My Kid Circus

Coming back from school the other day, Z tells me that some of the moms brought in cans of soda for his class Halloween party.  Z knows he is not allowed to  have soda, so he put his in his lunchbox, and brought it home to me.

I was so impressed with him, that I went on and on telling him how proud I was.  I told him that I was so proud that I didn’t even know what to say.  He said, “Thats okay, Mommy.  You’re welcome”. 🙂

Meanwhile, the little guy is in the back seat listening to this.  He says, “What about me, Mommy?  Was I good boy too?”.  I looked back as I started to tell him “of course”, when I saw that his mouth was stuffed full of the candy that I had just told him not to eat until we got home.

My mom just told me her new favorite quote, “People who say they believe in nurture over nature only have one child”.  These guys are making me agree with that!

Generally my boys don’t seem to have the “girls have cooties” mindset yet.  They both have very close friends who are girls, which I love. I had thought that they were seeing boys and girls as much the same (except for being miffed about girls’ affinity for princesses).  Recently though, I have seen that this is not quite true.

Z, on the way home from school, was telling me about a great game of “good guys vs. bad guys” that took place on the playground today.  He was jumping up and down excited to tell me about it.  In the midst of it he said, “it was SO great, even the GIRLS  got the hang of it!!”.  Hmm, not liking that.

That reminded me that just a few days ago, my mom was telling D about my brother, “Uncle Mike” liking to cook.  D looked at her and said, “him’s a boy”.  (He hasn’t quite worked out all of his pronouns).  I’m not quite sure how he put together in his mind that boys don’t cook, but honey, I can’t have that.  You are going to be on dinner duty for the next month or so….

The little guy, at 3, still doesn’t quite understand the differences between boys and girls.  Yesterday he was using the bathroom, and wistfully said, “When baby K turns into a boy, she can go to the bathroom just like me” (standing up).  I said, “No, remember boys are always boys, and girls are always girls, so K will never turn into a boy.”  D is always very firm in what he thinks to be true, so he just looked at me and said, “Yes she will.  I was a girl yesterday”.  🙂

Strangely enough, I don’t think my kids have ever seen Dumbo.  At this point, I think it is a good thing.  Since I had to take a parenting tip from the movie, I think I will try to keep the kids away from it for a while.

Z, being the deep thinker that he is, has acquired a fear of throwing up at school.  Of course I agree with him that if it happened, it would be terrible, but he has gotten so worried about it that he almost starts panicking in the car on the way to school.  One day last week, I actually had to turn around and go home because he had himself so worked up that he might get sick, that I was afraid he might actually get sick, leading to more problems…

Anyway, I was getting really worried about how to handle this new anxiety.  It escalated again before his first soccer practice, when he panicked that he might get sick at soccer.  Then I thought of our “magic” sea bands. I told him that those special bracelets would make it where he wouldn’t have a stomach ache, and certainly wouldn’t throw up.  He put them on excitedly, and has worn them for the last 6 days.

This morning he accidentally left them at home.  I was tempted to let him get through the day just to show him that he was fine, but as he got out of the van trying to bravely wipe away tears, I just couldn’t do it.  I went right home to get the sea bands for him.  He seemed absolutely fine when I got to school, but I was glad that I went back anyway.  I guess eventually he will figure out for himself that he doesn’t actually need the sea bands.  Then I will let him watch Dumbo…

Today I am really hoping to put an end to the drama of the summer.  Poor little K had to have tubes in her ears.  I know that this is a fairly routine procedure that many many children have, but when it was my child, honestly, it was just awful.

She was upset from the second they started weighing her, and when they dared to actually put a hospital bracelet on her ankle, she was furious.  It is so hard at this age when you can’t explain to them what is happening, or ask them what they are feeling.  I just had these images in my head of things that she might be remembering from her last time with a hospital bracelet on…

She was okay when we were in the room waiting for her turn, although she was definitely giving me “the eye” to let me know she was not happy about being there.

When they called us back, I was able to carry her back to the operating room, and hold her hands until she was asleep.  I thought I was prepared for this, but it was terrible.  In case anyone out there has to go through this, after they put the mask on, her eyes started rolling back, and her breathing turned into these strange, shallow squeaks.  Apparently this is normal, but I think it would have been helpful for them to tell me that BEFORE it happened.  To say that I was freaked out would be a definite understatement.  I was HORRIFIED! Then I had to leave my baby. 🙁

It was a very short procedure, so we didn’t have to wait for long.  When she came into the room, she had a terrible time waking up.  She was screaming, and thrashing, kicking, and obviously completely miserable.  After about 20 minutes of this, they came in to tell me that we could go.  All I could think was, “Really??  Do you see this child??”.  It took over an hour before she finally did calm down, and fell asleep in the car.

We watched some therapeutic Elmo when we got home, and she then went happily into her bed.  I am hoping that the rest of the day will continue to look better.  And on the bright side, hopefully now she will be able to enjoy some time free from ear infections, and she will be back dancing to music with ears that can actually hear!

You actually expect me to PLAY at a time like this??

Get me out of here!!

I have a lot of friends whose children started kindergarten this year.  Most of them started weeks ago.  Many of them posted facebook statuses about how hard it was to let them go.  I empathized with them, and took a minute to think about my own baby boy going to kindergarten.  Then the weeks dragged by, and yesterday was finally Z’s first day of school!  Probably since he is not yet going to a new school with “big” kids, it didn’t feel like the huge moment that many people make it out to be.  Instead,  I felt excited, thrilled, etc., to be putting this summer behind us, and moving into the more predictable rhythm of school days. (I feel sure the tears will come next year when he changes schools!)

Z had a great first day.  When I picked him up, he said that it really wasn’t too much different than last year.  Then he told me that his good friend told him that he had the sweetest Mommy.  Aww.  Z was so proud and happy that his friend thought I was sweet, which completely made my day! 🙂

He was also the one in his class who found their snacks by solving a treasure hunt, so the day was definitely a success! 🙂

D is only going to school three days a week, so he was home with me yesterday.  I thought he might miss his big brother, but no.  As soon as Z got in the car, D told me, “Okay, now we are going to go do puzzles, watch one Little Einsteins, play train track, and then play Buzz.”  Wow.  I guess he has been waiting for his turn in line with me.  Poor middle child. I let him choose everything we did yesterday, but it might be tough when he realizes that sometimes I actually have to do other things besides playing.  Unfortunately. 🙂