Crabby Butt

I hate it when I am really crabby and cranky at Gman.  He’s little and I know he can be overwhelmingly persistent and somewhat annoying, but I need to remember that these are the formative years.  The way I treat him now will impact him for years to come.  I grabbed his hands during night prayers last night and held them even when he tried to pull them away.  I don’t think I hurt him, I was only holding his hands, but still ….  I need you all to pray for me that I can be a better, more patient mother.  I need to become more like the Blessed Virgin.  I need to let go of this world and put myself more firmly in the arms of my Savior and ask Him to guide me and lead me on His path.  Please, God, help me to become more like the Blessed Virgin Mary.  Help me to raise my son the way that she raised Yours.  And even more, help me to guide him closer and closer to You so that he may walk the path You have ordained for him.  I ask this through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with You on High.  Amen

 

Anne

 

Happy Anniversary Baby

Today is Tom and my 10^th anniversary [of our 1^st date].  We went to dinner at Norton’s then out to Milo’s on the Hill.  And it was the night of our first kiss.  Who could have guessed that the next 10 years would bring:  the girls moving in, a new house, marriage, high school graduation x2, college graduation, rehab x2, college expulsion, home expulsion, baby conception and birth, baby conception and miscarriage, water pipe bursting, home remodeling x a billion, 4 cats down to no cats, fights and making up, romance, Nubby-Butt squirrels, every day wonderful, every day general, messy rooms, clean rooms, old furniture, new furniture, money troubles, money windfalls, taxes, parental death x3, preschool, talking, walking, sass, learning and growing, pumpkin patches, Christmas x10, family parties, family fights, nephews, nieces, great nephews and nieces, baptisms, making friends, losing friends, hunting and killing deer, eating deer, internet poltergeists, cable, dish TV, cable, antenna, meetings out of town, vacations, Catholicism, Traditional Tridentine Rite, Novus Ordo, Latin Mass, St. Andrew Missal, Marian Missal, Roman Missal 1962, promotions, raises, bicycles, birthdays, weight gain, weight loss, disease, medicine, apple picking, baking, gardening, lawn work, ……

 

And the list goes on.  All of it together.  Has it only been 10 years?  It feels like we just met yesterday and that we’ve known each other forever.  You are my best friend.  The person I want to talk to first thing in the morning and last thing at night.  I love you, honey.  Happy Anniversary.

Sun bugs

You know those motes of dust that float through the air?  Well, according to Gman, they are “Sun bugs”.  He was sitting on the potty and I pulled a bit of TP off [sure to set the lint a-flyin’] and he started swatting at the air.  I asked “What are you doing?” and he replied, “I’m trying to catch one of the sun bugs, Mommy!  Try to catch one!”  Too funny, but makes perfect sense.  If you didn’t know any better what would you think if you saw hundreds of little white things randomly flying through the air, but only in the sunlight?

 

Small Successes 7-29-09

 

1. I didn’t kill my milkweed!  I thought in my determination to get rid of the aphids on the milkweed that I had overdosed them with dishwashing liquid.  Many of them turned “black” [stems and leaves] and a bunch of the leaves fell off.  I thought they were goners for sure.  But much to my delight, the aphids are back, but so are the milkweed beetles and milkweed pods.  I am anxious to see if I get any monarch butterflies this year.  We had 4 last year and Gman still talks about his caterpillar “Little” who turned into a butterfly.

 

2. I talked with my contractor about money.  My house suffered some rather severe damage back in January when a water pipe burst on the 2^nd floor and rained in my house for about 3 hours.  We have been undergoing reconstruction and construction with the same contractor for the last 6 months.  It has been arduous for all of us [even the contractor I think] but we are approaching the end.  We are over budget, as these things usually are, and I had to have a talk with the contractor about money.  VERY UNCOMFORTABLE!  But I did it! And now we have a meeting scheduled for later this afternoon to discuss options for getting costs under control.

 

3. After staying up WAY past my bedtime last night [2 am] and getting awoken at 3:30 by a little man claiming to have had a “bad dream” – child lingo for I want to sleep with you and Daddy – I managed to get out of bed and to work by 7 AM.  Got to work, but I think I will be chastising myself severely for staying up too late.  Still, Success! I got to work.

Small Successes

 

1. I got up.  I actually got out of bed at 5:15 AM, showered, dressed, made coffee, left the house without making too much noise, and picked up my co-worker, making it to work by 6 AM.  For a night owl who hates the worm [the early bird gets the …], this feels like a major accomplishment.

