The following takes place between 4:30 p.m. and 8:02 p.m.
Let's see. . . picked up crayons all over the floor in the study. Turned attention to "Zolos" building toy all over the floor. Picked up Zolos. James empties the crayons I just picked up. Pick up crayons again. James now empties Zolos. Put crayons out of reach and pick up Zolos for a second time. Find James a few minutes later in our bathroom, where he has been playing in the toilet. Remove James from bathroom, wash his and my hands and return to mess in study.
Realize James has been awfully quiet, and rush to find him sitting on Caroline's sink, which he has filled with toys that he is now dousing with water. Get James down and proceed to clean up bathroom.
Find James a few minutes later in his room, coloring all over himself, his bed, and his chair with a burgundy marker. (Washable, thank goodness). Take marker away. Take James downstairs.
Older kids are painting suncatchers. James wants to paint too. I let him paint on paper with washable paint. He makes several nice pictures and then begins painting himself. He has been undressed down to a diaper for the painting endeavor and has now painted his entire stomach, part of his head and both his hands.
Remove James from painting area. Escort him to the tub where he can be hosed down. Will return later to scrub paint ring left in tub.
Clean up paints and begin dinner. Nothing fancy tonight--Scott is working late so Kraft Mac and Cheese is on the menu. Caroline comes into the kitchen and wants to help. She pulls a chair to the stove where water is beginning to boil. This makes me nervous but I keep a close eye on her. Colin enters the kitchen and declares how unfair it is that she always gets to help with cooking since I won't let the two of them teeter on the chair together over a pot of boiling water. James attempts to climb chair to join Caroline and access boiling water while Colin complains. Remove James from chair. While I review the finer points of kitchen safety with the older children, James dumps box of uncooked mac and cheese on floor, then begins to scream.
Older kids enlisted to pick up hundreds of uncooked macaroni noodles. James wanders off, presumably to the living room. Upon closer examination 5 minutes later I find James in our bedroom, having decorated his freshly bathed self, along with my antique embroidered dresser scarf, with my recently opened (and discontinued) favorite lipstick and an orange gel pen found on the dresser. Remove dresser scarf to a bowl of sudsy water, where marks show some promise of coming out. Lipstick is a goner. Scrub James with wet wipes, which he protests heartily.
Return to kitchen with James and water is boiling. Colin and Caroline have finished retrieving spilled noodles. Open new clean box of Kraft and dinner is on. Kids wash hands, help with making smoothies out of some fruit that needs to be used. James screams for strawberries and "o-ark" (yogurt) while we explain repeatedly that they will be used to make the smoothies and will be ready soon. Our message falls on deaf ears. Blender is on its last legs but smoothies get made and finally, everyone sits down to dinner.
Dinner ends and older kids go out to jump on the trampoline. James wants to go too. Caroline runs to the back porch to tell me something, at which point we discover non-washable suncatcher paint on her brand new bathing suit. I strip Caroline and rush the suit to the kitchen sink where fortunately, most of the paint comes off. Meanwhile, Caroline brings a live ladybug into the house where of course it escapes. It flies behind the shade on the back door. While I scrub paint off her swimsuit, she constructs a tower of two floor pillows with a chair on top in an attempt to retrieve the fugitive ladybug. Colin, with his usual disregard for his little sister, bursts in the back door to tell me something and knocks her down. I will get the ladybug, I tell them both.
Run out to retrieve James from the trampoline, where Colin has abandoned him. Take James upstairs, where he suddenly protests having his teeth brushed, his diaper changed, and virtually every part of his bedtime routine except having me read an Elmo book with a built in hand puppet. Tuck him in, return downstairs to discover Caroline has made another attempt at catching the ladybug and torn the back door blind in the process. Grit teeth, thankful that it is only a temporary blind anyway, and breath sigh of relief that good drapes and sheers are intact. Give the children permission to watch Power Rangers. Count minutes until Scott returns home.
Scott arrives; the kids zone out in soft glow of a cheesy Power Rangers plotline. Now--to find that ladybug. . .
Saturday, July 01, 2006
Saturday, June 03, 2006
Hail, trampoline!
