Ode to Mothers in the Middle of the Night...

It's 2:03 am.  I am deeply, deeply asleep.  Then, somewhere deep inside me, my conscious mind hears little feet hit the floor above my head.  By the time she reaches my doorway, that part of my brain is pushing past the dreams snuggled deep in my comfortable bed and by the time she reaches my side of the bed, I'm able to comprehend her small frame standing beside me. 

"What is it honey?" I mumble. 

"I have to go to the bathroom Mama." 

"So go", I sigh back at her. 

"I can't tuck myself back in."

 "Go on up, I'll be right there."  It isn't worth arguing with her in the middle of the night so she always automatically wins this fight.

I disentangle myself from the personal heater that is my sleeping husband and slip out of bed behind her.  Upstairs, I slump against the bathroom wall as she uses the toilet and then send her to her bed while I use it myself.  As I climb the steps to her bunkbed, I notice the shortest member of our family has, as usual, repositioned herself so that she is on top of all of her blankets with her feet on her pillow, her hands and knees tucked underneath herself, her rump in the air and her face straight down into the blankets.  A mass of hair covers the entirety of her head and her quiet snoring indicates that she is, in fact, able to breathe under there.  I step back down, find an extra blanket that has been used as a picnic blanket for stuffed animals on the floor and cover her.  In her bed, the taller one sits patiently waiting for me to tuck her back in.  After I make sure she's secure under a sheet and no less than four blankets, I start to whisper-sing "Rainbow Connection" to her and find that though I estimate that I have sung this song no less than 2,200 times in her lifetime I suddenly can't remember half the words.  I mumble the missing bits and she luckily, doesn't notice.  Straight into "La La Lemon" because if I don't sing them both - she WILL notice and I think, 'great - if I can't even remember the words, THIS time I'm tired enough to go straight back to sleep'. 

So here it is, 3:12 am and clearly I was NOT able to go straight back to sleep.  I know that the light from my computer and iPad are supposed to further disrupt my sleep pattern but mindless television seems to be the only thing that turns off my brain in these occasions.  So I write this little story, I'll watch part of an old episode of The West Wing and then try again to return to dreamland. 

Ah - the beautiful, blessed life of a mother.

wait...why am I saying "No" to this?

Sometimes I feel like I say "No" a million times a day!  I catch myself, all the time, saying "No" without even thinking about it when the girls ask me if they can do something new or different or that might create extra work for me.  Which really, is ridiculous.  My full-time job right now is caring for and raising my daughters.  No one is going to do the work for me and no one is going to do as a good of a job as I can.  And I'm thrilled to be doing it.  So why am I always saying "No"?

In my ECFE class a few weeks ago, we watched the 1980's era video "Kids Are Worth It" which is a lecture by Barbara Coloroso.  The woman is brilliant!  Our whole class was sucked in and hanging on her every word.  She had a lot of great things to say that I'm trying to incorporate into my every day, but one of them was to change the way that you think about saying "No".  She gives us, as parents, permission to say "No" but also permission to say "I need to think about it", "Not right now" or "Convince me".  What I am finding is that a lot of times, if I say "I need to think about it", I find that whatever the girls are asking for IS alright.  Sometimes just the way they are asking for "it" and sometimes as part of a compromise.  I'm also finding that sometimes, particularly if I'm "in a mood", I will say "no" when there is really, absolutely no reason to say 'no'.  Here's my latest example:

My 4 1/2 year old, B came up to me one morning just after breakfast and said, "Mama, I'd like to have an art show."  My immediate reaction was, sadly, "no".  But I managed to hold my tongue and instead, asked her to tell me more. Turns out that she essentially had the whole thing thought out.  She wanted to invite some friends over (she even had the beginning of a list in mind). These friends were supposed to bring with them a piece of artwork that they had made that they would like to show off.  She wanted to have her friends talk about the art that they made and then we'd hang them all up so that we could all look at them.  I asked her when she wanted to do this and her immediate response was "4:00".  I told her that I didn't think that we could do it that early, that we would probably need more time so, of course, her next response was "ok, how about 6:00?"  I did convince her to put the art show off for a few days in order to give her friends time to make some art and to make sure that they would be able to come.  So we set the date for Tuesday at 4:00 (of course) and I sent out emailed invitations to the parents.  Everyone's responses were enthusiastic.

