road Summer Swap and get all the info for how to sign up.

Procreation

Do you ever wonder, why do people choose to procreate when it means their entire life is going to become about somone else and their needs? Is it a biological drive embedded in our dna to continue the species? Are we trying to show our parents the "right" way to raise children? Is it the ideal of the perfect little American family?

I'm sure it is a little bit of a variety of reason for everyone, but for me the biggest reason is to be able to see the world anew again, through the eyes of my children and to find joy in the smallest of things. The other morning I was driving my son to preschool and he said, "Mommy, look! It's a school bus!" And strangely, I could feel his excitement at seeing a school bus, the most oridnary of things. Then there are the questions he constantly asks that challenge me everyday to think about the how and why of things that I would normally just take for granted. If my son brings wonder and amazement into my life, then my daughter brings joy and laughter. Everytime she hears music, she has to dance and she gets tickled at the slighest things and lets out these big belly laughs. My children remind me that there is more to life than getting things accomplished or running from here to there. They teach me how to enoy it.

The picture is an old one, taken shortly after my daughter's birth.

The Sisterhood of Motherhood

I started off wanting my blog to have a different personality than it does right now, but I think it would have to be a part-time job to make it into what I really envisioned it being. So, I will just have to settle for having it be mostly fluff and every once and awhile coming up with something that is somewhat thought provoking. I'm hoping this is one of those times, so without further ado, here is my post for the week:

My friend Michelle at the Mama Chronicles did a post awhile back titled People Join the Sisterhood of Motherhood. She basically said that parenting is hard enough as it is, without feeling judged by other moms or like you are in competition against each other. Since then, a few small events have occurred that made me think about her post.

The first event happened at my children's co-op preschool. One mother brought her younger son to family day with the older one like usual, only the younger one had a bad cough. She explained that it was bronchitis and not contagious. Apparently, one of the other mothers didn't hear the explanation or didn't trust the other mom and made a big stink about it to the teacher. The teacher then made the mom with the sick child feel bad for bringing him. The situation was not handled very compassionately and the mom with the sick baby left feeling totally unsupported and told me later that she had doubts about coming back.

The second event is much more uplifting. If you read my blog regularly or know me in real life, you know that I have a daughter that has some special needs. A few days ago I got an e-mail from another co-op mom (not mentioned above) telling me what a great job I do dealing with my daughter's issues and what a great example I am to other mothers. This person has quietly given me support for some time, so this was just icing on the cake. Things like that tend to stick with me and give me strength when I really need it.

I have realized that we as mothers have the ability to make this job harder for one another or easier. We can be judgemental, or we can be accepting. We can can make each other feel isolated, or we can make each other feel supported. It doesn't matter if you are a stay-at-home mom, a working mom or somewhere in between, we are all doing our best as moms and we should be able to count on each other. So, on the eve of Mother's Day weekend, I would like to invite every mother who reads this, to join the Sisterhood of Motherhood. Besides just honoring your own mother, think about how you can reach out and let another mom know that you are there for her or make her load just a little bit easier to bear. I would like to end by sharing the acrostic poem that my friend, Michelle, wrote in her inspring post (I hope she doesn't mind):

Many different things in different homes
One sisterhood
Togetherness
Hugs
Empathy
Respect
Indebtedness
Nice words
Grace

Happy Mother's Day!

BTW, the hands are my great-grandmother's, grandmother's, mother's, mine and my daughter's.

May Day, May Day!

A very good friend of mine sent me these today, for no other reason than to say Happy May Day and that she misses me (she lives across the state so we don't see each other as much as we'd like). It reminded me of when I was a kid and my mom would have my brother and I leave flowers, usually lilacs off our bushes, on our neighbors' doorsteps on May Day. We would ring the bell and then run away. So, I thought my son might have fun delivering some flowers of his own. Thankfully, we live close to a greenhouse so it was a snap to grab some flowers and pots. We left one for each of my nieces to find after school and one for my mother-in-law to find after work. My son really did get a kick out of secretly delivering flowers and anticipating how excited the recipients would be. Here is what ours looked like:

Happy May Day!!

