Blog Birthday

Happy birthday, my little blog! I went back to re-read some of my earlier posts a few weeks ago, and I realized that my very first post was mid-February. I decided to take stock of where I am right now, and see how I did with my goal of sweeping life changes.

Not too shabby, if I do say so myself.

I cook a LOT more for the girls, we do super fun stuff almost every day, I've cut down on their TV a *little*, and I feel like my attitude is much better in general. There are a few things that have really helped me get my shiz together.

N going to school has brought some weekly routine into the mix. Not only does it get us out and about early in the day, but it gives me some quality time with D. School has also helped N's attitude, I think. She freaks out less frequently, and is a little more reasonable when there's an obstacle in the way. A little. We're still working on that.

I discovered audiobooks! This was a housecleaning epiphany. My husband works very late 4 days a week, so I'm on my own a lot. After the girls are in bed, I feel like I need some *me* time, understandably so. Before, I would sit down for "just a minute" to check my e-mail or watch a short show while I ate dinner. Once I parked my butt, that was all she wrote. This way, I can listen to a book while I poke around the house cleaning. I lose myself in the books and I find myself looking for more things to do while I listen. The house isn't perfect, but it's a LOT better.

I made a conscious effort to not shrink away from "messy" fun. We've been doing more crafty fun things, even if the project requires a lot of clean up. I try to include D, but that's asking a little much, haha! Our messy play time is usually when D is sleeping in the afternoons. N has gotten a lot better at helping around the house. She cleans up her toys when I ask her, and she even empties parts of the dishwasher for me! She's in charge of silverware and sippy cups. What a big girl <3 !

Dried beans and glue! Just a quick little craft for the afternoon. D didn't try to eat *too* many beans. (Really, you would think she was old enough to know better by now!)

I joined a MOMS Club! It's been awesome. There are playdates available just about every weekday, if you want to go. There are also Mom's Nights Out once a month, but since A works late just about every night, I never get to go. Boo! I host at least one playdate a month here, so it's also a good motivation to get the first floor presentable once a month. I've met a lot of great moms that live in my town, and N & D have a bunch of friends that they get to play with regularly. Not only are the playdates super fun, but the support has been fantastic. When I have a question about ANYTHING, there's 20 other moms that have an opinion (and aren't afraid to share it!). They all have kids. They all live near me. They've all been where I am, and know how hard it can be. They also know how much fun it is, too. :)

We still eat mac & chee sometimes. D still has chronic diarrhea (nasty, I know!). I still get frustrated. But I feel like I'm floating through the days less and less. I feel like I have a Purpose. I know that this is largely due to the girls being one year older and a little easier to handle. N & D can play together, and now that D is talking a little clearer, they can have actual conversations. (SO freaking cute!!)

Those little heads bent together are just the sweetest!

I would love to bottle this positive feeling and keep it in a jar for those days when the grumps come creeping in. Bad days are a part of life, but they've been less frequent and for that I'm grateful.

Less is More vs. Toy Guilt

With the holidays behind us and the girls' birthdays come and gone, I can't help but stare at the house in horror. So. Many. Toys. I don't know what to do with them all. I know that they don't need so many (obviously!! Who needs that much?!) but I don't know what to donate. I feel like this is a dilemma that many parents face in today's materialistic and plastic age.

We recently dismantled our guest bedroom and turned it into a play room. This is awesome because at the end of the day, you just toss the toys in there and shut the door. This sucks because at the end of the day, you just toss the toys in there and shut the door. The sheer volume of toys housed in there is staggering. Ideally, I would love to cut the number of toys we have in half so that N & D could participate more in cleaning. It's hard to ask N to clean up her toys when they have no "home" in the playroom. Also, the size of the room has amplified the clutter. When it was spread out across the entire first floor of our house, it was more pervasive, but less overwhelming. Now, their toys live in two rooms: the play room (which no one plays in because it's a wreck) and the sun room. The sun room is mainly used for messy play, such as play doh, paint, markers, etc., and as additional toy storage. Yup. MORE toy storage.