Caught B's expression while gazing at some particularly
 interesting art at Minneapolis Institute of Art

As luck would have it, my Mom and I were taking the girls to the Minnesota Children's Theater that Sunday on our annual, 3 generation-dress-up-and-go-to-the-theater outing.  It was Grandma's brilliant idea to go a little early and walk the girls through some of the Minneapolis Institute of Art first to show B what a "real" art show looks like.  I was surprised and pleased by both of their reactions.  They each found something to look at that they thought was really neat and I do think that it fed their interest in the upcoming show.

3 Generations all gussied-up for the theater
(note one of my personal favorite art pieces behind us)

The night before the big art show, as I was putting her to bed, B told me "Mama, I don't think I'll be able to sleep because I'm so excited for the art show tomorrow".  And she was excited.  The next day at preschool she told her teachers all about the big art show and when she got home she tweaked her own art project and then she watched the clock, waiting for 4:00 to come around.  Unfortunately, several of her friends were unable to attend at the last minute due to illnesses and time conflicts and I was afraid B would be disappointed.  But she took it in stride and didn't even seem to think twice about it.  The friends that did come, seemed just as enthusiastic as B was!  They all showed off their artwork, telling us how they were made and then we hung them on the wall.  When they were finished, we went down to the kitchen table where I had art supplies waiting and everyone made a popsicle stick picture frame to enclose their NEXT work of art.  There were buttons and feathers and, of course, lots of glitter!  And at the end, B got to present each of her friends with a medal that had a picture of her artwork on the front of it and that said, "B's Art Show 2012" on the back.  She told them each that it was an award for making such wonderful art!  (thank you Grandma P for making sure that the awards happened!)

Our artists sitting with their artwork

In the end, we hosted a 90 minute event in our home that, yes - was a little bit of work.  But it thrilled my daughter to no end for DAYS in preparation.  It fed her creativity as she worked to create art for the show. And I like to think, it gave her the confidence to come up with other fantastic events / occasions / activities for the future.  As one of the other Moms said to me, "You've got one cool kid there!".  Yes, Yes I do!  Thank God, I didn't say "no"!

creating new art to take home

Teaching Perspective

Picture this... 
It's a beautiful day.  The whole family has spent a fabulous day together.  You've taken the kids on a surprise adventure to the zoo where you've spent the bulk of the day running from one exhibit to the next.  The kids laughed and grinned their way from one end of the place to the other.  You even went crazy and bought them cookies & ice cream as a treat because, well, why not?  Then it's time to leave and you offer to take the kids to their favorite fast food restaurant on the way home.  Everyone is in amazing spirits.  Then it happens.  One of your children spies the gift shop.  Or the vending machines.  Or the popcorn cart.  And you tell them 'no honey, not now'.  And it's as if the whole world ends.  And your child looks at you with big, angry tears in their eyes and tells you in all seriousness, "This is the worst day ever.  I am so mad at you."
And you.  Want To.  Leave  Them.  In The.  Parking Lot.

Pretty sure this is a universal picture.  Not just one that happens to ME on a regular basis.  Well, recently I've decided that I am tired of it.  I'm tired of the whining and crying in general.  But I'm super extra tired of it when it happens as I've described above.  I, as a parent, have gone out of my way to create a special experience for my children. I have given of my time, my energy, my money.  They have a wonderful time.  And then they want more.  I'm over it.  So I've been testing out an experiment with my 4 1/2 year old, B.  And here's how it goes.

This weekend we took the girls to the Mall of America specifically to ride the rides.  And ride them they did.  And Grandma promised the girls to buy them cookies on the way out of the mall from the Nestle Tollhouse store because we had all had such a wonderful day, the girls had been so patient when they had to wait in line, etc., etc.  I honestly don't even remember what it was that set her off, but B was overstimulated, overtired, over IT and pitched a holy fit on the way to the cookie store.  She was weeping and carrying on and telling me how this was the worst day.  That she didn't have ANY fun.  That she was so angry with me.  I stopped right there in the mall, waved my Mom on with my 2 year old and got down on my knees at B's level.  With a million people swirling around us, I said "B, I'm pretty sure you don't even remember why you're crying right now.  Can you tell me?"  She just stared at me.  "I want you to tell me 3 reasons that you should be really happy right now."  A smile tickled the edges of her lips and she said, "I rode rides" that's #1 "Grandma's here playing with us" there's #2 "and she's going to buy us cookies"...ding-ding-ding...there's 3!  And then I said, "Can you tell me 3 reasons that you should be crying, angry and unhappy right now?"  All she could do was smile.

