Well, that was fun.

While I had stopped to chat with a friend briefly, Kevin and Heidi found some axle grease under the donation trailer that is currently parked by our building. Kevin smeared it all over his hands like lotion so they were completely black and Heidi had it on her fingertips. And of course Kevin managed to smudge it on his face and arms as well. Those ten seconds of fun meant that Ryan and I got to spend the next half hour using an entire bottle of dish soap washing it off of them and the bathroom. It was one of those predicaments that are so ridiculous you have to laugh about it even though it's awful. If you look at the picture that shows Kevin's face you can see on his right hand what it looked like before we washed it.

Mother's Day Interviews

Ryan interviewed the kids on Mother's Day, and I think this was the first time we successfully got answers from the kids!

How old is Mom?
K: 27
H: 7

How tall is Mom?
K: 27
H: [reaches up as tall as she can]

What makes Mom happy?
K: When we help her.
H: I'm not telling you!! . . . (Later) Smiling!

What is Mom really good at?
K: Making dinner.
H: Writing notes for Grandma and Grandpa.

What is Mom's favorite food?
K: Soup.
H: Chocolate.

What do you and Mom do together?
K: Play games.
H: Make dinner.

What is something Mom always says to you?
K: Clean up your room. Clean up the living room.
H: Go to the playground!

Mom likes to relax by . . .
K: Say her prayers.
H: Buy some food.

The best thing she cooks is . . .
K: Pizza, cinnamon rolls
H: Cooked carrots, spaghetti and noodles and sauce, and that's all. Spaghetti sauce too.

When my mom shops she likes to get . . .
K: Stuff on sale.
H: Noodles. She likes to go to Target and buy some clothes for me and Kevin and you.

My mom's favorite household chore is . . .
K: Sweeping and cleaning and vacuuming.
H: Read scriptures.

If mom could go on a trip she would go to . . .
K: To Utah.
H: To the park.

I also did some Mother's Day interviews when I hosted joy school the week before Mother's Day, and here are the answers Heidi gave for that:

What does your mom do to relax?
Go out in the hall.

Where does your mom like to shop?
Costco

How old is your mom?
20

What do you love most about your mom?
Watching movies. I like buying carrots with my mom.

If you could buy your mom anything, what would it be?
A water bottle.

What does your mom do while you're at school?
Read books.

sour milk, farm days, chores, and Mount Laundry

Life has become really hectic. It's getting harder and harder to get even the basics done. And normal life never seems to happen because there's always something or other to disrupt my plans.

Ann Marie is pulling herself up on things to stand now (as of a few of weeks ago) and will kind of walk if you hold her hands. Army crawling is still her primary way of getting around, but she is transitioning into a regular crawl. I don't think many of her onesies are going to last for another child because she loves exploring the kitchen and inevitably gets stuff all over her front. And the sand park is an even worse culprit. She signs more and food and says more (Mah! Mah!), Dad (dada), and Mom (nanana or mamama). She is starting to figure out how to drink out of a sippy cup. Lately I feel like I can't make food fast enough for her to eat it. The other day I made sweet potato fries and I'm pretty sure she ate an entire sweet potato by herself.

Heidi can't keep her hands off of Ann Marie. Every time I turn around I see her carrying her by the armpits somewhere. I think being a big sister will be more fun once Ann Marie is walking and knows how to play and talk better.

Kevin has been doing a lot better with his reading lately. Sounding out words is not as much of a battle (still hard, but not as bad), and he's learned a lot of sight words, so that helps him to be able to read faster. It sounds like at school they are starting to learn more phonetics. He told me about how super E at the end of words can jump on the vowel in the middle and make it say its name, and he's been learning about some word families like the ones that end in -ay and words that have ee in them. He's been using a website called Raz Kids at school sometimes, and even though we have access to it at home I hadn't really had him do it at home much because I was getting things from the library for him to read. But a few weeks ago we got on there with him and realized he was way behind, and when we looked at the parents page we realized it was because he didn't understand how to take the quizzes and he was repeating the same five books over and over. So Ryan sat down with him one evening and helped Kevin understand it better and got him motivated to try to aim to get from Level B to Level C. In just a couple of days he read forty books and did all the quizzes and had moved on to Level C. He was pretty excited. So now he's working on getting to Level D. The books are even more dumb than the ones he's been bringing home from school, which I didn't realize was possible, but he's motivated by the levels and it does give him some practice with sight words and learning new words. Plus I was just a little embarrassed when I realized how behind he was.

Last week Kevin didn't miss the bus once in the morning. This is a huge accomplishment because we had a couple of months where I don't think he caught the bus once. I finally decided to stop fighting the daily half-hour battle of having him get himself dressed because it's much, much more convenient for me to dress him myself so he can catch the bus. If he misses the bus I end up spending twenty minutes in rush hour traffic both ways getting him to school.

Ryan is really close to having his first paper ready for publication. He keeps having things that need to be edited and tweaked, but he's close. He's also been working a little on his second paper.

A little over a week ago I bought groceries while Heidi was at joy school. I brought them home and was putting them away as quickly as I could so I could go pick up Heidi, when I realized that one of my jugs of milk had a hole in it. It made a puddle on the counter that I had to clean up, then I realized the stroller (which I had used to bring in all the groceries) was sopping wet, and then with a terrible sinking feeling I realized that meant there was probably a puddle of milk in the back of our van. My fears were confirmed when I went out to check. I had to call the mom who was hosting joy school to let her know I was going to be late because of the milk, but since she had to leave right away to go teach a class at a gym, she had to ask one of the other moms to stay with Heidi until I could get there. So I was grateful that I could take some time to try to clean up the milk. The floor of the van wasn't quite as bad as I had feared, but it was wet on one side, so I dried it as well as I could and then scrubbed at it with wet washcloths, then went and picked up Heidi.