I think my problem is that I become unreasonably sentimentally attached to their toys. I feel attached to toys that certain people gave them, just because I love that person. I feel attached to toys that are expensive, because I think that the girls need to get the giver's "money's worth" out of it. I feel attached to toys that they played with as babies. Hell, I'll feel attached to a toy merely because we've had it for a long time! It's hard to separate the feelings of false sentimentality with being truly attached to a toy that the girls loved (and would appreciate if it was saved.) That being said, I read somewhere that a person's memories usually start around age 4. N & D won't be missing a plastic baby rattle 20 years from now.

Another problem (if you can really call it that!) is that we have very generous and thoughtful friends and family. They love us and they love our daughters. And they LOVE to make our girls happy! As their parents, I think that my husband and I have bought maybe 15% of their toys and clothes. It's actually gotten easier since the girls are a little older (2 and 4! sniff, sniff!). Now we get a lot of art supplies, cool books, and clothes for them. Which is awesome. But we still get a lot of toys, too. I think we need to do a toy purge before the holidays and birthday times so that the girls can enjoy their new toys more, rather than losing them in the morass of the play room. I also need to be better prepared when someone asks me what to get the girls.

I recently ran across a blog, Play at Home Mom, that got my wheels turning in the direction of where I want to be. They write mostly about raising their young children through child-led play and learning. Their play rooms are astonishing. It's more than I feel like I am able to do, but I want to at least incorporate elements of their environments into my own. Maybe if I had seen this before we had children, it would be feasible. A lot of it centers around instilling respect for your environment at a very young age. D would kill someone, or herself, if she had easy access to one third of their play environment (glass, scissors, staple guns). If I had a do-over, I would have taught her better. Now, I guess I just have to wait for her to get a little older!

It's easy to think objectively about what to do about the mess of toys, but a lot harder to put into practice. Maybe I just need to jump in and start in a small spot. Divide and conquer.

Anyway, new goal. Clean up the damn toys.

New Year's Motivations

I know, I know... I'm a day (or 23) late and more than a few dollars short, but things have been busier than usual around here. I have a backlog of new posts in my head that have yet to make it to the blog, so hopefully I can get them out in the next week or so.

I dislike the term New Year's Resolution, because I feel like if there are changes that you want to make to your life, you shouldn't wait for a specific date to make it happen. I do, however, feel more motivation to make changes at the beginning of the new year. This is probably due more to the vacation days around the holiday and the impending easing of schedule (which oddly never happened) than anything else. There are a few areas of my own life, that impact not only me but my family, in which I feel motivated to better myself during this time of "new beginnings".

1. Let N be more independent.
This is a hard one for me. It's easier to swoop in when N is eating, getting dressed, putting away toys, etc, and do it myself rather than let her do it at her own pace. Which is maddeningly slow. I've seen the impact that it's made on her especially at mealtimes. Since I have to split my time between N and D, D has gotten very proficient in feeling herself and can eat faster and cleaner than N can, even though she's two years younger. We never let N do it for herself when she was little, and now she doesn't want to. I've got to back off and foster more independence in her life. I bought her special "4 year old" dishes that she can get from the cabinet herself. She loves them! Incidentally, this is also a visual reminder for me to control their portions better. 1/2 the plate for veggies, small sections for kid sized portions of meat and starch.

 

What big girls!

 

D has decided that she's too grown up for a highchair or booster seat, even though she can barely see her plate!

Using a fork and everything. :)

2. Be funner.

This is my main "resolution" for 2012, so there will be an entire blog post about it later. It's very easy to get into a rut of staying home. We drift through our days (still!) watching too much TV and doing... I'm not sure what. The days blend together sometimes and I hate to think that NOTHING got accomplished. The end of December and January has been a bust for playdates since daddy was home more, but we'll be getting back into that soon. The main thing I need to get into a better habit of is just plain making a mess. I hate cleaning up, so I'm loathe to get out the messy (fun) play time items. I've recently become addicted to Pinterest (more on that in another post) and it's definitely inspiring to see pages and pages of super cool kid crafts. This month I've gotten out the paints, play-doh, Elmer's Glue, and those toys with too many little pieces that N loves and D eats.

