Hush Bottles

Here in VA, I belong to an online mom's board where mom's can ask questions, share answers and offer helpful tips. On this mornings daily email, there is this mom that her husband just moved away, I don't know what for, but she works 3 days a week and is physically and emotionally drained with the behavior of her 2 daughters ages 2 and 4. Tantrums apparently are running amuck. So this particular "What do I do?" got me thinking about a post I had seen, where else but Pinterest, called Hush Bottles.

Hush Bottles work like a snow globe, but with glitter, water and glue. It's concept is that the wonderment of a child, whilst gazing into the bottle doesn't instantly hush and calm down but does it within about a minute watching the glitter whirl around the inside of the bottle before settling to the bottom. 

Pretty neat concept, if it works, but seems kinda "New Age". But hey, anything that keeps us calm, cool and collected is worth a try to me.

Warning Parental Failure: Yes, I'll let you be a Big Boy

Over the past couple of months we have watched our little Gator blossom into a sweet and loving little toddler, who wants to be just like his big brother. He wants to ride his big brother's bike, sleep in his big brother's bunk bed, and now try to use the potty like his big brother. So, one thing at a time.

We still do not let Monk sleep on the top bunk bed. This is a safety concern for us, of course we don't want him falling out, even though there is a rail, but more or less let's just say...we are not the best waking family on the planet. Meaning it takes all of us a good 20 minutes before we can function to even hear what is going on around us! That being said, when he wakes up at night to go potty, we need him to be able to function to get to the ladder and climb down, understanding that he can't just swing his legs over and sleep walk to the toilet. Reality: We still have the ladder hidden away!

So how does this fair for our Gator? Well, he saw all the hype that Monk displayed over his getting bunk beds.

Confession: We have had the bunk beds all along, we just never put the top bunk on until we moved and didn't have the space to store the pieces for the top.

Gator sees Monk in his new bed and wants to get in EVERY night. So he learned to hoist his little short heiny over the top of his crib. Yes, he fell out once, then tried multiple times again and one of those times he lodged himself between the wall and the crib rail. Yes, I stopped got out my phone to take a picture of this adventure. I know horrible mama not immediately coming to his rescue.

But the moral of my bed story is a 20 month old being able to climb out of bed every night is just not a good thing. We as parents know this and we also know that he just isn't ready for a big boy toddler bed yet and neither are we. Finally, just before he turned 21 months we got up the mustard to do it. Better to attempt to transition him, than him fall out break a bone or knock his pearly whites out. 

He is in love with the fact that he can get in and out of his bed on his own, but has absolutely no desire to actually sleep in it open. What is a parent to do? We tried for an hour and a half every night to get him to lay down and fall asleep. We even sent Monk out of the room and well that didn't work. We pretty much tried everything and got no where, then we turned the "bed" backwards against the wall! As you can see the sides of the crib are slanted so there is no hoisting capability, and he sleeps and so do the rest of us. 

So on to my parenting failure...

Our big boy, who isn't ready for a big boy bed yet, has decided that his new favorite word is POTTY. Everyone in the house goes potty in the toilet and well the other night he wanted to too. After putting him to bed, he started saying "POTTY, POTTY". What's a Parent to do? Picture this... Mr. BBH grabs him out of the crib, hands him over, goes running into our bathroom to get a toddler toilet ring that just never made it into a box when we moved, as I am ripping his footed jammies off and pulling his diaper off and then hoist this little barely 3 foot mini human onto the toilet where his legs barely hang over the edge. Then he is very uneasy on the toilet ring, why? He has a big booty and well the little potette ring just wasn't big enough. Well nothing happened but a battle of the wills. Gator swiftly trying to out smart BBH reaches for the flusher knob and woosh. Then again, but blocked by Mr. BBH. Now, the game has begun. 

We bought him some of his own Big Boy undies and let him try them out. He is very proud of his undies! I know blurry picture but the expression says it all!

So last night Mr. BBH, not wanting to have a toilet battle of the flushing wills take two, climbed up into the attic and searched for the box of Potties, since "Potty, Potty" came out at dinner time. We put him in his big boy undies and over to the potty he went. Nothing again, but hey it's a start. Not thinking Gator was still in just undies, the kids ran down stairs to the playroom to play for a bit before bed. Well, we called them up 10 minutes later and he was wet. Ok, so he just peed. No big deal. Upstairs to get ready for bed and clean jammies on. "Potty, Potty". This time, we put him in washable trainers and a vinyl cover, had a little potty in the bathroom, but footie jammies. Nothing happened in the potty, but his trainers were wet. We got him cleaned up, put a new pair of trainers on and vinyl again and off to lala dream land he went. Or so we thought. 

