Small Things

The first day of catechism

My first grade son started catechism classes yesterday, beginning to prepare for his first communion in two years.  He seemed to have a good time, when he walked in several kids he'd met at vacation bible school this summer called out called out his name, and they all started acting silly together.

All the parents gathered outside for a meeting with the director of religious education at our parish. The children's ministry building is new this year for our parish, it had previously been a preschool, but our church took it over and renovated it so our kids now have space for classes and activities. Sorely needed. Several years ago I volunteered to teach a 5th grade catechism class, and we met in what is now a storage closet.

So behind this new building is a big play area, with shade, and most importantly, fences. While the director addressed all the parents, our couple dozen preschoolers, too young for catechism, played 40 feet away on the playground, close enough to watch but far enough to not interrupt grownup conversation. Surrounded by fences, and supervised by a couple of confirmation students.

The director told us he'll be leading a bible study for parents here in the back yard of the ministry building during all classes, and plans for us all to bring our young ones to play just as they did yesterday. I know he's always led those bible studies before, but I never considered going because they were always crowded into some corner of the church, and I knew my two girls would not be able to sit and color or play quietly indoors like that.

But now! My girls were so happy playing, and I looked around at all the moms, and seriously, I was afraid I might start crying. I am so looking forward to Thursday evenings now. To have all of my kids happily engaged, while I get to be in basically the best Book club ever with other parents struggling with the same lifestyle as mine . . . what a blessing! What a bonus to bringing my kid to catechism!

Last night, I couldn't get Jimmy to tell me anything about what they talked about in his class. I tried, but he said he didn't really want to talk about it. I suspect he was still processing the new classroom, the new teacher, the kids, and the workbook. Maybe he is at a loss as to how to sum up the lesson for the day. (Also, he lost a tooth right at bedtime, and may have been preoccupied with thoughts of the tooth fairy coming.)

But I think he'll be happy to return next Thursday. I know I will be.

I think it's the start of a new era

Last week my oldest child started first grade. He was in half-day kindergarten last year, from 11 to 2, but is finally on a full schoolday schedule. His school starts at 7:45 in the morning.

So this is it, folks. No more do my earliest days begin with preschool drop off at 9, or the occassional 8 AM doctors appointment. This mom-gig may be 24-7, 365, but I at least enjoyed sleeping in most mornings til 8. No more. For the rest of my childraising years, at least 17 years more, I will rise with the sun. Sometimes before it.

I am trying not to focus on how contrary to my nature this is. I have been falling asleep during Conan's monologue, barely able to switch off the tv through my sleepy fog. I am exhausted from my full days, but I think that Conan's move to 11:35 has tricked my mind into feeling like it is later. Last night , I didn't even make it to Conan. Maybe when Leno starts his ten o'clock show, it will cue me to sleep even earlier?

I am amazed how much more I am getting done each day. Both by rising earlier, and thanks to the extended schedule first grade affords. My drop-off and pick-up schedule is much saner than it was last year, when each day I had only an hour or so between trips to my kids' two schools. It is thanks to this block of over six hours (six hours!) uninterupted by obligatory school runs that I am getting some quality time on the computer to finally return to my blog. This day feels positively indulgent.

Now I am wondering where in the country they might still have full-day kinder. Because I've got two more kids yet to turn 5, and once I get used to this staying-in-one-place for 6 hours, it will be so hard to return to the all-day chauffering.

35 isn't mid-life, it's mid-project

I am turning 35 this month. My husband asked me how I feel about turning 35, and my answer was, "I don't." I don't feel anything about it. Because I really don't think about it. Maybe that's a nice collateral effect of being preoccupied with three small children all the time.

I've discussed birthdays and aging with a few people lately, and I've figured out that I see my life right now as a stage, an era in my life. Having kids at home all the time, being a stay-at-home mom, is hard, and chaotic, and  . . . restrictive in many ways. I absolutely chose this life, and cherish this life, even though I don't always handle it gracefully.

But I also know it is temporary. Fleeting, even. My life will change dramatically when they are all in school for most of the day. When they are all able to do chores, pour drinks, bathe themselves, and are potty-independant, it will be a whole new ballgame. They will still need me . . . but not so constantly, and not so physically. Hopefully a little more cerebrally.

A couple of friends recently talked about coming to terms with reaching our adult goals in our thirties, and then feeling bored, with no major goals around the bend. That's not a problem for me. This job is a temp job, and I even have an end date in sight.

