Lowes Build and Grow Project

Today we went over to Lowes to participate in the twice monthly Build and Grow Program. The Things had a great time, even though it was pretty crowded.
What I found most interesting was the different types of parenting styles that were present. There is the overly involved parent, the parent that did it all, the parent in the corner on their blackberry, and hopefully us, the ones in the middle, helping with the directions, but having the kid do the project.
Let me note, it isn’t like we don’t have faults as parents, big ones. I threaten my kids far too often to coerce them to behave, we all talk way to loud in public, and generally I swear like a sailor kids around or not.
Lets start with the let me do this for you mom next to me, I will call her the Star Bellied Sneech. The Star Bellied Sneech kept all the tools on her side of the work space, she read the directions and handled all the material while she had a conversation with her little Sneech. She multiple times told her Sneech to make sure he didn’t loose the nails, while she was busy nailing the project together. At the end of the project, she loudly stated what a great job he did with his project, while looking at me like we were now locked together in a secret world where her son actually did the project. When they left she asked for an extra project, apparently her ‘son’ had somehow hammered through the side of the plywood with a nail.
On the other side of me was Yurtle the Turtle. He let his daughter do the project, but god forbid she do something without first consulting him and then doing it his way and his way only. She had to repeat back the instructions, line up the nails precisely, let him review the work and then she could proceed. At one point his little turtle incorrectly hammered the nail in and he took the project apart and the process restarted. Honestly, this wasn’t an outrageous method; it just seemed really tedious and not very much fun. The project was completed and both Yurtle and his little Turtle departed, the little turtle seemed more excited by the patch than the project.
The Seussisms are ending here, I can’t think of anything witty for Blackberry dad. The guy sat off on the side for a hour while his kids, looking about 10 and 5 tried to figure and puzzle their way through the project. The parents near by helped, and defiantly the older helped the younger, but I hope this dad wasn’t thinking this was quality dad time. The kids at one point were tugging on his sweater to get his attention and he was far to engrossed to assist. There are a lot of possible reasons for this, the chief being there may have been a work issue that he had to deal with and at least the kids got to participate in the project instead of staying home in front of the tv, also a family issue could have been occurring. Ultimately though, to the parents two down from me who were not only helping their three build the project, but his two, it had to have been a bit bothersome.
Now for us or at least the interpretation of us I want to believe. I helped more than I should have, I read the directions and Thing One is capable. I aligned the nails, and pulled them out for them when then went in at the wrong angles. When Thing One ‘got tired’ I didn’t give in and made her keep at it until she hammered her finger, then I hammered the nail in the rest of the way, on only that one nail. Neither kid made the prettiest, cleanest looking pinball thing, but they did make them themselves and were excited by thier project, they are playing with them right now. I think both Things got tired of the directive to hold the hammer farther down, but nothing is perfect.
I realized as a parent that I did do one thing well today, I trusted The Things. At multiple points in the project the Things started to get frustrated and I held the project for them while they hammered. Let me say this again, I held the project steady while they hammered near MY FINGERS. I never said, don’t hammer me, but when they finished I always praised them for doing such a great job, and said a quiet blessing I was not cussing in pain. Today The Things learned they can hammer a nail, and finish a project with a little help, and I learned it is always best to give them a little trust without comment and see what happens.

