To School or Not To School

So, my blogging reticence of late has been due to the big question that has plagued me relentlessly for the past couple of weeks. As I've mentioned here before, we had planned all summer to send Caleb to a church preschool this fall. The class I wanted him to be in, which meets 3 days a week, was full, so we had him on the role for a class that meets 4 days a week. The closer we got to school starting, the more and more apprehensive and doubtful I was feeling. Being me, I made long lists of pros and cons for preschool vs. keeping him home, but I just couldn't make a decision.

What I most wanted to do was keep Caleb home this year and enjoy the last year (assuming I don't homeschool) for all three of us to be together all the time. Unfortunately, I live in Alabama, and there is tremendous social pressure to do things "THE WAY" (for you foreigners, this means "the way everybody else does things in Alabama"). I had moms looking at me like I was insane when Caleb wasn't in preschool at age 2, and now they look at me like I've grown horns if I mention the possibility of keeping him home at age 4.

Here are some of the favorite questions:

"How will he be ready for kindergarten?"

"How will he learn to line up with other kids and be a part of a group?"

"What about socialization?"

"How will you get anything done if you have your kids all the time?"

Although I think these are valid questions, and I have turned them all over in my mind ad nauseam, it does bother me that I get such a one-dimensional response from almost everyone I talk to. I wish there was a little more room in the culture here to do things a little differently without encountering so much resistance. Besides, Caleb did go to preschool two days a week last year, and I think he has a good handle on lining up now :)

Regardless of the self-doubt created by so many incredulous people, I finally decided that Caleb (and my housework) could survive another year without preschool. I am planning for us to do homeschooling activities 3-4 days a week, and then just go places and play the other days. I am really happy with this decision for a lot of reasons. I was dreading separating my two little buddies so that Caleb could go to school. They play so well together and love each other so much, I would hate for school to change that, especially a year earlier than necessary. I was also dreading having Caleb gone four mornings a week. If he continues to nap, that would mean that I could spend time with him before 9:00 am when we left for school and after 4:30 pm when he woke up from his nap. That's just a little bit more than Marcus gets to see him while working full time! The biggest reason that I feel very good about this choice is that there are so many more things I want to teach Caleb myself before I send him out into the "school" world. This is such an ideal time for learning, and I want more time for his good character traits to solidify and to work on more good habits and attitudes before he is bombarded with academics and competition and peer influences. There will be plenty of years in the future for all that.

So, for better or worse, we are going to be a homeschooling family this year. Below is the daily agenda I put together (modeled after a friend's who is using the same curriculum) for the days that we do school. I plan to start on Monday, August 30th, after the curriculum and other materials I have ordered come in. It seems like a lot, but the structured activities will only take 15-20 minutes each, in keeping with a preschool attention span. Plus, most of this stuff is pure fun for them anyway.

Breakfast--Practice weekdays, months, seasons, weather, address & phone numbers

Devotional--Recite Lord’s Prayer together and practice this week’s memory verse

Bible Reading--Mommy reads her Bible silently while boys look at picture Bibles

Exercise--Push-ups, abs, squats, stretch; kids participate as much as they can

Get Ready--Get dressed, brush teeth & hair, tidy room, make bed

Read--Read Five in a Row book and other books aloud

Cleaning Time--Mommy does chores for day while kids play (or help if they can)

"FIAR" Activity--Alternate subject lessons throughout week from Five in a Row

Table Time--Coloring, scissors & glue, handwriting, drawing practice, etc.

Spanish Time--Listen to Hear Say CD, look at pics and practice saying words

Games/Puzzles--Play board or card game or do a big puzzle together

Outings/Errands--Groceries, gym, outside, etc.

Lunch & Nap--Ethan & Mommy sleep…Caleb sleeps or has quiet time in his room

Phonics/Math--Alternate starfall.com reading practice & math workbook with Caleb

It's In There Somewhere

I had the funniest and, at the same time, most rewarding conversation with Caleb the other day. It was just after his nap, and he was grumpy. He was sitting in the playroom amongst some toys with a sour expression on his face. I was folding clothes a few feet away from him, and I decided to use a little humor to cheer him up. I told him that I was glad to see that he was complying with the "No Happiness" hour I had declared. I warned him that if I saw one drop of happiness squeezing out of the corner of his mouth, he would have to go to time out. Of course, he started grinning a bit in spite of himself, so I kept going. I told him in a very sour voice that I was grumpy and I wanted everyone else to be grumpy, too. He surprised me by replying very seriously that it wasn't right for me to try to make other people grumpy with my grumpiness, and I needed to go to my room until I had a better attitude. I loved hearing one of my sermonettes from his little mouth, so I kept the game going with more phrases and ideas that he frequently sends my way.

Mommy: (glowering) I am just grumpy because nobody ever does what I want them to do!

Caleb: (very seriously) Mommy, you can't make other people do what you want them to do.

Mommy: (angrily) But I HAVE to! I will never, ever be happy again 'cause nobody does what I want!

Caleb: (very soberly) Mommy, it is your choice whether you will be happy or not, but you can't make people do what you want. (a bit more cheerfully) You can ask them nicely, and they might do what you want, if you ask nicely.

Mommy: (glumly) But sometimes I ask nicely and they STILL don't listen to me.

Caleb: That's just the way it is, Mommy. There is nothing you can do to make people do what you want all the time.