A Thursday Meme

7 Randon Things About Me:

1) I recently started working from home, about 5 hours a week, for my husband's moving company. I handle claims, which means when someone's furniture or property gets damaged during their move, I try to make it right again. People either love me (because their stuff get fixed) or hate me (because I have to deny their claim).

2) I often have feelings of being a bad mom, but then I look at my kids and see how happy they are most of the time. I have to say to myself, "extend some grace to yourself, you are not perfect, but you are doing a pretty good job."

3) I have a new nephew!! He was born a week and a half ago. I have not seen him yet, other than pictures. I am waiting to go make a visit until the new parents get settled a little.

4) I am a die hard ER fan. I think I started watching around 2003. Then after I had my son, I started watching all the reruns on TNT while I was stuck to the couch nursing my little guy around the clock. I think I have seen every episode ever made.

5) I have a really great husband. He is super busy with work, but still makes time to spend with the kids and me and has sacrificed his own hobbies to do so. He is very supportive of almost anything I do, and after 12 years of being together, he still makes me feel beautiful.

6) I have a fear of fire, particularly that my house will catch on fire while my family is sleeping in their beds. I know the root of this fear--my aunt and uncle's home burned to the ground when I was about eight. They got out okay, but some of their animals did not. I remember watching the story on the news. Still, knowing the root of my fear, does not make it go away. Maybe I should be hypnotized or something.

7) Housework is the bane of my existence. I envy people who actually seem to enjoy cleaning or have some motivation that has escaped me.

I think I have a pretty random list there. Now the hard part, tagging 7 more people. This is especially hard since I haven't been a very goody bloggy friend lately (see number 1 above) and don't want to just pop onto someone's blog and tag them after not having visited for awhile. So, I will just say if you are reading this, you are tagged. If you don't have a blog, leave a list in the comments (it doesn't have to be as detailed as mine) or post them on your myspace page.

Seeing Red

Yes, that is me after attempting to dye my own hair. I had been going for flirty-fun, not haha-fun, but go ahead and have a good laugh.

Things that made me laugh even though I was extremely depressed and humiliated after doing this to MYSELF:

1. A story on the evening news about a Phoenix man who played a huge hoax by attaching flares to helium balloons and releasing them into the night sky. Apparently thousands of people believed they were seeing a UFO.


2. Lunesta commercials that say "Call your doctor right away if after taking Lunesta you walk, drive, eat or engage in other activities while asleep." Do people actually take this stuff and just hope they don't take drive their kids to school while they're still asleep?

Things I have learned from this harrowing experience:

1. Some things are worth paying a professional, hair coloring and dental work being at the top of the list.


2. In times of tragedy, count your blessings. Like for example, I don't look half-bad in hats.


3. I am way too insecure about what people think of me.


4. I should have more faith in my friends and aquaintances and believe that they are not so shallow as to judge me as a person based on my physical appearance.


5. The Inernet is my friend. After I pulled myself together, I went to my computer and typed in "removing semi permanent hair dye" and found this page. I tried multiple washings and using hot oil, but ultimately opted for a chemical product called Color Oops.

Aah, much better!

New Book Blog!!

Check out the new book review blog my friend in Ohio and I just set up: Meg and Mag's Bookshelf. I just posted a book review of Expecting Adam. This is my favorite thing about the Internet, being able to work on a project with my friend that lives clear across the country! Stop by and give us your reading recommendations.