The next day the van definitely smelled like milk. It didn't smell like sour milk yet, but it smelled like milk. So I did a more vigorous scrub with Simple Green and water and got more worried. The next day we came out to go to church and the van smelled like rotting milk and I started freaking out that our car was going to be ruined. I didn't feel like scrubbing it myself was doing any good and I just wanted it taken care of. So finally I decided that the best thing would be to get it shampooed. That evening I did a lot of research about various car wash businesses, and I realized that it probably wouldn't cost as much as I had been thinking, so the next morning (Monday) I called and made an appointment. As soon as the worker opened the trunk and got a whiff, he said, "Oh, milk. I've dealt with this before." He shampooed the carpet pretty thoroughly and sprayed it with the same stuff they use to get rid of the smell of cigarette smoke. Then I spent as much time outside with the kids as possible so I could open the back of the van and keep an eye on it while it dried. Fortunately Tuesday was a warm sunny day, so it dried pretty quickly once the sun was shining on it. Now our car still smells like the stuff that was sprayed on the carpet, so we're getting a little tired of that smell, but so far the smell of rotten milk hasn't returned, even after a week, so I'm feeling hopeful that the problem is taken care of. I guess in the future I will make sure the milk isn't sitting right on top of the carpet in case something like this happens again. We are very grateful that the milk smell seems to be gone. One of my friends commented that whoever said "Never cry over spilled milk" was a fool.

I took Heidi to the NCSU Farm Animal Days again this year. I forgot to take the camera, but she had a good time. She still talks about holding the baby chicks from last year, so I knew she would really like to go again. She enjoyed looking at all the animals and trying a few of the tractors, and considering how long we had to wait in line to see the chicks she was pretty patient. I was a little annoyed because as we were getting close to the front of the line, three moms with about eight kids jumped in front of us in line. Apparently one of them had been saving a spot for everyone else so they wouldn't have to wait a long time with all their kids. On the one hand, it made sense, but it was still irritating to have that big group jump in front of us after we had waited so long. I decided not to say anything. Heidi was happy to finally get to hold a chick. When we had seen everything they gave us some free ice cream. Kevin was disappointed that he didn't get to come, but it only lasted until 2:00 every day and I didn't want to take him out of school since he's already missed eight days this year. Maybe next year I'll check him out of school so he can go.

We are trying to establish Saturday chores for the kids. We talked about it in family home evening and told how helping to clean up is part of being a family, so yesterday they asked if we were going to have a chore chart. We had them clean toilets and mirrors with a lot of guidance from me. We are also trying to be more strict about having them pick up the toys themselves and put their own clothes away. Most of the time it seems like a lot more work to get them to clean up after themselves, but I'm trying to remind myself that this is an investment in the future.

Every once in a while I feel like I'm close to being caught up on laundry. When that happens it usually means it's time to start washing all the clothes again. When Kevin was a baby I didn't understand why putting away clothes that are too small or out of season was such an ordeal for other moms, but now I get it. When you have several kids and a dozen bins full of clothes to save, it's a lot more work. I also realized that there were several cute girl outfits I had saved from when Heidi was a baby that are already close to being too small for Ann Marie. Whoops.

Parenting Myths I Believed

Don't give your child coloring books because it stunts their creativity. Instead give him/her blank pieces of paper and plenty of art supplies and let him/her come up with his/her own creations.

I know, it was dumb to believe this. But in my defense I was also under the impression that coloring books are expensive. The reality is that coloring books are dirt cheap in the dollar bins at Target, kids love them, and there's nothing wrong with them. Yes, there are some kids that can come up with creative things without being taught, but I've found that if I just give my kids art supplies they get overwhelmed and upset. I used to give Kevin scratch paper and crayons and try to get him to color, but he would get tense and usually refuse to even try. All he wanted was to tell me what to draw and watch me do it. Now that I know that he has dyspraxia I understand why he did that. Once he was given a model for how to draw a person he calmed down a lot and now he will draw all sorts of things. There's nothing wrong with giving them pictures to color and demonstrating for them how to draw basic things like cars, people, and trees. A lot of kids need to observe and then learn.

Kids need to be left to play by themselves so that they can learn social skills.

I agree that there is merit to this statement. It's good for kids to play without parents telling them what to do and micromanaging everything. Plus sometimes the magic of pretending goes away when a parent comes in for some reason. But at the same time social skills do not come naturally to kids, and they need coaching so that they can learn to interact with other people and get along well. I've learned a lot about this from taking Kevin to therapy. They often have kids play together and give them a lot of guidance for what to say and how to share. This week I brought Heidi with us to therapy and Kevin's OT had them play a game together at the end to see how they play together. I hadn't realized until she pointed it out how little they communicate with each other. For example, Kevin would grab things out of Heidi's hands without asking. I realized that a lot of conflicts happen because Kevin and Heidi don't communicate what they are going to do and they often expect each other to read their minds. These are problems that would be better treated by playing with them, observing closely, and giving lots and lots of guidance for what they should be saying or doing together. If we don't spend some time playing together with our children and their friends we miss things like that, and they miss out on learning important social skills. Some kids are better at it than others, but it doesn't come naturally and they often need to be directly taught. My guess is that most parents should probably play MORE with their kids, not less.

Laughing makes it easier to bear.

If there's anything I've learned in the past two and a half weeks, it's that laughing makes the hard things easier to bear.

I think I got proof yesterday that I'm starting to get it. I had made some cornbread for breakfast. Ryan and I ate some together because the kids had already had cereal. Ryan didn't finish his piece, so he left it on the table intending to finish it in a while. A few minutes later, Heidi came up to me and said sweetly, "Mom, is it okay if I eat that?" while pointing at Ryan's cornbread. I started to say yes, but then I stopped and said, "Actually, you probably shouldn't eat that because Daddy was sick with a stomach bug yesterday and you might get sick if you eat it. But I can get you your own . . . " Then Heidi got a horrified look on her face and I realized she had actually already eaten a few bites of Ryan's cornbread. Heidi started crying because she was so scared that now she was going to get sick. She cried so hard that she started coughing. She was coughing so hard that I started wondering if she would throw up. Then I realized she was throwing up, and instinctively I put my hand out to catch it because by this point she was on my lap and I guess it seemed like it would be better to wash my hand than to have it all in my lap. All I could do was yell, "Um, bowl!" and stare at my hand and laugh, because I just caught throw-up in my hand and how in the world was I supposed to know that she would react that way to what I had said? And of course now that Heidi actually did throw up she started crying and coughing even harder and saying, "I'm sick, I'm sick!" No amount of reassurance that she wasn't sick could get her to calm down, so I desperately grasped at straws and started talking about the freezing rain on the trees outside like it was the coolest thing ever, and luckily that seemed to calm her down enough. Once she had run off to play I just looked at Ryan and laughed and laughed at the absurdity of what had just happened. It seemed like a better option than getting upset.