At this point I laughed out loud, and he joined me, effectively ending the role play. But I was very happy to hear him articulate so well the lessons that I'm not ever sure are sinking in. I guess this proves that they are in there somewhere!

Insightful Moment

Yesterday, we spent the morning at a friend's pool. We haven't been swimming much since our trip to Florida because Caleb got burnt out on wearing sun screen while we were on vacation. Since then, every time we have been invited for a pool play date, I have asked the boys if they wanted to go, and Caleb has consistently declined (and convinced Ethan to do the same). Today, I decided that we really needed to go again before summer is over, so I didn't give him a choice.

All the way to the pool, he talked about how much he doesn't like sun screen and how much it burns his face and his eyes, and how he really doesn't want to go to the pool. When we arrived, I put sunscreen and hats on both boys, and they jumped in the pool. Sure enough, the first time Caleb's eyes hit the water, he started wailing that the sun screen was burning his eyes. I truly don't know how much is drama and how much is real discomfort, because I only put the sunscreen on his nose and on his face up to just above his cheekbones, staying clear of just under his eyes and his forehead (since he wears a hat). I think it is actually the chlorine that is stinging his eyes, but he thinks it is the sunscreen, and nothing can convince him otherwise.

So Caleb spiraled down into a full-out angry meltdown about the sun screen. Public meltdowns have been few and far between with Caleb, but this one was a doozy. I picked up a furious Caleb, placed him in a lounge chair and told him to stay there until he was done with his fit. He wailed that he wanted to go home and stated vehemently he would NOT stop crying unless I took him home RIGHT NOW. I told him that we were not going home because we had just arrived and Ethan and I were going to have a good time, whether he chose to or not. He kept crying loudly, so I told him that he could cry quietly as much as he wanted to, but if he continued to disturb everyone around with his crying, he was going to get a spanking. He lowered the volume right away and soon ceased crying altogether (since most of the motivation was disturbing everyone around him).

Ethan and I were having a blast in the kiddie pool and on the splash pad, and, after a while, Caleb piped up with: "Mommy, why don't you and Ethan go somewhere else and I will stay here." I knew he was wanting to get up and play, but he didn't want to be observed swallowing his pride. He watched us for a few more minutes, and then he finally got up and played happily with all of us for the next three hours. I had almost forgotten about the original incident when we were packing up our stuff to leave, until Caleb initiated this conversation:

Caleb: Mommy, you were right earlier.

Mommy: About what, son?

Caleb: You know, when I was crying? You were right that going home was not the best choice. I stopped crying and I had a lot of fun.

Mommy: Yes you did, Caleb. I'm very proud of you for getting control of yourself and changing your attitude. It is very hard to do that, but you did it.

Caleb: Yes, I did. Sometimes I am stronger than I know I am.

Mommy: (chuckling) Yes, you are, my son. Yes, you are :)

Preschool

I posted back in the fall about Caleb starting an MDO/preschool program. The school year came to a close last week, and now seems like a good time to do an overview of this experience. As you may remember from a much earlier post, I wasn't too sure about the whole MDO/preschool thing that was is so much a part of the culture here. We decided to try it because Caleb was acting anti-social at times (as a 3 1/2 year old), and because he started becoming very resistant to some of the homeschooling activities we were doing at home. He started in mid-October going Tuesdays & Thursdays from 9:30 am to 1:30 pm. For the first few weeks, he really enjoyed it, and he started acting better at home as well.

Unfortunately, somewhere in mid-November, he and his teacher started misunderstanding each other. Caleb is slow to transition and also processes directions more slowly than many children. This was causing him a problem at school because he would respond/transition slowly and the teacher would get frustrated with him. Eventually, he got it fixed in his head that the teacher couldn't be pleased, and he quit trying to cooperate. I didn't realize that all this was going on, because Caleb just stopped talking about school. Caleb is not a talkative child, and I chalked up his silence about school to his normal reticence about many things. Then, in January, I spoke to his teacher about another matter, and she told me that he had been acting out in class since mid-November. (That sounds like a really long time, but we are only talking about 6 or 7 half-days in school, since he was only going twice a week). Nevertheless, I was chagrinned to be hearing that this had been an ongoing problem, one I wished I'd had the opportunity to address when it first started. That day in January, I spoke with Caleb about his behavior at school. Through our conversation, I began to understand what had happened in his relationship with his teacher. He told me that she tells him to do too many things too fast and he can't remember them, and then she gets mad at him. He also kept repeating that she didn't like him because he wasn't a good boy like Shep or Matthew or whoever. He was absolutely convinced that he was incapable of pleasing her.

In an ultimately successful attempt to turn this train around, I had a long phone conversation with his teacher. I shared with her that Caleb processes things a little more slowly than some other kids, and that, as a result, he had gotten it into his head that she didn't like him. We collaborated on a plan to change his perception. Every day at school, his teacher made an extra effort to be sure he understood each instruction that was given, as well as to praise him for his successes. Then she filled out a little check sheet that I made, indicating to me that he was cooperative, positive, and helpful each day. When he brought home a check sheet full of "yes's" to me, he received a reward. Within two weeks (four days of school), his behavior had completely changed. His teacher called me with a glowing report of a what a bright, helpful, cooperative child he was. We soon abandoned the check sheets, and he started chatting cheerfully about school once again.

