Item #1: Fang No More
For weeks, the Youngest Boy insisted on letting his second loose tooth jut forward in the bottom his mouth as his adult tooth was rising up through the gums behind it, inching the baby tooth outward a little more each day. The discomfort caused him to stop eating anything with a discernible crunch, making feeding the child more than the challenge it is under normal conditions. When he would finally agree to eat, he would tilt his head to the side and eat out of one corner of his mouth, leaving what looked like a permanent streak of dried food remnants curling around the left side of his face. Despite parental offerings to “ease” the tooth from its irritating position – his uncle and his grandfather helpfully offered string-and-doorknob solutions -- he refused intervention.
So everyone, including him, began jokingly referring to him as Fang . . . until the tooth mercifully fell out of his mouth. (There was genuine concern that it was so loose that he’d swallow it in his sleep, thereby denying him the opportunity to put it under his pillow for the Tooth Fairy so he could get a dollar for his “money collection,” as he calls it.)
However as soon as the tooth came out, the Youngest Boy demanded that it return to its rightful place. As the 6-year-old fled the room sobbing, the Eldest Boy asked me if he could touch the tooth, to which I said, “No,” before trying to soothe He-Who-Hath-the-Bloody-Mouth. When the Youngest Boy calmed down, we returned to the kitchen only to find the Eldest Boy standing very still. “I lost the tooth,” he said, which sent his younger brother into another fit and provoked my loud lamentations about kids who don’t listen to me, which, in turn, sent the Eldest Boy out of the room, sobbing.
I did find the tooth, although it took the Youngest Boy two days to come to terms with the loss. (He initially told us he wanted to keep his tooth and insisted we hide it from the Tooth Fairy.) Finally, he agreed to place it under his pillow. The following morning, he got his dollar, thus concluding another in a string of recent, family melodramas.
Item #2: Daddy School
For once, I was not the subject of the children’s ire for daring to do something as irrational as refusing their requests to watch television for 17 consecutive hours, to play videogames until their eyeballs melted or to subsist on nothing more than ginger ale, frozen waffles and ice cream.
While The Spouse was having an argument with the Youngest Boy the other day – I think the dispute was over whether the child needed to wear a coat in 30-degree weather, but many of the pediatric arguments tend to blur together so I can’t be sure – I overheard the boy yell, “You’re the worst daddy in the world! You need to go to grown-up school to learn how to be a good dad!”
I laughed. Guffawed, actually. Out loud. Perhaps a bit too loudly.
After the child went outside to play, The Spouse said to me, “If I have to go to parenting classes, you’re coming with me.”
Item #3: In Today, Out Tomorrow
It seems like just a few years ago when The Girl refused to wear anything that wasn’t pink or some form of a dress or a skirt. Looking inside of her dresser drawers in those days was like looking into the eye of a Pepto-Bismol hurricane.
Not so anymore.
Nowadays, the 9-year-old is into sporty-gal chic, meaning absolutely nothing in pink, nothing frilly, no skirts and no dresses. She prefers bold, primary colors in hues of blue, red or green. I discovered how vehement she actually was about her new fashion preferences when we were getting ready to take The Spouse out to a nice dinner to celebrate a Milestone Birthday and I told her she couldn’t wear jeans. Her response was to vigorously stomp, yell and fall to the floor in abject horror. Later, when I demanded she accompany me to her room to make a more appropriate clothing choice and found some red pants and a fluffy sweater (which I couldn’t get her to stop wearing last year), she yelled, “You’re just trying to make me look fancy!”
In the meantime, the Youngest Son was absolutely blissful as he eagerly donned khakis, a button-down shirt, a tie and a sweater vest, so he could look just like his favorite person in the whole wide world, the guy who he said needed to take parenting classes.
Item #4: Make Way for Potter
My third graders are thrilled that I’ve decided to read the Harry Potter series. (They’re only on their 47th time through all seven books.) I introduced them to the books last summer and since then, they’ve been utterly hooked. In fact, it’s been painfully difficult to try to get my 9-year-old son to read anything other than a Potter book because, as he says, “There’s nothing else I like as much as these.”
Only problem is, the kids are extremely impatient with the pace of my reading. They don’t get that I can’t spend every waking moment reading for pleasure. When I explain that I have things to which I must attend such as work, reading for work, household chores, preparing them meals and sleeping, they look at me quizzically, as if I were speaking in a foreign tongue. And when they excitedly ask me to tell them at what exact scene I left off and I say I can’t remember, they look crestfallen.
For the record, I’m on the second book, but I’ve got a heap of work this weekend, so the likelihood that I’ll get to the book is slim. But try telling that to the kids. They think I’m just made of time.
Showing posts with label home front. Show all posts
Showing posts with label home front. Show all posts
Friday, March 7, 2008
Monday, January 14, 2008
Alternate Universe
Only when you’re the parent of a 6-year-old who’s just starting to get this whole reading/writing thing, would you applaud the fact that he wrote, “Your but smells bad” on the white board in the kitchen.
Then, after you tell him how smart he is having written that all by himself, do you gently tell him that he needs to add a second “t” onto the synonym for the word derriere.
His snarky sentence remains on the board at this very moment, but hopefully I’ll remember to erase it before company comes over and gets the wrong idea.
Then, after you tell him how smart he is having written that all by himself, do you gently tell him that he needs to add a second “t” onto the synonym for the word derriere.
His snarky sentence remains on the board at this very moment, but hopefully I’ll remember to erase it before company comes over and gets the wrong idea.
Thursday, January 3, 2008
Three for Thursday: Presidential Election Begins, Maternal Profiling and Holiday Round-Up
Item #1: What’s Up with Iowa?
What’s up with Iowa? Unless you’ve been living under a rock, it’s been hard to miss the mass hordes of reporters and politicos who’ve descended upon the farm state for the first official contest of the 2008 presidential election that starts tonight. What do the primaries have to do with parenting? That’s what my January Parents and Kids essay is about. If parents can get their kids all revved up about “American Idol” – as millions of parents do – why can’t they direct that energy and interest into something that really matters, like who’s going to be the country’s war-time commander-in-chief?