 

2. I made it to the doctor’s office on time and had the HUGE cyst on my wrist drained.  I’ve had this thing since February and it’s been grossing my husband out almost as long, so I finally did something about it.

 

3. I have kept the plant that my co-workers sent me on my father’s death alive for 3 ½ years now.  Granted there has been a bit of watering intervention by said co-workers, but still, mostly the girl with the black thumb [when it comes to houseplants] has had one for 3 years now.

Things are better

Things are better between Gman and myself.  I have calmed down and gotten a bit more of a sense of humor.  Instead of reacting in anger or frustration I am trying to defuse the situation with humor and laughter.  It’s working wonders.  Gman is responding with big belly laughs to his momma’s silliness and his momma is not having daily heart attacks or moments wondering if she is cut out for motherhood.  When Gman gets out of hand as three year olds are wont to do, hitting and acting out physically, I simply remove myself from the situation.  Last night at dinner he was hitting me in the arm [not hard or anything, just trying to get a response] and I picked up my food and moved a chair away from him so that he couldn’t reach me.  I told him that I didn’t sit next to boys that hit me.  I didn’t give it any value, meaning I didn’t tell him he was bad or make it any kind of judgment, I simply, moved and responded matter-of-factly to why I had done so when asked.  It kept me from being mad and stressed out that “I have a kid who hits and Oh My Goodness, what will I do when he goes to school and hits another kid and what will people think of him and me as a parent that I haven’t fixed this so we’d better get all over this now so that it can be fixed.”  It also kept me from being hit.  And now when he reacts physically, I tell him that I don’t play with boys who hit.  I try not to say it all negatively and just make it a statement.  He seems much happier and we are much closer.  We are talking to each other and playing together and I am enjoying him and he seems to be much less defiant.  In addition, I am spending more time with him doing things he likes.  Instead of expecting him to do what I need to do, I get what I can done and then we go and do something for him.  I needed to leave the house for dinner the other day and instead of taking him to a restaurant and expecting him to behave for the hour and a half it would have taken to eat dinner, I got carry out and we went to the park and sat at a picnic table.  He ate his dinner without complaint and without much fuss because he couldn’t wait to get on the equipment.  And when dinner was over, we blew some bubbles [and I used that as a way to clean his hands].  We spent 3 hours having fun and then went home and he played some more with his dad outside while I did some stuff inside the house.  I cannot thank all the moms who gave me advice enough gratitude.  Just getting some of it off my chest made me feel better and some of the advice I got was invaluable.  Thanks, Moms!! You guys keep me sane.

Book Review

#54 [100 Cupboards] by N. D. Wilson

 

As a reader, I really liked this book, as a parent, I have mixed feelings.  From the parental perspective, why is always necessary for kids to be brave and strong and intelligent without parents?  Look at Disney stories, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty (had to leave her parents), Snow White (where was her father in all that?), The Little Mermaid (okay, there was a dad, but where was Mom?) and look at the popular works of fiction for young adults: The [Harry Potter] series, [The Mysterious Benedict Society] series (Sticky had parents but ran away from them in the first book), [My Side of the Mountain] (his parents exist but he leaves them behind).  And now [100 Cupboards].  I know that parents are supposed to protect kids and keep them from harm, but what about a book where the parents help the kid have an adventure?  It would be nice to have more books like the [Percy Jackson] series where the mother (who granted, isn't in the books that much and father is pretty much absent) helps her son do the things that he must.  It would be nice if the parents weren't welcome mats, but someone the kid could count on to help with trouble, a venerable guide, a font of wisdom, not someone to be defied and proven wrong, but someone that recognized the potential of the kid and helped him achieve.  It would be nice if the kid succeeded with the help of the parents instead of in spite of the parents (or lack thereof).

 

However, as a story I liked it.  Henry moves to live with his aunt and uncle and 3 female cousins in Henry, KS.  It's a good adventure, a little dark in some parts, but otherwise well written and easy to follow.  The development of Henry's character was interesting, seeing how he was over protected by his parents and now experiencing freedom and a chance to be a kid.  In connection with my above rant, I thought the way Henry's parents treated him was interesting.  They didn't treat him like a kid, more like a Ming vase which they tried to protect but didn't relate to.  Which becomes an interesting story arc that I liked.  I'm going to save this book for my son for when he's in about 2nd grade.