There are certain things I have always considered decidedly tacky. Yards strewn with faded Little Tikes toys, huge satellite dishes, and yes, trampolines in the backyard. When I married my husband I breathed a secret sigh of relief that he is not a serious collector of anything, a dedicated handyman, or a car or motorcycle fanatic. No more would I live with the relics of my upbringing: piles of crap that might be useful one day, old broken cars that will be restored "someday," a garage that hasn't had a car parked in it in years, if ever.
And then we had children. Three of them.
Our vehicles ARE in the garage, albeit skillfully wedged between the plastic tote full of roller skates and bike helmets, current bicycles as well as the outgrown ones to be handed down to younger siblings and cousins, baseball equipment, cat carriers, and my non-handy husband's surprising new assortment of major power tools. A broken plastic sand and water table languishes behind the garage, its legs crumpled beneath it like some fallen creature from a Star Wars movie. The partially constructed jungle fort swingset stands as a monument to great ambition and limited time, and school ends in three days.
So we broke down.
Never mind the atrocious customer service provided, both in person and online, by the behemoth retailer that we all love to hate--we went to Wal-Mart. And bought. A trampoline. A big one.
The kids are ecstatic. The thing went together in under an hour, and soon they were jumping, bouncing, flipping, giggling hysterically. And miraculously, not fighting. They even persuaded me, an adult woman, to climb up and join them, and I have to admit--it was really fun. Thank goodness we live in the country, and as far as I know, no one could see me. The kids jumped on it for, count 'em, THREE hours. As for me, my fun was tempered by the fact that the births of these lovely children and the bouncing of the trampoline were a vivid reminder to go inside and do about 180,000 more Kegels. Ahh, womanhood.
So, now we have it. The big honkin' redneck yard sculpture. The summer is looking better already.
And then we had children. Three of them.
Our vehicles ARE in the garage, albeit skillfully wedged between the plastic tote full of roller skates and bike helmets, current bicycles as well as the outgrown ones to be handed down to younger siblings and cousins, baseball equipment, cat carriers, and my non-handy husband's surprising new assortment of major power tools. A broken plastic sand and water table languishes behind the garage, its legs crumpled beneath it like some fallen creature from a Star Wars movie. The partially constructed jungle fort swingset stands as a monument to great ambition and limited time, and school ends in three days.
So we broke down.
Never mind the atrocious customer service provided, both in person and online, by the behemoth retailer that we all love to hate--we went to Wal-Mart. And bought. A trampoline. A big one.
The kids are ecstatic. The thing went together in under an hour, and soon they were jumping, bouncing, flipping, giggling hysterically. And miraculously, not fighting. They even persuaded me, an adult woman, to climb up and join them, and I have to admit--it was really fun. Thank goodness we live in the country, and as far as I know, no one could see me. The kids jumped on it for, count 'em, THREE hours. As for me, my fun was tempered by the fact that the births of these lovely children and the bouncing of the trampoline were a vivid reminder to go inside and do about 180,000 more Kegels. Ahh, womanhood.
So, now we have it. The big honkin' redneck yard sculpture. The summer is looking better already.
Thursday, February 23, 2006
Take a load off
I took my two youngest children to have their pictures made today. Caroline wore a little crocheted dress made by my grandmother, and James wore the christening gown I made when Colin was born. (To see Colin's photo in the gown, click here. Enter the site, then click on "families and children." He's in the second photo). I had been feeling guilty for nearly a year over not having these photos taken, and even though it's been that long (longer?) since James was baptized, I figured it's better to have the pictures late than not at all. Miraculously, we got a few good shots, though Caroline still refuses to smile for pictures. I told her she didn't have to smile, but promised her the moon--or at least a Polly Pocket and some M&Ms--if she could just manage not to look sullen.
Later I enjoyed one of my daily chats with my sister, and we talked about feeling guilty for not having more professional photos made when the kids were tiny. It started me thinking of how many things we feel guilty about when it comes to our children. Collectively, she and I feel guilty for a host of things: not spending more time "enriching" them with various games or learning activities, losing our tempers from time to time; having more pictures of one than another, not being able to afford primo private school, kids having to share a room, feeding them non-organic food, having a messy house, not sewing all the daughter's dresses, giving up on cloth diapering, the fact that one has two cavities, you name it. After generations of our foremothers struggling for women's rights, we fret over not exhausting and martying our lives to provide a questionably perfect and idyllic existence for our offspring.