My husband is eligible for retirement from the Navy when we're 42. And even if we have another child, he or she would be school age by then, as well. So while I have no idea where we will be living, or what my husband's job will be, I know that age 42 will be a life-changing door to opportunity to me. Many restrictions lifted. More time for my individual pursuits.

When I've discussed this with my husband, he grins and says, "Who said I'm getting out at 20? That could be be when it just gets interesting!" We'll see. I'm open to discussion, when the time comes. Regardless, there will be a new era, new goals to plan.

For now, I am but halfway through the current plan. Mid-project, still working out the kinks, haven't quite found the balance between my kids needs and my own. Tinkering with a couple new strategies, particularly in the stress-management area.

Boredom is not a problem. I'm OK with 35. It's actually better than 30 was. I've been abundantly blessed with family, and lots of it, which keeps me busy but happy. It's going to be a good birthday.

I think something's calling

I had a long talk with a fellow Navy spouse today, and my heart just filled with . . . recognition. Confirmation of our shared experience. I don't know why, when I have so often told others how important it is to find support among people in the same boat, I continually forget it myself. Why do I have to be hit head over the head to be reminded that we struggle with the same stresses, and obstacles, and pitfalls.

I may manage to keep moving forward, just barely handling my load, but always, always there are women just like me starting the same path, with no answers. Stumbling at the same blocks I did. With no map.

Why are we always, always reinventing the wheel? This is not unchartered territory. Why are we so timid about sharing the load?

I guess I feel like I haven't got all the answers. Not sure that I have any wisdom to share. But I do know a couple things.

1. Knowing in advance that the path we choose is hard, is no reason to give up searching for a way to make it easier.

2. Narrowly focusing on always bearing our own load can prevent us from noticing when another's load is slipping.

I've missed it a couple of times. I can't let myself miss another. Especially not if it's me.

Mom's Golden Rule

If there is one rule that my kids learn to obey and never question, one rule that they never need reminders for, that they internalize so completely that it becomes instinctive behavior, let it be this:

Do Not Talk to Mommy While She Is Counting Coffee Scoops.

It's not like they would ever get punished for breaking this rule. If I'm in a really good mood, I will just ask them once again to please, please, please wait until I am done scooping the coffee.

If I am grouchy, mostly they get ignored, glared at, or exasperated sighs thrown their way. But if they mess up my count, they might get snapped at to be quiet for a minute.

Today poor Mary came and found me ten minutes later at the computer and asked me if I was done scooping the coffee yet. So clearly she needs a bit more explanation. And perhaps a bit more attention?

Top 5 Mom Injuries

Moms often come across warnings of common dangers to our children, but rarely do we see statistics on what kinds of injuries mothers commonly suffer. Now, I am not researching official records of reported injuries, my list is purely anecdotal.

1. Failing to fully clear a babygate and crashing down face first, possibly spraining a wrist. I was never really into sports, so I haven't much experience with being thrown to the ground, tackled, or otherwise finding myself prostrate and in pain. But at least twice I have tripped mid-gate-hurdling and crashed down, so violently that I lay there a good minute getting over the pain and gathering strength to get up again. Unfortunately, there are no teammates to take a knee while waiting to see if I'm ok, no spectators to clap politely when I do finally walk away from it. Then again, I am usually glad no one sees me do stuff like this.

2. Being bitten shockingly hard while clearing a choking hazard from your toddler's mouth. You know the feeling, those tiny little new baby teeth chomping down on your knuckle so tightly you can't help crying out. Sometimes it's even difficult to open the baby's jaw, and when you finally do you gaze in pain at the very deep impressions left on your finger, while the baby's smiles at her little game. Makes me marvel at how resiliant fingers are.

3. Burns from the oven. This has got to be a common one. It may not be ideal. but sometimes you've got to put things in or take things out of the oven while keeping a toddler away with one foot. So you only halfway open the oven door to slide in the baking sheet at an angle, brushing your hand or wrist againt the oven roof, or rack, or door. Ouch.

4. Mystery bruises. Ever step out of the shower and notice bruises on your hip or shin or arm that you don't remember getting? My husband thinks I'm crazy when I say I don't know where they came from, but moms are often so busy rushing, hauling, carrying, and thinking of what to make for dinner at the same time we don't even notice getting injured.

