Pure Bliss

The Performance

So the other day BioMom was in a dilemma, and I'm curious as to how you parents out there in the Blogsphere would react to this situation.

A local high school has these amazing summer classes for kids. They are inexpensive three hour classes that go Monday through Thursday for grades K-8 on a variety of topics from "gooey treats" to "la crosse" to "hollywood" to "rocket making". In short, a super opportunity for kids and parents alike!

Last week, Nine was signed up for two dramaish classes, one in the morning and one in the afternoon.

She was in heaven.

She and I have reached the honeymoon-is-over stage of summer where I have gotten entirely sick of picking up after her and attempting to entertain both a nine year old and a three year old, and she is tired of all of my boring adultish jokes and lame attempts at creating fun experiences:

Me: Baba's takin' us to the zoo tomorrow, zoo tomorrow, zoo tomorrow!

She: NOT THE ZOO AGAIN!!!!! What will we DOOOOO there?

So, off she went.

The problem with the dramaish classes, is that there is a performance at the end of the week.

I say "problem" because I'm a bad parent.

To me, the "performances" defeat the purpose: stretches of time away from each other.

And with TWO dramaish classes, that means one "performance" at 11:30 and another at 3:00.

So now, BioMom's dilemma: She had a long meeting scheduled last Thursday, to go from 2:00 p.m. indefinitely. So she decided to take the morning off to a) let me have a little free time and b) spend some quality time with the kids. Big and I had already planned on joining little nature kids club that was heading out to the Arboretum, and then make it back in time for the second of Nine's two performances.

So, BioMom had to choose: either come with us, or go to Nine's first performance.

She was torn. And, of course, Nine's "YOU NEVER COME TO ANY OF MY PERFORMANCES!!!" rant didn't help.

I didn't help either, pushing her to come with me. In my opinion, one of us getting to one of the performances was good enough.

So what's your take on attending all kids' EVERYTHING? Is it important to go to as many events, however small, as possible?

My 1950's-Era brother was in town last weekend, and he reminded me that we were lucky if our parents made it to state track, so with his opinion cataloged, I open it up to you:

What do you do?

Junipers

At Camp Du Nord, Big enjoyed his first requited friendship(s). There was a set of twin boys that enjoyed him as much as he enjoyed them.* Their parents told us that each morning they would wake up and exclaim that they wanted to see "[Big"]!

It was there that I realized how lucky we were to have only one boy at a time.

I could not imagine two of Big, joining their heads to create increasingly dangerous challenges for each other.

Those boys (who happen to live quite close to us and so, as a consequence, we are able to see in our post-Du Nord life), plus the addition of Cousin's seven year old boy in our life, has open the "world-of-boydom" to Big who had, heretofore, mainly been exposed, through his sister's friends, our mainly female-spawned neighborhood, his two mothers, and our family's two female cats, girls.

One consequence of his exposure to this new world, is that he has become incredibly silly. He uses silly words, sings silly songs, dances silly dances.

But most of all, his extreme physicality and growing sense of humor has translated into a unique facial intensity that is often hilarious, sometimes maddening, but nearly always surprising.

On one occasion, we were recently visiting my family in Omaha. At one point, I found myself chatting to my cousin and his wife, and their girl, also a three-year-old. She was lovely. Sitting near her parents, enjoying the conversation. Clean.

They asked "Where's [Big]? We'd love to see him again?"

I spent a bit of time locating him (apparently he had been exploring the greater Omaha metropolitan area by this time) and dragging him back into the fold.

He was dirty (sweat, dirt, food, and maybe even a bit of blood), reluctant, resistant, and resentful, his play disrupted by me for something he deemed unimportant: meeting family.

He pointed to their girl "What number is she?"

I interpreted: "She is three, like you!"

Him: "I'm bigger!"

My cousin's wife gave him the slightest encouragement to stand up next to their daughter, and he rushed up, chin held high and on tippy-toes to prove it.

Next was the meeting of my quite elderly aunt who was so lovely to stop and ask about Big.

She: "My husband's name is [Big]! And so was his father's!"

Big literally went, in one split second to having a nice, presentable smile on his face to the meanest, nastiest, scrunched up scowl that I could ever imagine. It was so impossibly bizarre that neither me nor my aunt knew what to do, so we just laughed and sent Mr. Hyde running.










*Until now, he has had only unrequited friendships: either he has really liked someone (like the girl down the street that tolerates him, but WAY prefers Nine, or the younger boy up the street that enjoys him, but who he regularly and loudly exclaims that he "hates" for no reason other than that he is younger and smaller.)

An Explanation for Attentive Parenting

Check out this blog column (Greg Mankiw is an economist and textbook writer--the book we are currently using) via Taggert at A Random Walk. It references a paper that attempts to explain the increase in attentiveness among parents.

The punch line?

Competition for college admissions.

Read that, instead of the old craw "this will stay on your PERMANENT record" parents are now using the verbal stick "you won't get into any decent college with THOSE [fill in the bad habit du jour] skills!"

Out of the Fog and Into the Fire

So I just finished up with a big work-push and am heartily prepared to fully enjoy the rest of the summer--at least until class prep has been put off long enough.

I hadn't done a whole lot of academic work since Big was born and decided, in one fell swoop, to make up for it by presenting three papers at a conference in the end of June.