Tattos: Your Ink and Your Kids

When I was 19 I got a tattoo, it is duck on my left shoulder. I love my duck and now have a ying yang surrounding the duck. For years whenever I taught swimming at least one kid would ask about it. They touched it, asked if it hurt when I got it, and would tell me they are going to get one or that their mom said bikers have tattoos. In an attempt to clean yesterday, I came across a picture Thing One told me months ago was going to be her tattoo when she got old enough. It is a huge multi colored cloud with paisleys and a ying yang in the middle, it is hideous.
I have always told the kids when they are 18 and have the money to pay for it themselves they are welcome to get a tattoo or do whatever it is they want with their bodies, but be warned, a tattoo is there forever. I think about all the people I watched get their tattoos that first and second year of college, it almost became something to do to prove your independence or coolness, I think about the rugby guys I played with wanting me to get some huge rugby scrum on my back, I think about all that and am thankful. I am thankful I got something with meaning to me, something relatively small and easy to hide, and something that I am not paying to remove right now. I was a bit of a dork for a bit by everyone’s standards because I waited so long to get mine, about 9 months after the rest of the gang got there’s, and I didn’t do it in the dorms but actually went to a reputable place.
I am watching people pay more that it cost to get a tattoo to have them removed, and I think how I can make the Things understand all this and the permanence of a tattoo, and do they really need to? Is this one of those mom things they will never hear you tell them about, and encourage them to do the opposite so they end up with a spider web on their face at 16? Is this something that discussing at 8 will fade in the 10 years it takes to get to 18? I am totally unsure.
I plan on getting more ink, not sure about the specifics yet but it will happen. I like my tattoo, and I want something I just need to find the right something. When I do get around to getting that tattoo I know all the questions will come up again, with new ones, like do people your age get tattoos. I don’t see this as one of those do as I say not as I do things. I see it more as what is the best choice for you and long term, what do you want on your body that represents you.
I know, I know, this won’t come up for years, but the Thing’s daycare has a lot of young women tattooing their bodies daily. Every few months some question comes about, why do tattoos hurt, why do you get one if they hurt, can they tattoo anything on a person, like swear words?
I may point them to the ugliest tattoos website, or tell them the stories of friends who have had tattoo nightmares, like the girl who got the Pieces symbol around her belly button and then got pregnant; her tattoo looked like spin art after. Though I will also tell them the right tattoo may help them always remember who they are and where they have been, too.
If you have any ideas for a new tattoo, or what the Things shouldn’t get at 18, let me know, and yes I need it touched up...

Mommy Guilt and Technology

OK, I know it seems like these two topics have next to nothing in common, but I promise I will try and bring them together as cohesively as possible.

Lets start with what is up right this minute; it is 5:30pm, I am in an empty house in my PJ's and I'm eating M & M dark chocolate candies. I am alone for the next 36 hours, why do you ask? My job, I work in information technology and am once again on a project that may see me swear at someone in upper management and totally make me feel like I am loosing my mind. I am spending most of the day tomorrow ensuring we are ready to start testing everything Monday and maintaining the time line I have committed to management we will meet. I am not thrilled about this, but I find a lot of satisfaction in learning a tool and being able to make it work in the way most people like. I like working, and doing something I feel is meaningful, I do not like not spending time with my kids to get that work done. I knew if I delayed our trip up to my parents yet again because of work, I would be at work pinning to get home to the kids and the kids would be making my husband NUTS.

I have mommy guilt, guilt that I haven't spent good quality time with the kids in the last week, guilt that my husband has had to pick up the slack, and guilt that there are days I am really glad I am going to get some time away...as anxious as it makes me to be away from them.

The mommy guilt train hasn't quite left that station yet though, a chief on-going level of my mommy guilt is my general disinterest is teaching the kids to be better with technology. Thing One and Two were probably the last of their friends to learn how to 'google' something, and rarely ever do they turn on the computer and get themselves all the way to a favorite game. We have bought an iPad and the point and click mentality of it has made it a lot easier for me to let go and let the kids play without my assistance. Now if you think I am doing this because I am concerned about content or something of the like, you're wrong. I do it because I don't want my PC to get messed up so I, or the hubs more than likely, have to fix it. I work in technology, I grew up with technology, but I hate dealing with it at home. Most of the people I work with are passionate about various forms of technology and have terabytes of crap at their homes, building their own DVRs and PCs, not me. If I can't plug and play it, screw it. If the kids mess with the setting and the PC blows, I am more likely to look into buying a new one than fighting it out with what I have, thankfully the hubs will fight it out, though he isn't a techie by nature either.

So instead of pulling out the energy efficient house science project Thing One spent all her Christmas money on, I am all for a round of Angry Birds, Lego car tracks or a scooter ride, anything but reading a manual and trying to figure out how to make it work. I know that an in depth knowledge of technology can only help them, but I just can't seem to muster the push to do it, and I feel guilty. I know enough to teach them the basics, get the supplies and help them build a PC, though I have cracked a few processors in my time, I just have no interest.

