34 posts tagged “parenting”

The kids made me cards this year.  I don't have a scanner that works with this laptop, so I can only type in what they wrote.  I am including the spelling and punctuation they used.

The Youngest, in his ten-year-old penmanship stuck with a simple greeting:  "Happy Mother's Day" on the front with a huge smiley face and "Happy Mother's Day Mom" inside, with a tiny drawing of me beneath and then "Love [his name].  On the other side, he drew a huge mom smiley face.  And there is yet another smiley on the very back.

At school he made a drawing on black construction paper and colored chalk with my first name on the front.  His teacher told the kids to write two words that describe their mom on the back; he wrote "forgiving" and "encouraging".

Makes me believe I am perhaps doing something right!

The Middle's card begins with "Dear Mom" sprawled across the front.  Inside is inscribed:

Its mothers day.
Sit back.
relax,
enjoy yourself.

After all, today and your birthday are really the only days we acknowledge what you do for us.

On any other day, we don't ever think twice about how much you do for us.

All I am trying to say is, thank you for what you do for us.
Thank you for putting up with our crap.

And most of all,
thank you for loving us!

Love, [his name]

Because without you, we wouldn't be here.

The Daughter wrote me a note:

Dear Mommy,
    HAPPY MOMMY'S DAY!  I know how much you like cards, but I decided to write you a letter.  I never was much good at following directions :-).  I just want to say, I love you and I truly am greatful for everything you do for me.  You really should be paid for what you do.  Thank you for putting up with me year round and still having me even thought (she meant though) I didn't wanna come out.  Show's my personality, eh?  I love you.
       Happy Mothers Day,
                [her name]

Sure, they drive me crazy some most days, but I wouldn't change being their mom for anything.

I am blessed.

It's Science Fair project time, and as most parents well know, these are parent projects, not student projects.

Forgive my absence over the next 4-5 days as I slave over we work on those, which are due on Monday, bright and early.

We also have company coming tomorrow night, and my house is a mess.  Though it is my best friend and she truly does not care, I DO.  So, I have to find time to clean between answering questions scientically and formatting display boards.

Gah.

On the bright side, my boss took me to a luncheon today celebrating "Administrative Professionals Day".  The district hosted it.  It started with a worship service, which I really enjoyed.  Very different from what I am used to, but quite similar to what I grew up with, so I found great comfort in it.  I am still processing how much it moved me.

Anyway, I'll read/comment as I can this weekend.

1) Still feeling like poop, so I am going to the doctor's at 10:30 AM to see if this is strep or the flu.  I am thinking strep since I have all of the classic symptoms.

2)  What is up with Vox's [good] pages?  They take away [this is good] promising more variety, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and they haven't updated in over a week.  Is everyone on vacation?  Seriously, WFT?

3)  Would you believe I had a daycare parent actually complain that our request that she send her over-one-year old son finger foods instead of baby food was going to make "more work" for her?  Hello?!  You had a kid.  KIDS ARE WORK.  You chose to continue working full-time and put him in a daycare that doesn't provide food (i.e., cheaper than all the other daycares around town).  THAT MEANS YOU ARE GOING TO HAVE TO PARENT.  Get a clue.  And don't try to complain to me about "too much work/more work" when I go home every night and pack FIVE lunches, cook dinner for 5 people, help at least one with homework, and iron clothes for three (not to mention any other chores that might need doing).  You will not beat me - it doesn't matter that you are a "new" parent and I am experienced.

And since when did over 12 months of parenthood mean you were still a "new" parent?

4)  I am finally convinced that the daycare/school is making me sick.  Since I started subbing there in the fall of 2006, I have had strep once (now probably twice), a horrible stomach flu that wiped me out for 2 days while on Christmas break, pink eye, a urinary tract infection, and numerous head and chest colds.  All within a span of 17 months.  Compare this to the fact that I hadn't been to the doctor for illness since 2002-03.  Oh, and then there is my BP issues for which I am now on a daily water pill.  

All of this on a bit more than minimum wage...Uh, have I mentioned how glad I am that I am leaving that place in three weeks?!

Okay, enough ranting for this morning.  Almost time to have a long Q-tip stuck down my throat.

I finally have new teeth!

Okay, so that sounds kind of weird.  Like I got dentures.  What I do have are four new crowns on my four top front teeth.

And they are actually right!  It only took three tries (for the front two, anyway), but they are finally right.

I'd pretty much lost faith in our dental practice, but they may have just redeemed themselves today.

Pictures to come, perhaps, tomorrow.  I have to get dressed up and presentable for a job interview, so I think that will be a good time to say cheese.  This will also feature my new highlights that my madre helped me with last weekend.  I just couldn't bring myself to take a photo with those horrid temps, not to mention the lovely, squinty, swollen, pink eye I was sporting at the top of the week.

I may actually have time to write a decent blog entry too - I have four days in a row off!  Woot, woot!!

I can not even begin to tell you how happy I am about that.

And now if tomorrow's interview would result in a job with great hours and a few more bucks per hour, I'd be flying so high I don't think you'd be able to peel me off of the ceiling.