Did I mention we've been getting a lot of snow here? In the past two school weeks the kids have had 1 1/2 days of school, plus Kevin missed the 13th because of an ear infection. Heidi hasn't been able to go to joy school, either. And yesterday church was cancelled because there was freezing rain. The first week with no school was rough. I had plans and I kept thinking there would be school again the next day and I could get some stuff done, so when school kept getting cancelled it was really frustrating. The second week was mostly better, although Friday was rough. At some point it got so ridiculous that I could only laugh when we got the calls cancelling school every evening, and laughing about it seemed to make it better. It also helped that the snow was better the second week, so we were able to have some fun in the snow.  It has been hard to have our routine disrupted. I haven't been able to get as much done as I want to. Some days I was lucky to get an opportunity to brush my hair.

I am hoping that school will be back in session this week. The school has changed all teacher workdays and delayed opening days to regular school days, and they've also decided to have school on Memorial Day and a couple of Saturdays (early release) to make up for what the kids have missed. The next couple of weeks still won't exactly be routine, though. I'm teaching joy school this week and next week, plus we have a piano tuner coming (finally!!), a doctor appointment for Ann Marie, my birthday, and of course Kevin's surgery today (Ryan is with him at the hospital right now, actually). I think what I'm starting to find is that there are always things that disrupt your schedule and while it's good to have a plan it's also important to mentally prepare to be flexible instead of getting grumpy when plans change.

I got a lot of pictures of the snow, but I haven't gotten a chance to go through them yet, so those are coming soon.

stuff I feel like writing about

I am still slowly making progress with Couch to 5K. On Wednesday I thought I would be able to move on to the week 3 program next week, but yesterday was really hard and now I'm thinking I'll be repeating the week 2 program for the third time. If I push myself too hard my calves get too sore and then I can't do anything, let alone exercise. I wish I could get better a little faster, but at least I'm doing something.

For some reason my body thinks it's a good idea to wake up at 4:00 in the morning and spend an hour or so worrying about things--some realistic, some less so. Then I have to get up early to get Kevin ready for school.  The last couple of days have been a little better, so hopefully I can break the pattern, because I'm awfully tired.

Overall I feel happy about Kevin being in school. He is really learning a lot. It's true that kindergarten is the new first grade, at least when it comes to reading and writing. By the end of the year all of the kids are supposed to be able to sound out words and know several sight words (and spell them), and they are supposed to be able to write about a book after they have read it. Some of their methods seem a little weird, but mostly it's fine.

The school has a behavior system that is based on the acronym CHOMP (Care for others, Have respect, Offer peer support, Make good choices, and Practice safety). When the kids are caught doing these behaviors they get CHOMP tickets, and when a class has gotten enough tickets they can earn rewards like extra recess, wearing pajamas to school, etc. This is a research-based program and I think it's good for the most part. The one thing that annoys me is that the rules are a little fuzzy sometimes--basically anything that doesn't fit in any one category just gets lumped into Make Good Choices. But they are usually good about understanding that these are just little kids and they're still learning the rules. It's harder for kids like Kevin who don't really fit the cookie cutter kid mold because some of those behaviors don't come as naturally to him as they do to most of the kids. Just as an example, Kevin is a very curious person. He's always observing the things around him, and if he sees something interesting he wants to touch it and figure out how it works. That's certainly a positive characteristic, but hand-in-hand with that characteristic is a tendency to get up and wander if he sees something interesting. Sometimes it feels like they miss the positives because they're so focused on making sure he's sitting down. I understand that they need to do that because if they don't tell all the kids to sit down then things will go crazy (and sitting down at appropriate times is a skill he's going to need to figure out), but I worry that they'll see the kid who won't sit down and miss that he's also the kid who's great at seeing how things work. Make sense? I don't worry too hard about it because we do plenty at home to encourage his talents and he's a confident person, but it does still worry and frustrate me.

Speaking of how things work, we've discovered the How It's Made videos on youtube, and there are a lot of cool ones. I've been letting Kevin watch them as a treat sometimes, and the nice thing is that I don't have to feel very guilty about letting him watch videos because he really learns a lot from them. We've enjoyed the ones about sugar, noodles, erasers, and chocolates, just to name a few.

I feel like Heidi is working on finding herself. She copies a lot of the things that Kevin does or says. She is really talkative at home lately. Sometimes I just have to go in our room for a couple of minutes to get a break because she chatters so much. It's cute, but after a while it can kind of wear on you. In other places she is more shy. She's obsessed with nonsense words. A lot of the time she'll just call things a "da-nya-nya" or a "gonch" or whatever else she feels like calling it and then expect you to give it to her.

We've signed the kids up for soccer. Kevin is doing a great job participating and following directions. It's really cute. Heidi is pretty shy and has to have some time before she's willing to play. Last time it took Ryan about 25 minutes to even coax her to kick the ball, and then finally in the last 10 minutes she started standing in the vicinity of her team.

Ann Marie is getting more social and more capable of grabbing things and putting them in her mouth. There was one evening this week when she was really upset during dinner, and finally I went and got her a baby spoon to play with and she was delighted. It was like she just wanted to have an eating utensil like everyone else. She can grab things and put them in her mouth.