For the remainder of the school year, I called his teacher every few weeks to make sure everything was still going well. She continued to give me glowing reports. I do very much regret that Caleb spent almost two months feeling like a "bad kid" at school before I realized what was going on, and I will take from this experience that silence about school is a bad thing, and not calling the teacher because I don't want to bother her is not doing anybody any favors.

Caleb finished out the school year a few weeks ago, and he still asks me several times a week when school will start again. And, thanks to the generosity of his Nanna and Papa, I can tell him that he will be able to go back to school in the fall to attend K4 four mornings a week!

Bedtime Battles

The last couple of weeks, sleep has become a battle again with Ethan. He just can't/won't settle down at night. And when he finally does, he frequently wakes up screaming around 2:00 am and ends up finishing the night in our bed. Neither of us have a problem with the 2:00 am transfer; we actually think its really sweet to wake up with him sleeping between us. If he wakes up first, he starts stroking our cheeks, hugging us and whispering sweet things like "I wuv you so so much!" You really can't beat that for an alarm clock :) The part that is getting a little old is the hour it takes from the end of his bedtime routine until he is actually asleep. Usually, he starts out in Caleb's bed, but he makes himself enough of a nuisance to Caleb that he gets moved into his crib. From his crib, he calls out to us for a good twenty minutes, wanting us to sing one more song, or get him "dust one lee-tle dink", or spread his blanket out on him, or take him to the potty, or give him one more hug and kiss, or whatever else he can think of. Eventually, we cut him off on the requests and tell him if he does not lay down and go to sleep, we are going to close the door to his room (leaving him with just a nightlight). He HATES being closed into his room, but inevitably, he does not lay down and go to sleep and continues shouting requests, so we close the door. After we close the door, he starts crying hysterically and wailing, "I need you, Mommy! I need you Daddy! I so so so scared! Please help me!" When he gets this out of control, one of usually caves and goes in there and either rocks him to sleep or brings him into our bed to fall asleep. This series has quickly gone from an exception to an expected pattern in just a couple of weeks, so now we've got to decide what to do. We could do the hard-nosed thing and just put him in his crib after the bedtime routine, close the door, and let him cry himself to sleep. Or, we could give up entirely on him sleeping independently and put him to bed initially in our bed. He is such a cuddly little man, and I know these years are going by too quickly anyway, that I'm leaning toward option 2, but we'll have to see what Daddy decides :)

Injury Drama

I know every parent has things their kids do that are exceptionally annoying. Caleb's thing that gets me more than anything is hyper-focusing on any injury for hours or even days. A skinned knee renders him lame for the afternoon, a bump on his head makes washing his hair that evening an excruciating experience, and heaven forbid anyone should suggest removing a splinter. He is terrified of blood and needles, just like I was. Even though I also dramatized every scratch and bump as a child (or perhaps because I did), I have little patience for his over-reactions. He is so effected by a scrape on his leg that he will wail, "I can't walk" and remain planted wherever he is for up to an hour. When he gets like this, I refuse to bring him the things he asks for. He loses priviliges and opportunities for fun when he shuts down into this defeatism. I know it bothers me because I so dislike the fatalism that I have to struggle against, and I will myself to have extra grace. But at the same time, I want to do everything I can to help him overcome that in his life.

Mommy Daycare

This week, I had the opportunity to keep a friend's 5-year-old and 3-year-old for about 24-hours. My friend needed to paint her house and air it out for the night before her kids came back home, so Daniel and Laura came over Tuesday morning, played all day, and stayed over for a big sleepover. I was a little uncertain about how it would all go: me with a 5, 4, 3, and 2-year-old, but it went surprisingly well. Like any challenge, I approached it with a plan: I wrote down a long list of actitivities and kept it on hand, so anytime conflict became a problem or the kids were bored with what we were doing, we cleaned up that stuff and moved to something else.

We started out with a Little People Village, which is what I call it when I get all of the Little People toys off the shelves and put them in a big circle in the playroom. Then we played with Play Dough, had snacks, played on the deck in the sandbox and came back in for lunch. After lunch, we got out the Thomas train set and Ethan went down for a nap. When they got tired of the train set, I let the three older kids watch a Winnie the Pooh video for the rest of Ethan's nap. When Ethan got up, we had a snack and then got out coloring books, crayons and markers. When that got old, we made a fort out of the dining room table. By this point, Ethan was very tired of only getting 1/4 of my attention, so he wandered upstairs to hang out with Aunt Wendi, since her attention was not so unacceptably divided.

When Ethan rejoined us, we played a rousing game of Lion Chase...Ethan was the lion and the other three ran the loop through the kitchen and living room with the little lion in hot pursuit. Marcus came home from work early at 5:30 so he could take Caleb to his swim lesson while I kept the other three and cooked dinner. While Caleb was gone, me and the other three kids read books together and did some puzzles. We had a late dinner at 7:00 after Marcus and Caleb got home. After dinner, we switched to zone defense...I did the dishes while Marcus manned the play room. Then Marcus bathed and bedded our boys in our bedrom while I put Daniel and Laura down in the boys' room.

After all four kids were asleep, we emerged from our respective rooms and were amazed that it was only 8:30 pm. We had the whole evening in front of us! But we were pretty beat, so we just talked for a while, watched 24, and went to sleep.