At 4 am. He woke up screaming. Now, not being those waking parents, Mr. BBH finally heard him and went in. I have been under the weather and well comatose at night. Finally 20 minutes later, Mr. BBH comes in and wakes me up, he can't figure out what is wrong and needs to go back to sleep. I go in. I reach into the mock crib for him, and he is soaked. Vinyl pants, you suck is all I thought. My poor little Gator, was freezing. So I call for Mr. BBH, "I need some help, I need a dipe!" We had pee, we had poop, we had a frozen little big boy that didn't want to take off his big boy undies and a wet bed. As I was ripping everything off, Mr. BBH felt horrible. "I asked him, I did, I checked to see if he was wet, he wasn't, I asked him if his teeth hurt and he said NO!" The Gator was just embarrassed he had an accident. Everything was alright we reminded him. We got him cleaned up and he was still hysterical. Mr. BBH took him back to our bed while I cleaned everything up. 

So much for our Big Boy, who needs a toddler bed... who just doesn't want one, and neither do we, but wants to potty train instead. What is a parent to do? Fail. Yep. We failed on our first go round of the big boy bed...our first potty training go round, by doing it at night. Hopefully, this doesn't deter him, but we are going to hit this full speed ahead this weekend and see where it lands us. We know better, I know better, but I wanted to let my child take the lead on this. So it's a dreary Wednesday and sleep deprived parents, our poor children who are all geared up for an awesome day are going to have to witness totally caffeinated struggling parents!

Day 109: De-cluttering Laundry for 2012

Everywhere I look these days, I find too many things that have a home and it is not in it and then there is stuff that is just lingering around because it doesn't have a home yet. There just aren't enough hours in the day for me to find homes for these "things".

I knew when we brought our mini-humans into the world that along with them would come stuff. I swore to myself that all of their "stuff" would be contained in their own rooms. Did it happen? Nope. As with everything else, I am finding it everywhere. Be it the 3 year old, who wants to play with his toys in the living room or the 9 month old who needs his own containment area for his own safety. So where do I find myself lately?

I wish that I could blame it on the holidays, birthdays and other special occasions but what it honestly boils down to is...I would rather play with my kids than do chores. We only have one chance to have this one day and well laundry can wait. The only problem is...I spend the day picking up from everything that we have been playing with that I just don't have the energy to pick up after the normal stuff.

One of my New Year's resolutions was to keep a handle on the laundry. For the month of January, I look back and think that I was pretty successful. Then on Monday, I walked into the laundry room. Ok I lied. I had to push and pull my way into the laundry room. I have been doing laundry for 4 people and a potty training puppy for 3 whole days now and well, after cleaning up the bedrooms I can probably add another day or two. Embarassed...yes...tired...yes...but I think that the whole neighborhood just decided to drop their laundry off at my house and pray that I would just not notice.

It's not that our children have too many clothes, because that is not the case. Each of them had a load and a half. I could possibly see the fact that we had guests in the house for well over a week, that the number of towels, blankets and sheets grew. I can also see that the children and I were gone for almost a week so we have that laundry too, and I can also see that we have a puppy that we are potty training right now. Do Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer and I have too many clothes...yes.

So what am I doing to simplify this task I desperately abhor?
A new system is going into play around here at Chez Stoneford. Monk is old enough to turn his clothes right side out when he takes them off and well Mr. BBH and I can too. So, I am instilling a your own laundry load system. I found that doing it this way, affords less time to fold and an easier time of actually putting the clothes away. No more sorting into five or six different piles then taking the to their desired locations. wash, dry, fold, go to ONE specific place...Load by Load laundry! Wish me luck!

I also went through all of the kids clothes and dumped. I had one empty laundry basket and into it went the clothes that were too small or I just would never let them wear. Since the kids clothes are easier to monitor...they are constantly changing sizes, I really don't have to worry about out of season clothes for them. Mr. BBH and me....different story. I went through all of my clothes in drawers and dumped. I found Maternity clothes still hiding out in there as well as clothes that I should never wear again. We need to donate these things before they go out of style and no one wants to wear them! When Mr. BBH gets home tonight I am praying that he will do the same! I am also hoping that we can tackle doing this to the Master Closet this weekend.

Today, I also tackled the linen closet. Gone went the ratty pilled towels, the sheets that we never use and those pillowcases that no longer match the sheet sets and the comforters that haven't seen a bed in a year. 

Discosure: I can't part with my down comforters though. Just because it was really pleasant this winter...in to a space bag they will go. 

Now back to that linen closet...it serves a dual purpose, not only does it hold linens, but the top rack is home for those taken away toys for naughty children. Better Homes and Gardens recommended a plastic container library. With this concept along with our taken toys, we will just dump them into the container and bring them out on rainy days. Personally, I prefer for Monk to earn them back, but I am just going to do that for the entertainment center dumping ground. We will see how it goes. Hey if anything, there will be less toys to pick up in the playroom!