Super simple craft with construction paper, glue, and dried beans.

Marble racer N got for Christmas. I hate this thing. N loves it. I just need to make sure we clean it up before D wakes up from her nap!

3. Be more positive.

This is really tied in with #2, but I need to enjoy my time home more. Don't sweat the messes, but get into a better habit of cleaning up. When the house gets to a disaster-type state around here, it affects not only me, but my husband and the kids, too. When I'm feeling positive and happy, it's easy to breeze around the house and pick up the ENDLESS messes that crop up. I also need to remember to take a break and do things that make ME happy, too. After the girls go to bed (still 7:00, weeee!) I whirlwind around the house and clean so I have time to crochet in the evenings while I listen to audiobooks. This is awesome, relaxing and productive all at once! Currently, I'm desperately trying to finish D's little afghan in time for her birthday party. *Finger's crossed*

I hope everyone had a fabulous holiday season and is back into the swing of every day life. It's hard to go from "vacation" mode to "serious work" mode, and this is our first week of it here. I'm ready to lock & load and rock & roll and... do stuff. Yeah.

Two Steps Back

I had an absolute armpit of a day today, which is really disappointing because I feel like I've been doing so much better lately. I think D is teething, so she's been in a rotten mood the past few days. Both my kids were painfully slow teethers. Emphasis on the *painful*! D only has her four top, four bottom and four molars in. I noticed her canines poking through this morning, so hopefully we're in the home stretch.

I swear I spent over half the day either crying or trying not to lose my shit. I really need to pay more attention to my personal habits, too. I know I skipped breakfast and forgot to eat lunch until almost 2 in the afternoon. That certainly doesn't help my mood.

N's been getting more possessive of her toys, too. Today she had a huge setup of Littlest Pet Shop animals and a building block city on the couch. Right at D level. As soon as D would come within a 5 foot radius of N's bustling metropolis, N would shriek at ear splitting levels and whack D on the chest. Everyone crying again. I need to make a little D-free zone for N to have her imaginative play time, because that takes up a large portion of her day.

The last recurring trial of the day (really the last week or two) is that D is obsessed with the "potty". I hate to discourage her, but she only wants to play in the bathroom. If I bring the little potty out of the bathroom for her, she wants nothing to do with it. She wants to sit on the big potty and play with N's toys, which inevitably fall between her legs into the toilet. Then she wants to get down and rummage in the extremely un-kidproofed closet. Ten times a day. I'm not sure what I'm going to do about that one. Like I said, I don't want to discourage her from potty stuff if she's interested, but I suspect she's just using it as a vehicle to achieve fun times in the bathroom.

Hopefully, the coming holidays will be a bit of a break with A home. We're having everyone over to my house for Thanksgiving, so I'm really excited about that. I have photos of the stamps and the craft we used them with to post, but I'll have to save that for another day. I have to go clean!

Tomorrow will be better, right?

Attack of the Toy Fairy

If you've been keeping up, you may have read about the Toy Fairy. I have threatened to leave toys out for the Toy Fairy in the past, and this usually spurs a little cleaning frenzy. N was feeling particularly obstinate the other day, so when she refused to help me clean I said "That's ok. I'm just going to clean this up for you and since you can't take care of your toys, I'll just leave them on the front porch for the Toy Fairy. She'll have lots of fun playing with your toys." I got through three bins of toys before N came to help me finish. Whenever she passed the kitchen window and saw her toys on the porch she got a little sad. The next morning they were gone. That day was fine, but the next morning she wanted to build a tower. I told her that if she helped me clean up all the toys that were out that we could write a note to the Toy Fairy asking for her toys back.