5. Repetitive back strain. This must, by far, be the most universal and endemic kind of injury mothers suffer. It starts during pregnancy, when your abs are stretched and spread til they are useless, and continues through various stresses and posture contortions, like lying on only your left side for 4 months, carrying laundry with a 1 year old on your hip, or nursing a baby while working on the computer.

So, moms, any of these strike a chord with you? Have I forgotten some other common injuries? We moms forget our injuries easily, seems we are always focused on our kids injuries. It may be a pain to be a mom sometimes, but when you've got a preschooler to sympathetically kiss you boo-boos and make it better, there's nothing sweeter.

Cuz you can't leave a baby home alone (. . . can you?)

Driving Jimmy to school takes 8 minutes. He goes to afternoon kindergarten, and the baby sometimes really needs a nap about 45 minutes before I have to take Jimmy to school. I can't put her down earlier, because that's when I'm taking Mary to preschool, and I can put her down when I get back, but then I have to wake her to go pick up Mary. There are only 1 hour windows for her to sleep in between drop-offs and pick-ups.

Unless I left her sleeping in her crib for the 8 minutes it takes to drop off Jimmy. It's so tempting. I won't ever do it, I know it's probably a bad idea, I'm sure I could even be arrested. Even though I know the risk is so ridiculously trivial. You might even say, with the number of car accidents that happen within two miles of home, she's actually safer at home in her crib.

Still. It's so darn tempting. She could get a full hour more more of sleep if I didn't wake her. Sigh.

I can't get no . . . concentration

I have often felt like becoming a mom came with a case of attention deficit disorder. I can't seem to focus on one task at a time and get it done, whether it's laundry, cleaning the kitchen, typing a blog post, even checking email! It's not just that kids frequently interupt me with immediate snack/potty/booboo needs. Even when they are asleep, it is hard for me to stick to one job through completion.

I have realized about myself that I am a binge worker. I work best alone, in total concentration, with no distractions, and with a deadline. This worked fine when I was in college and could hunker down 24 hrs before a paper deadline and do nothing but write. When I started working more shifts to pay the bills, my grades plummeted because I didn't have the freedom to hunker down for 24 hrs straight. And I never learned to spread my work out over time.

For me, the getting into the work-groove takes time. And if I know I will have to walk away from an unfinished job, I just don't even want to start. This is why the laundry piles up so high, as do the dishes and the mail.

I am no good at multitasking by design. I multitask by necessity--making dinner, supervising homework, while washing the teakwondo uniform needed by 4 pm. I get the immediate needs done. But I just can't seem to plan, say, 30 minutes of folding laundry, 30 minutes for cleaning bathrooms, 30 minutes for sorting mail and papers, etc. I can't make myself do it. I want to take a 5 hour block and get one job DONE.

My husband would say, too bad. Suck it up. Time management is a monkey on my back. That's all I got now, time to run and get the boy from Kindergarten!

No resolutions here, I'm plum out of resolve

I didn't make any New Year's Resolutions this year. I think because there are so many things I know I should do, know I need to do, not to mention the things I'd like to do. And I know instinctively that just "resolving" to do them won't get them done.

The other night, I went out for milk and bread and wound up at the Barnes and Noble. (Jamie called right after I finally got into the grocery store, "What? Yes, of course I'm at the ALbertson's, hear the coffee grinding right now? Where else would I be?"

I went to the self-help section first. I've had several books on life-organization for stay-at-home moms on my Amazon wishlist, but haven't been able to find any such topic in an actuial bookstore. Books for moms are on childcare, pregnancy, or of the cup-of-comfort vignette variety. But I don't need another childcare book, or a cozy vignette. I need help.

I've been saying for some time that somethings gotta give. I am not keeping my marbles very well gathered when Jamie is deployed. Between kids, housework, cooking, school stuff, afterschool stuff, bills and real estate, and the Baby Philosophy business, marbles are rolling under the couch into dark corners I dare not search.

This last deployment, it was the business that gave. Well, ok, and the housework. And often the cooking. And then when I would drop the ball with the kids, I just felt like crap.

And giving up on these things leave me feeling like a failure. What am I working my butt off for if nothing gets done well? (And my butt is still there?) What is there for me to feel proud of?

I know that I need accomplishment to feel satisfied. I need acheivements, goals met, good things created, finished stuff that I am proud of to gaze at before I go to bed, so I can feel . . . productive. Successful at SOMETHING.