Needless to say, it was quite an effort to prepare for the talks. But Boston was amazing, and I visited some old friends in Brooklyn.





The following is more evidence of recent summer adventures with Cousin and the family, and what will follow in blogs to come are more assertive efforts to maintain regularity.

Peppers


Seasalt


This year's paltry cherry crop

Notes from Camp Du Nord

We just got home from Camp Du Nord, a YMCA family camp.

It was amazing.





"Frogs Dig Pink"


"The Big One"


"North, Northwest"


"Into the BWCA, at least for an hour"

Here is the mission of the camp:


The mission of Camp du Nord is to strengthen families by providing opportunities for individual and family growth, supporting spiritual development and enhancing environmental awareness in a wilderness setting. Guided by this mission, our programs seek to:

• Enrich family life and inter-family relationships;

• Develop new insights and understanding between family members;

• Encourage awareness of the natural world and strengthen appreciation for wilderness;

• Encourage spiritual growth and renewal in a wilderness setting.

I don't mean to be cheesy about it, but it was all that and more. I will write more, but wanted to post some pictures.

Pre-Metamorphosis

Burnt Marshmallows and Unconditional Love

My mom died when I was nine.

That morning, when my older brother told me that she had passed, a gloomy Friday in October, remains one of the single most defining moments of my life.

All of my memories huddle around that bold line: before and after.

Cousin and I will recount doings from our childhood and know our age based on if my mom was around in our memories. As in, "how old were we when we had that sleepover on your backporch and we pulled my cat up in a bedsheet?" "Oh, we must've been eight because that was when mom and dad were on vacation and I was staying with you."

I mark time by that day.

Once eighteen, I had been living longer without her than with her.

On the 25th anniversary (again, I am always surprised at the passage of time without her), I planted a cherry tree in the front yard (see it below a little five years later--it actually produces yummy sour cherries!).



And this past year, when I turned 39, now with children of my own, ironically aged 3 and 9, I had lived (survived?) an astonishing 30 years without my mother.

Lately, in my rush toward middle age, I have been urgently, literally and metaphorically cleaning out the deadwood in my life.

We have this hedge in the backyard that you can see from space.

I mean that. I checked it out on Google Maps.

Anyway, the hedge had gone for for years without much attention. An annual trimming here or there, but no real clearing of the deadwood. No raking of the dead leaves. No opening, no renewing.

This year, I find myself inside the hedge. Tugging out the dead, opening up space for new growth. Bagging lots of leaves.

We had about 10 bags of lawn waste the other day about which neighbors commented relentlessly.

At a little BBQ, I began burning some of this wood. The pieces are awkward, bent and ill-fitting in the little firepit, so I have to be on constant vigilance, hand on hose, for stray fires in the surrounding area.

We had s'mores at the end of the night, for Big, his first. He loved the combination of fire, hot marshmallows, melted chocolate and graham crackers.

As I toasted his, I remembered my mom fawning over the most charred ones, gobbling up all of my mistakes as though I had produced a Renoir or a short story by Tillie Olsen for her to savor.

Then it dawned on me: she couldn't have loved my charred marshmallows. . . At least not at the Taylorist, scientific management rate at which I produced them.

She just loved me and eating those blackened marshmallows was just one of the many gifts she gave me during our short time together.

So here is a toast to all those mothers out there who are eating burnt marshmallows, or chewing ABC gum, or enjoying open-mouthed-snotty kisses (BioMom got one of those this morning!) or faking surprise at breakfast-in-bed, or sacrificing their alone time, or putting off their careers to spend time with their kids when they are young, or pining for dandelion bouquets and all of the other small and large sacrifices that translate into small and large gifts that may not go appreciated until they grow up and stop to recognize what had been given.

My Woman

Sorry for the lack of posts. I've been suffering from some sort of midlife trauma that has taken me off course. Cousin is here now though and life seems to be moving back to some sort of normal, whatever that is.

Yesterday Nine, Big and I wandered over to our local coffee shop for French Sodas (them raspberry and cherry and me cherry/lime) when Big noticed a dalmation and his pal with their human owners a couple of tables down.

Big: Are those guys yours?

The stranger: Yeah. Is that woman yours? (pointing at me)

Big: Yeah. That's my woman!

I was surprised. He often identifies me as a boy. . .

Pulling Her Leg: My Response

Easter Morning, April 2009
Dear [Nine]:

Thank you very much for your letter, dated April 10, 2009. I do often receive letters such as your own, so please forgive me if I provide my pat answers to your questions. There are, as you can imagine, many many children with questions such as your own.

Your first question is apparently, of high concern among children, particularly children from Western countries like the United States of America. I am curious about this. Are you, somehow, insecure about whether or not you have behaved naughtily throughout the past year? Do you fear that you, somehow, deserve rocks in your Easter Basket?