N dictated the note, decorated it and signed the bottom. She even drew a picture of the Toy Fairy in the bottom left hand corner. The little blobs above it are her wings, haha! After all that she *still* had to wait until the next morning to get her toys, since the Toy Fairy (like most fairys) only operates at night when you're not looking. For the most part, she's been better about cleaning up lately. We'll see if this made any kind of impression on her next time I need to pull it out!

Don't Worry, It's Just a Phase

I've been away from blogging over the summer. My husband was home more and my evenings somehow disappeared into a haze of cleaning and vegging in front of the TV. (yuk!) Now that the semester is yet again underway, I'm on my own at least 4 full days a week. It's definitely trying my patience, but we're all adjusting. I'll touch on a few things before I get into my "real" blog post.

Preschool

N started preschool this year. *tear* She goes in the mornings two days a week. It's a nice break in our routine, but it's a busy way to start our loooong week. I was worried that N would have a little trouble being away since she's never been watched by anyone other than immediate family. I should have saved myself the grey hairs. I don't even get a kiss goodbye before she's running into her classroom. Of course, D wailing and draping herself across my arms may have something to do with that, too. D redeems herself when we go to pick up N and she's squealing and dancing before we reach the door. Actually, both of them are. Cute!

 

N's First Day of School

 

N's First Two Weeks of Classwork

The Garden

This turned out to be such a nice project for the summer. We ate oodles of squash, and a good amount of cucumbers. The peppers were a little sparse, but I think that was due more to the damage of the storm/hurricane than anything else. They were coming in late in the season, right when the storm hit.

The Beach

We went on vacation to Nags Head, NC for a week with my parents. IT WAS AWESOME! We had a great time. The girls behaved so well and the weather was perfect. I can't say enough good things about our time there.

 

A & D in the outside shower. This is my favorite picture from the week! (seriously, we didn't take a single shower inside all week)

Family Photo! The stairs on the right hand side of the photo led to our cabin.

Ready to head home :)

Not Much Else

I'm sure we did more, but nothing is standing out to me at the moment. We didn't do anything life changing or epic (other than our rockin' vacation).

Just a Phase

You know when you hear that phrase... it's exactly WHILE your kid is doing something embarassing/out of control/or vaguely obscene that someone sagely nods their head and says "Oh don't worry, it's just a phase, hon." I hate that. Unfortunately, it's also true. I remember when we thought that Nora would never get out of her 24/7 temper tantrum. I felt like she spent 90% of her waking time rolling around on the ground sounding *exactly* like what I imagine a stuck pig to sound like.

This is her licking snot off her nose following a fit because the stupid baby bjorn wouldn't stay on or something. This was March 2010, so she was 26 months and D was one month old. Obviously, we weren't in the best frame of mind to deal with the trivial (to us!) problems of a two year old, either. However, this time passed without us noticing the end of it. That's not to say that N never has hissy fits, they're just much less frequent and often we can head them off at the pass and avoid it altogether. At the time they were absolutely unavoidable. The frustrations of being two coupled with distracted parents and a new baby sister (not to mention her sassy personality) were a recipe for disaster. Unfortunately, D is just gearing up for her time to shine...

Oh, bad mommy won't let you pull a frying pan full of ground beef and grease on your head. :(

N's bedtime routines have also eased up a bit. We have a nice, SHORT, reasonable routine in place. No more 30 minutes from start to finish. I think a big thing that helped with this was N giving up her nap. (If you could spend a moment of silence to mourn its passing, I would appreciate it.) With no nap and school in the mix she is very tired by bedtime, which has been bumped up to 7 so that she goes to bed the same time as D. Sweet! There's little resistance especially on nights that A isn't home. We have our ducks in a row and mommy doesn't take any crap. Not that daddy does, but I think with two of us around she sees the opportunity to take a chance on someone being a softie.

Another change that I have noticed since the last time I blogged is that things are a lot more in control for me at home. I cook a lot more, and the house is almost always tidy. I still have a hard time keeping up with the "real" cleaning like mopping, bathrooms and laundry, but the dishes are usually done and the floors/countertops are clear before I go to bed. I attribute this solely to audiobooks. WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN ALL MY LIFE?! It makes it so much easier to lose myself in my book while cleaning. I never look at the clock to see if I've cleaned long enough to sit down guilt free, and I actually look for things to do so I can listen longer.

