I have nowhere else to go.

  • Posted on September 10, 2009 at 02:21

My old blog URL is gone, and I’ve been trying to figure out where to go. I need a new home, and this really isn’t it, I don’t think. I don’t know.

But right now, I just need to write, to get it out.

Tonight was horrible. Absolutely horrible. My son just wouldn’t go to bed. He was scared. Always something. He’s having a tough time, and I don’t know why. He screamed at us, told us to shut up, and get out of hear, and some other things that were really really horrible to hear coming out of his mouth. When we wouldn’t stay with him in bed, he said we were making him sick, and he was going to throw up. Oh, the drama.

And then we did the unthinkable. We washed his mouth out with soap. Only a little bit, and we did warn him (stop talking like that, or we will have to clean up your mouth soap). And thus, we had to follow through, when he continued to scream nastiness at us.

He was, to say the least, not happy. Didn’t get sick (we used only a tiny bit of soap).

And then I lay with him, held him tight, and helped him calm down.

And then? He told me he didn’t like school. (A new school).

That his best friend, the boy he’s been inseparable from at school and the park since they were 8 months old, bit him.

And I cannot even talk to the boys mother, because she’s forsaken us as friends. Oh yes, we used to be friends, met through our kids. However, for whatever reason, her and her husband don’t have any interest in being social with us anymore. It’s a horrible situation, for my son, and it’s a sad situation for us, because we thought that we were friends.

I’m just at a loss right now.  I’m 28 weeks pregnant.  I’m tired.  The big boy hasn’t spent a full night in his own bed in over a month.  He’s scared.  He’s clingly.  And he’s TIRED.  I feel like I am failing him.  He is just so young, and now I think that maybe he isn’t ready for SK, that we should keep him in JK for another year.

This parenting thing is exhausting.

Map of the World…Part 1

  • Posted on February 3, 2009 at 17:33

I like maps.  It’s a thing.  I’ve always liked maps.  I think if I had gone to school a few years later, I would have gone into GIS.  That said, I didn’t, but I still like maps.

Apparently, my fondness for them has been passed along to my elder son.  Linus came home with the following picture from kindergarten today:

Linus' Map of His World

Linus' Map of His World

Together we added the captions that labeled the places of importance in his world.

Sometimes the simplest things show us so much!

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For reference, the “round restaurant” is a local Chinese buffet restaurant.  For the longest time I thought it was called the round restaurant because we walked around to get food.  However, I’ve been informed that it’s called the Round Restaurant because we have to drive around to get to the parking (it’s the scariest parking garage I’ve ever been in!!).

In which I kvell* about my children (feel free to ignore)

  • Posted on January 23, 2009 at 12:35

Talking about our children is often difficult. Do people think we are one of those “competimommies” if we say things our children do? I don’t want to be thought of that way, because, truly, every child is different, and every child has strengths (and weaknesses) that are all their own.

That being said, last night was Parent-Teacher interview night at my children’s school.  It was a wonderful experience, talking with their teachers.  Let’s start with Stewie.

Stewie is my younger boy.  Just a few months over 2, he’s one of the younger ones in his class.  (Of the 15 children, I think there are 2 or possibly 3 that are younger then he is).  He’s easily one of the tallest (of the 15 children, there might be 2 or possibly 3 that are taller then he is).  His teacher GUSHED about him!  Loves him.  Talked about how he tells stores, easily shares, loves to talk.  He is comfortable talking to adults, and tends to talk to them more then to the other children.  (The reason, of course, is quite simple – adults talk back!)

She mentioned that his favourite places in the classroom are the doll centre, the play dough table and the construction toys.  He does the art now (which he wasn’t doing at the beginning of the year), and, in her words, is a joy to have in the class.  She then said to us that whatever we are doing as parents to keep doing it, as we’re doing a wonderful job.

She did say some other things, and both my husband & I got the same thing out of them – he’s just too smart & too advanced for the class.  Of course, it’s a wonderful opportunity for him to socialize with his peers (which, to be sure, was the one thing she thought he needed work on – he seems to prefer the adults to the kids in the class).  We’ve thought for a while that he was different, and it was interesting to hear it from another adult who knows him well.

Then there was Linus.  He’s in junior kindergarten, and so he actually got a report card.  It was really great – almost everything was rated “well established” (3 on the 1-3 scale).  They talked about how pleasant he was, how he chose a good selection of activities in the day and how he works well on his own.  He chooses activities based on his own interests, not on who was there, which was a worry for us (his closest friend is in the class with him, and we worry that he’s the only child that he plays with, or that he follows him around).  It was nice to hear that he’s somewhat independent.

He’s showing interest in reading, and will probably start with readers soon.  She thinks that he’ll certainly be reading at least a little bit well before first grade, which is great.  She told us that she loves having him in the class, and that his smile brightens her day.

As we were driving home, I commented to The Taxman that we have 16 more years of these nights, in which we come home to our children, after having talked to their teachers.  It’s a bit daunting, but also kind of exciting.  I am sure that there will be issues, but I hope that all of those parent-teacher nights are as pleasant and heartwarming as this one was.

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*kvell – a Yiddish word, meaning, essentially, to gush over