I can't help but reflect on the time when the little dress Caroline wore today was made--sometime in the early forties, by a woman struggling against the stark ignorance and poverty of coal-mining Kentucky, for whom adequate medical care or higher education, for herself or her family, was a fantasy. She died at 41 after delivering a stillborn boy, leaving behind 3 grown children, a teenager, and two preschool children (one of whom was my mother) whose remaining childhood became a horror story for another day. Somehow I doubt that against this backdrop anyone had time to feel guilty about the way she was raising her children. Getting food on the table and keeping a fire in the stove was worry enough.
Our kids have vaccinations, preschool, car seats, "Back to Sleep," crayons, paper, gratuitous amounts of toys, Leap Pads, flouride, water and heat that don't have to be brought in from outside, more photos already than my parents had made in a lifetime, combined, Flintstones vitamins, well checks, and a distinct lack of intestinal parasites and head lice, yet we neurotically worry that we're not providing some self-imposed standard of perfection in their young lives. My grandmother would think my children live like royalty.
Admittedly, I feel like a significantly better mother for having documented my little ones wearing these past and future heirlooms, but I think I'll counter that virtuous feeling by firing up the stove to prepare some Kraft Mac and Cheese for dinner, and I might not even serve a salad. I might even let them watch a little extra television since their Daddy is working late. To all other mothers, I suggest you take a load off too. We're doing better than we think.
Later I enjoyed one of my daily chats with my sister, and we talked about feeling guilty for not having more professional photos made when the kids were tiny. It started me thinking of how many things we feel guilty about when it comes to our children. Collectively, she and I feel guilty for a host of things: not spending more time "enriching" them with various games or learning activities, losing our tempers from time to time; having more pictures of one than another, not being able to afford primo private school, kids having to share a room, feeding them non-organic food, having a messy house, not sewing all the daughter's dresses, giving up on cloth diapering, the fact that one has two cavities, you name it. After generations of our foremothers struggling for women's rights, we fret over not exhausting and martying our lives to provide a questionably perfect and idyllic existence for our offspring.
I can't help but reflect on the time when the little dress Caroline wore today was made--sometime in the early forties, by a woman struggling against the stark ignorance and poverty of coal-mining Kentucky, for whom adequate medical care or higher education, for herself or her family, was a fantasy. She died at 41 after delivering a stillborn boy, leaving behind 3 grown children, a teenager, and two preschool children (one of whom was my mother) whose remaining childhood became a horror story for another day. Somehow I doubt that against this backdrop anyone had time to feel guilty about the way she was raising her children. Getting food on the table and keeping a fire in the stove was worry enough.
Our kids have vaccinations, preschool, car seats, "Back to Sleep," crayons, paper, gratuitous amounts of toys, Leap Pads, flouride, water and heat that don't have to be brought in from outside, more photos already than my parents had made in a lifetime, combined, Flintstones vitamins, well checks, and a distinct lack of intestinal parasites and head lice, yet we neurotically worry that we're not providing some self-imposed standard of perfection in their young lives. My grandmother would think my children live like royalty.
Admittedly, I feel like a significantly better mother for having documented my little ones wearing these past and future heirlooms, but I think I'll counter that virtuous feeling by firing up the stove to prepare some Kraft Mac and Cheese for dinner, and I might not even serve a salad. I might even let them watch a little extra television since their Daddy is working late. To all other mothers, I suggest you take a load off too. We're doing better than we think.
Monday, February 20, 2006
Houses in the Fields (apologies to John Gorka)
Sat on the back porch today, waiting while my newly adopted dog sniffed at everything and did her biological business, reflecting on the landscape around me. The air filled with the sound of migrating Canadian geese; in the distance was the sound of a woodpecker and a distant neighbor's barking dogs. Our home is recently constructed in the middle of a cow pasture on the old family farm, with rolling hills around as far as you can see and a huge, open, star studded sky at night, but as I waited for Chloe to finish her explorations, I couldn't help but wonder, how long can it stay this way?