(Speaking of politics . . . the razor-sharp satirists at JibJab, who create funny animated bits about politics and current events, just released their 2007 year-in-review cartoon. Warning: The video is distinctly kid- and work-UNfriendly. Plus, it may offend those who are easily offended.)
What’s up with Iowa? Unless you’ve been living under a rock, it’s been hard to miss the mass hordes of reporters and politicos who’ve descended upon the farm state for the first official contest of the 2008 presidential election that starts tonight. What do the primaries have to do with parenting? That’s what my January Parents and Kids essay is about. If parents can get their kids all revved up about “American Idol” – as millions of parents do – why can’t they direct that energy and interest into something that really matters, like who’s going to be the country’s war-time commander-in-chief?
(Speaking of politics . . . the razor-sharp satirists at JibJab, who create funny animated bits about politics and current events, just released their 2007 year-in-review cartoon. Warning: The video is distinctly kid- and work-UNfriendly. Plus, it may offend those who are easily offended.)
Item #2: Maternal Profiling
The Huffington Post has an interesting entry this week about how the New York Times declared that the term “maternal profiling” -- a fancy way of describing the employment discrimination that some mothers encounter – was one of the hot buzzwords of 2007.
The Huffington Post has an interesting entry this week about how the New York Times declared that the term “maternal profiling” -- a fancy way of describing the employment discrimination that some mothers encounter – was one of the hot buzzwords of 2007.
Item #3: Holiday Round-Up
Gifts: Santa bestowed upon my three rug rats: A Lego Star Wars Jabba the Hut barge, a Lego Star Wars Republic Cruiser and -- God help us -- a kid-sized set of drums. Grandma gave the Girl a karaoke machine (with which she’s been belting out all tunes “High School Musical” and “Hannah Montana” related. Non-stop.). Auntie Ellen gave the Eldest Boy a robot that, according to the box, not only is able to travel all around the house and see in the dark, but will develop its own personality and -- get this -- respond to aggression. Frankly, I’m frightened, and have already informed my beloved sister-in-law that if the four-legged robot gets out of hand, I’m going to abandon it on her front doorstep so it can exact its metallic aggression on her house.
Gifts: Santa bestowed upon my three rug rats: A Lego Star Wars Jabba the Hut barge, a Lego Star Wars Republic Cruiser and -- God help us -- a kid-sized set of drums. Grandma gave the Girl a karaoke machine (with which she’s been belting out all tunes “High School Musical” and “Hannah Montana” related. Non-stop.). Auntie Ellen gave the Eldest Boy a robot that, according to the box, not only is able to travel all around the house and see in the dark, but will develop its own personality and -- get this -- respond to aggression. Frankly, I’m frightened, and have already informed my beloved sister-in-law that if the four-legged robot gets out of hand, I’m going to abandon it on her front doorstep so it can exact its metallic aggression on her house.
Mirth: We got through Hanukkah, Christmas, New Year’s, the Patriots’ regular season finale and a Festivus celebration (with my awesomely snarky friends) in tact. No one contracted a stomach bug (as I did last Christmas). No one was besieged by lice (as the Girl and I both were when were planning on marking the dark, grievance-filled holiday of Festivus with the same friends last year). No one died. So, as far as I’m concerned, ‘twas all good.
Family Togetherness: The day after Christmas, The Spouse and I took all three of our offspring, plus one friend apiece, to see “Alvin and the Chipmunks” at a movie theater. The three sets of friends all wanted to sit in three different rows, as if they didn’t know the grown-ups except when I distributed bags of popcorn and drinks . . . oh, and when our Youngest Boy wanted to hold his Daddy’s hand. After the movie, after they devoured Christmas cookies at our house, played the drums, played video games, sang karaoke and all the friends had gone home, each one of our children, one by one, got angry with The Spouse and I for insisting that it was time for bed when it was an hour-plus past their usual bedtime. Each one of the ingrates told us that we were ruining their lives. Plus we were accused of getting a secret thrill out of bossing little kids around. Nothing like gifts, a hyper-saccharine kids’ movie, time with friends, oodles of sugar and late bedtimes to bring a family together.
Family Togetherness: The day after Christmas, The Spouse and I took all three of our offspring, plus one friend apiece, to see “Alvin and the Chipmunks” at a movie theater. The three sets of friends all wanted to sit in three different rows, as if they didn’t know the grown-ups except when I distributed bags of popcorn and drinks . . . oh, and when our Youngest Boy wanted to hold his Daddy’s hand. After the movie, after they devoured Christmas cookies at our house, played the drums, played video games, sang karaoke and all the friends had gone home, each one of our children, one by one, got angry with The Spouse and I for insisting that it was time for bed when it was an hour-plus past their usual bedtime. Each one of the ingrates told us that we were ruining their lives. Plus we were accused of getting a secret thrill out of bossing little kids around. Nothing like gifts, a hyper-saccharine kids’ movie, time with friends, oodles of sugar and late bedtimes to bring a family together.
(Image from CNN.)
Thursday, December 20, 2007
Three for Thursday Returns With: To Freeze or Not to Freeze, the Ghost of Christmas Eve Past and Dragon Vomit
After a hiatus, “Three for Thursday” has returned . . . consider it an early Christmas gift.
Item #1: To Freeze or Not to Freeze
It comes as no shock that trying to have a career and parent young children simultaneously is insanely difficult and makes legions of parents stressed out. It also comes as no surprise that when women strive to climb the career ladder during their childbearing years, they oftentimes find themselves torn. Some want to get to a certain point in their career before having children and then some find that delaying childbearing can make getting pregnant more challenging. Others have children without regard to career concerns and later find that hitting the “pause” button on their work can hurt their careers.
Enter into the fray this piece from the Wall Street Journal by Ronald W. Dworkin, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, about the evolving technology which allows women to freeze their eggs – therefore suspending their fertility — indefinitely while they work on their career. Dworkin wrote:
“Our culture encourages women to pursue high-powered careers. Many women must pursue at least some kind of career: With the divorce rate over 50%, women can no longer rely on the integrity of the family unit to support them. The culture paints a rosy image about career and family. Then biological truth breaks through, by which time these women have lost a decade of their best childbearing years.”