I know people always say that they wish that there were more hours in a day. What I want is another *day* in my day. The only caveat is that my kids need to be on another plane of existence while I have my extra time. There are a few basic things that I want/need to accomplish with my time sans children: cleaning, crocheting, reading and the occasional blog. I can not keep up with all these in the time allotted. Since I have the girls from waking to sleeping, at least four days a week, I also need to get to bed at a reasonable time every night. This is very hard for me, still. I want to cram as much "me time" in the hours after 7pm that I end up staying awake way too long. This makes me cranky and short-tempered the next day, which is bad for everyone.

Well, the long and the short of it is that I need to: 1) remember how far N has come in a year, 2) cut D some slack and 3) discover how to manipulate the space-time continuum so that I can get everything done.

Easy peasy, mac & cheesie!

The Toy Fairy

Lots of households with kids have random fairys that reside within. One popular one is the Tooth Fairy. We have lots of little Nature Fairies that live in the birdhouses outside (they only come out when you're not looking). I've often heard moms wish that they had a Clean-Up Fairy to do all their work! Well, I think that I've met the Clean-Up Fairy's cousin, and it's the Toy Fairy.

The Toy Fairy doesn't leave your darling children toys while they sleep. The Toy Fairy doesn't magically fix a broken favorite toy. The Toy Fairy doesn't even give you mystical inspiration on what to get your kids for their birthdays. The Toy Fairy in our house will STEAL YOUR TOYS IF YOU DON'T PUT THEM AWAY! I'm not even kidding. Well, she's a little nicer than that, but she will take them to play with for an undetermined amount of time if you leave them out. It's so awesome. When N's done with a box of blocks and wants to move on to something else but is too distracted to get them all put away... "Honey, I thought I heard the Toy Fairy in the house last night. You better get those blocks put away or she might take them to play with!" It just lights a little fire under her butt, hehehe! As of yet, we haven't had to actually implement a toy taking. The threat of fairy invaders has been enough to spur a cleaning frenzy.

I've also heard that the Toy Fairy has lots of sisters and brothers, just in case you want to invite one to stay at your house. ;)

Stickers, Stickers Everywhere!

It's funny how much a small change can make such a big impact on such a young mind.

A few months ago, I was at my wit's end with N. My anxiety level was at an all time high, she had screaming temper tantrums several times a day and I cried at least once a day from anger and frustration. We've been going through a lot of big family changes, which I've touched on before. The biggest is A's schedule. Before he got the wonderful opportunity to teach, he gave the girls a bath and put them to bed every night. It was their daddy time. Right now, he's in school and working more hours in the hopes that he can teach full time in the future. I think this has impacted N the most. Don't get me wrong, I miss him, too, but at least I can rationalize and understand what's going on. N's little brain just went haywire, I think. The tiniest obstacle would result in yelling, crying and throwing whatever she could get her hands on. Time outs were marginally effective. They were better at calming her down after the fact than preventing one to begin with. At her worst, she was going ballistic more than once an hour. And so was I.

To vent a little of the steam, I posted up on facebook and got many helpful tips from my friends. One was that I should do something to reward and reinforce good behavior. They suggested a chart that she could put a sticker on when she did something good, then trade it in at the end of the week for special "daddy time." The very first day we instituted it, I felt like she was calmer. It wasn't like she was trying to be good, but maybe that I noticed the good things she did more often and praised her for them. I couldn't think of a good name for it, so I just called it the Be Good Chart, haha! The chart was definitely therapeutic for her AND me. It's hard to get through the day when the moments that stick in your mind are all the crappy ones. I knew I would never remember everything that she did, so I would put a sticker on and then write one line at the bottom about how she was good. I tried to get her to tell me what she did, like "shared toys with D" or "left the park without a fit." Lately I've been heading off tantrums with a reminder that if she gets ready for bed quickly without a fuss, we can put a sticker on the chart.