Book Review: Siblings Without Rivalry

I finished reading Siblings Without Rivalry a few weeks ago, but for some reason didn't get around to writing a review of it. I read it for the parenting book club that I attend. It was a really easy read and had lots of examples that the authors took from parenting seminars that they taught. There were several pieces of advice that have stuck with me since reading it and that I am trying to follow:

1. Not taking sides in an argument between siblings
2. Helping children solve their own disagreements
3. Emphasizing teamwork, not competion among siblings
4. Not casting children into roles within the family
5. Valuing each child fo their uniqueness

Some of this stuff may seem like it is for people with older children than mine, but I want to take a proactive approach on this issue. I would rather be educated early on so that I can prevent as much sibling rivalry as possible. I want my children to be good friends and I hope this is not too much to ask for. I don't want them to see the other one as their competion for attention, love, etc.

This book also made me realize that it is not too late to develop a closer relationship with my brother. The authors describe how many of the people in their workshop ended up having revelations about their own relationships with their siblings and went on to try and repair those relationships. My brother and I are five years apart and have totally different interests and have never really been close. However, I think if I just made more of an effort to stay in contact, we could be closer than we are now. Especially since we share the bond of both being parents now.

Right now I am reading three books at once, something I don't normally do. They are:

Expecting Adam

Operating Instructions

Practically Perfect In Every Way

My friend Michelle and I are planning to start a blog together, completely devoted to book reviews and I hope to have it up and running before I finish all those books, so check back soon for the link. Michelle is great at picking good books, so I think it will be an interesting blog.

It's the Process, Not the Product!

While my husband was out of town, I decided to do a fun, kid friendly meal, and hopefully distract my son from the fact that Daddy was not home for dinner. I thought we would make sandwich faces. Here is what I envisioned them looking like:

My son, however, had different ideas. First of all, he didn't want any cream cheese on his and then decided to use the goldfish (I had intended them to go on the side) as his main adornment. Later, I let him make one with peanutbutter and raisins.

They are both supposed to be monsters. The first one is a one-eyed monster with a very large mouth. The second one has 14 eyes and a row of raisins for the mouth at the bottom of the face.
Sometimes I have a really hard time not getting frustrated with him when I have this great vision worked up in my head of how a project is going to turn out. I have to remind myself that it is the process and also spending time together that matter the most. I also have to remember that he is not always going to be interested in every activity that I think sounds really fun, and it won't be a good time for either of us if I push him into it. I would like to hear if anyone has any other thoughts on this or similar experiences.

P.S. We are still planning to do a cooking project with the edible googly eyes from our swap partners but decided to wait and use them on some sort of dessert, since the main ingredient is Milk Duds (probably wouldn't be too great with garlic flavored ceam cheese).

Warming Up

I was beginning to think we were living in the land that spring forgot, but it was beautiful in our neck of the woods this weekend. The kids and I spent about three hours at the park soaking in the sunshine, having a picnic, feeding the ducks and, of course, playing on the playground. My husband, Jeff, was out of town for the weekend, so the kids and I were on our own. So besides the weather warming up, we are also warming up for our business' busy season. We own a moving company and summer is the time when we do the most volume. It won't be long and Jeff will practically be living at the office. I sometimes complain that he is busiest when the weather's the nicest and we could be out biking or camping together, but the truth is, it is probably much better that I can take the kids to the park and do things outdoors when Jeff is tied up with work. If I had to spend the long, dark winter without him around, it would be so much worse.

Doodling

Science Night & Clinton/Obama Balloon Races

My son's co-op preschool recently had a science night. Have I mentioned how much I love co-ops? His teacher did such a great job planning it and it was so much fun. These were the stations she had set up:

1) Volcanoes:
The kids would dump a cup of baking soda into a clay volcano and then pour in a cup of vinegar (with red food coloring) and watch the eruption. My husband was in charge of this station and it was one of the most popular.

2) Water and Oil "Lava Lamps":
The kids would fill a water bottle (lable removed) a little over halfway with water, then add oil, food coloring and a small rubber toy. The lid was then glued on and they could shake it up and then watch what happened when it settled again.