We had well-child checkups for Heidi and Ann Marie this week. Heidi is 29 pounds and 37 inches tall, and Ann Marie is 14 pounds and 24 inches long. As I recall, they're both around the 25th percentile for height and weight. The nice thing about having three kids is that the doctor assumes that I know what I'm doing and isn't as pushy about some things. It was a rough day for Heidi. She got a flu shot and thought it was horrible, and then on top of that we found out she has an ear infection, so she also had to start taking yucky amoxicillin twice a day, which she also thinks is horrible.

about the kids

Ann Marie
It's hard to believe she's already over two months old! Life before she joined our family seems like a different world. She is a wonderful influence on our family. Ann Marie is starting to find her fingers and suck on them to soothe herself. If I told you what a good baby she is you would probably try to kidnap her. I know the older kids were sleeping for longer stretches by this point, but she still sleeps pretty well at night and she makes up for it by being so patient with all the craziness during the day. She's figured out how to suck on two fingers to sooth herself (Kevin and Heidi are both thumb suckers). We love her sweet smiles and hearing her say "Oh" to us. We've decided that she probably can roll over both ways, but she's pretty content just sitting there, so she doesn't really try. Sometimes she's gotten pretty close.

Heidi
Heidi is the girl with all the questions. Sometimes it's hard to be patient with the repetition because she asks the same questions over and over. Here are some of the ones we hear a lot these days:

• Why was the baby naked at the midwife?
• I was a baby in your tummy?
• Will the baby go back in your tummy?
• Where's the baby?

Honestly, Heidi is becoming quite the drama queen. She collapses onto the floor and cries quietly at the slightest provocation. She doesn't usually throw tantrums or cry loudly. It's not the worst parenting problem I've ever encountered, but there's something about the way she does it that sometimes catches me off guard and makes me feel so guilty that I just told her she has to go back to bed. Most of the time I can just ignore it, though. Other than that, though, she's really a sweetheart. She loves to help out in the kitchen. Today she helped me make bread and actually did a pretty good job of shaping the loaves and putting them in the bread pans.

Kevin

We are getting ready for Kindergarten. I am freaking out on an hourly basis. We have prayed and pondered a great deal about it and we feel that it is the right choice to send him to public school this year, but I'm really nervous that people will misunderstand him and he'll get labeled as a problem child because he's so active and can get very overstimulated. All-day kindergarten is the only option here, and they only get 15 minutes of recess every day. Every time I think about the different options, I feel like this is the right one, so the plan is to go forward with it and be willing to change if things aren't working out.

We got most of the school supplies yesterday. I asked Kevin if he's excited to go to Kindergarten, and he said he doesn't want to go because they'll make him sit with the other kids and he doesn't want them to touch him. Other times he seems excited. He probably has no idea what to expect. But he does like his backpack. He's been begging for a backpack for a couple of years. We were able to persuade him to get a nice black one instead of something cheap and tacky with superheroes all over it.

I've been reading a book called Playful Parenting. It's been really helpful to me and given me a lot of ideas about how to play with my kids and use play to help them with their problems. It's given me a more positive outlook on motherhood. One of the concepts that I have gleaned from the book is that there will be times when I won't get along with the kids, but the important thing is that I need to keep seeking opportunities to reconnect with them. It's helped me to notice more opportunities to create happy moments. One day we spent over an hour sitting on the couch while I told them stories about my childhood. Another time when Heidi was reluctant to take a nap, she was crying for a drink of water, so I brought in a cup of water and said, "Oh, you want a drink-o-rama?" It was just the kind of humor that she loves, and I heard her giggling for several minutes about how Mommy said drink-o-rama. I hope that the new perspective I have gotten from this book will last.

Satan's tricks

Recently I was listening to the song Let Us All Press On and I was struck by the line in the chorus, "Fear not, though the enemy deride." It reminded me of 3 Nephi 9:2: "For the devil laugheth."

Specifically, the line reminded me how Satan enjoys making us miserable by counterfeiting the Holy Ghost.

Like most moms, I often feel like I don't know what I'm doing. A message I sometimes get from the Holy Ghost is, "You know, you've been a little hard on your kids lately. You should spend more quality time with them and give them some grace." The message I get from Satan is, "You are really messing this up. Your kids are going to be scarred for life because you are completely messing them up by doing such a terrible job." When I worry it can be hard to remember how to distinguish between those two messages. The difference is that the Holy Ghost's influence is a loving reminder that motivates me to change, whereas Satan's influence fills me with despair and strips away my confidence so that I struggle even more. This is why the line, "though the enemy deride," really stuck out to me this time. I know that the devil really wants me to fail and that he will attack our family and try to bring us all down. But I also know that God has given me the resources I need to raise these children, and he's not going to let me fail if I do my best. I know enough. (I was just looking over that blog post again and I had to laugh out loud, because although I was aware that motherhood was going to have its challenges, I can see now that I had no idea what I was getting into!)

My yelling triggers

For the past year or so I've been reading theorangerhino.com, a blog about yelling less and loving more. I've never gotten ambitious enough to make a goal to not yell at my kids for 365 days, like the author did, but she offers some great ideas that she figured out herself as she worked on that goal. One of the things she figured out was that there are certain things that make her more inclined to yell, so when she feels like yelling, she goes through her list of triggers to see if any of those are the real reason she wants to yell. It's been helpful to me to do this because often when I am yelling at my kids a lot it's because of something I'm dealing with, not something they are doing. So here is my list of triggers:

• I'm hungry.
• The sink is full of dirty dishes.
• There are a lot of toys all over the floor.
• It's almost dinner time and I don't know what to make.
• I've been spending too much time on the computer.
• I read a post or article about parenting (or worse, the comments under a post about parenting) and it made me upset. (Even the positive ones tend to do this.)
• I'm tired.
• I have a headache.
• I'm stressed about something. (This used to happen a lot when I had a test or a paper coming up or I didn't know how to do a problem on my homework.)
• I haven't spent time with friends for a while.
• I need to exercise and/or I've been eating too much junk food.
• I haven't been saying my prayers.
• We've been out doing errands or at the park for a long time and I need some time at home to reset and get my energy back.