I, in fact, do not deliver rocks to naughty children. Even us bunnies realize that all children are both naughty and nice to varying degrees at different times. Furthermore, such behavior is often precipitated by choices made by the parents. Did you ever, as an example, read the book Charlie and the Chocolate Factory? Do you remember the character Veruca Salt? Veruca, the only daughter of the wealthy Henry and Angina Salt, regularly exerts petulant behavior in order to get what she desires. When Veruca demands that she must have a Golden Ticket, her father buys numerous cases of Wonka Bars, and orders his factory workers to put aside their regular duties of peanut-shelling and unwrap the bars. The process lasts three days, all of which Veruca spends complaining that she doesn't have her ticket. When the ticket is finally found, Veruca is "all smiles again." Her father later confesses to Wonka that he knows his daughter is "a bit of a frump." So you can see, even spoiled little boys and girls deserve a chocolate on Easter.

You can decipher for yourself if I find you and your brother to be naughty or nice.

Do bunnies like carrots? Indeed, we do enjoy carrots. The story of Peter Rabbit and his trials and tribulations with Farmer McGregor were all true. We risk life and limb to acquire the tasty delicacies of fresh fruits and vegetables from people’s gardens. If only we were served or had the means to pay for such vegetables at the upscale groceries that cater to humans like yourself. Alas.

Why do humans dye eggs? Why is Easter in spring? Did Jesus die and rise again? Why are you the symbol of Easter? Did they have the seasons back then? I put all of these questions together because they are inextricably linked.

The Easter Bunny as a symbol has its origins in Alsace Germany where it was first mentioned in German writings as early as the 1600s. Why rabbits though? Well, rabbits are symbols of fertility (ask your parents what that means) from a long long time ago. Since birds lay eggs and rabbits give birth to a large number of babies at one time in the early spring, these (both eggs and bunnies) became symbols of the rising fertility of the earth at the Vernal Equinox (this just means the beginning of spring). So you can see, your questions are perfectly related as Easter, bunnies, eggs, renewal and the changing of the seasons are all intertwined.

Bunnies, then were symbols of spring when the celebrations were very different sorts of celebrations than they are now with, as you said, a link to the death and rise of Jesus. The celebration of spring was and still is, for some, what is known as a Pagan holiday – that is one without explicit religious connotations. People around the world, for all times have created celebrations around the changing of the seasons. In the fall, people celebrated the harvest and the beginning of winter, with days getting shorter and the cold weather and lack of abundant food. As spring comes, people celebrate rejuvenation, and life, and abundance. The ancient Saxons celebrated the return of spring with an uproarious festival commemorating their goddess of offspring and of springtime, Eostre.

So, now, on to eggs. Eggs, too, are a celebration of fertility that is quite separate from the life and death of Jesus. The precise origin of the ancient custom of coloring eggs is not known. Many eastern Christians to this day typically dye their Easter eggs red, the color of blood, in recognition of the renewal of life in springtime. Some also used the color green, in honor of the new foliage emerging after the long dead time of winter.

As for your question about Jesus. I cannot, unfortunately, answer this for you as it is a personal question of your faith and beliefs.

As for my life before obtaining this post as the Official Easter Bunny. I was born of meager means in the southern tip of Albania in a small town outside of Saranda near the Greek island of Corfu on the Ionian Sea, in the late Twentieth Century. I studied hard at school and was quite diligent in my duties at home in my community. I never expected to be assigned to this post as an adult, but am very grateful for the opportunity. It is an arduous task with long hours, particularly in the months of February, March and April, but, certainly, when I receive letters such as yours, the rewards are immeasurable. I will pass on this post in two years time and go back to my life with my family (I have approximately 1,326 children of varying ages).

Good luck young [Nine],

E. B.

Who is Pulling Whose Leg Now?

We are not parents who never lie to their kids.

Particularly in the realm of the holiday fantasies.

So Nine is now, clearly at a precipice. Not exactly sure what to do with her questioning and her hopes for all things Easter Bunny, Santa, Tooth-Fairy and the like.

Today she has left said Bunny a note, with the hopes of some clarification. The note reads as follows (I have not altered anything in any way to protect the innocent or her spelling concerns):

Saturday April 10, 2009
Dear Mr. Easter Bunny,
I have a couple of questions for you. Do you bring rocks to the naughty children? If so would you bring them to us? I hope not! Do bunnys really like carrots? Or is it just a symbol? Why do we dye eggs? Why is easter in spring? Did Jesus die and rise again in spring? Did they have the seasons back then? Why are you the symbol of easter? What was your life like before you were the "Easter Bunny"?

Love,
[Nine].

At this point, I feel somewhat compelled, in my response, to forge ahead with thoughts of our future relationship. The one that I intend to enjoy with her when she is, say, 16 or 17 when all veils are lifted and we can laugh a bit about life together over, say a cup of coffee, or later at age 25 over a gin and tonic. I feel a sort of pressure to make a humorous lasting impression, not unlike the feeling of the first day of a semester when one hopes to be compelling, challenging, interesting AND someone the students would like to befriend at some point after their grades had been long turned in.

I am reminded of one This American Life story in which a young woman recalls her long-held belief that their neighbor was the tooth fairy. (If you're interested, it is a fantastic episode. Check it out here: Kid Logic.

All this is to say that we are going to great lengths to respond, write, legitimize and, ultimately, print in some exacting way, a letter from said Bunny.

Potential

Followup to the Blockbuster Incident

So yesterday I was interested in getting the new movie Bolt for the kids, and, to be honest myself, and was preparing to head back to the local movie peddler early enough to actually get a copy of the popular movie before the weekend started.