Before leaving to go for Grandma's birthday and Grammy's surgery, I decluttered the play room. The trash bags came out when the kids were napping and into them went those toys that I can stand, the ones that are too young for Monk but too old for the Gator and reorganized and simplified. I toted them up to the attic and they are awaiting the next consignment sale to find their forever homes! I was recently reading Real Simple to try to find ways to simplify our life. I hope that I got something from it, but actually applying it will be another story.

Where I am in the De-cluttering world...
one 1/2 Bath, one coat closet, two kitchen counter dump sites, one pantry, two freezers, one top of the fridge, one playroom, 3 dressers, children's bedroom, one sitting room and one laundry room! Yeah, I wish I could say the garage or storage room, but hey some of us just can't change overnight but we are on the right path...I hope.

For my locals, the end of April is Alley Cats & Angels semi-annual yard sale....

Day 108: Prepping for Spring

With Spring fast approaching here at Chez Stoneford, the wonderful La Nina has graced us with a very very mild winter. We can't help the wonderful warm days that are upon us as we step out the door. I also can't help my anticipation of our summer garden fruitions.

Over the past years our ever so brown almost black thumbs have progressively gotten greener and this year, we plan to expand what we have spent the last five springs preparing for...low maintenance, care free and pretty much self sustaining gardening. A lot of trial and error was most of our leg work!

 For those of you who choose to have your own home garden, you already know that nothing is better than cooking up a meal and using stuff freshly plucked from right out your back door. Hey, you put in a little leg work and your body is going to thank you for it and so is your wallet. Our family had a wonderful time together last year prepping our garden, working in it and reaping its benefits.

Last spring, we even gave Monk his very own section that he was responsible for taking care of. Yes, I know strange idea putting that kind of responsibility on a 2 year old, but, he loved it and it gave him his own sense of ownership of it. Since we follow the Square Foot Garden method, he obeyed every "rule" we set infront of him about the garden and got upset if any of his tot friends violated them. We envolved him in every aspect about it. From seed starting, tilling and picking out new veggies after the tornado that come through our neighborhood destroyed our hard work. I highly recommend getting your kids involved, hey, you might have your non-lettuce eating mini-human eating what he/she otherwise wouldn't touch, just because he/she grew it themself.

So what are we doing this year? I'll write about our adventures.
Well now is the time to start thinking about starting to grow some seeds. Those catalogs are coming out in full force and local gardening supply stores are stocking their shelves. If you choose to Square foot Garden (SFG) then start getting your boxes ready. Turn over your soils and add some hummus and compost. If you are new to trying to grow or are in the habitual mindset of picking up perishables at the grocer, start small. I recommend no more than 2 boxes. But for us we will be doing much more.

We plan on only going to the farmers market for our tried desperately but epically failed oh so loved potatoes and fruit from trees.

 My newly loved Pinterst addiction is really helping with all of the planning and idea starting. This past weekend we started some of our seeds that need some time to grow before we can plant them outside. What I have found in the past, is that we just don't have the capacity or money for those fancy grow light systems. This year we are trying the outside milk jug/2 liter green houses for our seeds. You can leave them outside all the time and they get all the hardening and light they need and are protected from the elements. I'll post some pictures later.

What we started... Bell peppers, Jalapeno peppers, Carrots, Romaine, Mesculin lettuce, & Cauliflower.
We also started some flowers... Snapdragons & sunflowers.

Disclosure: SFG is not your grandma's gardening. You grow everything in 4x4 raised boxes. 16 Square feet will feed enough for and adult and child for the whole growing season. No back breaking work. It pretty much sustains itself except for watering when hot out and if you think you can't do it, just remember my 2 year old did.

What are the monetary benefits of growing your own garden?
Well last year tomatoes in our area got to be as high as $2.99 lb. and that was even at the farmer's market much less the grocer. We eat more perishables in the summer, because they are more readily available and try to blanche and freeze as much as we can to enjoy our fresh veggies throughout the year. So for a family of 4, at the grocer we would save at least on our consumption probably around $40 a month. For us that's almost a whole week's worth of groceries! Hey, saving that money affords us to get away for a mini-vacation!

$40/month x 6 months= $240 of free money! Plus we are eating better!

Day 106: January Challenge Update

It being the last day of January, here is how our month long Challenge went.

Friday nights have become family movie night. We rented a movie either out of the redbox or blockbuster express box. Both free of course, made some popcorn, blew up the air mattress and had fun filled family Fridays! Some went well others didn't but that is just what you get when you rent a "haven't seen before" movie.

Monk now looks fondly forward to Saturdays. No matter where we "drag" him on our errands, he knows that after all is said and done, we will sit down picnic style in the living room and play board games until well we all get bored!

This past week my grandmother had heart surgery (she is doing great, BTW) but we were in SC from Tuesday through ummm, Saturday. We HAD to get home, why, GAMENIGHT! Monk kept saying to me when we were packing up, "Come'on Mommy! We have to get home to Daddy, it's game night!" or "We are never going to get home, we are going to miss gamenight" and my favorite "Sorry Grandma but we have to go today, it's gamenight"! Wow, the insight of my mini-human and his family focus!