N is so proud of her chart, she shows it off whenever she can. Just last week, Aunt C came to see N (and incidentally stay later after N & D went to bed for drinks and crocheting) and one of the first things N said was "Come look at my Be Good chart!!" I think a lot of the change in the household attitude is stemming from focusing on the positive. A comes home and asks how the day went and I can tell him all the nice things N did, instead of how many hissy fits she had.

I also wanted to post about N's visit to pre-school, a few of our crafts and D's scary trip to the ER, but it's really late. Everyone probably already heard through Facebook, but D spent the day at the ER with pneumonia. No fun! She's all better now, so I guess there isn't really anything to post about. We've been blessed thus far in that we've never had any serious health problems with our children. This was the first time anyone has been seriously ill and one of only a handful of times we've ever even taken them to the doc's for being sick. N went for an earache once, and D went when she had Fifth Disease and went for her diarrhea, but that's it. Like I said, we've been lucky!

I'll try to get back soon for the rest of the updates, but until then... Be Good!!

That's What Friends Are For!

I did a little brain-storming with C and came up with a well thought out (I think!) plan of attack for N's temper tantrums. I haven't actually started these, so any input or feedback is welcome and appreciated.

1. Feelings Flashcards
I think that a large part of N's (and any pre-schooler's tantrums) stems from her inability to articulate what she's feeling. My idea was to make 8.5 x 11 sheets with faces on them to illustrate what a feeling looks like. One for each sheet. I haven't decided if I want to do simple smiley-type faces, pictures of N, pictures of us, magazine clippings or a combination of all. These will go either in a binder or on a wall. The master plan is to try to distract N from a pending hissy fit by asking her to either point out how she feels or maybe putting a sticker on the face that she feels like. Hopefully this will help her to talk about what's going on in her head as opposed to rolling around on the ground screaming, which I don't find helpful at all.

N pretending to be sad. (summer 2010)

2. Punching Bag Monster
When N is trying to not have a full blown on-the-ground temper tantrum, she often hits herself or throws whatever is handy. If nothing's nearby, she'll walk all the way across the kitchen to dump a box of toys and then look back at me to check my reaction. *sigh* I'm hoping with this idea to create an outlet for her anger and frustration that is acceptable. I've got lots of fabric laying around, so I was going to make a monster for her that she could punch, throw, hit, whatever, when she was mad. I'm not sure if this will help her channel herself into an acceptable outlet or if it will encourage her already feisty tendencies. I need a good name for him, too. Punchinello? Hissy Fit Harry? Temper Tantrum Timmy?

3. Daddy-Time Chart
I think a lot of N's temper problems have escalated since A's been gone so much. It's been a big change in the household and it's hard on everyone, A included. I try to keep my own frustration levels down by thinking "it's not forever!" but N doesn't have the luxury of understanding that. A friend suggested that N could earn special time with Daddy with stickers for good behavior. I don't really have any structure in mind other than a blank week that she gets to put a sticker on when she does something nice or acts politely without me asking her. Sometimes she IS very sweet and thoughtful to her sister, or she gets ready to go out the door with no fuss, and I would like to reward her. I always make sure to let her know I noticed her good behavior, and I thank her for it without making it the hugest deal in the world. Kind of like her tantrums, I let her know that it isn't acceptable and I either ignore her or put her in time out. Hopefully this will make her more conscious of the good things that she does, and she'll get to spend some one-on-one time with A on the weekend.

I don't know why N's temper tantrums have escalated so badly the last few months. It makes me feel like a terrible parent when she melts down at a play group or family member's house. We don't go out too often, largely because I'm trying to avoid a scene. I don't feel like I reinforce her bad behavior, but obviously I'm not doing something right if she's being this bad. I definitely think that her behavior is worse than other kids her age. Maybe it's her age, maybe it's all the changes, maybe the wind is blowing the wrong way that day. Who knows? I just know that I need to get her in hand, and I have no real idea how to go about it.