On the newspaper’s working parents blog, “The Juggle” blogger Sara Schaefer Munoz asked her readers whether, when they were younger, they thought that men and women would have the same “career trajectories” through their childbearing years.
Item #2: The Ghost of Christmas Eve Past
I just returned from visiting my first grade son’s classroom for a “holiday” party and, after hearing several mothers discussing the vast number of children who’ve recently succumbed to a vicious stomach bug – striking victims in not only my son’s school, but in my twins’ school as well – my own stomach began to churn. It’s nearly the first anniversary of the Christmas Eve From Hell when, just after I finished eating our traditional Christmas Eve dinner, I fled to the bathroom where I spent the next two days making close friends with my toilet. I missed Christmas and was miserable for days afterward.
I’d been trying to blot that experience from my mind as my family’s Christmas Eve dinner draws near (though I did tell my mother that I can’t bring myself to eat the baked stuffed shrimp she’s planning on making as not enough time has elapsed since The Incident for me to stomach that particular dish yet).
However hearing that there’s a stomach bug going around has sent me into a hand washing frenzy. But it’s hard to wash your hands when your fingers are crossed as you pray that the bug will skip your house this year.
Item #3: Dragon Vomit
Random pediatric comment of the week, uttered by my 9-year-old son after suspiciously eyeing a pan of lasagna his father made: “That looks like dragon vomit.”
At least he’s got a flair for colorful adjectives.
Item #1: To Freeze or Not to Freeze
It comes as no shock that trying to have a career and parent young children simultaneously is insanely difficult and makes legions of parents stressed out. It also comes as no surprise that when women strive to climb the career ladder during their childbearing years, they oftentimes find themselves torn. Some want to get to a certain point in their career before having children and then some find that delaying childbearing can make getting pregnant more challenging. Others have children without regard to career concerns and later find that hitting the “pause” button on their work can hurt their careers.
Enter into the fray this piece from the Wall Street Journal by Ronald W. Dworkin, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, about the evolving technology which allows women to freeze their eggs – therefore suspending their fertility — indefinitely while they work on their career. Dworkin wrote:
“Our culture encourages women to pursue high-powered careers. Many women must pursue at least some kind of career: With the divorce rate over 50%, women can no longer rely on the integrity of the family unit to support them. The culture paints a rosy image about career and family. Then biological truth breaks through, by which time these women have lost a decade of their best childbearing years.”
On the newspaper’s working parents blog, “The Juggle” blogger Sara Schaefer Munoz asked her readers whether, when they were younger, they thought that men and women would have the same “career trajectories” through their childbearing years.
Item #2: The Ghost of Christmas Eve Past
I just returned from visiting my first grade son’s classroom for a “holiday” party and, after hearing several mothers discussing the vast number of children who’ve recently succumbed to a vicious stomach bug – striking victims in not only my son’s school, but in my twins’ school as well – my own stomach began to churn. It’s nearly the first anniversary of the Christmas Eve From Hell when, just after I finished eating our traditional Christmas Eve dinner, I fled to the bathroom where I spent the next two days making close friends with my toilet. I missed Christmas and was miserable for days afterward.
I’d been trying to blot that experience from my mind as my family’s Christmas Eve dinner draws near (though I did tell my mother that I can’t bring myself to eat the baked stuffed shrimp she’s planning on making as not enough time has elapsed since The Incident for me to stomach that particular dish yet).
However hearing that there’s a stomach bug going around has sent me into a hand washing frenzy. But it’s hard to wash your hands when your fingers are crossed as you pray that the bug will skip your house this year.
Item #3: Dragon Vomit
Random pediatric comment of the week, uttered by my 9-year-old son after suspiciously eyeing a pan of lasagna his father made: “That looks like dragon vomit.”
At least he’s got a flair for colorful adjectives.
Friday, December 14, 2007
Six-and-a-Half Hours
That's how long it took me to get home from work yesterday.
Six-and-a-half hours.
I could've driven from the Boston area to Baltimore in that time. Instead, I spent those clenched, nerve-wracking hours driving on the snow-covered, clogged and slippery (UNPLOWED! Even on major highways that were not congested) trying to make it home in what is normally a 90-minute trip.
Before I even left work, I received an automated phone call on my cell phone from my children's school department telling me that school was letting out two hours early. Even if I'd left work the moment I got that call, given the conditions of Massachusetts highways yesterday (gridlock beyond belief) I would've never made it back in time. I wound up placing several frantic phone calls, trying to find anyone who could get the kids off the bus. Lucky for me, one of my neighbors was indeed available. Initially, I thought she'd only have to watch the three kids for a half-hour. Then, after I came face-to-face with the worst commute of my life, she wound up watching them for four-and-a-half hours and fed them dinner, which was a good thing seeing as though I still had no food in the house yesterday.
When I finally made it home, leaving my minivan in the street in front of my house because I couldn't get into my driveway, then trudged through 10+ inches of snow to my neighbor's house to pick up the kids, they, the charmers that they are, gave me grief. They didn't want to leave. It had been a kid-friendly winter wonderland over there. They'd gone sledding, had snowball fights, had dinner and snacks, watched "Rudolph" on TV, played a pretend game of Harry Potter and were in the middle of filling a Mad Lib with all manner of juvenile, toilet-related humor when I arrived and dragged them out of a warm, magical neighbor's home. As we slogged through the snow, they said they couldn't understand why I was in such a foul mood.
"I was in the car for six-and-a-half hours!" I wearily replied. "I had to stop on the side of the road tons of times to chop ice off of my windshield wipers. I was so nervous."
"You've already told us that Mom," my 9-year-old son quipped as he tossed his snowpants into the garage. "We get it."
As for The Spouse, he tried repeatedly to get home, but when his car got stuck in a snowbank, he abandoned it on the side of the road, until about 9:30 p.m. or so when he got a group of guys together to shove his car out of the snow and onto the streets. He rolled in at around 10:30.