I highly recommend incorporating some sort of family to do schedule into your weekly routine. These 2 things, made our family a bit closer and looking forward to spending that time together, plus it didn't cost us a thing!

So how is the Decent Human Being week going? Well, Sunday we went to BJ's and for once (lately) my faith in decency was restored by the man working the customer service desk. Not only was he nice, pleasant but actually was helpful!

Day 22: Anti-Consumerism comes to a Close

So how did we do on our first 365 Changing the Way we do month-long Challenge? Personally we did great. Here are a few things that we learned to appreciate along the way.    

Saving $$$ and Spending less afforded us more time as a family, more volunteer work, ability to eat what we had on hand, retrain our brains on the way we think about stuff we spend $$$ on!

Gas:

-Without the usual outings to the multiple grocers & pharmacies, you know, some of us can't just shop at one to get everything we need. One trip to the farmer's market every 2 weeks and one to the grocer for milk.
-No unnecessary gas guzzling trips for fast food for lunches or quick suppers
-No driving around the block or leaving the car run in the driveway when our children wouldn't sleep or fell asleep in the car

Time:

-We gained more time as a family
   - We gained 12 more hours with Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer. I know it doesn't seem like much, but  
     really it was. That time not spend running around town, afforded us the luxury of lounging at home.
   - We learned to really utilize family movie night. Blockbuster gives out free codes each week on sites
     such as southernsavers.com and coupondad.net. We would blow up the air mattress and pop a bag
     of popcorn and Voila!
   -We worked on projects around the house together. Monk enjoyed setting up the playroom and
    putting decorations up for Halloween.
 
-We re-learned the joys of cooking together
   - Having missed this past-time, we had to get creative on some of the meals that needed preparing.
     So, it took some thought and opened up more communication for us as a family as to what and how
     we were going to make our meals and we did it together!
   - We actually ate more and more nutritiously. We were more apt to try new things. Oldies and
     goodies from the farmers market were bought, but if something looked interesting we tried it out.
     Last night we had purple sweet potatoes! They sounded interesting, looked very interesting and
     tasted Grrreatt! But we came up with more combinations for food and new recipes were born!

-We volunteered more hours for our favorite cat rescue Alley Cats & Angels alleycatsandangels.org
   -We got re-involved with cleaning the petsmart adoption centers. Yes. We did this with 2 kids in tow.
    So it can be done! Monk has learned the art of caring for animals that are not ours, and that they too
    need time, attention and maintenance.
   - We did this between once and twice a week, and that little hour and a half went along way in the
    lives of these kitties!

Clearing out:

-We cleared out most of the stand-up freezer
   -Those dreadful potatoes are down to 2 bags from 10!
   -Wow, you really can put together a dinner straight from the freezer in 20 minutes!
   - It is primed and ready for the winter soup, stew and veggie collections!

-We cleared out most of the pantry
  - We traded in quick take-out for can be made quick in home!

  - The depths of those avoidance foods are gone. Now we just know not to buy them again. Good 

     deal or not!

  - Nothing was wasted. No having to bring out the trash can and dump expired foods in the next few 

    weeks!

- Our garage stock pile 

  - Has plenty of empty shelves 

  - Plenty of empty bags of toiletry items

All in all this was a nice life lesson for our family. 

* We gained an appreciation for our couponing lifestyle that though we may do it out of necessity to save money in the long run, it affords us the capability to be able to take a month off of spending and utilize what we have on hand. Even when you have company!

* We gained an appreciation for trying new things and adapting our eating styles

* We gained an appreciation for repairing what was on hand with what was on hand instead of taking the easy way out and just buying new.

* We learned that the best things in life are actually free and are accessible, you just have to seek and find them. 

* We spent more time as a family. We are teaching our children the value of time together, creativeness and the value of a dollar. We are becoming better parents. 

Day 21: Happy Hallows

When I was a child, Halloween was one of the most coveted and anticipated holidays of the fall season.  My dad Bah Humbugged his was through Christmas, but not Halloween. Spooks, stories, goblins and gorries, I can remember my dad saying. We would searchhigh and low for things just laying around, to create our porch masterpiece, the Jack-o-Lantern.  Opening cans and jars of stuff in the pantry. Climbing trees to get moss and picking up straw. So much fun searching. Then came the transformation of our garae into the neighborhood haunted house. My poor mom, eventually the haunted house migrated to encompass not only the garage but also the kitchen and dining room too. You never ran out to buy things you used creativity and whatever you had lying around the house and yard. You knew your neighbors, had costume contests and enjoyed pleasant tricks along with treats.