Big was actually paying attention to me when I gave him the "Dora Map" overview of the things I had hoped we would accomplish yesterday, and absorbed the full meaning of going to the movie store.

His response? In a sadistic tone, with slim, slanty eyes he said:

I'm gonna get some candy at the movie store.

What am I in for with this one?

Our Friends in Greece

Check out their blog designed, organized, and written by their daughter.

Touching the Butt at Blockbuster

So I just got back from a little errand for a Saturday Night movie from Blockbuster.

I took Big because he took the longest nap on the planet today and we were hoping to do the bait-and-switch with Nine, getting her to bed before him as she was MORE than ready.

Knowing what was in store, I spent at least 3/4 of the drive preparing him for the inevitable onslaught of sugary delectables that would entice, but which would, ultimately be denied.

To be clear: I was not going to buy any candy.

It all started out great. We looked around for movies, ran into a few friends (one of whom hilariously confused me for a different lesbian in one of his ECFE classes --"Didn't you move?" and then analogized with an episode from The Office in which a guy actually marked an Asian woman at a party that he was interested in, in order to not confuse her with the other Asian woman at the party).

We got to the infuriatingly long line, which left too much time to check out all of the glorious sugary goodness that shouted out to us: ME! PICK ME!! ME!

Apparently they shouted out to Big in a louder voice. He started opening a sucker.

Me (panicking slightly): Mr. [Big]. If you open that we will leave immediately. do not open that.

That time it worked. I literally think I said "Thank God" aloud.

Then he moved on to one of those push-up suckers and opened it as quickly as he possibly could and shoved it into his mouth.

I thought to myself F($*&#K. Now I have to follow through. How long can one damn line be? And is this movie WORTH it?

And then remembered why we never take him anywhere.

I grabbed him and in as composed of a voice and demeanor as I could muster, seriously put the candy on the counter (okay, slammed): That's it. We're buying it and you're going to watch me throw it away.

In my head I added: Out of your COLLEGE FUND, MISTER! And that one FRIGGIN dollar would have added up to at LEAST FIVE in this market by the time you'd have been eighteen -- IF, that is, you even GET there at this rate!

He: Screams.

Me, not exactly mortified, but attempting to wait patiently in line as though I don't have a dejected three-foot monster clinging to my knees and yelling BABA! BABA! WHY DID YOU SAY NO, BABA? WHYYYYYYYYY? I DON'T WANT YOU TO SAY NO!!! at the top of his lungs.

Me, incredibly calm, but bracing. Acid beginning to leak out of my stomach lining.

He: But... I'M HUNGRYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!

The gal at the counter looked on understandingly and said that we didn't need to purchase the candy.

Me: Yes.

She: Should I just throw it away?

Me: No.

She checked us out and I walked around the side of the counter. The line was no less long as when we began.

Me, kneeling and in a very low, very serious tone (and I need to be clear here, I did NOT have my fingers wrapped tightly around his upper arm as my mom CERTAINLY would have at this point. See? I am growing up!): [Big], I warned you that we weren't going to have any candy from here. We're going home and having some ice cream. But no candy here. You didn't listen to me and I need to throw this away.

We walked out holding hands.

Me: Anticipating a G&T.

Him: Trusting me a bit more.

At least I hope.

Girl-On-Girl GOP Catfight!

Yum.

Check out this great synopsis and analysis By Dahlia Lithwick of the McCain, Coulter, Ingraham drama that has been replayed over and over on every media outlet possible.

A couple of choice quotes for your perusal:

Ever wonder why some men think women are less than serious political thinkers? It certainly helps explain why so many men continue to believe that when it comes to "political discourse," women are all long, sprawling legs and silky blond hair in a tangle on the dessert cart. It's one thing to air your dirty laundry. But are we really stupid enough to be having a front-page battle over a plus-size thong?

And:

McCain's problem isn't her weight, or her views, or even the fact that she doesn't know a lot. It's that she suddenly holds a rather enormous megaphone without understanding that the person most likely to be smacked on the head with it is herself.

The Food Experiment Continued: Article from Good Housekeeping

My Sister-in-Law sent us the article "the Junk Food Gene" from the March 2009 issue of Good Housekeeping.

In response to a woman's worry about her eight-year-old daughter's obsession with chocolate, a doctor responds:
"'On your way home, stop at the store and buy enough chocolate to fill an entire kitchen cabinet. In your kitchen, designate one cabinet The Chocolate Cabinet and fill it to overflowing with the chocolate you bought. Now tell your daughter that this is hers and hers alone. Tell her that she can eat as much of it as she wants and that you will fill it back up when the cabinet gets even a tiny bit empty. Do not criticize her. Do not watch her with hawk eyes. And make sure that cabinet is brimming with chocolate. Wait three weeks, and then let me know what happens.'"

Fast forward three weeks.

"'When I first told Gracie about the new plan, she didn't believe me. She waited until I left the kitchen, and then she plowed through the contents of her cabinet before I could change my mind. I filled up that cabinet four times that first week (with gritted teeth, I admit). But when Gracie realized I was not going to criticize her and that I was absolutely serious about letting her have as much as she wanted, she ate less and less. By the second week, I only had to buy a little chocolate, and by the third week, none at all. She is more relaxed around food. She is losing weight. I am a chocolate-cabinet convert!'"

