Snuggle Bunny

My House is Your House, Your Activities and My Activities

We're doing too much.

Well, actually, the boys are doing too much.

Which means I am doing too much.

The boys are doing DI this year, again. The past couple of years I've managed DI but when I started working I realized I simply didn't have enough time for weekly meetings. Each team is required to have at least one appraiser and one volunteer, and out of sheer guilt I signed up to appraise - this is usually a hard role to fill.

The appraiser is a hard role to fill because the appraiser cannot appraise at the same meet their own child is competing at. Well, you can, but then you don't get to see your kids compete. So they give you an alternate assignment - another meet to appraise at. All day. From 7am to whenever it ends, frequently after 5pm.

The other meet date - aside from the one my boys are at - is the same weekend as the play Nick and Nate are doing. I also have the boys that weekend. While I haven't heard back from Steve, I am reasonably sure he will be able to watch the boys and get them to their performances. I can make three of the four. Still, I'll be spending a whole day doing something because of an activity they are a part of.

Today I spent the day training for this day of not-my-activity activity. This isn't even taking into account the day I'll spend at the meet my boys are actually attending.

Oh... and that play. The boys are having a great time and are doing such great jobs. But they parents were asked to volunteer both behind the scenes and ahead of time. I was hoping to lend my hand during the production, but now that I'm not there for Saturday's I can't. This doesn't mean I'm not stressing about being so awkward at finding props (my other assignment) or selling ad space.

It's tough, that play. Because the rehearsals are constantly conflicting with rescheduled basketball games and practices. Those were originally scheduled for Friday and Saturday, but keep getting rescheduled for Sunday and Tuesday due to kindergarten registration and snowstorms.

This week is going to be exceptionally difficult because the band concert that was snowed out is smooshed up against the previously scheduled violin concert, and now we have activities every afternoon this week.

I don't want to do all this. But I guess I didn't quite realize that, at this point at least, if the boys are doing something, I need to do it also. Only I need to know all of the details while the boys only think about it during the moments they are IN the activity.

We'll sign back up for karate in March.

sigh...

Screen Time

When I was a kid, I would wake up early in the morning and go down to watch TV. Sometimes I would be so early, the station hadn't come on yet. You remember that? When there would just be a barcode up with maybe a line of odd code on the bottom? Because people back then didn't usually stay up all night watching TV. Not yet.

Screen time was TV. My mother made an effort to control it. We could watch only certain shows (Sesame Street, Electric Company, Captain Kangaroo, Mr. Rodgers...) And then all heck broke loose. We discovered cable. We watched hours of stupid cartoons on Saturdays, starting with the Smurfs, the Snorks, Spaceghost, the Shirt Tales...  And my mother made a declaration. Only 1 hour of TV a day.
Mind you, we were only allowed to watch during the weekends, anyway, so...

I thought it was horribly unfair. My friends were playing V out on the playground, and knew exactly who the people were in Miami Vice. I was doomed.

Fast Forward to yesterday when a therapist was lecturing me on limiting screen time for the boys. She told me about 9-year-olds addicted to porn. She went on about desensitizing young men to the act of killing. And then she brought up the fact that all 3 of my boys had been terrified of a certain video game a friend of theirs had shown them.

I admit. She is right. I don't know anything about what the boys do on their screens. I mean, it is So BORING. I really don't want to know. But I cant just pretend that none of them had trouble sleeping the night after that stupid game walked into my home. Or that the internet is a safe place for children.

So, I made some changes.

It was hard, because the schools now assign homework Every Night that must be done on a computer.

The thing is, playing one spelling game can then lead to "I was just checking this thing out..." and before you know it they're all watching YouTube.

I made the boys give me everything. DSs, Laptops, tablets. I took the Wii U controllers and the remotes for the TV. And I put them in a basket in my room.

When it is time for screen time, I will let them choose a device. I will set a timer. And when it's over, then it's over.

Homework that involves the computer will wait until I get home to supervise.

I know it seems unfair. I know it seems a bit insane. But I guess it's just my effort to regain a little control over the situation. I'll have to see how it works out.

Homework

It's official.

All three boys now have homework.

None of them like to do it.

Right now, the boys are at Steve's, and there is an unfinished assignment on the kitchen table, due tomorrow.

I told the boy it should all be done yesterday, and was assured I was being ridiculous.

This would be slightly easier if the boys didn't have to be wrestled into their chairs to complete this stuff.

A Barrel Of Apples

A few years ago, Meg and Winston came to visit and bought us Apples To Apples.

This is a really fun game. But it got put away once they left, because it was no fun when Steve and I were playing it alone.

Then the boys discovered it at some game night, and they started playing it at home. It came out when my family came to visit.

Seriously, the boys this this game os so much fun.