Implicit vs. Explicit

I've been thinking a lot lately about what my boys will be taking with them when they grow up and leave our home. The more I turn it over in my mind, the more convinced I am that they will learn almost everything they learn from me implicitly rather than explicitly. They will take more from what they observe, from what they know about my choices, from the ways they see me spend my time, from the way I speak to others, than they will learn from what I tell them or explain to them. I think back to what I learned from my parents, and I think I absorbed much more from the way my parents lived their lives than from what they overtly taught me. Growing up, I received an exceptional amount of Godly teaching, through Christian school, a strong, active youth group, and a home where Bible-reading and discussions about faith were frequent. I have no doubt that all of that was a blessing, but when it comes right down to it, it is the individual choices or my parents (and other influential adults), and the outcomes of those choices, that have had the greatest impact on who I want to be and how I want to live my life. In some ways, the realization that my implicit teaching carries so much more weight is very freeing. So, I'm not sure that a lot of the things I worry about in regards to parenting make a lot of difference. Maybe there aren't too many right or wrong choices I can make for my kids. I guess the best thing I can do for them is to honestly model what I believe matters most in life, and leave the rest up to God.

Caleb Starts Preschool!

I know everyone says this, but life has been so busy lately! Busy in a good way, but it has definitely derailed my daily-blogging thing. I am going to try to get back in the habit, but I know better than to make any promises :)

Anyway, to catch you up, Marcus and I took the plunge a couple of weeks ago and enrolled Caleb in a preschool/MDO program at a nearby church for two mornings a week. Our minister's wife works at the school, and Caleb's good friend Matthew was getting ready to start there, so I decided to check it out. Now, during the past six months of toying with the idea of preschool, I have taken tours of quite a few. This one impressed me more than any of the others, though I have trouble explaining exactly why. All I can say is the atmosphere/attitude of the place fits what I think Caleb needs right now. It is structured, just like any preschool, but in a relaxed way. There is no extended care, so all the kids in his class are only there from 9:30 to 1:30 on Tuesdays and Thursdays (meaning no one is using this "school" as a daycare). The kids transition to different rooms for different activities, which is really good for Caleb because he enjoys the changing scenery. The kids play outside for 30 minutes every day if the weather is nice, and in the gym if it is not.

Let me back up a minute and explain how we came to the decision to try preschool. Caleb and I hit a wall about six weeks ago, right around the time that he quit taking naps. We seem to have been butting heads in a variety of new ways ever since he hit that milestone. I don't know exactly what has been going on with him, but I knew that we needed a change of pace to reset since we were both much too frustrated, much too frequently. So Marcus and I talked about it repeatedly, and we came to the decision to do something we have never done before: pay for something that we are not able to fit into our budget. I pinched and squeezed the numbers as much as I could, but we are still having to take from savings every month to cover the $140 a month. As uncharacteristic as this is for us to do, we both believe that we have made the right decision for Caleb, and therefore it is worth stepping out of our financial comfort zone.

After we made the decision, I went in and signed him up. I was very excited to learn that he and Matthew would be able to join the same class and would be starting on the same day. This was very nice since both boys were starting about a month into the school year, so at least they would have each other as they entered into an established class. The first day went off without a hitch, and it has been a uniformly positive experience since then.

During the past two weeks, Caleb's attitude has significantly improved. He has an air of maturity that we haven't seen before, and his desire to please has made a welcome return. He LOVES "going to school," and happily reports about his activities when I pick him up. He is doing chapel, art, music and organized movement (is that Southern Baptist for dance?) in the preschool program each week. He is in a class with ten other 3-year-olds, only three of whom are girls (poor girls!). His classroom is large and inviting, and he has already gotten in the groove of all the little routines like putting his lunch in his cubby, finding his chair, standing in line, etc.

So far the funniest conversation Caleb and I have had about school went like this:

"Caleb, does anyone in your class have to sit in time-out at school?"
"Yes, sometimes people have to sit in time-out, when they are ugly to other boys."
"Do you ever have to sit in time-out at school?"
"Just a little bit...not a lot. Just when I be ugly."
"Does Matthew ever have to sit in time-out?"
"NO he doesn't! He is SO, SO, SO good! He NEVER, EVER has to sit in time-out!" (spoken with incredulous animation)
"Wow, that is really cool that Matthew is so good. Do you want to be good like Matthew and never go to time out?"
(long, thoughtful pause) "I just can't."

At least he knows his own limits!

Sleep Elf

I'm starting to think that there is a little elf in my house who is pulling all-nighters for the sole purpose of destroying my sleep! Here's how the past two nights have played out:

Saturday Night:
I went to bed at midnight because Marcus was up studying and I don't like to go to bed alone. At 2:15 am, one of our Irish setters (Riley), started barking. Just once or twice, but very loudly. Three minutes later, he did it again. He continued this intermittent barking for OVER AN HOUR. I tried everything I could think of to get him to stop: refilled his water and food bowls, let him into the yard in case he had to potty, scolded him, petted him, and finally yelled at him (whisper-yelled, since everyone was asleep). I don't know if one of these things worked or if he just got tired and ready to go back to sleep, but the barking finally ended. Unfortunately, I was all worked up and couldn't go back to sleep until around 4:30 am. The kids were up at 6:15, so I went into Sunday with exactly 4 hours of sleep.