Nowadays, people use stencil cutouts for Jack-o-lanterns, and I will admit that we have succumb, but we will be changing that for next year. People don't really know their neighbors, so there isn't really that mystery of who is under that costume. My anticipation for Halloween is changing. Sadly. So for Changing the way we do, Halloween 2012 is on the list.

During the past years, we have had contests going in multiple states and cities to see who had the most trick or treaters. It was a highlight to the night. Everyone gets involved. Some of us even get up on our roofs to throw down candy to the treaters. Sadly this year, we did not participate. Due to our consumerist challenge, we did not turn our porch light on to hand out treats.

So how was Halloween 2011 for Chez Stoneford?

We took our children to the library and let them hear stories, play games and enjoy the spirit. We carved pumpkins after our visit to the farm, they "died" over the course of the week. We decorated the house with what decorations we had and made some crafts to decorate next year even more. We had friends over to join us too, and a yummy birthday dinner for Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer.

All 4 of us dressed in costume to go trick or treating in the cold and pouring rain. We armed ourselves with umbrellas and boots. We were going to make the best of 2011 Hallows. With the few houses that had their porch lights on, the kids rang and banged away. "Trick or Treat" Monk and the Edge would say before someone would come to the door. It was cute. But as we walked uphill both ways...saw parents driving their kids from house to house...saw kids unchaperoned...and speeders on the streets...the cold and wet got to us after about an hour. We came home, but the kids had fun.

So, now our porch light stayed off but that didn't stop the banging on our door even upwards of 11:00pm. Maybe it's just a few of us that follow the etiquette of Halloween, but you don't bother people who don't have their lights on and you don't dare knock on a door after 9pm, and if their light is on you are pleasant ...say thank-you and Happy Halloween. A couple of the times we opened the door to check to see if the weather was lightening up, but we were met by a race of people to our door and when we told them "I'm sorry our porch light is off and we do not have any candy" we were returned with not-so-nice pleasantries. F-bombs and other 4 letter words and the occasional "they ain't got no candy" was appalling by children of all ages. Excuse me. These parents were in their cars and condoning this behavior. This can't be the generation of tomorrow. This can't be the generation of parents today. It took everything out of me not to go knock on the window and tell them what profanities their children were saying.

Hopefully Halloween 2012 will be so much better, but despite it all we had a nice holiday and hope you did too!

Day 17: Being ME vs. Other Parenting

When I was in college a friend gave me a copy of this poem and it has always stayed with me... Always in the back of my mind when I look at any child. 

Law Nolte, Dorothy (1924 - 2005) Children learn what they live

If children live with criticism, they learn to condemn. If children live with hostility, they learn to fight. If children live with fear, they learn to be apprehensive. If children live with pity, they learn to feel sorry for themselves. If children live with ridicule, they learn to feel shy. If children live with jealousy, they learn to feel envy. If children live with shame, they learn to feel guilty. If children live with encouragement, they learn confidence. If children live with tolerance, they learn patience. If children live with praise, they learn appreciation. If children live with acceptance, they learn to love. If children live with approval, they learn to like themselves. If children live with recognition, they learn it is good to have a goal. If children live with sharing, they learn generosity. If children live with honesty, they learn truthfulness. If children live with fairness, they learn justice. If children live with kindness and consideration, they learn respect. If children live with security, they learn to have faith in themselves and in those about them. If children live with friendliness, they learn the world is a nice place in which to live.

I understand that there are very few people like myself in the world. I say what I mean and mean what I say. I do not have a penis in this sense but I have a hard time understanding why people just can't be totally honest with each other. Granted, I am brash and blunt most of the time. Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer says that I do not have a mute button when I give honest answers. I feel that I would be doing a huge disservice to my children if I sugar coated things. If I weren't forthright with them, it would be as if I am telling them they need to be honest human beings...but only in certain circumstances. This is just the tip of my iceberg on that subject.

In our home there is nothing on a child's level that can not be played with. Everything in their reach can be picked up, played with and learned about. We do not prevent our children and those that visit our home from a teaching experience. We want our children to know how things work, what they do, what they do not do and what they can become. We encourage active imaginative play and not with just toys. We support well rounded learning and vocabulary boosting. We do not baby talk to our children. If our child wants to try to do something, we encourage it. I am not saying that we are letting them jump off the banister or do anything that could potentially maim them for life!  If they want to taste something, we encourage it. They are individual human beings. Just because I or we may not like to do or eat something, does not mean that this separate person capable of their own individual likes and dislikes will or won't.

Being a SAHM offers me the advantages of choosing what I deem appropriate for my children to learn. I am fortunate in this instance. I understand that parents who opt to send their children to a formalized preschool or daycare, believe in their heart that they have made the correct choice of appropriateness as to what their children are exposed to whether it was by necessity or not. I also understand that I can not control what they are going to be introduced to when they start school, but we as parents will be involved.