Between now and New Year's, I am officially not singing any snow-related Christmas songs that speak in glowing terms about the white, freezing matter. Me and snow, to crib a line from an old "Gilmore Girls" episode, we're not on speaking terms right now.
(Image from the Boston Herald.)
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Holiday Madness: When Everything Can’t Get Get Done
Why haven’t I blogged in, what, weeks? I’m going to brazenly pass the buck and blame it on Christmas . . . and Hanukkah . . . and the fact that, when you live in dual-career household while trying to raise small children, it’s virtually impossible to keep up with everything, especially in a holiday season where you celebrate not one, but TWO major religious observances. Seriously.
As Christmas cards started filling my mailbox beginning on the Monday after Thanksgiving (!), the pressure to get our family cards done and mailed has continued to mount. (I wouldn’t open the cards for a while, simply shoved them into a corner in the kitchen because their presence was making me anxious about the fact that I hadn’t yet done ours.) Because I foolishly hand-make our cards – my December essay in Parents and Kids attempts to explain the irrational rationale behind my holiday card mania – and I haven’t had sufficient time to work on them. I’m way, way behind, even by my lax standards.
Hanukkah, which we celebrate in my interfaith family, is over. Yet in my house, we’re still pretending as though it’s on-going. Why? I completely forgot about lighting the candles on Monday night. When the kids remembered that we hadn’t lit the menorah, just as I was putting them to bed way past their bedtime, they went nuts. Of course they didn’t remember about the candle lighting either and The Spouse, who’s been working late into the evening many nights recently, wasn’t around to remember to light the candles either. Regardless of what the calendar says, we’re going to keep lighting the candles until we’ve officially celebrated all eight nights.
What about our Hanukkah cards, which I hand-make at the same time I do the (*ahem* not even started) Christmas cards? Well, my Jewish friends and family members, we’re going to pretend that the Festival of Lights is a tad longer this year.
I haven’t finished Christmas shopping. I haven’t baked Christmas cookies with the kids. I only got our outdoor Christmas lights fully up and operational yesterday (we had one of the few dark, light-less homes on my street). I’m still trying to figure out what to get The Spouse as he’s one of the hardest and pickiest people for whom to shop. In a weak moment two weeks ago (my mind clouded by the medicine I’d taken to battle back against a cold that wouldn’t end), I allowed my eldest son Jonah to convince me to buy a gingerbread house kit. Yeah, we’ve got time to stop everything else and put together a gingerbread house which likely won’t make it a full 24 hours without getting crushed or irreparably damaged by my 6-year-old son.
My kids just wrote their letters to Santa this past weekend, which means they just decided what single present they want from the big guy. (They didn’t want to give Santa a list of choices.) Jonah, clever child that he is, wrote his letter in secret, then sealed it and taped it closed and has been “checking” on it for the past few days — shocker, I haven’t yet mailed the letters — to make sure that neither The Spouse nor I have peeked at its contents. (Yes, it’s a test.)
Oh, and did I mention that Jonah’s indoor soccer league is extremely active (two, count ‘em, TWO games this past Saturday, scheduled several hours apart by the genius scheduling gods). My 9-year-old daughter’s basketball team has a game a week, one practice and a separate “open gym” time. AND The Spouse coaches both teams.
My father-in-law’s 75th birthday party – which most of his grown children are throwing for him – is this weekend. (We have neither purchased a gift nor bought the ingredients for the food we’re supposed to bring and make.)
My father just had knee replacement surgery, yet I’ve only been able to take the kids to see him once since his operation.
My daughter has a sleepover birthday party this weekend (she’ll attend after her grandfather’s party) for which I had to scurry to pick up a gift.
A church religious class just decided to do a holiday gift swap which will take place after the nativity play where my 9-year-old son will play the role of an inn keeper who denied Mary and Joseph lodging on the first Christmas Eve.
Despite my repeated distribution of salt all over our icy driveway and front walk, there remains a slushy snow/ice mixture that I haven’t had time to shovel away. And since The Spouse has been out most nights or is coaching one of his kids, the mess just refreezes every night. (I’m praying it will melt away.)
Our pantry is precariously barren. (How many consecutive nights can I serve breakfast for dinner before the child nutritionists descend upon my house?) Throw in the fact that it’s the end of the semester where I teach and the pressure is on to read dozens of papers and calculate grades, it’s no wonder I feel buried with stuff, domestic and professional.
In the winter issue of Hybrid Mom Magazine, a publication that emphasizes stories for down-to-earth moms both at-home and working, I wrote one of the lead stories on how to embrace the “Reason for the Season,” how to try to chill out and streamline your holiday “To Do” list while being realistic about what parents of small children can truly accomplish during this very busy time of year. I interviewed several women for the article, many of whom offered very sage advice. Unfortunately, I haven’t heeded a word of it.
So I face this choice: Either I just chill and let go of some of these tasks (For example, do we have to make everyone’s favorite Christmas cookie?), or I’m going to be in a distinctly bah humbug/Grinch state of mind until January while attempting to get everything done and done well. For the sake of my family and my own sanity, I chose Option #1.
Wednesday, November 7, 2007
Trivial Complaints from the Domestic Front
Various and sundry complaints from the home front, in no particular order:
Trivial Complaint #1: The youngest boy became extremely angry with me this morning after I made him take off a pair of khaki pants (the cuffs were miles from his shoes) and put on a different pair of khaki pants that actually fit him. In fact, he worked himself into such a frenzy of anger that he puked all over the carpeted stairs leading to the garage. Mere minutes before the school bus came. Then the little man proceeded to argue with me, saying he didn’t need a coat (it was in the 40s) because he was wearing a Patriots sweatshirt that would keep him warm. Arguing with a 6-year-old is a futile exercise. It makes one understand why, “Because I said so,” became a cliché.