The author replies:
It's not about the food. Although the chocolate-cabinet idea was radical, I was almost positive that what Gracie wanted wasn't candy. She wanted her mother's (positive) attention. She wanted her mother to trust her. But mostly, she wanted to believe in and trust herself, and the only way she could do that was first learning those skills from her mother. The drama around food and weight gain was the language that Gracie was using to communicate with her mother. The real issue is never about food.

And here's more:
Mothers from around the world ask her: "How do I best love my child when it comes to food? What will help her the most?"

And she responds: "'Attend to your own relationship with food first.'"

"And ask yourself this question: If you could fill a cabinet with anything--food, attention, time--what would it be? Chances are, it won't be chocolate. Commit to being lavish with yourself with what you really need. As you do that, you will become a living example of self-care and trust and love. You will be who you want your children to become. Believe me, they'll notice.'"

Why it Would Suck to be an Academic's Daughter: Part 1 of 10,572

You didn't know a bear could be cute, did you?

Irresistable Subjects

39 Months and 5 days: Touching the Butt

I am finally getting around to reading my borrowed copy of Your Three Year Old: Friend or Enemy that I got about a month ago from Catherine.

From the prologue, I can tell you I'm already fearing three-and-a-half, but for now, Big is true to the description:

"Three now enjoys other children, but most of all he enjoys his [Baba]. He loves to do things with her--go for a walk, go to the store, 'help' with housework, and, above all, play. He is happiest when his [Baba] finds it possible to give up other activities and concentrate on him. Almost anything the two of you do together bring him joy. It is bliss to have [Baba] read to him, play games with him, talk to him, just be near him."

Can I freeze time?

Even as I read this, not focusing on him, but stealing time to blog, he is near me playing well enough alone, but asking for my help. In a few minutes he'll be by my side, a small foot digging into my leg, wanting to be touching. If the leg is not enough, he'll roll his whole body into mine and rub his face on my face.

It is like new love and spring and hot baked bread out of the oven all wrapped up together.

At night, when I'm walking out of his room after the bedtime routine, we have a little game that prolongs our time together:

Me: I love you!

He: I love you too!

Me: I love you more!

He: I love you most!

Me: I love you more than most!

And we giggle and have to practically start the process over.

The up-and-downside of our incredibly active and curious little Three is one of the most constant features of his personality: He touches the Butt.

If you aren't familiar with this line, check out this long but incredible clip from Finding Nemo (the relevant portion is in the last 5 seconds of this clip). Nemo swims out over the "drop off" to a boat with his father threatening him with all he can to come back and, finally, to not touch the boat. Nemo defies him by flicking a single finn on the boat.

His friend gasps: HE TOUCHED THE BUTT!!

Big invariably touches the butt.

We'll threaten. We'll time out. We'll ignore.

He still touches the butt.

Ignoring is the worst because he then has to bring it to our attention:

He: I'm touching the BUUUU-UHHH-TTT!

Also true to Your Three Year Old is his fascination with words. "Not only is he secure physically and happy socially and calm emotionally, but language now means a great deal to him. He LOVES new words--new words, big words, different words."

Today he asked what "naked" meant (his sister had on the television and there was a commercial for the Naked Brother's Band).

His response to the definition: But, they're wearing clothes???

Nine

I can't believe she's nine.

Oh, and the boy, above, is turning into a bit of a pain in the arse, at least from her perspective. I wish I had the above moment on video. He was sitting there with her, next to her, singing, allowing her her moment. And then... The last verse:

. . . . Happy BIIIIRTH day dear [Eigh...ght] .... Happy birth... day... To...

[he blows the candle out]

YOUUUUU!

Our Food Experiment: A Week of Home Detoxification

So I am finally getting back to following up with my original post on our household eating experiment.

This topic seems to hit a nerve with people. Most kids, for example, seem obsessed with sweets and, because we all only care about our kids and want the best of them, I think parents get obsessed about kids' obsessions.

And we don't realize that things change. Kids change. They won't be how they are today, tomorrow, so issues today get compounded.

Anyway, on to our experiment with letting go of control.

To recap: BioMom and I realized, with some gentle nudging from a loving and concerned neighbor, that perhaps, we were part of the problem with what we perceived was an excessive obsession with food on behalf of our esteemed eight (almost nine) year old.

The suggestion? Why not try saying "yes" to everything?

Our response? How long?

The answer? Long enough to make a real habit if it. Say six or seven weeks?

So off we set into the land of the counter-intuitive: to help out with a food obsession, let HER have the control. Let HER make the mistakes. Let HER make decisions about her own body.

In conjunction, BioMom began reading How to get your kids to eat (but not too much)*, recommended to me by a mom from our ECFE class and several people have pointed me toward a recent article about one family's response to their daughter's obsession with chocolate (which I have yet to track down -- if anyone can help me here, I'd really appreciate it).

So on to Day One.

I was the one home that day when Eight came home from school looking for snacks.

Can I have a snack?

Sure? Have whatever you want.

At this point, I had no idea how much cr*&%)p was in our house, but as you'll see, Eight was HIGHLY in tuned.

Can I have a strawberry soda?

Yes.