I know, I really do, that the ultimate success, more important than any other I strive for, is to raise my kids into capable, fulfilled, and generous adults. But come on, that won't be for, like, another 15 years! I need something slightly more short term than that to keep me going through the daily grind.

Why is there not a whole shelf at the Barnes and Noble dedicated to this dilemma?

I did find a book that I am excited about, and I will share that in my next post. Right now, I am off to bed.

Mom's Top 5 Family Christmas Traditions

When couples marry, they face a lot of compromise, and holidays can be trickier to negotiate then congressional bailouts. Luckily, my husband and I have been together since we were embryos (ok, not really, that would make us twins). So we were introduced to each other's Christmas traditions while we were still living with our parents, enjoying the holiday from a kids' perspective. Once we went off to college, we took turns staying at each other's parents' houses for Christmas break, and came to appreciate the few differences in how our families "do" Christmas.

Once we married and had our own tree, hearth, and home, I was surprised at how much we still managed to find to argue about. The biggest fight was about colored lights vs. white lights, and I believe I actually cried in the Home Depot parking lot. (My husband, bull-headed? Me, over-emotional? Never!) I remember complaining to my Dad on the phone about how uncompromising Jamie was being, expecting to get some sympathy. Instead, Dad suggested that colored lights might mean a lot to Jamie, and that it would be a small sacrifice, and maybe we could switch next year. We had colored lights that year, and I am woman enough to admit the tree looked quite cheerful and festive.

Colored lights aside, as the wife and mom, I am certainly the primary Steward of Christmas. I oversee unloading the Christmas boxes, I do almost all the gift shopping, wrapping, and shipping, the cards, the decorating, the table setting, and it might be safe to say, ALL of the clean up. Jamie has taken over most of the cooking, which I miss doing, but haven't figured out how to make time for. Jamie is a good cook.

Now for the the list. My Top 5 Favorite Family Christmas Traditions:

1. Singing carols on Christmas Eve. My sisters have always been very musical, my younger sister is a music therapist and plays like 27 instruments. Her husband is a talented classical guitarist. While my talent is harder to pinpoint, I do like to sing, and we always do a lot of that at Christmas.

2. Christmas Eve mass. We dress up, and rush to get seats, and it's always overcrowded and overheated, but I love it. I love the candles, and the singing, and the feeling of anticipation, of impending happiness. We actually missed it this year. We arrived a half hour before the children's mass, to standing room only, which we just can't do with a baby, a preschooler, and a kindergartner. So we left, and went back the next morning at 10:30. (I cried a little over it, though.)

3. Noche Buena. The Cuban side of my husband's family always celebrates on Christmas Eve with a pork roast, black beans and rice, and fried plantains, among other things. We continued this traditional meal at our house the first time we hosted our own Christmas Eve, and now my family enjoys it too. Jamie cooks it all, pretty much, which works well because I am usually still busy with last minute gift wrapping, and getting the kids ready for church.

4. The Stockings. At my house, when we were growing up, our stockings were an important part of Christmas morning. They were handmade by my mother, and Santa always stuffed them to overflowing. We would all come downstairs and admire the pile of presents around the tree, and then head to the mantle to each take down our stocking and cradle it on our lap while Dad made coffee and Mom combed her hair, put on slippers, and whatever else she decided was worth making us wait in torture. We unwrapped the presents in the stocking first, things like paperback books, cassette tapes, inexpensive earrings, chocolates, candy canes, gum, and makeup. It was hard to get Jamie to accept the Stocking tradition. At his house, the stockings were kind of an afterthought. I was there one Christmas during college when his Mom had us all paint our names on fuzzy red stockings with glitter paint. (I guess she suspected I was probably a keeper.)  They still hang those stockings to this day, but they are not a major player. We've found lotto tickets, or a roll of film, in them before. When we are there for Christmas, I usually stuff a little something in them all. I have made Jamie do Stockings first every Christmas at our house, except this one, because the kids' toys were too big a lure for them. Who can ignore a 7x4 foot slotcar racetrack long enough to sit and dig through a stocking? So we did the tree first this year. But I plan to restore the proper order in the future.

5. Epiphany. We leave the tree and all the decorations up for the full twelve days of Christmas, until the Feast of Epiphany. Traditionally, that's when the three wise men reached the baby Jesus to give their gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

As always, please feel free to share your favorite traditions!