I'm trying out this new tactic for several reasons.  First of all, I think that all too often we discount what our kids are feeling.  We just shut them down and tell them "no - you are not feeling that way".  We also tell them what to feel and what to think instead of explaining to them why they should feel and think that way.  I don't think that this teaches them how to think and feel for themselves.  What I'm trying to do here is to try to teach my children to deal with disappointment, deal with frustration, deal with anger by putting things into perspective.  If B had been able to list off 3 legitimate reasons for being angry.  I think I would've let her cry. She would've earned the right.  Instead, I did not put words in her mouth, she honestly came up with those reasons all on her own.  Pretty quickly too.  It really happened, just the way I described.

The disclaimer is that this won't always work of course.  And it isn't always the tactic that I'll take.  Sometimes the whining just must end.  Now.  And I DO just shut it down.  Sometimes I ignore it because acknowledging it feeds it.  But sometimes, I am able to turn it into a teaching moment.  I don't want to create children who stuff their feelings.  But I DO want to create children who can put things into perspective and consciously decide if something is worth being upset about or not.

I'll let you know how this experiment pans out in the long run.  For now, about a week into it, it seems to be working.

Inspiration

I've been trying to figure out how to make this statement without offending anyone or coming off all high-and-mighty or something...I can't come up with anything brilliant, so I'm just gonna come out and say it and hope that no one judges me too harshly.  Here goes -

I consider myself a pretty good Mom.  My girls are generally well behaved.  They are intelligent, creative, helpful, compassionate.  They play well together and with other kids.  I know that THEY know that they are loved.

But sometimes I'm not a pretty good Mom.  Sometimes I fall down and screw up or just slide a little bit.  Sometimes my girls are NOT well behaved.  Sometimes they sit down in the middle of an aisle at the grocery store and scream their little heads off for no apparent reason.  Sometimes they tell other little girls "I don't want to play with you".  Sometimes they hit each other and sometimes they don't share.  Sometimes they, out loud, say "Mama, that lady is fat!  Why is she so fat, Mama?" and I want to melt into the pavement.

Like everyone, I take inspiration from the "Big Guys".  The Martin Luther King Jr's of the world, the Mother Teresa's, the Helen Keller's, etc. but I take even MORE inspiration from the stories of the "Little Guys".  The old family friend who in her retirement age takes cell phone calls at all hours of the day to do everything she can to help out the downtrodden in the community.  The Mom who, in her "spare time", starts a nonprofit to help out other Moms who don't have the resources that the rest of us do.  And in the even "littler guys".  We all know the ones!  Those who do everything they can to raise "good" kids.  The ones who always have a smile for you even when it looks a little strained around the edges from lack of sleep or just the world pressing down a little too hard.  Those who offer to watch your kids for you so you can go to work or just get a break.

And here is where it might start sounding a little too high-and-mighty...I can't decide.  It is really my goal to be one of those "littler guys" who is an inspiration to someone.  I am a normal person who falls down a lot but who usually tries REALLY hard and once in a while gets something right.  I want someone to be able to look at me and the work that I'm doing every day and to say, "well, if SHE can do it...then I'm sure with a little effort, I can do it too!" whether "it" is getting your kids to eat broccoli, "it" is taking care of yourself by indulging in a healthy hobby or "it" is simply getting out of bed to do it one more time.

I guess that's Reason #278 for my beginning to jot down my thoughts as a Mom, as an employee, as a business owner, as a wife and a community member.  I'm hoping that someone, somewhere will read my words and they something will hit them just right at just the right time and I will have helped them.  A little.

Pinkified...

I just saw this posted on facebook:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/15/lego-friends-girls-gender-toy-marketing_n_1206293.html#s608563&title=Cabbage_Patch_Kids

and thought I had better give it a quick read because it feeds right into what I've been trying to wrap my brain around lately.  It's the "Princess vs. Robot" debate.  Sort of.  But different.  I think.  Or at least it sent my brain in an ever so slightly different spin...