Cleaning it up, however? Less fun.

What's In A Name?

The other day, in the car, one of the kids asked a question about a teenage friend of theirs.

"Why does he have one last name and his mom have another last name?"


I explained that their friend's mom gave her son her last name when he was born, but then when she got married, she changed her name so that she and her new husband had the same last name.

"Last names are funny things," I said. "Some people change their names when they get married and some people don't. And some people change their names back when they get a divorce."

I glanced in the rear-view to see what kind of reaction the boys would have to that.

There was a moment of silence while the concept sank in.

"Are you gonna change your name?"

Now, I already had the answer to this one in my back pocket, but I thought I'd feel it out. just in case.

"I don't know, what do you think?" I asked.

"But then we wouldn't have the same last name as you?"

"No. I would have my old last name and you would keep yours. What do you think?"

Well, it turned out there were three different schools of thought, and none of them were from who you'd expect. I'm not saying which kid had which reaction, but here they were.

One kid didn't care at all, either way.

One kid clung to me, as if changing my name would sever the bond between us.

One kid said he thought I should change my name back to my maiden name. And, to take it a step further, the boys should also change THEIR last names. It's a cool last name. Can we do that? Let's do that. And it was very important, and should be done as soon as possible. And why are you laughing, Mom?

I thought that changing my name when I got married would be a piece of cake. I would sign an official document, slip something in the mail, sprinkle it with fairy dust, and everything would be changed. I didn't picture standing in lines, paying change fees, spending the next eight years pointing to the stapled-in sheet on my passport (which I paid money for) which showed that I had changed my name just so they would let me on the plane / into the country. It was such a pain, in fact, that there are a couple of things I never changed at all. I still have a credit card in my maiden name. My AAA card, too. This would make things easier for me. If I were going to change it back.

But I don't think I am.

Long, long ago, when I had a job and co-workers, one of them explained how her mother chose her last name. She had been married three times, and had children with her second husband. When she divorced her second husband, she actually went and changed her last name... back to her second husband's last name. My friend explained that her mother had just wanted to have the same last name as her kids.

There are advantages to my maiden name. It's easier to spell. It's already written in a lot of my books. And I know plenty of mothers who do not have the same last name as their children. But still... I think I'll keep the one I have now. I can understand why that mother would want to have the same last name as her child. It's symbolic, sure. But it can mean a lot. And that one kid that clung to me? I want to stay as close to him as possible.

Your Mom's Candid Camera

This is a photograph of the boys in a tree.

I had a better photo of the boys in the tree, taken not long after this one. Seconds later, maybe. It was on my camera. I know it was on my camera because I had viewed it later, and showed it to the boys. It was the one I was going to use  on this blog, and maybe post to a fall/facebook album when I had more than two good shots.

This morning I uploaded the photos from my camera to my computer.

And see, this is where things get strange and technological and stupid. Each time I transfer the photos from my camera to the computer, I get a few photos that just turn up black. I mean, they show up in iphoto as black squares, like someone forgot to take of the lens cap. Except I have a point 'n shoot and there is no lens cap, only that techno thing that opens when you turn the camera on, and closes when you turn the camera off.

Until now, I attributed the black squares to the camera thingy just not opening when I took a shot. But if this was the case, then the photos would show up ON THE CAMERA as black squares, too, right?

So anyway, I uploaded photos this morning, got a bunch of black squares, and deleted them.

Then I switched views, saw a few more and deleted them also.

By the way, I also deleted all the photos from the camera, figuring they were on my computer.

And then I went looking for my favorite shots, AND THEY WERE GONE!

Seriously, the tree one was cute. But there was also a really good shot of Nate carrying Frank up the porch steps, Frank looking seriously tolerant and Nate looking a little scared... And it's gone, too.

So.

Ugh.

So this happens. That's the bad news.

But I now know that this happens, so that's good news. I can now NOT delete photos from my camera until I'm sure all the nice and cute shots have made it. It's just.... SO not fair!

That tree climbing shot,  I tell you... You should have seen it.

Growth Chart

When Nick was born, I moved this dresser into his bedroom. It was one of the dressers we had when I was a kid. It used to be cream with gold detail, but after I spilled a tube of magic bubbles on the top, it got scraped down to a natural wood. It's a great piece of furniture - still sturdy, still working.

I shared this dresser with my sisters. I can't even remember what was in it. I think it was in my room, and then maybe in Anne-E's room. But eventually it ended up in the hallway, and various shirts were kept in it. We also had a huge closet, and whenever one of us needed anything that wasn't immediately in our closets we went to this huge closet and it was probably hanging in there. Along with various forgotten sweaters, jackets, ugly dresses, and clothing from the 1980's my mother used to wear. We had so much storage space, and when I thought back to it I always thought it was weird that we had our own rooms but still couldn't fit all our stuff in one closet or dresser.