Sunday Night:
Sunday was a very busy day for me, and I was ultra-exhausted by the end of it. I went to bed at 9:30, only to be woken up an hour later by a really, really loud thunderstorm. I couldn't fall back asleep until shortly after Marcus came to bed at 11:15. Then, the mischevious sleep-stealing elf made its way into Ethan's room. Ethan woke up screaming "Mama!" (as only he can) around 12:30 am. I gave him a cup of milk in case he was hungry, and then rocked him back to sleep. Over the next four hours, Ethan got up FOUR MORE TIMES. That's as bad as he was when he was a tiny baby! I tried everything I could think of that could be bothering him. At one point, Marcus suggested putting warmer pajamas on him in case he was kicking his blanket off and getting cold. Neither this nor anything else we tried worked...he just kept waking up every 45-minutes and yelling for me. Finally, around 4:30, I gave him some Motrin (hoping that it was the molars that are breaking through his gums that were bothering him). After that, he slept straight through to 6:45, giving me a full 2 hours of sleep (longest stretch of the night).

Needless to say, I did NOT enjoy this flashback to tiny-baby days, and I am very glad that weeks-on-end of sleep like this are not on my near-horizon :)

My Own Mouth

All parents know how much God uses children to teach us, but lately it has been more obvious to me than usual. When I repeat a truth to Caleb or Ethan, I immediately hear the Lord's voice echoing the same truth from Him to me. Here are just a few examples:

"Don't take the food from your brother's plate. Ask me and I will give you more."
"I understand that you are angry, but you still have to speak to me respectfully."
"What you want is not the most important thing."
"It is always better to do what makes other people happy than to do what makes you happy."
"I tell you not to do certain things because I don't want you to get hurt."
"I love you too much to let you get away with allowing your emotions to control you."
"If you choose to disobey me, the consequence is going to hurt."
"Be thankful for the toys that you have. Some other boys do not have toys to play with."

I've been convicted by many people's wisdom, both written and spoken, but it makes me laugh when God uses my own mouth to remind me of His truths :)

Alas, The Day Has Come

So the day that every stay-at-home-parent dreads has finally visited our home: Caleb has given up napping. Now, I know that many of you out there lost your "break" time months before your child was 3 1/2, but I was holding out hope that I was one of the really lucky ones, and that Caleb would keep napping until he was five :) It is now the fourth day of no afternoon sleeping, and I am officially giving up. I would have tried for a few more days, but we had a naptime disaster yesterday that deterred me from further efforts.

I tucked Caleb in for his "nap" (it was in quotes in my head because I doubted that it would happen), and went downstairs. Unlike the other days, where he kept coming downstairs and being put back in his bed, he stayed put. I thought, "What luck! He went to sleep!" But alas, this was not the case. About 45 minutes after I tucked him in, he came downstairs and said, "Mommy, I made a real bad choice. I'm real, real, real sorry." I realized while he was talking that he had not gone to sleep at all and that he had been up to some mischief in his room the whole time instead. With dread I asked him, "What bad choice, Caleb? What did you do?"

"I tear all the books up, Mommy. I real, real sorry."

I raced up the stairs to assess the damage. Sure enough, he had taken four library books, no less, and decimated the pages. Struck dumb from the horror of a book explosion in the room, I truly had no idea what to do or say. He had never torn a book on purpose in his whole life. And I'd never seen him do something so completely destructive, either. Usually I am pretty quick with consequences, but this situation warranted a call to Daddy for some ideas. What we came up with during the phone conference was this:

(1) All other library books would be returned and no more would be checked out for a month.
(2) All of his own books were taken out of his room.
(3) No reading books with Mommy or Daddy before bedtime for three nights.
(4) He would clean up the entire paper mess by himself (which he did).

I went over the consequences with him, and he was distraught, particularly about the books being taken out of his room and not reading books at night. We hope that these consequences will impress on his little mind the absolute unacceptability of destroying books (or anything else for that matter). Overall, not the most encouraging parenting day, but they can't all be encouraging :) Hopefully, I won't be even more upset about it when we go to the library tomorrow and pay for the books.

Leaving the Kids

Well, Marcus and I navigated yet another parenting milestone this past weekend. We left the kids here in Birmingham with the boys' Mimi (who flew in from Florida), and drove a couple hours north to stay in a rented cabin with some friends for three nights. This is the first time that we've left the kids overnight, and we were a little nervous about how they'd do (particularly Ethan). This nervousness found its outlet in typing up a five-page document (that we both contributed to) with all kinds of information about the boys' eating, sleeping, discipline, playing, safety, etc. Mimi laughed when we gave it to her, commenting that she used to only have to read one page when she babysat Caleb back in Florida. Then we dilly-dallied for about an hour past our planned departure time, and were finally advised to go ahead and cut the umbilical cord and head on out. So we did.

And it turned out the boys did just fine without us. They definitely gave Mimi a full workout, complete with incessant energy, nap strikes, and a good amount of Ethan-whining, but she survived and even thrived. She took them to the mall, and to the library and to church. They built a fort with bed sheets and the dining room table, and piled toys underneath (they are still playing with their fort today).

Caleb is old enough now that he can tell long and detailed stories from the weekend, and my favorite story that he has told so far is about Mimi showing him where Mommy and Daddy went. I was very impressed with this idea. She had taken the name of the cabin and the town we were staying in and googled it. Then she sat the boys down on her lap in front of the computer and showed them pictures of the cabin from the rental agency website. Caleb told us laughingly that the cabin was silly because it had a bathtub outside (i.e. a hot tub). He also told us there were no toys to play with in the cabin and that's why we didn't take him and Ethan (good one, Mimi). This was a very wise and creative way for Mimi to show the boys that we hadn't just disappeared into the unknown, but that we were visiting a very specific house that they could see, and would soon return to be here with them again.