When I was 21, 8 million years ago, I received a laptop/word processor from my parents for my birthday. Inside was a note, go forth and become the techno weenie we know you can be, I laughed, there was no way I was going to be near a computer once I got out of school, I was going to work with people and make a difference. I still work with people, but the focus is the technology and computers and delivering the service to the customer. The basics my parents taught me before I left their house, helped me get a job years later and set the path I am on now, even geeks need administration, was what a friend said when I wondered how I was ever going to get a job with a Recreation Administration Masters. So here I sit with my free time, typing into the techno verse instead of the knitting or the paper scrap booking projects piled up around me, here I sit when the kids tug on my arm to play a computer game and I don't want to scan the site to see if there are any viruses on it. I hope like me they learn the people side before the computer side, but the mommy guilt is still there. Still haunting me....though hopefully the cider I am drinking will make it a little less and the Huck Finn existence they experience at my parents house makes the occational weekend mommy can't spend with them OK.

And yes I still have the paper...but when I replaced it with this one in my office I knew the prophocy had been foretold

Making a Connection..

I have to admit to a bit of an obsession...crafts with the kids. I love to go through magazines and look for that one thing that the kids will get excited to do with me. This week I found this, http://cookiesandcups.blogspot.com/2011/01/popcorn-cake.html.

I am totally tempted to do this with the kids, and the recent family fun magazine had an absolute TON, of activities.

Why then, do you ask that I am not a Target like store picking up supplies as we speak...

Neither kid seems all that into the craft thing right now...sign

I recently organized thier school art supplies, and though they love it, they see it less as a fun way to do art and more as a way to make sure we are not on thier asses about cleaning up.

Where am I going with this is, what are the things you do to make a connection with your child...where do you meet them? What are your passions that you want to share with them?

I love to read and though Thing One struggles, I fully expect her to eventually develop the love and I CAN'T WAIT. I am so excited to share with her the books I love and connect with, insert any Lucy Maud Montgomery book here. When Thing Two gets there with reading I fully expect SciFi discussions about what is feasible and what is a total joke that the author knows is unreal. But what if, what if reading is somthing they despise, and so is crafts, and geocaching and all the other things we love to do..

Pursuing whatever the Things are into is totally good with me, right now, but what happens down the road? How many parents are into something only so long as thier Things are in the house, or unable to get themselves to and from the acitivy. I want to be relevant in thier lives, to be a person beyond when they live here, to be thier champion.

Is that somethign that you can plan and implement when they are young, I am totally unsure?

Mommy Mentors

I know this is a shout out to moms and it is no where near mothers day, but to hell with it we all need some props.

Do you have any mommy mentors??
You know those moms that throw you a line, or a thermos of wine on those days when you are sure you can't do it right, or can't seem to decide what is the best choice for you and yours. These women are not always moms, and not always married, sometimes they are just the friend that tells you to pull my head out and breath, and sometimes it is the message board friend I have never met telling me it will all be ok.
I have these women in my life. I these women save me..
The mom who insisted on taking me out to lunch, out of the hospital, when my first born was in the NICU, the one who came and ate at the hospital with me. The friend who shares her marriage woes no matter how crazy so that I feel less crazy. The mom that told me it was ok to feed my son a bottle when I hadn't slept in three days, and the mom who told me my son reminded her of her oldest who had ADHD.
In the last month or so I have been over-using a lot of my mommy mentors to deal with Thing One and Two and what is the best choices for them. I have been emailing, calling and chattering incessantly trying to figure out what will work best and what to fight for. I realized something in all this, even though the final decision about what to do is mine, all these moms are sharing their personal experiences with me to help make me a better person.
Being a mentor can be tough, sometimes you have to give advice to a friend knowing they may take it and do it, and something won't go the way you expect. Giving advice, having it followed, and it not working can be difficult, for the person giving and receiving. Then I think about all those women who went out on a limb for me. I think about all those women telling me their stories, making their lives open books. They do not dictate or tell me what I should do or how I should do it, they tell their story and give me their action and the reason for it. I adore these women, I may not see or talk to them much and they may only come through my life in snippets, but they are the women I will fell indebted to for life.
Am I a mentor?
I hope so..
I want to be that for some other mom, say the hard thing, listen to the tough story.
I just need to learn to listen more and talk less.