Yesterday I drove near my old neighborhood in Charlotte (incidentally, on the way to and from Judy Chicago, which my sister sums up beautifully in her blog) which itself was once open farmland. Now there are rows and rows of treeless, mind-numbingly similar subdivisions, disorientingly and dispiritingly alike, punctuated by the same mega-corporate chain stores one can find from Detroit to Decatur. It is the America John Steinbeck predicted nearly fifty years ago in Travels with Charley. I moved only 4 years ago and barely recognize the landscape.
We live in a thriving region, which has many advantages, but one of the disadvantages is that the South I have come to love, the rolling countryside, the sleepy small towns, the family ties to land and place, is being overwhelmed by growth. Not orderly, measured growth, natural and desired, but a rampant and malignant excrescence that disfigures and blights its host. Hastily constructed neighborhoods spring up and spread like kudsu, with no time to plan for the type of design or construction that might feed the spirit or foster community.
Now I have enough red-blooded hillbilly in me to believe if you want to sell your land for profit, that's your business. But my heart sinks each time I see a parcel for sale, and the signs creep nearer and nearer to my own cherished open space. It's not that I dislike density--I love real cities, with their history and the energy that springs from the wonderful stew of diverse people and cultures bubbling in the same pot--or that I don't understand that the influx of new people needs a place to live. It's just that what I love most about any place is its sense of place, whether that be the outrageous chaos of Rome or the quiet melancholy of the Appalachians.
Growth seems like a giant amoeba, mindlessly absorbing everthing around it into one insentient, amorphous whole. The larger cities have their identities; I worry about all the smaller places in between. I worry about what becomes of individuality, creativity, when the experience of living in one place blurs into the next with no distinctions. I fret at the thought that we have to travel farther and farther to find something different from our own landscape. Will individuality flounder, or will it manage to simmer up from the bland stew of contrived lifestyle neighborhoods and homeowners' association restrictions?
It's a good problem we have, to live in a place where we can debate growth; where, poorly designed and executed or not, at least it's housing, but then, are stewardship and conservation of the land really a luxury?
I will go out with the dog once more tonight, and drink in the night sky while I can. And, with a nod to my former homeowners' association, when the dog poops, I will leave it to become a part of the landscape.
Yesterday I drove near my old neighborhood in Charlotte (incidentally, on the way to and from Judy Chicago, which my sister sums up beautifully in her blog) which itself was once open farmland. Now there are rows and rows of treeless, mind-numbingly similar subdivisions, disorientingly and dispiritingly alike, punctuated by the same mega-corporate chain stores one can find from Detroit to Decatur. It is the America John Steinbeck predicted nearly fifty years ago in Travels with Charley. I moved only 4 years ago and barely recognize the landscape.
We live in a thriving region, which has many advantages, but one of the disadvantages is that the South I have come to love, the rolling countryside, the sleepy small towns, the family ties to land and place, is being overwhelmed by growth. Not orderly, measured growth, natural and desired, but a rampant and malignant excrescence that disfigures and blights its host. Hastily constructed neighborhoods spring up and spread like kudsu, with no time to plan for the type of design or construction that might feed the spirit or foster community.
Now I have enough red-blooded hillbilly in me to believe if you want to sell your land for profit, that's your business. But my heart sinks each time I see a parcel for sale, and the signs creep nearer and nearer to my own cherished open space. It's not that I dislike density--I love real cities, with their history and the energy that springs from the wonderful stew of diverse people and cultures bubbling in the same pot--or that I don't understand that the influx of new people needs a place to live. It's just that what I love most about any place is its sense of place, whether that be the outrageous chaos of Rome or the quiet melancholy of the Appalachians.
Growth seems like a giant amoeba, mindlessly absorbing everthing around it into one insentient, amorphous whole. The larger cities have their identities; I worry about all the smaller places in between. I worry about what becomes of individuality, creativity, when the experience of living in one place blurs into the next with no distinctions. I fret at the thought that we have to travel farther and farther to find something different from our own landscape. Will individuality flounder, or will it manage to simmer up from the bland stew of contrived lifestyle neighborhoods and homeowners' association restrictions?
It's a good problem we have, to live in a place where we can debate growth; where, poorly designed and executed or not, at least it's housing, but then, are stewardship and conservation of the land really a luxury?
I will go out with the dog once more tonight, and drink in the night sky while I can. And, with a nod to my former homeowners' association, when the dog poops, I will leave it to become a part of the landscape.
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