Trivial Complaint #2: While trying to make a wholesome meal – roasted chicken with vegetables – the other night, I was having trouble extracting that vile bag of “giblets” from the bird. In fact, the bag broke and I had a tough time getting everything out while I muttered in frustration under my breath. In the meantime, the youngest boy thought the entire incident was cool, breathlessly telling his older brother, “Mom took the guts out of the chicken and then shoved a lemon up its butt.” For the record, only one of the three kids wound up eating the meal. I think that the “guts” and lemon-up-the-butt comments had a negative impact.
Trivial Complaint #3: When a young person who lives in my house leaves her belongings all over the joint, sheds items like sweaters or jackets wherever and whenever she sees fit, then (*shocker*) cannot find stuff that she needs (like an instrument for school) RIGHT NOW before the bus comes and blames everyone but herself, it doesn’t make me feel very cheery.
Trivial Complaint #4: After a dizzying few months of trying to simultaneously get all three kids to soccer games (some a 45-minute drive away from home) and to a bazillion practices (as if the kids are training for the Olympics and every practice is vital -- vital I tell you! – to their future success), I was just getting ready to breathe. Until The Spouse told me that my eldest son’s indoor soccer season is starting tonight, before the fall outdoor soccer season has finally come to an end. I think my head is going to explode.
Trivial Complaint #5: If I receive another stack of paper from my kids’ schools making pleas for me to provide free labor by working in the library or the computer room, asking for me to volunteer for yet another fundraising event, or to open my wallet (*again*) to buy junk I don’t need, I’m going to call Al Gore and report them for the unnecessary killing of trees for no good reason. I’m so inundated with fliers that I wind up tossing the entire pile into the recycling bin. Enough already!
Trivial Complaint #6: This is the third week in a row that one of my kids has had a half-day of school so that teachers can conduct parent-teacher conferences. This half-day-of-school business is terrible for working parents who carefully plan their work schedules. In fact, I had to take my youngest to work with me one day when, at the last minute, I couldn’t get babysitting for him. The Spouse worked from home to cover a half-day last week and my in-laws are going to (*hopefully*) cover the third half-day that occurs later this week. Question: Why are school schedules for young children so working-parent unfriendly? These half-days, they stink.
Trivial Complaint #1: The youngest boy became extremely angry with me this morning after I made him take off a pair of khaki pants (the cuffs were miles from his shoes) and put on a different pair of khaki pants that actually fit him. In fact, he worked himself into such a frenzy of anger that he puked all over the carpeted stairs leading to the garage. Mere minutes before the school bus came. Then the little man proceeded to argue with me, saying he didn’t need a coat (it was in the 40s) because he was wearing a Patriots sweatshirt that would keep him warm. Arguing with a 6-year-old is a futile exercise. It makes one understand why, “Because I said so,” became a cliché.
Trivial Complaint #2: While trying to make a wholesome meal – roasted chicken with vegetables – the other night, I was having trouble extracting that vile bag of “giblets” from the bird. In fact, the bag broke and I had a tough time getting everything out while I muttered in frustration under my breath. In the meantime, the youngest boy thought the entire incident was cool, breathlessly telling his older brother, “Mom took the guts out of the chicken and then shoved a lemon up its butt.” For the record, only one of the three kids wound up eating the meal. I think that the “guts” and lemon-up-the-butt comments had a negative impact.
Trivial Complaint #3: When a young person who lives in my house leaves her belongings all over the joint, sheds items like sweaters or jackets wherever and whenever she sees fit, then (*shocker*) cannot find stuff that she needs (like an instrument for school) RIGHT NOW before the bus comes and blames everyone but herself, it doesn’t make me feel very cheery.
Trivial Complaint #4: After a dizzying few months of trying to simultaneously get all three kids to soccer games (some a 45-minute drive away from home) and to a bazillion practices (as if the kids are training for the Olympics and every practice is vital -- vital I tell you! – to their future success), I was just getting ready to breathe. Until The Spouse told me that my eldest son’s indoor soccer season is starting tonight, before the fall outdoor soccer season has finally come to an end. I think my head is going to explode.
Trivial Complaint #5: If I receive another stack of paper from my kids’ schools making pleas for me to provide free labor by working in the library or the computer room, asking for me to volunteer for yet another fundraising event, or to open my wallet (*again*) to buy junk I don’t need, I’m going to call Al Gore and report them for the unnecessary killing of trees for no good reason. I’m so inundated with fliers that I wind up tossing the entire pile into the recycling bin. Enough already!
Trivial Complaint #6: This is the third week in a row that one of my kids has had a half-day of school so that teachers can conduct parent-teacher conferences. This half-day-of-school business is terrible for working parents who carefully plan their work schedules. In fact, I had to take my youngest to work with me one day when, at the last minute, I couldn’t get babysitting for him. The Spouse worked from home to cover a half-day last week and my in-laws are going to (*hopefully*) cover the third half-day that occurs later this week. Question: Why are school schedules for young children so working-parent unfriendly? These half-days, they stink.
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Three for Thursday: Chopsticks, Junie B. and Flex-Time
Item #1: Chopsticks. Everywhere.
If you asked any one of my three children why nearly all of the chopsticks in our house are scattered all over the place – on the garage floor, under the picnic table on the back deck, and underfoot in the family room – you would get a very simple response: “They’re not CHOPSTICKS! (*eyes rolling*) They’re magic WANDS!” (As in Harry Potter magic wands.)
To which my fruitless response has been: “Then make them MAGICALLY disappear!”
Item #2: Defending Junie B. Jones
Its parents like this, complaining in the New York Times, that just don’t get that the Junie B. Jones books is not s’posed to be grammaticly right. They are meant to be funny. And to make kids wanna read books ‘bout some real kid, like them.
Jeez.
Lie-ten up.
Item #3: Part-Time Shouldn’t Mean Sub-Standard
Citing a recent Pew Research Center study which found that 60 percent of working mothers would prefer to work part-time, “Perfect Madness” author Judith Warner asked in a New York Times op/ed this week why the American workplace doesn’t afford parents the ability to work part-time or flexible schedules without penalizing them with substantial pay and benefit
reductions.
“Only 24 percent of working mothers now work part-time,” Warner wrote. “The reason so few do isn’t complicated: most women can’t afford to. Part-time work doesn’t pay.”