For the most part the things on this list are not the kids' fault and they are things that I can control or do something about, so if I stop and think about what is really causing me to yell, I can address that problem. Usually once I've taken care of it my body relaxes (like all the hot air has been released or something) and suddenly I feel like being nice to the kids again. Sometimes I'm just grumpy or emotional for no apparent reason, and that's harder to deal with, but it's helpful to know that at least sometimes there are things I can do to fix it.

on development

In the past week or two Heidi has started potty training herself. It's mostly been a breeze. She does everything herself except that she needs a little help cleaning off the froggy potty. I don't have to remind her or sit with her or help with clothes or anything. A year ago I thought she was ready and I tried to potty train her, and it just didn't work. She wasn't quite ready to recognize and control her body's signals. Even three weeks ago I thought she'd be in diapers until she was four.

A week or so ago I thought I'd try to start working on handwriting with Kevin. I was going to start with writing his name and go from there. When we sat down I was expecting a bit of resistance because for a long time he has been very reluctant to even try writing letters himself. I've been worried sick for a year that he would have a really hard time in kindergarten because of his unwillingness to write. To my surprise, he did pretty well this time! After I showed him how to write the letters he took the pencil and gave it a try. Sure, he may need some work making his writing more neat, but at least he's trying, and that's all I want. I'm much less worried about his ability to do the writing activities in school now.

I think about these big accomplishments that my kids are making and I wish I could go back in time and tell myself not to stress and worry so much. I realize now that their brains will develop at their own rates, and when they are developmentally ready, they will write or potty train or whatever else. I mean, I've known that all along, but in the moment it was hard to remember it. At the time it was hard to remind myself that if they haven't figured something out yet it's not all my fault. Little kids are all so different and they reach milestones at different times.

Are we over-protecting our children?

This is pretty much a rant in response to articles like this one claiming that we are permanently debilitating our children's emotional, mental, and physical well-being by not letting them take risks and prohibiting them wandering the streets unsupervised all day. This is probably the most extreme of the posts I have seen on this issue, but the subject has been coming up a lot lately and while I agree that many parents are too overprotective and micromanage their kids' lives too much, I completely disagree that the solution is to swing to the other extreme.

One of the claims they often make is that our mothers turned us loose and let us roam the streets and woods unsupervised all day, and since nothing bad happened to us it was fine. Guess what, that story did not turn out so nicely for the ones who DID have something bad happen to them. The kids who drowned or got hit by a car or got seriously burned aren't around to tell how they wish their mom had known what they were doing. Don't underestimate the stupid things kids can do if left unchecked. Last night I was telling Ryan about some of the stupid things I did with friends while we were left unsupervised, and he looked completely unimpressed and proceeded to tell me about all the things he and his friends had done with matches, lighter fluid, and gasoline. Have you ever read Lord of the Flies? One of the things that's so disturbing about that book is that it actually sounds plausible that kids could get that crazy if left completely on their own. As parents it's our job to be there to give our children reasonable limits while they learn what behavior is acceptable and what behavior isn't. I learned my most valuable lessons at home with my family, not when I was wandering around Kimberly with my friends. There's nothing wrong with giving children reasonable limits while they develop discipline and responsibility.

Another claim is that letting kids play by themselves actually teaches them to not be bullies because they realize that nobody wants to play with them if they're mean. As someone who has been bullied by mean kids when no adults were around, I can tell you for certain that this is not true. Mean kids who enjoy making somebody cry will seek out opportunities to bully other kids no matter how hard their victims try to avoid them. Personally, I would like to know if my kids are being bullied or if they are being a bully so that I can address the issue, and I will probably only know that if I spend at least some of the time with my kids when they are playing with friends. Sure, it's good to give kids some space playing by themselves. There are some kinds of magic that don't really happen if your parents are hovering over you while you are pretending something. But sometimes you have to protect your kids from their "friends," and you will only know if that's needed if you've seen them playing together.

Family time is important. My most cherished memories are of spending time with my parents. I haven't remained close to any of my childhood friends, but I am still close to my own family. I suspect that for most kids, they would benefit a lot more from spending a little more time with their mom than from gaining a little independence by roaming the streets unsupervised.

Overall, I think we're all over-thinking it. A few days ago I went to the park with the kids. While I was sitting on the bench watching them play, I felt torn. On the one hand, I felt pleased that my kids were playing independently, but on the other hand I felt guilty that I wasn't up there chasing them around and giggling hysterically right along with them. Finally it occurred to me that it was completely absurd to analyze it so much when I should have simply enjoyed the fact that we were having a lovely time at the playground on a day with perfect weather. The truth is that if you are trying your best to instill the right values into your children, spend quality time with them, and regularly pray, read the scriptures, and have Family Home Evening together, your kids will probably turn out okay. Giving our kids enough risk or enough supervision is not the most important concern that we should have as parents.

dealing with my space bubble

I am not a cuddler. I am a person with a space bubble. Occasionally my space bubble even becomes a porcupine skin. Sometimes it's because I don't want to be touched and I am purposely avoiding touching somebody, and sometimes I'm just avoiding it out of habit without thinking about it. Apparently it's obvious enough that when Ryan and I had recently started dating, there was a guy who saw us sitting pretty close together (not even holding hands at the time) and guessed based on that that we were dating because he had observed how much I like my personal space.

(As a side note, I think I'm lucky that I've never had a stranger touch my belly when I have been pregnant, because I really would have no idea what to do.)

For most of my life this characteristic hasn't been a problem, but recently I have become more aware of it because kids need physical touch. Part of the issue is that my kids are wiggly and when they are like that I tend to get away because I don't like being kicked and jabbed, but even then I feel bad because sometimes I find myself saying things like, "I need space!" or "Just stop touching me!" which are phrases that the kids now repeat. But even if they are calm, I often forget to cuddle them or hold them. It's just not something I think about. And I am starting to sense that my kids need more physical love than I am giving them.