I'm getting off topic. How surprising. Not.

Anyway, Nick had this dresser, and I remember being very pregnant and putting his newly laundered little onesies and footie outfits in there. His clothing was so tiny. I put all the newborn things in the top drawer, with short sleeves on one side and longer, warmer items on another side. The next drawer had the 3-6 months, the next drawer had 6-9 mos, and finally the next drawer had the 12 month items I felt he'd never actually grow into.

And he had clothes - Holy Moly, this kid had 3 complete sets of clothing. More things than I did, I promise you. And once he started wearing his things, I was the one who was more concerned about wearing a clean shirt. Baby might be wearing his third outfit of the day, all nice and cozy, but I was wearing a maternity shirt that smelled like puke and sweat.

Sorry... where was I?

This dresser. I still have the dresser. When Nate came along I just used some of the drawers for Nate and some for Nick. Eventually I started having to put some things in storage to make room.

And then Andy came along...

And then there was no more room. I had to use another dresser, one that used to belong to my other gramma. The drawers don't open and close as easily. It has a mirror that has always warped reflections - It was in my room all through high school, so I should know.

The boys have all split these dressers. Shirts are in one, pants in another. Socks and undies are spilt. In fact, Nick's socks and underwear take up as much room as all of his newborn stuff put together. Andy's pants fill a drawer - if they are all clean, the drawer won't close.

So now the boys are getting their own rooms, and I realized I'm going to need at least one new dresser. Possibly two, if I can find a place for Gramma's with the mirror - the drawers really don't close properly and clothes are all over the floor...

It's just that, all of their clothing used to fit in this one piece of furniture, and now it's hardly enough for one of them. It's not just the boys that grow. They really do start to take up more room.

Pardon Our Appearance

And by "Our Appearance" I really mean "The lack of Blog Posts On This Blog." I actually like the look it has right now, and until I get irritated or board by it, I refuse to apologize for that.

Masks - April 2013

 I did, however, mean to post a few things ahead of time before I left for New York. Yet I did not.

For this, we are truly sorry.

Masks - April 2013

Logic

Andy had a sore toe.

I knew he'd hurt it, and I'd put a band-aid on it a few days earlier, but I suddenly got a good look at it when his brothers were in karate and eww... it was so gross. The toenail looked ingrown, but there was a cut and the whole thing was swollen. No further detail. Just trust me, it was gross.

I was concerned enough to take immediate action, so I told Andy we were going right to CVS to get bactine, neosporin, and some band-aids.

"You get to pick whichever band-aids you want," I said.

"Yes," said Andy, playing into this as only he can. "And then I get to dump them all out and pick the one I want on my toe."

"Why do you need to dump them out?" I asked. "Then we have to get all the others back into the box. Why can't you just look into the box and take out the one you want?"

"I can't do that. My eyes are too short."

Andy, examining his dinner, March 2013

A Place For Everything...

Around here, you never know what you're going to find around the corner.

What Day Is It?

Nick has his on waffles with chocolate syrup and lots of strawberries and blueberries. Andy prefers his in a bowl with lots of Cinnamon Life cereal sprinkled on top. I like a scoop of coffee in my coffee.

So many possibilities. It's Ice Cream For Breakfast Day.

I know, it's so odd, but once a year it's a great pick-me-up, and one of my life's missions is to get more people to do this. Spread the word!

Bed Head

Lately the boys have become a little involved with their hair.

Steve actually caught Andy trying to cut his hair.

I have tried convincing them that running a comb through it is the first step.

No one seems very excited about that.

The Dark Suffer

I can't remember what we were talking about. I think it was Nate's Tick. Or maybe it was about the rats in New York city escaping the subway... But I think it was more likely about Nate's Tick....

Anyway, he suddenly started talking about The Dark Suffer.

"You know, The Dark Suffer. Nick knows about it, right Nick?"

I thought it must be some Pokemon battle thing, but then Nick said "You know, when the fleas from rats made people sick?"

"Wait," I said. "Are you talking about the Black Plague?"

Recognition lit up both boy's faces as they nodded. "The Black Plague? That was hundreds of years ago. You don't really have to worry about that anymore."

The Dark Suffer?

No Ticks On Me

After Trick-Or-Treating on the 31st, we still had to make the drive back home.

Both Nate and Andy fell asleep in the car, so when we got home, I had them skip baths so they could hop into bed, even though it wasn't even 8pm.

The next morning, at the breakfast table, there was a slight commotion. Then Nick and Nate were both shouting at me that there was a tick on Nate.

It was on his chest, high up enough so that he couldn't see it. It wasn't swollen, but it has sug itself in.

