Tuesday, December 19, 2017
Love this girl
Here's a first....an electronic Christmas list, complete with links to purchase the items.
Saturday, December 16, 2017
Amy's short story
Amy's English teacher encouraged her to enter a writing contest at school. Reading her entry was a really nice surprise – she worked really hard on it, and she's a great writer!
Here it is....
Carol was annoyed. She wanted everything to go back to how it was, but she knew that it couldn’t. Because he was gone and he was never coming back.
She wants to move on but everyone keeps reminding her. Reminding her with their condolences. With their pity. With their treating her like a child.
And everything keeps reminding her of him too. The couch in her apartment with its cat scratches even though she doesn’t even have a cat where they ate cheap pizza and binged tv shows and gorged themselves on ice cream. Her table with the uneven leg and her mismatched chairs where they ate waffles and drank coffee and made fun of the articles in the paper. The bay window and its pillows that his mom handmade where they had deep conversations while drinking tea and staring out at the city.
Everything makes her think of him and she just wants it to stop. She wants to forget about him completely because remembering him isn’t doing her any favors.
She tries and tries but it’s hard to forget someone you loved that much.
She goes to work and pretends everything is okay even though it’s not. Her boss assigns her only inconsequential puff pieces which are not helping her to improve thank you very little. She begs and begs and they assign her a story that, while it isn’t a murder mystery, is more exciting than reviewing ‘white girl meets white boy and they fall in love’ number 1994529.
There’s a charity gala in New Jersey, at the mansion of a rich guy, Peter Yates. He is more interesting than she originally thought (or maybe she just convinced herself of that so she wasn’t disappointed with getting the story).
He’s an orphan, since he was very young. He’s never had any sort of long-term romantic partner, even though he has lots of kids. The people in his city love him and his kids, and it seems that he never has been involved in some sort of scandal which is rare with rich people. Or he just covered it up really well. Who knows.
That thought, the ‘who knows’ scared her. Who was she anymore? A potential story and her response is ‘who knows’? She has to get her head in the game. That’s what he would’ve wanted. No. That’s what she wants.
The mansion is posh, and the guests are just what she expected: rich people, all with dresses and jewelry that cost more than her year’s salary that they’ll probably never wear again. Mr. Yates is 30 minutes late, even though he is the host and it’s at his own house. He arrives wearing a Fioravanti suit, looking like he stepped out of a commercial. He is followed by four of his kids, all looking equally dashing in their suits and dresses. There’s music, and it’s nice, though it’s not really her favorite.
She socializes with the other reporters for a time while searching for a good story to tell.
It’s nearing the end of the night, and the only story that she’s gotten was the same one everyone else there had gotten, which, while not being the worst thing in the world, was not ideal if she wanted to prove herself again.
A new song starts. Someone taps her on the shoulder. “May I have this dance?” She turns around, about to decline, but she finds herself face to face with the man of the hour, Peter Yates. “Sure.” She says, while wearing her ‘you are beneath me but I will still talk to you’ face which she has perfected over the years of talking to rich entitled men.
It seemed unnecessary though, after she started talking to him. He was respectful and that was so refreshing. They dance for a while and made small talk and it felt so natural, like they could just talk and talk forever.
She barely notices that they’ve been dancing for far too long, and it seems like he did too. Guests start trickling out and a man taps Peter on the shoulder. The man is older, and has white hair and a timeworn face.
“Not to intrude on what seems to be a lovely conversation, but sir, you are not completing your duties as host. Your guests are starting to leave.”
Peter looks around, and when he notices that the old man is not, in fact, lying to him about the present-ness of the guests, he sends her an apologetic look, “I’m sorry, I have to- you know-”
“I get it” she cuts him off. “Go. Go off and fulfill your duties or whatever.” He smiles gratefully and weaves his way to the front of the crowd, starting to say his thank you’s and goodbyes to all of the guests.
The old man leans towards her a whispers into her ear “If you stay, he might just give you an exclusive interview” She looks at him, eyebrows raised with disbelief. “An exclusive interview? For real? Or is that a euphemism?” The man looks at her and his face reads ‘I don’t know’ or ‘you decide’, both of which are not helpful.