I have often been angered by the pink trap.  I recall vividly walking through Babies 'R Us and being utterly amazed by the rows and rows of otherwise gender-neutral toys that had been "pinkified" for no obviously good reason.  Every toddling toy you could think of had been rendered in shades of pinks & purples.  I remember specifically the good 'ole popcorn popper push toy & the plastic stacking rings that EVERY toddler must have.  At the time I remember being 50/50 disgusted with the need to turn everything pink AND with the obvious question "what if my second child is a boy?" (which - I know - brings up a whole new set of questions like "so what?  can your boy baby NOT push a pink popcorn popper?")  Why is it that my beautiful baby girl was supposed to suddenly become color blind to everything but pinks & purples.

 I don't remember ever being that infatuated with pink myself.  I remember loving yellow.  My bedroom was painted half yellow with the other half covered in wallpaper of butterflies.  Yup - very girly - but not pink.  And when I got older and decided that yellow was "so yesterday" I opted for blue.  I don't really recall pink being THAT big of a deal as I was growing up.  Perhaps memories fade with time...

Leaving alone for a moment the "dangers of Barbie" and the horrid things that "they" have done to Strawberry Shortcake, etc. (I think I'll delve into my thoughts on that topic in another post down the road)  I thought I'd wander through my girls' playroom to see what traps we had fallen into without realizing.  I went looking for otherwise gender-neutral items that had been "pinkified".  I'm pleased to report that I didn't find MUCH.  They have basic building blocks in the whole rainbow of colors (which they love), they have puzzles featuring wildlife & bugs, planes & trains, dinosaurs.  Their stuffed animal bins are overflowing with everything from the basic teddy bear to a stuffed octopus, lobster, monkeys, even a turkey.  All of which are colored "appropriately".  Yes, they have a whole army of baby dolls (again - a topic for another day) but their play kitchen is gender neutral (purchased by Grandma and if I recall correctly, she and I discussed in advance that I preferred a kitchen that was NOT pink and flowery).  I found two things that ALMOST made me feel guilty.  I found a very flowery, pink kickball and I found the "pinkified" LEGOS.  No, not the LEGOS referenced in the attached article but just your basic LEGOS which happen to be in girly shades and happen to include a horse, flowers and "castley-looking" windows.  What makes me feel better about these items - the kickball was found in a bin stocked FULL of balls that were blue, red, orange...and while this kickball WAS the largest, it was certainly not in the majority in terms of appearance.  And the LEGOS - well - my daughter loves to build with her big, interlocking blocks but seemed ready to graduate to the next level with the smaller LEGOS.  I really wanted to foster that love for building - wanted to make sure that she didn't suddenly deem it a "boy" activity...so I fell deep into the trap and bought pink.

All in all - in terms of toys that should otherwise be gender neutral, I feel like we've done a fairly bang-up job of keeping things less pink and more rainbow colored!  Score one for us?!

Maybe I'll win Mother of the Year after all...

Every parent screws up.  Even me.  It appears that I totally screwed up my children's eating habits.

Dinnertime has always been a family affair for us.  In actuality, we usually more or less all sit down to eat breakfast and lunch together too but not as consistently.  Dinner - unless one of us is out of town, we ALL sit down together to eat and discuss life's great topics...every night!  When B was a baby and toddler, she would eat ANYTHING.  Seriously.  Of course, her favorite foods were the usual kid-friendly favorites, but she would happily eat anything that we put in front of her except rice.  For whatever reason, the kid wouldn't touch rice with a 10-foot pole.  No problem.

Well time passed, and yes I'm going to give myself an excuse here...Chris travels a lot.  And it's really hard for me to force myself to cook a whole meal that I will eat - and the girls will nibble at.  So I got really, really lazy over the last year or so.  I got into the habit of cooking for them whatever they wanted (ie. hot dogs, pbj, mac & cheese) and making something equally delicious for myself.  Note to self:  this PROBABLY contributed to my need for weight watchers as well.

So now - we had reached a stage where the girls refused to eat anything that wasn't made of peanut butter or whatever hot dogs are made out of.  Oops.  I screwed up.  But keep reading...'cause I think I fixed it!  Hooray!