“Feminists have long been leery of part-time work policies, which tend to be disproportionately used by women, mommy-tracking them and placing them at an economic disadvantage within their marriages and in society,” she said, adding that women have tried to forge their own work-family balances, but that this individualistic approach is simply not working.
E-mail Meredith
(Image from the Barnes & Noble web site.)
If you asked any one of my three children why nearly all of the chopsticks in our house are scattered all over the place – on the garage floor, under the picnic table on the back deck, and underfoot in the family room – you would get a very simple response: “They’re not CHOPSTICKS! (*eyes rolling*) They’re magic WANDS!” (As in Harry Potter magic wands.)
To which my fruitless response has been: “Then make them MAGICALLY disappear!”
Item #2: Defending Junie B. Jones
Its parents like this, complaining in the New York Times, that just don’t get that the Junie B. Jones books is not s’posed to be grammaticly right. They are meant to be funny. And to make kids wanna read books ‘bout some real kid, like them.
Jeez.
Lie-ten up.
Item #3: Part-Time Shouldn’t Mean Sub-Standard
Citing a recent Pew Research Center study which found that 60 percent of working mothers would prefer to work part-time, “Perfect Madness” author Judith Warner asked in a New York Times op/ed this week why the American workplace doesn’t afford parents the ability to work part-time or flexible schedules without penalizing them with substantial pay and benefit
reductions.
“Only 24 percent of working mothers now work part-time,” Warner wrote. “The reason so few do isn’t complicated: most women can’t afford to. Part-time work doesn’t pay.”
“Feminists have long been leery of part-time work policies, which tend to be disproportionately used by women, mommy-tracking them and placing them at an economic disadvantage within their marriages and in society,” she said, adding that women have tried to forge their own work-family balances, but that this individualistic approach is simply not working.
E-mail Meredith
(Image from the Barnes & Noble web site.)
Friday, July 13, 2007
Four for Friday: Summer of Potter, Anti-Princess Reading List, Part-Time Working Moms and Signed Books
Item #1: It’s the Summer of Potter (Continued)
The Harry Potter mania in my house continues unabated. Now that my nearly 9-year-old twins
have been sucked into the vortex that is Harry Potter, they are unstoppable reading machines.
Now, ordinarily, I’d be cheering this development. But, given that it’s summer and I want them playing outside – ACTIVELY PLAYING (so that they tire themselves out) – all of this reading is complicating things. Actually, it’s complicating one thing: Their nearly 6-year-old brother who can’t yet read. So while his siblings are engrossed in Harry, the little one gets frustrated and either picks fights with them or hounds me in my office. Thus, all-Potter-all-the-time doesn’t exactly bring a smile to my face. (I think I’m going to have to hide the books and extort their return in exchange for some whiffle ball games with their brother outside.)
Item #2: Anti-Princess Reading List
My editor Amy Keroes over at the Mommy Track’d web site – it features news, columns (including mine on TV, movies and media), tips, interviews and products aimed at working moms – has hit upon a genius idea. Tired of reading simply princess-oriented material to her young daughter, she decided to come up with a list of books with strong girl protagonists.
Currently the list contains 35 titles including: Harriet the Spy, Olive’s Pirate Party, Cowgirl Kate and Cocoa, Do Princesses Scrape Their Knees? and Winners Never Quit (by Mia Hamm).
Item #3: Part-Time Working Moms?
Currently the list contains 35 titles including: Harriet the Spy, Olive’s Pirate Party, Cowgirl Kate and Cocoa, Do Princesses Scrape Their Knees? and Winners Never Quit (by Mia Hamm).
Item #3: Part-Time Working Moms?
A new survey by the Pew Research Center of women’s attitudes toward work and parenthood has found that 60 percent of those polled would prefer to work part-time. This is a marked increase, according to news reports, from 10 years ago when only 48 percent of women found part-time work appealing.
Media coverage of the poll has varied in quality, with some highlighting the fact that 45 percent of men and 38 percent of women think that mothers are better off staying home and not working, while 35 percent of men and 46 percent of women think that moms working part-time is a better arrangement. “It turns out dads are more comfortable with those longer hours, with 72 percent saying full-time work for them is ideal,” reported the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
What did not get as much emphasis was the fact that many work-life analysts say that as work hours creep into what had previously been private, family time, the tension between home and work has grown so intense, that some mothers feel as though they have no choice but to either leave work or work part-time, in positions with little or no benefits, security and pay mere percentages of full-time employment. (Read some material from economist Heather Boushey for more on the media’s coverage of working moms and work.)
Item #4: Signed Copies of ‘Suburban Mom’ at Bellingham Barnes & Noble
Thanks to those who showed up at the book signing for The Book – A Suburban Mom: Notes from the Asylum – including my editor Heather Kempskie, from Parents and Kids, and my longtime buddies Kerry and Tim and their crew. There are still copies for sale at the Bellingham (MA) Barnes & Noble.
Thursday, June 21, 2007
Three for Thursday: Parenting Twins, Harry Potter Mania & Booster Seats
Item #1: Multiples Madness
The July issue of Parents and Kids focuses on the unique challenges of raising twins, triplets, quads, and “higher order multiples.” Included in the package is an essay from yours truly about what it’s like to parent grade school-aged twins.
In a word: Insane.
In three words: Lotsa coffee necessary.
Item #2: The Summer of Potter
Before the kids’ summer vacation commenced, I bought the first Harry Potter book with the notion that I’d read a little bit of the book aloud to the kiddos throughout the summer, mostly for the benefit of my soon-to-be 6-year-old who can’t yet read on his own but likes to be read “big kid” fare. But before I even had a chance to pick it up, my daughter Abbey decided to take a look at it on Monday. By Wednesday night, she was done. With a 300-plus page book. She’s 8.
Doing her best Rory Gilmore impression, Abbey had her nose in that book non-stop for three days. I was stunned. And even though I’m bursting with pride that she’s passionate about reading (just like her dear old ma), there were several times in the past few days when I had to literally grab the book out of her hands in order to make her do things like, oh, I dunno, eat and sleep.