I called him over and got it out with a cotton ball, dish soap, and tweezers. (I've heard that if you cover it in soap or oil, it backs out, trying to breathe, and it makes it easier to pluck off. Don't know if it's true, but getting it off Nate was pretty easy.)

Nate sniffed a little, but the tick was off, and I figured it was forgotten.

That afternoon, however, he was poking at it during piano practice.

"I feel all funny about it," he said. And then he asked if it was true that you could catch a disease from ticks.

"Yes," I said, not really thinking about it. "You can, but you won't. We'll keep an eye on it just in case, but I'm sure you're fine. Now let's practice this."

Cut to Nate in Steve's Den, crying with worry about catching some illness from his tick bite.

By the way, he's fine. The area was red because he was poking it all day. Once we put a band-aid on the spot and he was able to see the reflection in the mirror, he was a lot calmer.

What Did You Want?

Andy: I SAID I wanted a Nature Valley Gorilla Bar!

Let's Boogie

After four days, Nathan started asking to stay home from the beach. He was a wild man in the water, but the waves were sometimes too much for him, and the water was cold. And by cold I don't mean "The water's a bit chilly this morning, just get it over your shoulders and you'll be fine." I mean you step onto the water and your joints begin aching from the cold and after five minutes, if you've managed to work your way to your waist, you realize you've lost all feeling in your thighs. A shark could be gnawing off your foot and you'd have no idea because you're entire body is numb.

So I bribed the boys with Boogie Boards, something they've been asking for since last year.

They were so excited, and ran in right away to use them. Of course, the water was very cold, and the waves that day turned violently hard and high, so we had to pull them out of the water before noon anyway, but it made for a fun day.

Crack of Dawn

My kids go to bed at 8pm.

At home, they go to bed at 8PM, and as far as they know, the rest of the world also goes to bed at 8pm, except me and Steve. How would they know otherwise?

When we go to NY, people still bustle around, but they are far, far away, down on the street.

At Hampton Beach, the people are right outside your window, propped open because of the heat, and you can hear their conversation.

I overheard Nathan muttering to his brother: It's the crack of dawn and people are still walking around out there.

It was 9PM.

Someone should explain to Nate that 9PM is still a good time for adults to be awake. It's 5AM, when he wakes up, which is the crack of dawn.

Home Work

A few years ago, gripped with the fear that my child was struggling in school and would forget everything he had ever learned by the time fall came around, I started the boys doing summer workbooks.

 The boys liked doing the workbooks. It was a game. When I told the boys I got them workbooks, they begged to start them right away.

Last year things started to get more difficult. Math started to be about adding, and even about (gulp) subtracting. Nathan ended up with a book asking him to write sentences (It had Lighting McQueen, and I swear it said it was for Kindergarten. These Disney folk must have high standards.) The boys started liking it less.

But I am an evil mother. An Evil Mother with a Tiger Mom streak of doom. I decided that I didn’t really care if my kids enjoyed this work or not. I wouldn’t over do it. I got each of them three workbooks, and one journal. And they are usually required to do two pages in each workbook a day (sometimes only one page in the subtraction book, because I know it is more difficult.)

Andy’s books are, of course, much simpler. These are the books we started off with. He writes the letter N. He circles the pictures that begin with N. He gets his work done in ten minutes and bounces off to play.

Nick and Nate have more challenging work. Their books no longer have games, or little cartoon aliens having pizza parties coaxing them through the exercises. Instead, they have to read. They have to know what a noun is, and they have to know which words in a sentence get capitalized. They have to write whole sentences and actually do sums.

Oh. The. Horror.

Steve says I make them do a lot. And this might be true. But a lot is not the same as Too Much. I am not asking the boys to do anything they cannot do. The boys still have plenty of time to play. So I don’t think this is a bad thing. It can only help them in the long run, when they see this stuff come up at school. And it will come up in school. And if it doesn't at least they've learned it here.

But if you listened to the crying and the moaning and the protests…. You would think I was making them sit there for HOURS reading dull history narratives, or doing calculus. In fact, more time and effort is spent on dramatics than on actually doing the work.

Beach Brain

When the summer started, I promised myself we’d go to the beach more this year. Not the big beach, the town beach. We can stop off there for an hour and the boys would at least get the chance to try out their swimming skills.

But so far we’ve only made it once.

I can’t tell you why we haven’t had the reason. Something always comes up. We had a week of camp. It rained a whole bunch. I was sick with a cold. Only all of those things happened the same week, so its not much of an excuse.

It must be me. I must be putting other things first. Obviously. My kids would have us there every day.

How is this possible? How can I feel so busy, and yet still get nothing fun inton the schedule? We still haven’t seen Brave!