The point of my parenting rant is not the actuality of being a SAHP or not. This is not a war between the working parents...just because you work hard, bring home a paycheck and I do not does not by any mean, mean that I do not work just as hard or even harder than you...DRAMA. The fundamental of my argument is how children are being raised today. Many of them are taught that the world owes them something. This attitude is primarily based on bribing children in my mind. If you do what I ask of you right now then you will get ____ in return. How about teaching your children that you mean what you say and leave the bribery out.

Disclosure: I will include that a reward system for long-term success for attaining certain goals is appreciated in my mind such as acts in Potty Training.

Parents are so apt today to give in and forget that a child is learning everything everyday to which the parents have known their whole life. Can a parent honestly say that they have bribery arguments with their boss or anyone in the real world? Re-teaching the parent to actually say what they mean and mean what they say when it comes to parenting I feel is necessary to raise a capable, self assured, contributing and productive child.

We, as parents spend so much time teaching our children what they can't do rather than letting them learn what they can do. A capable child, understands that making their own choices is part of everyday life. I am not saying that I am offering my children my keys to drive my car. I am, however notioning to the fact that all actions are choices and most of those choices have consequences. Life isn't always fair, every parent or non-parent alike knows this. However, if you give your children time for appropriateness, you will spend less time telling them no, when it is not the appropriate situation of sorts. Leading by example, getting down, experiencing life through their eyes and teaching your child manners will give them the cornerstone of success in life.

We have an art table in our kitchen that is stocked with paper, markers, crayons, stickers, playdoh and tools as well as colored pastas, yarn and glue. It is fully accessible for him to get creative with these supplies as long as they are done at the art table. It is there for getting creative. When I set things out for him to "experiment" with, we do this together, messes are contained and are ok. Showing him that this is the appropriate place to make a mess.

Yesterday, we had a play date for Monk here at our house. There were 3 other children in addition to Monk. So, these 3 other children at the play date kept looking up at their mothers to see if today's messy activity was ok. Monk was happily playing along and getting royally messy. Stated in our posted play date was the fact that we were going to get messy, so bring a change of clothes. Over and over these moms kept asking me "are you sure this is ok?" I kept saying to these moms that it is ok for the kids to get messy; "pour, dump, taste, & try new things" I told the kids. They (the moms) looked at me like I was nuts. In return, I tried my hardest not to look at them back with the look of "you don't let your children do this?" Do these parents not talk to their children about where they are going and what they are going to do when they get there? Or better yet, standing there speechless at their child...not one of them asked their children questions about what they were doing, making ect. No engagement. Maybe I am wrong in my thinking about them as parents, but their children had a very hard time engaging in messy play, it was if they thought that by participating they would "get in trouble."

In our family, we learn new things together, make a mess together and together we clean it up. If you don't do this, how will they learn what stuff feels like, tastes like, imagine...create and to clean up their messes? It's as if you gave a child a box of crayons without outlets to utilize them, duh they are going to think of something to use them on and most likely you are going to have to clean their artwork off the walls. In doing this, will they have a sense of self accomplishment, self assurance, self awareness? Yes, but you will probably end up frustrated, portraying your frustration to your child thus unknowingly telling them that this accomplishment...their masterpiece is not acceptable in your mind.  Thus teaching them that it is right to be shameful and wrong to have confidence in what they are capable of doing. I know that there can't be just a few of us parents in the world! You know those of us who want our children to know what a tree feels like rather than looking at it out a window or on a computer!

It just astounds me the way that parents will talk down to a child yet expect them to act like mature adults all the time and then be embarrassed at ultimate meltdowns. We knew what type of parents we wanted to be before we became parents. I know this is true of most parents. There are things that we as grown "children" think that our parents could have done differently and we as the "parents" now are out to change. There are things that we as "parents" will instill in our children as our parents did that we will pass along. We as parents want the best for our children...for some it is the best clothes, schools, toys, you know what you can buy your child. The best thing in life that you can give your child is your actions, attention, patience, kindness and love; you know the stuff you can't buy but teach. The hindsight of relegating your child to the back burner in life and not being that parent you knew you wanted to be to your child is...your decision.

Day 10: EveryBODY Poops

So, today is our anniversary. I woke up in bed with my husband. Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer woke up in bed with our 2 children. We have been married for 4 years. Little did we know that 4 years later this would be our routine. Monk was born exactly 10 months and 1 day after we got married, so we really never got to experience the newlywed period of life without children. Oops, guess we were just too good at the practicing. We always said that we didn't want to just have one child. We wanted him/her to have a sibling, and well we weren't going to rush it, but I didn't want to even think about it until Monk was at least 2 years old. Well, God had a different plan for us. There was no thinking about it or "trying". A few weeks after Monk turned 2 the stick turned blue.