She comes out to the living room where I was working (Big was taking a nap) with a box of vanilla wafers and a strawberry soda.

My immediate reaction was, what kind of freakshow household with kids still has three Crush sodas leftover from New Year's Eve in their fridge? I mean what kind of control freaks are we that they aren't gone?

I was prepared to let her have all three at once, if asked.

Gulp.

I emailed BioMom with an update. We have been processing this constantly, trying to read ahead in the book where necessary for advice about rules (if any).

When Eight was done with a few cookies (she ended up finishing the box in three setting which we realized was a slight amount over the suggested serving size, but said nothing) she just moved on with her day. No big deal.

Day 2: Soda number two of three and more cookies. And after dinner:
Can we have some ice cream?

Sure, I think we have some mango sorbet in the freezer.

I don't like that. Can I have some ice cream?

I don't think we have any.

She rushes to the downstairs freezer and pulls out an old quart of ice cream left over from Big's December birthday which I didn't know even existed. We open it and it is completely crystallized, but consumed with glee with the requested mini chocolate chips sprinkled on top.

Day 3: Soda number three of three. That evening:
Can we have some ice cream?

I don't think we have any.

Yes -- what about the ice cream from last night?

There isn't any left?

Can I have the mango sorbet?

This became a pattern. She essentially moved down her utility curve on preferred sweets. As we ran out of what was initially preferred, she would request the stuff that was rejected initially.

By the fifth or sixth day, most of the real junk in our house was gone. We weren't replacing, but this was only somewhat purposefully. We had hoped that she would stabilize before we re-introduced sweets.

We worried about what would happen when the girl scout cookies came. Would we just give her the box, or dole out servings?

Once the bulk of the junk was gone, she moved on to ingredients.

What is 'malted milk'?

Oh, that is stuff that you put into shakes to make them malts (we hadn't used it in years but it was in the 'baking section' of our kitchen.

Can I try it?

Sure!

At this point she started realizing that something strange and fantastic was happening in our house.

To friend after school one day after asking for a snack she says:
She'll let us have ANYTHING in the house!!

Friend: ANYTHING???

Eight: YES!!

Little did they know that the house had been quickly scoured for the junkiest of junk.

Another day:

Can I have some sugar?

That's when we imposed the 'You need to eat actual food. Not ingredients' rule.

At one point she asked for the rest of the mini chocolate chips in the bag described above. At that point I did have a little talk about serving size. (It turns out that a serving of mini chocolate chips is a disappointing number of 24, to both Eight and my's true dismay.)


I'll close for now on my initial report with a promise to follow up on what happened post detox.


*This turns out to be a better book than even its title suggests. It addresses the parent's own issues with eating as well as the kids need for control and how to deal with that. I highly recommend it to all, particularly those concerned with kids that won't eat a thing.

The Waffle House Lesbian

So, my faux mother-in-law (there's no legal relationship going on around here) is hilarious.*

A couple of years ago we visited them during their month-long sojourn to the warm-land in January.

Having done my graduate studies on the east coast, I talked everyone into reliving some of my glory days by heading over to the Waffle House for breakfast.

Let's just say that the food was certainly not what I remembered or had my tastes simply grown with the slight increase in wealth (let's just say that I earn more than my graduate stipend which was then $8,500)?

But the service? That's where this story takes off.

We were being served by a waiter that BioMom and I immediately recognized as one of ours but whom the faux Father-in-law referred to as "Sir" as in "Sir, can I get a refill on this orange juice?"

She didn't flinch. But Eight (then Six or Seven) looked over at grandpa sharply as in "can't you tell that that's a woman? A woman like my Baba?? Are you an idiot?"

We so enjoyed ourselves that BioMom unknowingly left the restaurant with a souvenir mug in her quite accompanying purse.**

So today BioMom spent some time with her parents upon their return from the '09 visit to the land-of-warm only to return with a legitimate, paid-for substitute that I, and I told her so in my appreciative acknowledgment, value less.


*No, this is not a brown-nosing entry. She doesn't know this blog exists, although I do expect she'd pass an exam question such as the following: "What is a URL?" That is to say that it is not that she is computer-illiterate that she is unawares of the goings-on in this corner of the blogsphere.

**This blog author does not support or condone illegal behavior in any way. Do not try this at home.

Joining the Maddow Widowers' Support Group

So I recently joined LesbianDad's new support group for Widowers of partners lost to Rachel Maddow.

As I said in her comment section, on one recent Valentine's day, I found, upon retiring that evening, a little red card sitting underneath the remote control. Decorated with loving, flowery writing, it mentioned how our nights would, henceforth, be filled with humor and lightness.

Why? I queried my love.

Turn it on! She responded, barely able to hold back her delight.

I flicked on the television only to find a wolf in hot dyke's clothing (albeit unfortunately coiffed for prime-time).

I felt like a 1950's wife receiving a pink bowling ball for Valentine's day.

I Heart Crayola

Talk about gender-reversals... I've become way too crafty in my stay-at-homo role. See the below progression.

And Baby Makes Five

So in addition to all of the discussion of the insane woman who just had octuplets, a friend of ours just delivered her fifth.

No I recognize that I am neurotic and that my reaction here is not very rational, but I can't help but seeing that decision and reacting personally to it.