So this isn't really a measurable goal, but I am trying to be more aware of this problem and give Kevin and Heidi (and Ryan) more cuddles and hugs. One thing that I know is helpful is to read books together a lot. And as they get older and more aware, maybe we can come to a compromise where we respect Mom's personal space but also have a family that shows love to each other through physical touch.

Good Medicine (an honest post)

I've been yelling a lot lately, mainly on nights when Ryan is at work late. It's the hardest time of day because the kids are hungry, I'm hungry, I'm ready for some adult conversation, I'm tired of being the referee, the house is trashed, and the kids are generally in the mood for playing with things I don't want them to have or else fighting.

On one such night this week, I stopped and said, "You know what, guys? Let's be quiet from now on instead of loud." And that was when things got silly. I yelled, "Is this quiet? IS THIS QUIET? IS THIS QUIET?" Hysterical giggles ensued. Then I said, "Is this loud? Is this loud? Is this loud?" while quieting down to a whisper. More hysterical giggles. It didn't take too long before the kids tried to join in the game and it really did get way too loud, but fortunately I got the idea to do faces instead of volumes. I would make an angry face and say, "Is this a nice face?" Then I would make a silly face and say, "Is this a nice face?" Then a sad face, and so on. The result was more giggles. It was amazing how the nasty feelings dissipated as soon as I started making it my goal to make them laugh. Laughter is good medicine.

Memory Lane: How remembering my childhood helps me understand my kids (kind of)

When I was little, maybe three years old, I got a hold of a bottle of Head and Shoulders. I took it out into the living room, sat down under the piano, and proceeded to dump the entire bottle onto my head. It got into my eyes and hurt really bad. My mom called a neighbor to come watch my little sister while I got my first shower. I can only imagine how long it took to rinse it out.

I'm pretty sure I am not exaggerating when I say it was an entire bottle. When we moved out of the house fifteen years later, there was still a very large greasy spot on the carpet that had the unmistakable smell of Head and Shoulders, and I know the carpet had been shampooed several times by the Kirby salesman, so it must have been rooted into the carpet pretty deeply.

Another time, my mom was sick in bed. I wanted to do something to help her, and it occurred to me that I could help by getting the mail. Our house was on a dirt road 1/4 of a mile a way from the highway, and our mailbox was at the start of the dirt road on the highway. My dad was working in the garden and he saw me try to go walking up the road, so he warned me that it wasn't safe and I should not go up there because I could get run over. But I couldn't imagine myself getting hurt, so I didn't think it would be a problem. I just waited until he was somewhere else and then set off up the driveway while he couldn't see. It was all going great and (at least from my perspective) I had gotten pretty far up the driveway (I wasn't even half-way). Then, to my horror, an enormous red combine turned from the highway onto the dirt road. I was going to get RUN OVER by a combine! I knew it would be a close race, but my only hope was to turn around and run as fast as I could back to my house. I didn't look behind me, but I was sure that the combine was practically on my heels. Against all odds, I made it back to the house safely, and I think my dad realized what I had done and said I told you so. For a few years I was certain that I must be an incredibly fast runner because I had outrun a combine. (Now I know I could probably walk at a casual pace and still be going faster than a combine at its fastest speed.)

It's interesting how most of our childhood memories get fuzzy with time. I am glad I have held onto a few, because remembering them helps remind me that to my kids, the strange things they do probably make perfect sense. To me what I had done was completely rational.

On that note, I have cleaned up a small swimming pool in our bathroom twice in the past week, which is partly why I was thinking about these stories. I did send the offending party to time out, but I think I handled the situation a little more patiently than normal. After it happened the second time I opted to remove the plug from the sink so the kids can't plug the sink and then let the water run over the sides and onto the floor (this obsession with playing in the water has been a bit of a problem lately, although normally it was not this bad). The thingy on the faucet says it lets out 2 gallons per minute, so it doesn't take long for the sink to overflow. (We changed that out too for one with a slightly slower flow.) I was really annoyed that I had to sop up an inch of water off of the floor, but at the same time I had to admit that I used to enjoy filling the sink up with water and floating things in it, and when I was little I didn't notice that water was getting all over the floor, and the kids probably aren't doing it with the intent of making a lot of work for me. I figure it's probably better to unscrew the plug than to keep fighting them about it.

He's not ruining it.

Yesterday we went to Pullen Park as a family. I'll post pictures and such later, but I wanted to share an insight I had while we were there.

Pullen Park has several different playgrounds and it also has a train, a carousel, and a little boat ride for kids. I noticed quickly that after a ride was over and we brought the kids out of the ride, Kevin would get upset and throw a fit. After the second time I started to feel upset and I thought, "Why does he have to ruin this by acting that way?" But then a little voice gave me a different perspective: "He's not ruining it. When he looks back on this day he will only remember the nice time he had. He's just a child and he is still learning to control his passions. Focus on the fun parts and ignore the tantrums." That was encouraging to me. After that I focused on the fun things like the looks on their faces and the comments the kids made, and I learned that the best approach was to ignore the tantrums and move on, which made me realize that in reality Kevin was never upset for very long, and mostly he was having a nice time. This was a valuable lesson for me because I am often very frustrated when we do something nice like go to a park or watch a movie, and then at the end I have to deal with the kids being upset that they can't stay or watch more. I tend to feel like ending the fun thing with a tantrum just ruins it all, when in reality the tantrums never last long, and while they are unpleasant (and of course we are going to keep working on teaching the kids not to behave that way), they don't negate the fact that we had a very nice time together.

bread day/a very honest post/a teaching moment

Today was bread day. The kids always like to help me with the whole process of making bread, but normally it drives me nuts because it's always such a mess. I was pretty patient for a while and allowed Kevin to help put wheat in the Nutrimill and didn't get upset when Heidi kept dipping her finger in everything from the yeast mixture to the freshly ground flour and eating it. But at some point I just got sick of it and sent them to get Daddy to play duplos with them.

It seems like bread rises so fast when you mix it in a Bosch. I think it took around fifteen minutes for the dough to spill over the sides and start taking over the kitchen. I punched it down and decided to stick it in the fridge so we could go to the park instead of having to stay home babysitting bread.