Having a new baby, your world starts revolving around poop. We never thought that poop would be a topic of conversation in our household. Boy, is life...ummm interesting. The screams of "oh, my God, how could something this little have that much poo!" was probably heard by our neighbors as well as "Honey, get the scissors, this onezie is not worth saving!". Oh the delights of being a first time parent.

Now, flash forward 3 years into parenting comes potty training. Just when our neighbors thought that the yelling for scissors was over, little did they know it would be followed by "these underwear are not worth saving!" nor did we. While we were in the beginning stages of this new parenting quest, praise, joy, and rewards were abound. We made a big deal out of using the potty and wearing big boy undies. Monk pretty much has it down pat except for at night. Yay, one kid out of diapers, one more to go!

Gator is an a-typical pooping baby. When he was about a month old, he went without pooping for 6 days and our entire family began to worry something was wrong with him. We rushed him to the pediatrician, who looked at me and said "since he is a breastfed baby, it's OK. We will talk when he hasn't pooped for 10 days. Since he is a preemie,  he is probably using up everything he eats.". When he finally did poop, later that night, we sort of made a big deal with it. Of course, Monk was there to hear and bear witness to the whole thing.

Little did we know that we created a poop patrol monster. Monk is the Sergeant in Command. Now Sgt. Monk of the Poop Patrol thinks it is his duty to have to look at every one of the Gator's diapers checking to see if the Gator has pooped. If he did, the excitement comes out "Yay, he pooped" comes flying out of his mouth followed by "it's ____(color)".  If Gator has not, Monk is quiet and somber "Nope, just pee." and goes running back to whatever he was doing.

So now, the cloth diapers has turned Sgt. Monk of the Poop Patrol's world upside down. Cloth diapers in this house already come with colors. Though the insides are white in the ever on duty mini-human's mind, the poop has to be a different color than what it used to be when we would throw them away. Throwing in another curve ball is the fact that the Gator started eating solid foods. "whoa Mommy, that doesn't look right, I think he needs to go to the doctor!" What's a mother to do?

Now the "Why's" have started and beginning with poop and the color of it. Dog poop, cat poop, everybody poops Sgt. Monk, just like you! A wise friend, who has raised her children, just sending her youngest off to college, told me that she hasn't been to the restroom by herself in over 32 years. When she first told me of this, I thought...Hello door locks! Well door locks as I have come to find out, don't keep your child from asking you "Mommy why did you lock the door? Are you pooping? Daddy Whatcha doing in there? Are you pooping?" I now understand where she was going with this when she was referring to her children when they were little. Why lock the door, they are just going to beat on it until you answer them! All our Pooping Sgt. wants to know is if you are regular or do we need to take you to the doctor. We have thought about getting the "Everybody Poops" book for him at the library, but that's about making it OK for a kid to poop in the potty, defeating the grand purpose of changing the subject of poop in our house. 

Day 9: Consumerism Challenge: Cardboard boxes are like gold

Consumerism doesn't get to get the best of me today, a little creativity goes a long way.

We, like most parents despise the word can't and lately Monk has been using it alot. The "I can't because..." is really getting annoying. Over the last oh 6-8 months Monk has grown a fascination with knights. By mistake he watched the movie Shrek and well, since Shrek is a knight and saves the princess, you can see how Monk would want to do the same.

Yesterday, we went to a play date with Monk's best friend Edge and he loves playing knights. This morning Monk came down stairs and wailed those dreadful "I can't words" this time being followed by "be a knight, because I don't have a shield!". No knight gear in our house...or so Monk thinks. I had actually picked him up a set of armor and shields at a consignment sale a few months back to give him as a Christmas present. I couldn't just go running to the garage and get it out. What lesson would that teach my son? When we think we can't or we don't have just go buy one?  That mentality is what I definitely don't want my children to express. Ever. We have strived with our children to let very few branded characters in our house, so that we can get through shopping without having the screaming child yelling about how they want the "Little Red Devil...a.k.a. Elmo" and not being able to leave or being so utterly embarrassed that we would have to buy it just to shut him up. Most parents will never admit the fact that they have had to do this, but we haven't and never plan on it either.

Since cardboard boxes are like gold around here at Chez Stoneford out came the scissors, foil, & tape. Voila in about 20 minutes, Monk had a shield! I was smart enough in the fact that when I was cutting out the one, I actually cut out two, just in case Monk wanted to play with anyone, but primarily I knew Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer would want one too. So, Monk was happy with my creation, a shield with a giant Autobot logo on it. For those of you who don't know what an Autobot logo is, it's the Transformers logo. I live in a house with all men and since Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer is a self professed 80's cartoon freak, he of course would want to pass on his Transformer obsession to his sons.