3) Slime:
I don't know what recipe they used for this since I was manning the lava lamp station most of the night, plus my son wanted nothing to do with it. He gets his neatness trait honestly from his dad.

4) Rainbow Carnations:
Each child got to take home a white carnation that was stuck into a florist's vial that was filled with food coloring. By morning our carnation had turned turquoise on the tips of all the petals.

5) Microscope and Magnifying Glass:
Pretty self-explanatory, but also pretty engaging for the kids.

6) Balloon Rockets:
The kids got blow balloons up with these little handheld pumps (great for preschoolers that can't blow balloons up yet) and then shoot them off down the hallway. Plus each kid got to take home a balloon and pump. My son played with his the entire next morning.

Then his two cousins, Big T and Little T, came over after school. He showed them his balloon and pump, which reminded Big T of an experiment that her class did at school with balloon airplanes. We decided to replicate it at home. We took fishing line and tied it to a chair, then threaded it through a straw and tied the other end to another chair. We did this twice so that we could have races. Then we took two balloons, blew them up, taped them to the straws and let go! This kept all three kids busy for most of the afternoon :)

It got me thinking though, maybe this is how each political party should choose their presidential canidates in the future. They could write each contenders name on a balloon and just let 'em rip. It would be a much less painful process and definitely more clear cut then the Clinton/Obama race. Plus you wouldn't have the primary canidates (who are supposed to be on the same team) tearing each other apart, and we wouldn't have to deal with all the ugly tv ads and hideous yard signs. Come to think of it, we could decide the whole election this way, not just the primaries. After all, when it is all said and done, we still end up with a politician in the White House no matter what.

THANK YOU, SWAP PARTNERS!!

We got packages from both our swap partners yesterday. Both packages were extremely creative, but very different from each other.

This one was from Mama Bird at Surely You Nest and her two children.

Their package was full of really unique projects for the kids and I to do together. They sent us the ingredients to make bath bombs, which is very cool because that is the type of project I would think sounds really fun, but would never go and track down all the ingredients. They also sent us the materials to make edible googly eyes, little pots with sunflower seeds and soil, and some craft supplies. My son is dying to make the googly eyes, but I want to wait until after we go to the grocery store so that we can get the stuff to make sandwich faces to the put the googly eyes on. I think the sunflower seeds are going to be great too since he has been really interested in a new book that we got about sunflowers (I mentioned it in an early post). I think I am most excited to make the bath bombs and then see my kids' reaction when we put them in the tub.



This one was from the mama over at The Belly Chronicles and her two children:

They sent us an ocean themed package, which included a beautiful book about shells, drift wood, a conch shell, a heart-shaped rock and two amazing handmade felt journals with my kids' names on them (I will have to find out how they made these). This package really touched me because I had mentioned in the questionaire how we love the ocean but don't live anywhere near it. It probably would have been more accurate to say that I love the ocean and want my children to develop an appreciation for it too, so it was really neat to have these artifacts come into our home that they can touch and feel. My son immediately sat down to write in his journal and then wanted to use the driftwood to pretend he was camping. It was also very sweet of them to include a knitted ear-muff for me.

After receiving the packages my son said that he wants to go on an airplane and meet his swap partners. This has been a wonderful experience for us. My son has gotten the idea of an exchange and developed a curiosity for maps, and I feel like I have made some new blogger friends. Thank you again to my swap partners and everyone who participated.

Thursday Meme

I was tagged for a meme by Mama Bird at Surely You Nest. She is one of my partners in the Little People Care Package Swap. So here goes:

Ten Years Ago...I was finishing up my freshmen year at Washington State University. By then I had already decided to change my major to education, after trying interior design and communications for a semester each. I eventually did get a degree in elementary education. I was also newly engaged to my now husband. We will celebrate our nine year anniversary next month. People are always surprised when they hear how long we're married and I can see them doing calculations in their head trying to figure out how old we are. It doesn't help that I look younger than I am anyway.