When we got home, I opened the fridge and found that the dough had spilled over again and was taking over the fridge and drying out. It was no big deal because I just stuffed it all in again and had it mix for a while. It didn't take long before it was all smooth and moist again.

Kevin and Heidi really like touching bread dough and eating it (yuck!). I was tired from being at the park, and I was pretty annoyed when they tried to help with shaping the loaves. I don't really care what the bread looks like, but things got crazy and I was grumpy and didn't like having them in my personal space. I told them to just go play because I didn't want their help. But then I thought about the talk by Elder Perry (see last post) and realized this was actually a pretty good job for them and well within their abilities. So I said I had changed my mind and they could help me make loaves. They both got a loaf-sized ball and got to squish it and knead it while I made the other four loaves. I didn't even yell at Kevin when his dough fell on the floor. (I may or may not have baked that loaf anyway . . . ) Then I took Heidi's hands and helped her shape her dough into a loaf and put it in the pan while Kevin squished his dough into his bread pan. Kevin helped me cover the bread with towels to rise.

I was very glad that I stepped back and realized this was a good teaching moment instead of giving in to my instinctive response, which was to harshly tell them to go away. The spirit in the room completely changed. The kids were thrilled to get to help, and it was fun for all of us. I want to have a home where there is an expectation that everyone helps, so if we are going to have that, I have to start now with letting them help when they can, and also remember that they will not always do the job as well as I would like it at first since it takes practice.

lost and found, a.k.a. the worst experience I have ever had

My heart is full of gratitude to my Heavenly Father and to my friends Jamie and Emily for supporting and blessing me yesterday. While we were at the park Kevin disappeared and was lost for a very long time. The park is surrounded by woods, and we looked everywhere. I was sure he had drowned in the pond. Recently a man in NC died in a waterfall accident, and a family member's Facebook status said that he was "safe in the arms of our loving Heavenly Father." Now I felt sick at the thought of writing that about my own child. Emily insisted we would find him and wouldn't let me think of that possibility. Jamie offered to call the police, and I agreed it was time. When she told them it had been around 20 minutes since he disappeared I felt shocked that it had been so long and almost lost hope. (I later talked to her on the phone and she said she had been estimating pretty high because she wanted them to take her seriously and come right away, since in the past when she had to call them about foster children who ran away they would sometimes just tell her to call back in a few minutes.) We kept searching (Jamie stayed and watched all of our kids), and I was walking down a path sobbing, praying aloud, begging Kevin to come out or yell. I came back a little after the police arrived. Just as I had finished describing him to the police, Jamie said, "Oh, my goodness, there he is!" and Kevin came out of the woods from the path we had followed to get to the park from the car. He said he had been fixing the tire on the car. I couldn't believe it. I am so thankful that he came back and was safe. I kept thinking I didn't know how we could live without him.

When we went back to the car I found the left turn signal, the windshield wipers, and the lights on, and the seat was definitely adjusted, and the tire pressure gauge was sitting on the passenger seat, so he probably was playing in the van and at some point was "fixing" the tires. Emily had looked in the parking lot, so I'm guessing she couldn't see him because he was playing in the van. I know I locked the car, but I do remember thinking that I should check to make sure the sliding door on the other side had closed and dismissing the thought, so I'm guessing that's how he got in. But maybe it's a good thing he could get in so that he was safe in the van instead of wandering farther away. Emily invited us over to have lunch, which we did. I was so blessed to have my friends there to support me and be calm when I was falling apart. I can't describe to you how helpful they were for me. I am still working on getting over all the emotions. I prayed so many times for him to be returned to me, and I am grateful that Heavenly Father guided him back. Life would be so empty without Kevin. We are going to have to figure out a way to drill into this kid's head that he has to stay where he can see me.

practicing the piano

I played the piano for three pieces in yesterday's Easter program at church, so I was trying to get some more practice in the morning before going to church. The kids wanted to practice too. Kevin actually wasn't too problematic because he seemed to figure out that he could only play the high notes, but when Heidi came up between my knees that made things interesting! When I decided I was done, Kevin begged me to play "Hosanna" again. (He sort of knew the song because the primary children sang some of the piece with us.)

how I do laundry

Laundry is probably my favorite household chore. It's not my favorite thing to do in the world, but I don't mind it as much as other household jobs. Washing dishes and cleaning the kitchen are probably my least favorite. I don't really like touching dirty, soapy water. Ryan actually does a lot of the dish-washing around here.

I was just thinking that as time goes on it would be interesting to look back and remember how I did laundry when I only had two kids and I lived in a small apartment. So I'm going to write some things about how laundry goes right now so that someday I will have a record of it to read.

One of the interesting things about being the mom/wife has been realizing that what works for my mom doesn't always work for me, and that if I prefer to do things differently, it doesn't mean I'm doing it wrong (or that my mom is doing it wrong). This has applied to laundry. My mom washed everyone's clothes together and sorted them into darks, pastels, whites, and sometimes reds and greens if there were enough of those to wash separately. It works for her, and that's great. I tried to do that at first, but after Kevin and Heidi came around I realized I didn't like having so many people's clothes mixed together when I was folding the clothes. I also felt like it was silly to sort out everyone's clothes together by color when I was just going to be sorting them out later by person. So now here's how we sort out clothes: Ryan's clothes and my clothes are washed together, separated into colors and whites. Sometimes towels and jeans go in their own load if there are a lot of clothes. Sheets get their own load. Then Kevin and Heidi's clothes are washed in one big load, regardless of color. If we get some new clothes that I think will probably bleed their colors, I sort out the clothes by color for a few laundry batches. I've never had a problem with colors bleeding. Towels, washcloths, and bibs are usually washed with the kids' clothes, but sometimes they go with our colored clothes if needed, or they get their own load. As our family grows I will probably continue to do laundry by bedroom instead of washing everyone's clothes together. I like that all the clothes in a load go to the same room so that I'm not taking things all over the house with each load of clothes.