Disclosure: The day Monk crawled up into bed and wanted to watch TV with Daddy, Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer's heart totally jumped at the fact that his son wanted to watch...THE ROBOTS! Then the day came when Grandma & Mommy came home from the consignment sale, Optimus Prime Robot in hand, Daddy jumped up opened up his toy cabinet to get his old Optimus Prime, and I caught the two of them having a Transformers battle on the couch..."Look Mommy we're playing Robots, Daddy's is the Daddy Optimus Prime and mine is the little boy." Ok, my heart melted a little too. Then came the day when after Monk's 3rd birthday, we took him to the toy store, gave him 1/2 of his "Birthday Money" and he wanted to buy a new Robot, just like Daddy's toys.

So back to not running out to the store to buy knight gear...

Monk came upstairs and again uttered the words, "I can't be a knight because I don't have a sword!". Stumped and almost about to have to blow our Consumerism Challenge, I stopped looked around, and then remembered Nana had bought Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer a set of light sabers for him to play with Monk. So I bent down and told him, "You are right, you don't have a sword...You have a LIGHT SABER!" All was right with the mini-human's world. He came down stairs and since Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer is still on his Fur-cation (he is furloughed from work right now), Monk asked him to play knights. Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer looked at me and I told him to take 10 minutes and play knights. So what does Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer say to me? "I can't play knights, I don't have a shield." Boom, not as cool as Monk's but I had at least had the forethought that he might "need" one.

Consumerism avoided! I may actually get away with re-consigning the knight gear! Woo Hoo! Cool points to this Mommy today! With a little creativity, you can make a child's day without having to spend any $$$ and turn the dreadful "I can't" into "I can, I am!"

Consumerism Challenge: 0
Us:1

Day 7: The Burning of the Bats

I have always been a fan of Cathy Guisewite's comic strip "Cathy". Well, last week the strip that I have always looked forward to reading every weekend came to an end. At times, I could really relate to Guisewite's humor. Back in 1999, she had written a strip talking about how she wanted to understand the man's world. I cut it out of the paper, and it has been on my refrigerator since, move after move I have carried this one particular strip with me. I have tried to find a link online, so that I could share but the archives that I have found do not go back that far. But the gist of the strip, which has disappeared from the fridge, is this...

She wants to understand everything in the man's world...love...food...relationships...everything except football.

I am reminded of this strip every fall when football starts and I chuckle. I am not that into football except when the Bills make the playoffs. Fortunately, Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer doesn't care about football and the only time I catch the T.V. turned to a game is when he wants to check that the HD is working properly. He says the green is just gorgeous. I find him doing this @ oh... end of March. March, I know funny huh. Some women are married to football men and then some of us are married to baseball freaks. Thus it was as if Cathy was futuristically speaking to me about baseball...not so much, but my mind thinks of it that way.

Now, I like baseball. I played softball growing up, so I understand the game and understand the past time.  Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer played baseball in college and still loves to play. For the last 4 out of 5 years, Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer has played on an adult league, but for the 2011 season he asked me if I would mind if he played. I never gave him and answer, it was an open ended catch 22. He finally decided he wasn't going to play. At the time, I was pregnant with the Gator, and his due date was a few weeks into the season and it wouldn't be nice to leave me at home on the weekends sans help to play ball. Props to all you single parents out there, I just don't know how you do it! I thought this was very sweet that he wanted to stay at home with me and the kids. He also told me that since he was beginning to fall apart (age not disclosed...) he wanted to save whatever playing he had left in him for when Monk and TBD (Gator) were old enough to play. I know sweet again.

Throughout the season, his coach would call and ask him to come out and play. Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer always asked if we had anything special planned and if I would mind if he went. I obliged knowing how much the game means to him. Being a guest player wasn't an every weekend commitment, so we could manage the few hours. Funny thing though, come the end of the season, the messages left by the coach ended up being for me rather than Mr. Bacon Bringer Homer. Begging, pleading and some groveling was usually involved, but I packed the kids and we cheered Daddy on.

During the games, the coach collects all of the broken bats from all of the players, then he has a end of season party where they burn all those collected bats. The first year I went, I thought they were nuts. It seemed as if they were eulogizing these broken bats before sending them to their etherial destiny...followed by eating cake! Over the years I have come to understand this ritual for them. These men, relive/retell their favorite brief moments that revolve around a passion that lets them feel as if they have the world in the palm of their hands, their future is limitless, and the can do anything mindset...a little boy mentality.

These are men, not children... from different backgrounds, ages, and demographics, coming together forming a camaraderie for the love of playing as if they were 12 again. Baseball boys at heart. It is this part of the man's world that I want to understand. Being a woman, I have a such vast different perspective. Probably, because woman are too catty and I don't get that. We have very few things in common with each other. Most of us have motherhood in common and yes that bares somewhat of a camaraderie, but...what else?

Being a mother, in the 21 century, I am petrified in the electronic age that my sons will have little knowledge of what true commonality and camaraderie is. So, it is up to us parents to understand and pass on. Crackberry's, iPhones, iPad, PC, Mac, Xbox,...you name it & Wii just can't bring the past time and cherished memories of sharing a human moment together.