When we were in a local bookstore yesterday to buy birthday presents for a friend whose party she’s attending later today, she begged me to buy the second book in the Potter series. And with Abbey’s twin brother Jonah now suddenly intrigued with tackling a Potter book (he previously thought it seemed too hard to read), I agreed.
It’s shaping up to be the summer of Potter.
Item #3: Booster Seats for Grade Schoolers
I expect that I’m one of a small group of parents of grade schoolers who still has my twin 8-year-olds sit in booster seats when they’re in vehicles. The American Academy of Pediatrics, recommends that kids sit in booster seats when they’re in vehicles until they’re 4’ 9” (usually between ages 8-12) in order to make sure that the seatbelts hit the kids on the right spots on their bodies (so the belts aren’t digging into the kids’ faces, necks, etc.). My kids aren’t quite that tall yet, so they still use booster seats for most trips, though, on some occasions — such as when The Spouse or I have forgotten to put the booster seats into one another’s vehicles — they do ride without them on short trips.
But the days of parents being able to use their discretion about booster seats may be numbered if a bill pending in the Massachusetts State Legislature passes and mandates booster seats. (Parents with kids riding sans the booster seats could be fined.)
I think booster seats are great ideas. They’re inexpensive. They’re easy to move to different vehicles, even though I sometimes forgets to do so. My family uses them because we think they work well for our kids. As a rule, I’m not one for the government sticking its nose into family lives. (See previous entries opposing banning smoking in cars with children present.) It’s one thing to mandate that babies be put in car seats because they are so very fragile, but mandating booster seats for grade schoolers goes just one step further than I’m comfortable with.
Give parents the information. Tell us why booster seats are a good idea. Disseminate that information and safety statistics through the school systems. Then let us decide. And, if the Massachusetts lawmakers are bored and looking for something to do, why don’t they pass the breastfeeding legislation?
E-mail Meredith
The July issue of Parents and Kids focuses on the unique challenges of raising twins, triplets, quads, and “higher order multiples.” Included in the package is an essay from yours truly about what it’s like to parent grade school-aged twins.
In a word: Insane.
In three words: Lotsa coffee necessary.
Item #2: The Summer of Potter
Before the kids’ summer vacation commenced, I bought the first Harry Potter book with the notion that I’d read a little bit of the book aloud to the kiddos throughout the summer, mostly for the benefit of my soon-to-be 6-year-old who can’t yet read on his own but likes to be read “big kid” fare. But before I even had a chance to pick it up, my daughter Abbey decided to take a look at it on Monday. By Wednesday night, she was done. With a 300-plus page book. She’s 8.
Doing her best Rory Gilmore impression, Abbey had her nose in that book non-stop for three days. I was stunned. And even though I’m bursting with pride that she’s passionate about reading (just like her dear old ma), there were several times in the past few days when I had to literally grab the book out of her hands in order to make her do things like, oh, I dunno, eat and sleep.
When we were in a local bookstore yesterday to buy birthday presents for a friend whose party she’s attending later today, she begged me to buy the second book in the Potter series. And with Abbey’s twin brother Jonah now suddenly intrigued with tackling a Potter book (he previously thought it seemed too hard to read), I agreed.
It’s shaping up to be the summer of Potter.
Item #3: Booster Seats for Grade Schoolers
I expect that I’m one of a small group of parents of grade schoolers who still has my twin 8-year-olds sit in booster seats when they’re in vehicles. The American Academy of Pediatrics, recommends that kids sit in booster seats when they’re in vehicles until they’re 4’ 9” (usually between ages 8-12) in order to make sure that the seatbelts hit the kids on the right spots on their bodies (so the belts aren’t digging into the kids’ faces, necks, etc.). My kids aren’t quite that tall yet, so they still use booster seats for most trips, though, on some occasions — such as when The Spouse or I have forgotten to put the booster seats into one another’s vehicles — they do ride without them on short trips.
But the days of parents being able to use their discretion about booster seats may be numbered if a bill pending in the Massachusetts State Legislature passes and mandates booster seats. (Parents with kids riding sans the booster seats could be fined.)
I think booster seats are great ideas. They’re inexpensive. They’re easy to move to different vehicles, even though I sometimes forgets to do so. My family uses them because we think they work well for our kids. As a rule, I’m not one for the government sticking its nose into family lives. (See previous entries opposing banning smoking in cars with children present.) It’s one thing to mandate that babies be put in car seats because they are so very fragile, but mandating booster seats for grade schoolers goes just one step further than I’m comfortable with.
Give parents the information. Tell us why booster seats are a good idea. Disseminate that information and safety statistics through the school systems. Then let us decide. And, if the Massachusetts lawmakers are bored and looking for something to do, why don’t they pass the breastfeeding legislation?
E-mail Meredith
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Okay, I’ll Just Admit That I Can’t Keep Up With Other Moms
Here are five random reasons:
1. I didn’t know that parents are expected to give end-of-the-year gifts to the school bus drivers. (Thankfully, my kind neighbor let me know that parents DO give end-of-the-year presents and offered buy one and let me give her cash later this week.)
2. I’m abundantly happy that tonight’s make-up soccer game for Abbey’s team was canceled. (We had a make-up game last night, have soccer “evaluations” – re: tryouts – tomorrow night, and the final game on Saturday morning. Last week, her team had soccer four out of five days.)
3. I have hardly any fresh food in the house. (The kids were actually begging for fruit and a “balanced meal” last night, after I drove the kids and myself a couple towns over so Casey could get his T-ball photo re-shot and before I dragged us all to Abbey’s soccer game. Don’t even ask me what I’ve packed them for lunches this past week. The contents would make their school nurse/nutritionist scream.)
4. There are five loads of clean laundry (washed by The Spouse) sitting, all wrinkled, on a sofa in the family room. (The only reason there aren’t four more loads sitting, likewise wrinkled, on my bedroom floor is because I finally got to folding them early this morning.)
5. There’s a new mirror, still in its packaging, that’s been sitting atop Jonah’s dust-laden bureau for several months. I just haven’t gotten around to putting it up.