So, despite our belatedly severed umbilical cord, we had an absolutely wonderful, relaxing weekend, which I will post more about tomorrow.

Stubborn Morning

As I've mentioned, Caleb is generally a compliant child, but he has his days. We had one of those days on Monday. Monday is our grocery shopping day, and the boys love to go grocery shopping because I always let them get a free cookie from the bakery at Publix. We were all getting ready to leave, and I said to Caleb, "Son, please pick up those toys and put them back in the basket before we go." Usually, he would pick up the toys without a word. Not today. He fell crying on the floor, wailing that he didn't want to pick up the toys. I calmly reminded him that what he wants is not the most important thing, and that it is his job to clean up toys when Mommy asks him to. (These are phrases he hears many, many times each week.) The fit continued. I saw that he was losing control of himself in his emotional storm, so I tried another tactic that has worked before:

"Caleb, do you like crying? Is it fun?"
"NOOOOO!" (wailing)
"Who controls your crying? Who makes it stop and start?"
"CAAA-LEEEBBB!!" (wailing louder)
"Well, then, why don't you make the crying stop since you don't like doing it?"

Sometimes, he chokes back a couple of sobs and gets control of himself, but not this time. Running out of resources and time, I sighed and made a decision to put the morning's plans on hold to see this battle to the end.

"Caleb, I have asked you to pick up those toys. We are not going to go to the grocery store or anywhere else until you do as I asked. You are also not allowed to play with other toys or read books until you pick those toys up. In addition, all of your crying needs to take place upstairs in your room, because Ethan and I do not want to listen to it."

I repeated my ultimatum, just in case he hadn't heard me completely. Then I carried him upstairs and put him in his room to finish his fit.

It has been a long time since Caleb pushed me this far, and I really didn't know what to expect. What ensued was another hour-and-a-half of coming downstairs tear-free, being reminded to pick up the toys, and then being carried back upstairs, wailing pleads and protests. (He was particularly upset when he came down and Ethan and I were having snacks without him.) Finally, after the third or fourth round of this cycle, he came downstairs and said, "I real, real, real angry...but I gonna pick up the toys now." And he did. Every single one.

After he was done, he was immediately cheerful again, and ready to go to the grocery store. He was very disappointed when I explained that all of his crying and waiting had used up the time we were planning to go shopping. But he accepted the natural consequence pretty well, and I think that he understood his responsibility for it.

I'm glad these kind of days are very few and far between!

Caleb (Monthly Update)

Caleb is 3-years-and-5-months-old today. As always, he is very into pretending. Lately, he has been pretending to be Spiderman, The Green Goblin, Batman, a pirate, and of course, Peter Pan. Now, he has never seen any of the first three except on posters in the toy store, but he got the idea that they were very strong and impressive. I think he thinks that Spiderman and Batman actually turn other people into spiders and bats.

Caleb has also been doing very well with learning his phonics sounds. I started teaching the sounds about 3 weeks ago using starfall.com and the Leapfrog Letters DVD. He now knows which sounds the first 15 letters make, and he'll probably know them all in another 2-3 weeks. I also got him his first little Kumon workbook (the capital letters one); he loves to trace and practice writing the capital letters in this book. Puzzles and coloring are two more daily favorites. I figured out that it is really easy to print out any type of coloring page from the internet, so we currently have six different pictures of Spiderman hanging in our play room. He much prefers markers to crayons right now, and has gotten considerably better lately about staying in the lines. (I have never said anything to him about it, but he just started doing it.) He is very intent and focused when coloring, and to date has never quit without completing whatever he is working on. He actually cried one day during class at church because the teacher tried to put the paints away before his picture was done. I like that he wants to finish what he starts :). The puzzles he does are mostly the 48-piece Melissa and Doug wooden ones, of which we only have four, but he just does them over and over. We also have a few 24-piece ones that he'll do when he wants something different. (I wish Melissa & Doug made something in between 48-pieces and 1oo-pieces.)

Though I admit I've had little to do with this because I haven't started teaching any math, Caleb has also gotten really good at counting lately. He can usually accurately count up to four or five items in a group in his head. I ask him how many are there, he looks at the group, and then tells me. If he gets it wrong, he can count them out loud and get the right answer the second time.

One of the cutest things about this age is his love for "impressing" and "being a hero." He is always coming up with some new jump or tumble or fighting stance, and he ALWAYS wants an audience and feedback. "Is that cool, Mama? You like that, Ethan?" is a chorus in our house right now. He is always telling us that he is so strong and showing us his muscles. Nothing exacts such instant attention and cooperation than when I start a phrase with, "Caleb, are you strong enough to... [carry this bag upstairs and put it on daddy's computer chair]?" He immediately hops up and does it, saying "Yes, I am!" He also loves to do anything that he can view as heroic. When Ethan is darting away from me at the library counter or at the park, I tell Caleb, "Go save brother! He's trying to get away!" Lickety-split, Caleb has Ethan by the hand and is leading him back to me. (It's very cute how willing Ethan is to be led by his brother...if I had tried the same thing, a fit might have ensued.) Most of his heroics have to do with saving Ethan from either running away, putting something "dangerous" in his mouth, trying to touch a bug, etc. I love that he sees himself as his brother's protector (even though I have to admit that he is also his brother's tormentor at times).