Reboot for a New Week

We had friends in town this weekend, so after a very full week with a vendor on site for me, a doctor appointment for Thing two, a few colds and just keeping the regular stuff running it; we had to clean the house and host some folks.
TOTAL TANGENT: My old cranky cat is sleeping on the sofa arm chair and our year old boxer is trying to start a fight by growling and mini barking at her from across the room, the dog is obsessed!!!!!
Now back to your regular scheduled rant to the universe. We bought an iPad, so far Angry Birds is way more popular than the math and grammar apps, but being able to say do one and you can do the other is really good. Hopefully the interest in it will maintain. The number of Apps out there to help Thing One are impressive. I am just not always sure which ones are the best ones and which are crap.
Thing Two started his ADHD meds this weekend also. Generally he seems calmer and less manically happy. There have been a few emotional outbursts but I can't be sure those aren't from lack of sleep due to playing with house guests. I hope the meds do what they want and don't change his personality. I guess I worry about it because that is what everyone else is telling me is a concern of theirs, not that I have seen any research that it really changes personality. I still want to beautiful, funny little nut job, just not so crazy I want to hang him outside by his sneakers.
On the Thing One front the school wants to do a 504 and most of the people I am asking for advice are recommending a IEP. I am going to find out the guidelines for an IEP vs 504 and then make the call, but more and more I just don't trust the school personnel to have her best interest. I used to always believe that schools always really cared and just wanted the best, I have come to doubt that. I feel highly uneducated on these issues and constantly struggle with when to say yes, this is what she needs and when to say NO and you need to make this right. All I want is what is best for her, to allow her to succeed and do what she wants. I know that is most parents desires and constant adjustment is needed in their lives and ours to achieve it, I just struggle and hate it.
As a child I thought all the "adult" things seemed so easy: marriage, job, kids; I can't be that hard, man was I naive..
Oh well another week another set of chaos, at least no vendors for either of the adults this week, though now the rubber has hit the road with my project and I only have two development weeks to get the basics configured. There is so much in all these pieces we perform in our lives I have no idea how we all keep is straight.

Another week..Comings and Goings

Another week has passed and once again I am facing the weekend with questions, research needs, and a general malaise.
In the last few months the kids have dropped one activity and are on the way to dropping another. Until the last planned drop is done it just seems like there is never enough time. This week Tae Kwon Do considered testing the Things for their next belt. Never mind neither had gotten a stripe of accomplishment on any of the things to be tested. Then the idea came up, if they get stripes and are really viable to test, do we drop an activity for the week so they are better prepared for their test, and then how do we organize those comings and going. It seems everything always centers around transportation and time, it rules the house and our world.
We met with the company that will be starting Thing Ones foundational learning tutoring. The chief questions besides money were transportation. Who can we get to do what, how, when, what works best. Then they throw the ringer, really tutoring once in school should be twice a week...We are intentionally dropping things to lighten the schedule and now, it is tutoring on One twice a week, which two will have to be with me at, and Tae Kwon Do twice a week. There goes the idea of having a relaxing night a few nights a week.
As an adult who once had friends and could go out, spend time with them, talk to them, and generally be a good friend; these comings and goings are killing me. At what point can I go out with a girlfriend for a drink, hit up and after work band camp', go play on the IT indoor soccer team. I feel so overwhelmed coming and going I no longer have a life of my own. I feel like a crappy friend and a crappier human being. At some point very soon there will be no more need for comings and goings, and then where will I and all the moms like me be. Hopefully the rest of my friends are in the same spot and won't hate me when I can see again.
I love and miss you all, but the comings and going have consumed me.....


PS On a side note I have been doing quite a bit of research on assisted technology for learning disabilities and really am liking this idea. I am incredibly close to buying Thing One and iPad and getting her Apps that help with process output. I have to say, I love the idea of adaptive technology that fuses with what is already out there being used in education..