In my gut I think Who would ever want FIVE children?

My next immediate reaction is: Why don't I want FIVE children?

What does this mean about me and my love for kids if I don't want more?

This is that lesson -- why do people want different things? -- that I've been coming back to ever since that first time I got dumped in high school.

But really. . . Doesn't Christmas (or any holiday) sound great with five excited kids running around, thrilled with the joy of the season? Don't you miss the stages as they go by--first smile, first giggle, first step, first word, first. . . . ? This friend of mine has one before and, now, two after Big so she'll be enjoying a three-year-old at Christmas for some time.

Does sibling rivalry have diminishing marginal returns as one has more kids? In other words, do kids realize that with more of them they get less of an effect either with the parents or with the other kids and therefore fight less?

Do they fight more?

Is it easier if you just give in to it all and not expect to have your own life?

My bottom line is gloves and all other winter paraphernalia.

How the hell can one or two people keep track of five children's winter paraphernalia?

Maybe children's independence increases as the number of siblings increases.

Maybe if we just moved to Hawaii I'd want eight.

The (USM) Academy Awards

West Point Cadets pick gay Hero, Harvey Milk


With all the awards being thrown about in the month of January, West Point’s 2nd Annual Cadet Choice Award could easily have gone unnoticed, except for several of their nominations. The Award was set up last year to “celebrate the character’s display of leadership and the West Point values of Duty, Honor and Country.” Last year Will Smith won for his performance as the last man on earth in I Am Legend. But this year, the list seems both obvious and odd. Among the standard men of action are Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) in The Dark Knight, Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg (Tom Cruise) in Valkyrie, and Dr. Henry Walton “Indiana” Jones, Jr. (Harrison Ford) in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. But the other two picks seem strange for different reasons. John Hancock (Will Smith) in Hancock is a superhero, but a messy alcoholic one at that. And Harvey Milk (Sean Penn) in Milk was certainly an American leader and a cultural hero, but he was also an openly gay leader pushing others to come out. As such the choice of Harvey Milk seems to collide head on with the Army’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, and certainly runs counter to the opinion of such military leaders as Marine Gen. Peter Pace, former chairman of the Joint Staffs, who proclaimed that, “I believe that homosexual acts between individuals are immoral, and that we should not condone immoral acts.” But the Cadets obviously feel differently, and that is change we can all believe in.

Three Year Old Soccer is like. . .

Herding apathetic, autistic cats.

The Experiment with Letting Go of Control

So, a couple of weeks ago we had a serendipitous experience with a neighbor who came over to offer us some redecorating advice and conversation.

At some point, the conversation devolved into on of our favorite (or if not favorite, then frequent) topics: Eight's obsession with food.

I could go on and on here with stories and examples, but the truth is, that I've built up so much shame around the topic that it is even difficult for me to write about it now.

But what was so amazing about that night and our neighbor being over was that BioMom and I were in just the right space to hear her message which was this:

What the hell is your problem?

Meaning OUR problem. Meaning how did WE create this OCD behavior in HER.

Whoa.

It still blows me away.

She basically was addressing our concern that Eight doesn't know when to stop eating the stuff that's bad for you. Like drinking enough cups of cocoa to make oneself sick. Like never stopping eating spaghetti. Like obsessing about the single known quantity of dessert in the house for days on end.

Our neighbor pointed out that turning of that 'want spigot' is a skill. And a skill that Eight clearly doesn't have.

We realized that we were controlling way too much in her life: school uniforms, homework, time, her room, etc. etc. And that we should consider letting go of some stuff, prioritizing others. And that maybe her stuff around food was the only thing that she really could control, regardless of what we did.

Whoa. Talk about enlightening.

Then she suggested this:

Why not try saying "yes" to her around food for a while?

How long?

Long enough to break the old habits and make new ones. . . Say, six or seven weeks?

SIX OR SEVEN WEEKS????

And so, we have.

What follows will be a series of posts about the initial days and weeks of our experiment: her choices, our reactions.

And, being the over-thinkers that we are, we are, naturally basing all of this in theory. Check out the book How to Get Your Kids to Eat, but Not Too Much.

A teaser for day one: Three soda pops one sitting????

How did the control freak (me) react????

Gay Marriage and Taxes

Lee Badgett has a great, carefully constructed, analysis of the income tax consequences of gay marriage that I highly recommend.

I say carefully constructed because she essentially looks at changes in government revenue from tax receipts based on several assumptions about how large the GLBT population is and what would happen if we legalized gay marriage.

As I am doing my taxes now, the first real year in which I worked part time (at least financially -- I worked full time at two different colleges/universities, but at only one was I paid a normal salary) I am considering the implications of not being married to BioMom.

The great irony, is that I might actually qualify for the earned income tax credit (EITC) depending on if they take pre or post-403b contributed income.

I want to compare the extra earnings that I would get from this negative tax to what we were to get if BioMom and I could file jointly -- a practice that mainly benefits couples with a great disparity in their earnings.*


*Note -- I love to unravel the government's goals behind policies. This one clearly encourages the single-breadwinner model in which one person works full-time while the other stays at home. The current income tax model has quite negative consequences for couples who earn similar amounts and file jointly.

Yin and Yang

Priorities or Neuroses?