The diapers get washed every 2-3 days. We have 36 large prefolds, 24 infant prefolds, and a lot of covers. We also have about 50 cloth wipes that I made out of flannel (two 8 x 8 layers zigzag stitched together). I do a prewash cycle first, and then a regular cycle with detergent. We have metal wall shelving above the washer and dryer, and we hang the wet bags and the covers up there to dry. The diapers and wipes go in the dryer. No fabric softener. Before Heidi was born, we did medium loads, but now that we have two in diapers, we're doing super loads. I should note that for us, cloth diapers really aren't much more work than disposable because our dumpster is quite a ways away from our apartment building. I'm not joking when I say it probably takes an hour to take the garbage out if I bring the kids with me. I'd much rather dump some stuff in the washer every couple of days than be taking the diapers to the garbage all the time.

On socks. My mom likes socks pinned together. She learned the trick from my Grandma, who had ten children. I used to like it too. But then one day I realized that I would rather sort out socks than hunt down safety pins. (My mom would rather hunt down safety pins than sort socks.) Now I use mesh bags for socks. There is one mesh bag for Kevin and Heidi's socks, and one for my socks. This keeps everyone's socks separate from each other and they're less likely to get eaten by the sock monster at some point in the laundry cycle. Ryan's socks are all the same, except for two pairs of Sunday socks, and he doesn't care about mixing old ones with new ones, so I've never bothered with telling him to sort his socks in any way. He just gets his pile of socks, which he keeps in a pile in his drawer. The one problem with my method is that sometimes the mesh bags tend to disappear or be buried in a pile of clean laundry if I've gotten behind, and then everyone's socks just get tossed in the hamper and get all mixed up. If I can't find a match to a sock I always return it to its drawer anyway, figuring that eventually (usually the next time I do laundry) its one true love will find its way home. We'll see how well I like this method if I have six kids (right now two is plenty). But so far it's working well for me.

I don't think this is as much of a problem in the West, but here in the East it is a lot more humid, which means washcloths don't just dry on the counter if you lay them flat. The result is mildew, and the grey stains never, ever come out. I've found that the best way to avoid mildew is to hang wet things so that air flows on both sides of them. I have a metal basket in the laundry closet where I put washcloths and towels, and whenever I put washcloths in there I always hang them on the side first until they are dry. If they all just sit in a pile, they never dry and they grow mildew really quickly.

I like Shout stain remover. I used to use Resolve Spray n Wash because it was a little cheaper, but then I did laundry at my grandma's house and realized that Shout doesn't stink like Spray n Wash does, and then I was converted. We go through a lot of Shout in our house.

I always cut my dryer sheets in half all at once when I open a box. Half of a dryer sheet is enough. When we got married Ryan said that his mom always did that, and I figured it couldn't hurt and started doing it too. Not that dryer sheets are an especially significant draw on our bank account, because I think we've gone through maybe four boxes since we got married. So I guess maybe we've saved $4 on dryer sheets by cutting them in half. Yippee.

We have a very basic washer and dryer, but I've been very happy with them. I don't know if I'll ever go for anything fancier. The washer is a top loader. I know there are advantages to having a front loader, but I think the main disadvantage is that front loaders grow mold more easily, and that is a deal-breaker for me.

Ryan and I probably do about the same amount of laundry. If it piles up (which happens a lot) we sometimes have clothes-folding parties and watch a movie after the kids are in bed. I think the fact that I can watch a movie while folding clothes might be one of the reasons laundry is my favorite chore. Laundry also isn't a huge deal for us because it doesn't take that long to stick a load in the washer or transfer it to the dryer. Main floor laundry is one of my top five priorities in any place we live because having it on the main floor makes it so you can just do a step in the laundry process as you're passing by. I don't fancy the idea of hauling baskets up and down stairs. I also would love to have more of a laundry room. Right now we have a closet in a hallway, which makes things kind of a tight fit--but I'm not complaining. My great-grandparents were washing things on washboards with their hands.

seasons

Today in Sacrament Meeting I was feeling really frustrated. Kevin was wild. By the time the sacrament was passed he was launching himself over the bench in front of us and jumping up and down on the floor. He also thought it was fun to spit at the family behind us. The kids were crawling all over me and I was tired of being treated like a jungle gym. Ryan ended up taking Kevin into the hall to sit on the couch.

I was feeling pretty upset. A lot of Sundays I wonder why we even bother to come to Sacrament Meeting because it's always a wrestling match. I often contemplate just taking the kids for a drive until it's time for Sunday School so that I can hand Kevin off to his nursery leaders. (I haven't resorted to that yet, by the way.)

So while I was sitting in the chapel and thinking about how my life is falling apart, and Heidi was continuing to crawl all over me and attempting to escape into the aisle, my friend Nicole Empey went to the front and bore her testimony. She wanted to bear her testimony that there are times and seasons in our lives, and sometimes they're good seasons and sometimes they're hard seasons. (She has twin boys who are Kevin's age and a little girl who is older than Heidi, so she knows about hard seasons.) We just have to realize that sometimes we will have hard seasons because that is how life goes. I knew as soon as she started talking that this was for me. I usually only get snippets of thoughts from Sacrament Meeting talks because my attention is so divided, and it's frustrating for me because I need that spiritual nourishment too and it's hard to get it right now. And I really do often feel like my life is falling apart these days. The clothes are never folded, the sink is full of dishes, and there's a growing pile of "stuff to go through/finish" on the floor by my bed, and meanwhile I'm struggling to get school assignments done. But today I was grateful for this reminder that right now I'm in a challenging season, and even though I'm often frustrated and stressed and upset, this season is good for me and it is teaching me important things. I guess even though it's harder to get spiritual nourishment from the sources I'm used to, my life experiences are also strengthening me, so that's spiritual nourishment too. I appreciate that when God gives me challenges to help me grow, he also gives me experiences along the way that remind me that He is watching over me and is not forsaking me. Today was one of those times when He reminded me that He is aware of my spiritual needs and will provide for them if I am open to receive them.