One of the difficult things about this stage is Caleb's ability to weigh consequences in his mind and go ahead with a misbehavior because he's decided that the consequence is worth it (or he hopes that he won't get caught.) That is driving me nuts. I try to motivate him in all kinds of positive ways with verbal encouragement, reminders of positive consequences, reminders about how things make other people feel, but there are still so many times that he chooses to be mischevious and has to have a negative consequence doled out. I get so tired of taking priviliges and toys away from him, but I guess that's just the way things are with a little boy.

Another challenge is his increased ability to use words to avoid the little verbal "guides" that I'm used to setting up. Like when I give him two choices of which I find both acceptable, he persistently argues for the 3rd choice of his own making, and refuses to pick one of mine. He remembers EVERYTHING now, and is always looking for logical holes in the general statements that I make. Here's an example conversation:

"Don't drop things on your brother's head, Caleb." (something he has heard literally 50+ times)
"Why not?"
"Because it might hurt him."
"But it didn't hurt him. See, he's not crying."
"Not this time, but it could next time."
"No it won't, because I'll drop it just the same. I think he likes it."
"Regardless, I do not want you to drop anything on anyone's head. That is the rule in our house and I expect you to follow it. If you do it again, you're going to have to sit in time-out."
"Okay, Mommy, I not going to do it again."

or it could be...

"Caleb, don't throw toys."
"Why not?"
"Because the toy might hit someone."
"But it didn't hit anyone."
"Yes, I know, but the next time it might."
"But it won't because I'll throw it over Ethan like I just did."
"We don't throw toys! That's the rule! Obey the rule or there will be a consequence that you don't like!"

And so it goes :)

Mother Bear

I don't think that there is anything in the world that gets my ire up more quickly than seeing my child treated badly. We were at the science center this morning, and Caleb (age 3 1/2) was eagerly trying to join with two older boys (brothers, ages 4 and 5) in building a wooden block city. There were plenty of blocks, and he was not moving anything they had placed, just adding pieces of his own. They told him flat out that he couldn't build with them. He responded politely with, "Please, can I build with you?" They told him that he was too little to play and to go away. I saw the light go out of his eyes, and he walked over to where I was with his head down. He told me what happened (he didn't realize I'd been watching), and then he said, "That hurts my feelings." I hugged him and told him that he could go back and build, even if they didn't want him to, or he could go do something else.

He opted to go back and try again. He continued building with the blocks, this time not adding to the other boys' structure but building his own thing. Two different times, one of the other boys took a block out of Caleb's hand, rather than one of the many on the floor. When that didn't deter him, the younger boy said, "I'm four. You're only two, so you can't build with these blocks or play with us." Caleb said, "I'm not two! I'm four!" I was now sitting much closer in order to monitor the situation, and I quietly corrected Caleb, saying, "You're three, sweetheart." The other boys laughed at him and said something about him being stupid because he didn't even know how old he was. At that point, their mother came up and said, "Hey, you guys! Are you guys having fun? Are you sharing? You're doing a great job building! I'm so proud of you! Okay, I'm going to go back over there, you keep having fun!"

It was all I could do not to speak to her about the situation, but as I was watching her talk, I was able to calm myself down and remember that children do not become bullies by accident. They become bullies because no one cares enough about them to watch them, be aware of them and teach them. It was obvious to me that her even coming over to speak to them was purely out of duty and not interest in their play. She didn't pause to allow the boys to answer any of her strung-together questions or respond to her comments, and she didn't even make eye contact with them while she was talking.

The boys left a few minutes later, and in retrospect I'm glad that I didn't say anything. Yes, Caleb's feelings were hurt. Yes, those boys were behaving badly. But I'm afraid if I had spoken to either the kids or their mom, I would have been speaking out of anger and hurt rather than concern for them, and of that I would have been ashamed. And, all-in-all, I'm proud of the way Caleb handled the situation. He used words to express his feelings, he did not lash out or imitate their rudeness, and nor did he react fearfully and give up on the blocks. I would have been fine with it if he had, but I was kind of proud of him for plugging on, despite the obvious deterrent. And I was proud of myself for stifling those mother-bear instincts and resisting the urge to swoop in and "make" those boys be kind. I will not always be there, and as we get closer and closer to school age, I want him to have more and more opportunities to handle difficult situations on his own.

Car Talk

One thing Marcus and I are very guilty of as parents is talking to each other like the kids aren't listening when we're in the car. We are usually playing music, and the kids are both very quiet in the car (most of the time), so we just sit and chat about everything without thinking too much about how closely they may be listening. A few days ago, we were talking about something or other and the word "sex" was used. I said it in the middle of a sentence without any pause or inflection, but Caleb still picked up on the one word spoken that he didn't already know.