E-mail Meredith
1. I didn’t know that parents are expected to give end-of-the-year gifts to the school bus drivers. (Thankfully, my kind neighbor let me know that parents DO give end-of-the-year presents and offered buy one and let me give her cash later this week.)
2. I’m abundantly happy that tonight’s make-up soccer game for Abbey’s team was canceled. (We had a make-up game last night, have soccer “evaluations” – re: tryouts – tomorrow night, and the final game on Saturday morning. Last week, her team had soccer four out of five days.)
3. I have hardly any fresh food in the house. (The kids were actually begging for fruit and a “balanced meal” last night, after I drove the kids and myself a couple towns over so Casey could get his T-ball photo re-shot and before I dragged us all to Abbey’s soccer game. Don’t even ask me what I’ve packed them for lunches this past week. The contents would make their school nurse/nutritionist scream.)
4. There are five loads of clean laundry (washed by The Spouse) sitting, all wrinkled, on a sofa in the family room. (The only reason there aren’t four more loads sitting, likewise wrinkled, on my bedroom floor is because I finally got to folding them early this morning.)
5. There’s a new mirror, still in its packaging, that’s been sitting atop Jonah’s dust-laden bureau for several months. I just haven’t gotten around to putting it up.
E-mail Meredith
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
There’s More to Life Than Chicken Fingers
When I took my 8-year-old daughter – one of two of my uber-finicky juvenile eaters – to a Japanese restaurant last week during a mother-daughter shopping/dinner expedition, I anticipated the gnashing of teeth and complaints of utter, cruel starvation upon learning that there were no chicken fingers on the menu. Despite my propaganda about how eating food she’d never tasted would be a great adventure, I fully expected that my little culinary experiment would fail miserably, thereby putting a taint on the delectable scallops teriyaki dish I’d been craving.
Except it didn’t fail.
Not only did Abbey thoroughly enjoy her “kid-sized” teriyaki steak and steamed vegetables, she even ate, and liked, the California rolls I ordered. And she said she couldn’t wait to return, but next time wanted to sit at the sushi bar to watch the chef make sushi right in front of her.
By the time we arrived back home, Abbey was so jazzed about trying different foods (as long as I promised she could have cereal later if she didn’t like the offerings) that she said she wanted to spend summer vacation trying and cooking foods from all over the world. However her two brothers – ages 8 and 5 – didn’t buy into the idea. Jonah, 8, suggested we eat only food that hailed from America, while tears actually gathered in Casey’s eyes at the prospect of going to a restaurant that did not serve mac-n-cheese or chicken fingers.
After years of catering to the lowest common denominator of my children’s gastronomical desires, I’ve decided things need to change and that The Spouse and I need to re-claim our family’s menu, even if it means putting up with some whining and the prospect of three children eating cereal for dinner for weeks if they don’t like what The Spouse and I put on the table.
I, however, am not alone. Writer David Kamp, in today’s New York Times, says that while having a children’s menu that offered kid-friendly standbys (chicken fingers, mac-n-cheese, burgers and grilled cheese) was comforting when he first became a parent, it now seems downright depressing. “It pains me that many children now grow up eating little besides golden-brown logs of kid food, especially in a time when the quality, variety and availability is better than ever,” Kamp wrote. “We accept that it’s bad not to read to young children lest it affect their ‘wiring,’ and that it’s bad to let them slack off on exercise lest their muscles not develop, but we’re kind of lazy on the palate front. And really, discovering new foods and flavors is one of the most delightful experiences that childhood can offer.”
I’m with Kamp. I’m going to make it a point to try this summer to get the kiddos – especially the youngest who won’t eat a vegetable except under extreme duress (we’ve considered enlisting Jack Bauer’s help in making the kid to eat his broccoli) – to be cuisine adventurers. Key word here: Try. Either this whole endeavor will be a resounding success, or our family will single-handedly pay for the cereal producers’ Christmas bonuses.
E-mail Meredith
Except it didn’t fail.
Not only did Abbey thoroughly enjoy her “kid-sized” teriyaki steak and steamed vegetables, she even ate, and liked, the California rolls I ordered. And she said she couldn’t wait to return, but next time wanted to sit at the sushi bar to watch the chef make sushi right in front of her.
By the time we arrived back home, Abbey was so jazzed about trying different foods (as long as I promised she could have cereal later if she didn’t like the offerings) that she said she wanted to spend summer vacation trying and cooking foods from all over the world. However her two brothers – ages 8 and 5 – didn’t buy into the idea. Jonah, 8, suggested we eat only food that hailed from America, while tears actually gathered in Casey’s eyes at the prospect of going to a restaurant that did not serve mac-n-cheese or chicken fingers.
After years of catering to the lowest common denominator of my children’s gastronomical desires, I’ve decided things need to change and that The Spouse and I need to re-claim our family’s menu, even if it means putting up with some whining and the prospect of three children eating cereal for dinner for weeks if they don’t like what The Spouse and I put on the table.
I, however, am not alone. Writer David Kamp, in today’s New York Times, says that while having a children’s menu that offered kid-friendly standbys (chicken fingers, mac-n-cheese, burgers and grilled cheese) was comforting when he first became a parent, it now seems downright depressing. “It pains me that many children now grow up eating little besides golden-brown logs of kid food, especially in a time when the quality, variety and availability is better than ever,” Kamp wrote. “We accept that it’s bad not to read to young children lest it affect their ‘wiring,’ and that it’s bad to let them slack off on exercise lest their muscles not develop, but we’re kind of lazy on the palate front. And really, discovering new foods and flavors is one of the most delightful experiences that childhood can offer.”
I’m with Kamp. I’m going to make it a point to try this summer to get the kiddos – especially the youngest who won’t eat a vegetable except under extreme duress (we’ve considered enlisting Jack Bauer’s help in making the kid to eat his broccoli) – to be cuisine adventurers. Key word here: Try. Either this whole endeavor will be a resounding success, or our family will single-handedly pay for the cereal producers’ Christmas bonuses.
E-mail Meredith
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