As for it being V-Day and all that crap (heh), Rob and I actually celebrated on Monday night.  He doesn't like fighting the V-Day dinner crowds, so we usually celebrate a few days early.  Hence, we had a nice, quiet, relaxing dinner at the Crustacean who is Crimson restaurant with enough leftover to feed us lunch the next day.

We did exchange cards this morning.  The one I found for him garnered two minutes of chuckling and a trip to his cube to display proudly for his coworkers.  As for the kiddos, I was a bad mom and had totally forgotten to get them even a piece of chocolate, so I stopped at the Place that America Runs On and got them a fried, high-calorie, loaded-with-sugar-and-processed-stuff treat.

They were thrilled.

Guess I am not such a bad mom after all (wry grin).

Last night the hubby and I headed to bed at a decent hour so that neither of us were asleep as soon as we hit the pillows.  A rarity in this house lately with the hours we've been keeping.

We chit-chatted a bit about our day and then the conversation waned.  Snuggling and - ahem - some preliminary extracurricular activities ensued.  That is, until we heard:

Knock, knock, knock.

"Yes?"  Rob inquired.

"It's me, [insert The Youngest's name here].  Can I come in?"

"What's wrong, buddy?"

Slowly he opened the door and tiptoed in.  "My stomach really hurts," he whispered.  And then he proceeded to puke all over the floor at my side of the bed.

Lovely.

Rob hurried him into the bathroom in case there was more to come.  Being in a bit of a state of undress, I was unable to jump right up, so Rob was the lucky one who cleaned up the bulk of the mess.

The good news is, we have ceramic tile floors in our bedroom, so it was pretty easy to clean.  The bad news is that ceramic floors make quite the trajectory for a vomitous youth, so the splash factor managed to wipe out our bedding and quite a large radius surrounding the point of impact.

This morning, instead of attending church, I am home with The Youngest recovering (he's nibbling on crackers and sipping Gatorade now), and The Middle is in bed trying to stave off his own personal puke-fest.

The Daughter was feeling wonky all day yesterday, but never gave in to worshiping the porcelain god.  She spent the night at a friend's last night, so hopefully she didn't take this lovely bug along for the ride.

I knew it was probably coming since we've had four-five infants contract it in the past week, the first of who is one of my primary* kids, not to mention that it has been going through some of the classes at school.

And did I mention that I think I have pink eye?

As to how our night ended once we were able to crawl back into bed...?

I will leave that to you imagination.

*We each have 4-5 babies that we are personally responsible for, though we do assist each other as needed.

Janette wrote a wonderful entry about stay-at-home and working moms.  She encourages one to stop judging that harried woman in mis-matched sweats with a handful of toddlers clambering about her legs at the local Super Store.

I am chagrined to admit that I have been on the exact opposite end of the spectrum.  I have been the mom who looked down my nose at "those women" who chose to pop their tot in the closest daycare so they could continue climbing the corporate ladder.

Or so I assumed.  I mean, why else would one - could one! - give up those precious moments with their little one?!

Then finances necessitated that I return to work and pop our youngest into a "chain" daycare facility and not only was I eating a hurried lunch at my desk each day between interviewing prospective employees, I was also consuming a heaping helping of crow.

Janette is right on.  There is no one answer.  Every situation is different.  Every mother has their reasons for choosing to stay home or return to work.  Granted, some reasons on both sides of this debate are selfish and not in the best interest of the children or the family as a whole.  The only thing you can bank on is this: what is good for one family could be very bad for another.

Given my conservative religious background, I have heard it said time and time again that a mother needs to be home with their child(ren) nomatterwhatbygolly, that God will provide if they take that "step of faith" to stay home and care for little Johnny and Susie.  And I bought into that myth for many years.

What I failed to realize since I was personally geared toward being a stay-at-home mom is that not everyone feels the same way as I do.  And do you know what else?  That's okay!

Bottom line is, you (and your spouse) need to decide what is best for you and your family.  As a family, all of the options and alternatives must be carefully weighed.  And then you have to be true to yourself and what your personal needs and desires are.

As well, you have to constantly reassess these things.  Situations and needs change.  What worked for you and your family this time last year may not be ideal today.

Once you've made your decision, stop making apologies and/or feeling guilty for doing what you know is in the best interest of your family.  As moms, we tend to major in that guilt thing, don't we?  So stop that right now.

And the next time you see that well-coiffed woman dropping her infant off at the daycare, don't assume that you have any clue whatsoever.

I was just interviewed by our local paper about being a "tech-savvy" parent.

Basically, he wanted to know if I had a Facebook and/or MySpace, if I used it, if our kids used either, and how the kids feel about me using either of those.

They are sending a photographer to the house this afternoon to take a picture of me with my computer.

Interesting.

I hope that what I said is represented accurately.  In a nutshell, I tried to relay that we do our best to allow our kids some independence and freedom of expression when it comes to their MySpace, BUT that we keep tabs both directly and indirectly to make sure that they are safe and/or appropriate.

He also wanted to know if The Daughter resented any involvement that I have when it comes to checking up on her and her online activities.  I told him that I think it is important for teens to have some level of freedom, but that parents need to make sure they are keeping their child safe.  I told him that when/if our child breeches our trust, then measures would be put into place to limit their freedoms.

I feel like I rambled on and on.  Gah!  I do hope he doesn't twist anything I said...