"Daddy, what is 'sex'?" he piped up. I was thinking: "He's only 3! I'm not ready for this question! What can I say that is true but not too much information?" Marcus, clearly more prepared than I, recovered the situation with "Well, Caleb, it's in between 5 and 7 when you are counting: four, five, six, seven, eight." Caleb accepted that with a happy, "Oh, I see!" (and probably wondered why it took us a few long seconds to answer such a simple question). Marcus says his answer will probably buy us 6 months. I'm hoping that with a little more discretion on my part, we may have a couple of years before he throws that one at us again :)

Our Little Tornado

Lately, I have felt very uncertain about Ethan's aggressiveness. He is a very physical little boy, and I feel at a loss as to the best way to deal with it. Anytime he is crossed (like when he is told "No" by an adult, a child takes a toy from him, a child touches a toy that he thinks is his, etc), he responds physically by hitting, throwing, pushing, pinching or pulling hair. When Caleb was 16-months-old (and even older), we didn't have problems with this angry aggressiveness. What I usually do with Ethan is anticipate his outbreak and physcially prevent him from doing whatever he intends. But this is only successful about 75% of the time, and the other 25% of the time ends with another child in tears (Ethan is very strong and holds nothing back). I put him in time-out sometimes, but he acts so impulsively with the aggression that I do not think the time-out is doing anything to cause him pause the next time. I feel like I have to be on top of him every second, and I wonder if this is normal. Caleb went through a hitting phase from 32-34 months (right after Ethan started crawling), but other than during that brief time period, Ethan has not been the recipient of any of this physical stuff. This indicates to me that it is more instinctive rather than learned.

I was recently talking to a good guy-friend about my concerns regarding Ethan's behavior, and he said something that really surprised me at the time. He said that he, even as an adult, thinks it would be fun to go around hitting people all the time. He said that he chooses not to do it because it's socially unacceptable and because he doesn't want to hurt people, but that it would be fun if he could. Because I do not relate to this at all as a woman, I just figured he had issues and mentally dismissed his input. (Sorry, Al :) But then I started asking other men (including my husband), and got uniformly similar responses. So now I am accepting that enjoying the act of exerting his own physical force is a natural thing for a little boy. That gives me some relief, but I still need help in teaching Ethan some impulse control, because, right now, he is a play-group terror!

Good one, Daddy!

Caleb has had a few days of pushing my limits. Part of it is because Marcus has been working so many hours the past few weeks, and the other part is just being a little boy. Anyway, I have been frustrated with his nonchalant disobedience, and have been running a little low on creative and effective consequences. We do spank Caleb, but on days like we've been having, spanking for every act of disobedience or unkindness would be excessive.

At the end of this particular day, Caleb had been sent to time out multiple times, spanked and even lost the privilege of an errand he wanted to go on. When Marcus got home around 7:30 pm, I was at my limit of disciplinary resources. Caleb was trying Marcus about something, and Marcus told him, "Caleb, if you do that again, I'm not going to let you pretend to be Peter Pan anymore until tomorrow." Caleb, the child who rarely even cries when spanked, BURST into tears. He can take a lot of abuse from other kids and his own brother before he is moved to tears, but he LOST IT when Daddy threatened to take away his favorite pretending game. Since October of last year, when he first watched the animated Disney movie Peter Pan, pretending to be Peter Pan has been a daily pasttime. (In case you're not doing the math, that's a full nine months of playing Peter Pan.) The funniest part of this consequence is Caleb's complete belief in our omnipotence. It didn't even occur to him that we can't keep him from pretending whatever he wants (though I'm sure that he will eventually figure that out). Well, Daddy the genius figured out how to hit Caleb right where it hurt, and we all reaped the benefits of his much-improved attitude.

Potty Training

I just looked back at Caleb's journal to check my dates, so here's the scoop on Caleb's potty training. A year ago, when Caleb was almost 2-and-a-half-years-old, we started potty training. It started out strong. We used a potty chart with stickers and the reward for each success was five minutes with a special toy, reserved only for these occasions. (I liked this reward better than candy.) After about a month, he was down to about one accident a day.

But then we went on a long weekend trip, put him in Pull-ups for the weekend, and had a total relapse. I don't think that we could have avoided the relapse without the trip, but the trip definitely facilitated it. Caleb was getting bored with the effort required of him to consistently go in the potty, and I think that he would have relapsed trip or no trip. Regardless, from this point on, it was a slow process. It took us another four months to completely recover the ground we'd lost. But by the end of January, 2 months before his 3rd birthday and 5 months after the start of potty training, he was wearing underwear all the time (except for sleeping), and most days and even weeks were accident-free. We considered Caleb to be potty-trained at this point, though it would be several more months before he would consistently poop in the potty. The main reason for this delay was simply that he only poops once or twice a week, so he had fewer opportunities to practice, as well as to get into a routine.

At this point, almost a full year after taking-on potty training, Caleb often doesn't even tell us that he has to go. He just goes upstairs, pulls his pants down, goes, flushes, pulls his pants up, and comes down. The only reason I know that he has gone is that he asks me to button his pants when he comes back down. I never remind him to go unless we're going to be out for a while and it will be inconvenient to find a bathroom. Unless he has had a lot to drink, he can usually hold it for up to four hours during the day.

This past week, we took what we think is the final step in the potty-training process. Caleb is now napping and sleeping at night in his underwear instead of a Pull-up. Prior to the switch, he had been waking up with a dry Pull-up about half the time. I think sometimes he was wet because he knew he was wearing a Pull-up, so he chose to urinate before getting out of bed. I decided that the only thing that will stop this is actually wetting his bed a time or two, since he does not like the sensation of wet pants/bedding. It's been four days since we stopped using Pull-ups, and he is still waking up dry about half the time. Either that will improve, or I'll get tired of washing bedding and put him back in Pull-ups at night :)

The only thing that is still frustrating us is the accidents he has when we're in a hectic environment. He goes weeks and weeks without an accident, but when he does have one, it is guaranteed to be when there is a lot going on, and usually when we're out (like in the middle of a friend's living room). If any of you have an older child and you can give me an idea of when these activity-induced accidents might end, I'm all ears :)