What's On My To-Do List:

1) Clean-out my office. I have started working from home about 10 hours a week, helping my husband with his business. I could be a lot more efficient if I wasn't tripping over piles of junk trying to reach the printer or digging through mountains of debris in order to find a paperclip.

2) Buy a birthday gift for my nephew who is turning four. His party is tomorrow. Part of me is tempted to buy him a garage for his toy cars (he loves the one at our house), but I know it would be much more practical to buy him some summer clothes. I really appreciate it when my children get clothes for birthdays and Christmases.

3) Bug the Shriners until they agree to see my daughter. She has loose tendons in her ankles which her physical therapist now believes are at the root of her inability to walk. My previous experience thus far in trying to get her the services she needs tells me that I just need to keep making phone calls and be as sweet as I can while I'm doing it. BTW, I am not a phone person, so this is somewhat torturous for me.

If I Had a Billion Dollars...I would set up a program like the drop-in centers that I heard about at Mama's Village in the US. They are free facilities (apparently all over Toronto) where parents can take their children, meet up with other families and get information and support during the first six years of their children's lives. They often have crafts and some of them have gyms where the kids can ride bikes and such. My family is involved in a co-op preschool which serves a lot of the same pursposes, but we also pay $100/month to be members and it is only available to us certain days and hours. I have always heard that other countries are more family-friendly than the US, but have only recently been getting a taste of why people say that.

3 Bad Habits:

1) Drinking Coke or Pepsi (I'm not picky) pretty much everyday. I keep telling myself if I could only kick the habit, I could probably lose 10 pounds easily. Does anyone know of a Cola Drinkers Annonymous group I could join?

2) Letting the laundry pile up.

3) Ignoring the things I should really do in order to do the things I want to do.

5 Jobs I've Had:

1) Dishwasher in one of my college's cafeterias--I would have to scrape food and paper products off people's trays and into a trough that would take it into a giant composter. The water running through the trough was orange because it was recyled through the composter. Have you ever smelled compost in large quantities?

2) Clerk at a Rite-Aid--I spent an entire summer asking people if they wanted to sign-up for a Rite-Aid card and "facing" shelves (moving the items to the front of the shelf).

3) Filing Clerk--I spent another summer doing almost nothing but filing papers. It was more boring than "facing" shelves.

4) Day Camp Counselor for the YMCA--I don't know if I would call forcing five-year-olds to do crafts, go on nature walks and play organized games fun, but at least I was outdoors.

5) Subsititute Teacher--worse than being a dishwasher.

*The best job I ever had was the year I taught third grade in Stockton, CA. The only reason I quit was because I decided to be a stay-at-home mom.

5 Things About Me:

1) I love to sleep and am so thankful that my kids are good sleepers. If they weren't I would never had time to blog.

2) I love to read and often feel a compulsion to read. I feel like if I am not reading something everyday, I am going to get stupider.

3) I am really bad with due dates. I often have fines at the library and started using Netflix to avoid fines at the videostore. It is a miracle that I mailed my swap packages on time, but I still have not mailed birthday presents to two my friends' little boys (their birthdays were Feb. 21 and March 10). So, it is sort of wierd that both my children were born on their due dates.

4) I have a loud and unusual laugh. I think it surprises people, because I am generally a quiet person. My children love it when I laugh.

5) I am a lapsed-Baptist. I don't know if I've heard that phrase before, but I have heard lapsed-Catholic several times. Anyway, my husband I have had a hard time finding church since moving back to Washington. We tried one for awhile until we started to feel like maybe it was a cult. Then we tried being Methodists for awhile until we realized that we would have to go through a whole process of confirmation before we could become members (plus there were no kids anywhere near our kids' ages). We also tried a foursquare church but everyone there was really phony--the type of people that give Christians a bad name. It has been about a year since I have even gone to church and I think I am ready to try again, but I will have to muster some bravery from somewhere first.

I am tagging my other swap partner at The Belly Chronicles.