We tried lots of stuff...I tried pleading and crying...we tried threatening...we tried "2 more bites"-ing...tried "you just have to try a bite"...tried that thing where you just "put-it in-front-of-them-and-refuse-to-make-anything-else-and-"eventually"-they'll-get-hungry"...all it was doing was making dinnertime a MISERABLE affair.

Yup!  That's MY child eating steamed broccoli the size of her head!

And - we have a sense of humor around here...Daddy paid her for her efforts!  

Finally, I hit on the idea of getting B involved in the process.  The girls already love to bake and cook.  All I have to do is open a cupboard and they come running into the kitchen trailing aprons behind, chorusing "I'll help", pushing chairs ahead of them to reach the counter.  So on Sunday afternoon, B and I sit down with the cookbook and a piece of paper.  I start reading off the names of recipes (I do pick things to read that I think she might actually like...nothing too spicy, nothing too complicated...).  Every once in a while she'll ask "what's that one?" and I'll tell her what's in it.  I have her pick 3 or 4 recipes that sound good to her and I make my grocery list from that.  Then when we go to the grocery store, I let her help pick out ingredients as we go.  I ask, "should we buy a yellow onion or a white one?" and "which box of noodles looks better?" and tell her "walk over there and pick out a package of broccoli".  And I explain to her that we are buying this and that for Recipe A or Recipe B that she picked out.  I get her very involved.  When it comes time to MAKE dinner - in come the girls to don their aprons and wield their spatulas.  Of course, this whole process - choosing a weekly menu, buying groceries and prepping dinner - takes at least twice as long as it needs to, BUT...*drumroll please* Miracle upon Miracles...they EAT!  We've been going strong this way for about 3 weeks and with one exception (B thought the beef stroganoff looked like "mud" and she refused to eat it) the girls have been eating their dinner.  Turns out I might just pass the Mother Test after all!  Chalk one up for me!

B contemplates her broccoli (note that the chicken is already essentially gone!)

Princesses VS robots? Or Princesses AND robots?

B loves robots.  Has loved robots for over half her life.  She has a stuffed robot that she sleeps with...she loves the movie "Short Circuit"...last year she chose a Transformer backpack for herself because robots are "so cool"...she and her daddy made a little cardboard robot together that really works!  Today B said something to me that made me genuinely sad.  She informed me that she likes Princesses but not robots because "Princesses are just so girly and robots are really just for boys". 

I am planning right now to dedicate several blog posts to this topic in an effort to straighten out my own thoughts on the topic, track some research and pay close attention to what the girls are up to these days.  "This", this "thing" that I am witnessing in my oldest daughter is something that I've feared since before my girls were born. 

How exactly DOES one raise a strong, independent, intelligent, thoughtful and caring young woman who is as comfortab

le with a child on her hip in the kitchen as she is, say driving a stick shift on her way to the paintball field?  I want my daughters to be so incredibly comfortable in their own skins that they choose their own fashion sense over someone else's, that they choose to eat healthy & exercise because it makes them physically feel good more than it makes them LOOK physically good.  I want them to choose their hobbies & passions based on their own preferences rather than society's.  I want them to enjoy science & math as much as they do literature and music. 

Myself?  I've never been into fashion, makeup, hairstyles, etc.  I've always had male friends that were as close to me (if not closer) as my female friends.  I've always enjoyed time outdoors, climbing trees, scaling rocks even if I wasn't very skilled at these pursuits.  I can't throw a ball accurately to save my soul but I once could sing, play the piano, the oboe and the flute...I don't think that these were separations thrust upon me so much as reactions to my own preferences and talents.  As an adult, I thoroughly enjoy and am proud of my skills on the firing range, enjoy the occasional paintball game and love to SCUBA dive (not to mention am VERY proud of the fact that I am a very good breather - can last a lot longer on one tank of air than most).  I also really enjoy cooking when I don't have someone hanging onto my leg and I love to sew.  My husband used to refer to me as his "Swiss-Army-Wife" and this has always made me warm with pride.  I feel that I have always made my own decisions about what I want to do.  I don't recall ever really feeling the sting of society's judgement.  I'm certain that it was there, but I legitimately believe that I just didn't care.  I'm not sure where this balance came from in me.  I don't know if it is just my temperament or if it was some sort of guidance from my parents?  I don't know how to pass this pure acceptance of themselves on to my daughters.