So I'm back at work for the semester.

It's my first day back at Macalester College in St Paul where I feel like I've won the lottery with my career. I kept tenure at the Midwestern Public University where I now teach only in the fall semesters, and that leaves the spring semesters open to pursuing other adventures. This past semester was my first one back at my 'real' job and the one thing that I walked away with was the knowledge at how simply satisfied I was there and how much I generally enjoy the students there as well as my colleagues, even after my experience with this elite college and its incredibly smart and motivated students. Maybe it is just the ability to have both that is so amazing.

Anyway.

So this semester I am teaching one course, an applied statistics course that is cross-listed with Math and is more fun than hard for both me and the students. It is my first time teaching it, so a new prep but still.

In addition, I'm auditing a course on behavioral economics with an eye to teach it in the future and working on three separate lines of research.

So here I am, the time between classes, getting started on some of this work and another adjunct gal walked into our shared office and we spent some time catching up. She is a former Manhattan investment-banker type whose entrepreneur husband made it big so they decided to move back to the land of reasonable real estate and nice people to procreate. Two kids later (one now 3 and one now 1) and she's interested in balancing life a bit more by adjuncting at her alma mater.

We quickly deposed each other about our schedules, where our kids are, what kinds of preschools we're considering, etc. and here's what I walked away with:

She has care (either a nanny or preschool) for her kids 8 hours/day, 5 days/week and she is teaching one class with zero research requirements.

This will be, nearly literally, the fifth semester that I have juggled our now three year old (he goes to Mother-of-Four's two days per week this semester) as well as the demands of a sometimes full, but always heavy, load of teaching, research and service.

What is my problem? Or are her priorities off?

It gets back to my obsessive pre-grieving. I view this time with Big -- this January until next September as, really, the last time in his life and mine where his time is still, really all mine. And I don't want to miss a thing.

Obviously, even at the expense of my own sanity.

What are all of your thoughts on the work life balance in conjunction with both maintaining sanity and in being present as fully as possible in our children's childhoods?

Fearless

So I achieved an unbelievable, rarely achieved feat.

Be prepared, you may find yourself envious.

I got both of our kids, kids at very distinct and different levels of swimming competency, into lessons on the same evening, at the same time, at the same place.

Holy s&$t.

Last night was the first lesson that they were both able to attend and where I was prepared enough to have actually located swimming suits that fit in time for the class (yes, Eight missed a night due to this sad fact).

Big is by far the youngest in his first on-his-own class and, although he is a thousand percent more composed than I expected him to be, I can tell that the teacher is slightly stressed by his, his, let's call it enthusiasm.

Last night while attending to one of the three other children in the course (how dare she!) he started demanding her attention by showing her a new "trick" which was to hold on to the ledge with his right hand, face outward, and quickly spin around in the water with the goal of then grabbing the ledge with his left hand before sinking like a stone in the shallow-end water in which he is still at least two inches too short to be able to inhale oxygen if standing on the bottom.

He achieved his goal in this trick only about eighty percent of the time, at which point the teacher had to quickly pull him up, leaving her current charge in the lurch for a moment or two and ultimately leading the teacher to tactfully lift him out of the water so that he had to sit on the ledge and watch the other kids do the task at hand.

He is literally fearless in the water.

When the time of the lesson came to an end, he turned to me and wailed, never wanting to leave the pool even to eat or drink.

Meditations on Mindful Parenting: Day 2

A Quote, to start:

And just as in life itself, when faced with a range of family, social and cultural pressures to conform to frequently unstated and unconscious norms, and with all the inherent stresses of caring for children, as parents we often find ourselves in spite of all our best intentions and our deep love for our children, running more or less on automatic pilot. To the extent that we are chronically preoccupied and invariably pressed for time, we may be out of touch with the richness, what Thoreau called the "bloom," of the present moment. This moment may seem far too ordinary, routine, and fleeting to single out for attention. Living like this, it is easy to fall into a dreamy kind of automaticity as far as our parenting is concerned, believing that whatever we do will be okay as long as the basic love for our children and desire for their well-being is there. We can rationalize such a view by telling ourselves that children are resilient creatures and that the little things that happen to them are just that, little things that may have no effect on them at all. Children can take a lot, we tell ourselves.

Before Big, BioMom and I rarely stopped. Well, certainly once Eight had become Four or so and started having her 'own life'. Once preschool started. Big forces you to be in the moment. His energy requires ours. And I am grateful.

The authors go on to talk about the 'rising stress on virtually all fronts in the society, and an accelerating sense of time urgency and insufficiency.' This could have perfectly described our lives six months ago, and to many, it probably still does. We have a tendency, I suppose not unlike most American families, to overschedule. To not want to miss out on social and educational opportunities for us and our kids. We live in a city with thousands of options for children to be enriched. Where does one stop? And without mindful parenting, how can one know when enough is enough for your child?

Reading this book makes me remember to look forward to the smallest moments. I can't wait for Eight to come home from school today so that I can show her the article I read about Sasha and Malia and how they met the Jonas brothers and stayed up with their friends on the night of the inauguration watching High School Musical III. These are things that I would have not noticed without her. It is a reminder to jump in with her and her life. To learn the things she loves and hang on tight for her life's ride because that train will go with or without me.