She does get her interview. She listens to Peter and his twin children, Samantha and Scott, talk about the charity they founded (the one the gala was about). Their story is interesting, hopeful and heartbreaking and inspiring, and she’s swimming in ideas for her article.
When the interview is over, Samantha and Scott go off to do who knows what, and Peter invites her into his kitchen.
It’s nice, and it doesn’t feel like the kitchen of billionaire. There are stacks of papers everywhere, there are dirty dishes in the sink, and the fridge is covered in magnets and pictures and flyers like any other house with lots of messy people.
“Coffee?” He asks.
Maybe he noticed that she was halfheartedly trying to take off her shoe, or maybe the pain on her face was just really evident, but regardless of the reason, peter asked her “Do you want to take your shoes off? I can take them for you.”
“Sure, thanks.” She fumbles with the straps of her shoes and unintentionally shoves them too hard into his hand. He lets out a tiny yelp and she notices “Oh shoot, sorry.”
“It’s fine.” He smiles and makes his way out of the room, putting her shoes who-knows-where. She starts to halfheartedly rub her feet to ease the pain and waits for him to come back.
When he finally does, he seems to notice the awkward situations that his action had created. Letting her take her shoes off implies that he wants to let her stay longer, but it was nearly 11:30 and really, any later would be considered staying the night. They were both stuck, not wanting to say anything in fear of an awkward conversion, which, admittedly, was what was already happening. She gathered her courage first. “Can I stay the night? I don’t think that I’ll be able to make the drive home, and hotels here are really expensive.”
“Sure, it would be no problem at all.” He answered, looking extremely relieved. “Do you want clothes to change into? Sleeping in a dress doesn’t seem like a comfortable thing to do”
She nodded, laughing slightly, “That would be nice, thank you.”
He led her to a parlor with lots of big windows with a pretty view and comfortable-looking couches, where he told her to stay while he got her clothes. He returned with a sweatshirt and sweatpants and then left the room so she could change. She called him back in and they sat together on the couch next to the window with the best view.
They sat, staring at the stars, and talked about anything and everything they could think of. Sometime while they were talking, the sky darkened and it started to rain. At first it was a light drizzle, but soon it evolved into a full-on storm. Their view out the window changed from picture-perfect to blurry, but it made the city’s lights seem brighter. She leaned back onto her pillow and closed her eyes. She doesn’t know where this -whatever it was- will go, but she’s okay with that.
And maybe, in the morning, she'll regret it.
Maybe, in the daylight, he won’t be as good as she thought he was.
But for now, she's happy looking at him lit by the faint light leaking in from the crack underneath the door, the distant glow of the city, and the moonlight.
Here it is....
Carol was annoyed. She wanted everything to go back to how it was, but she knew that it couldn’t. Because he was gone and he was never coming back.
She wants to move on but everyone keeps reminding her. Reminding her with their condolences. With their pity. With their treating her like a child.
And everything keeps reminding her of him too. The couch in her apartment with its cat scratches even though she doesn’t even have a cat where they ate cheap pizza and binged tv shows and gorged themselves on ice cream. Her table with the uneven leg and her mismatched chairs where they ate waffles and drank coffee and made fun of the articles in the paper. The bay window and its pillows that his mom handmade where they had deep conversations while drinking tea and staring out at the city.
Everything makes her think of him and she just wants it to stop. She wants to forget about him completely because remembering him isn’t doing her any favors.
She tries and tries but it’s hard to forget someone you loved that much.
She goes to work and pretends everything is okay even though it’s not. Her boss assigns her only inconsequential puff pieces which are not helping her to improve thank you very little. She begs and begs and they assign her a story that, while it isn’t a murder mystery, is more exciting than reviewing ‘white girl meets white boy and they fall in love’ number 1994529.
There’s a charity gala in New Jersey, at the mansion of a rich guy, Peter Yates. He is more interesting than she originally thought (or maybe she just convinced herself of that so she wasn’t disappointed with getting the story).
He’s an orphan, since he was very young. He’s never had any sort of long-term romantic partner, even though he has lots of kids. The people in his city love him and his kids, and it seems that he never has been involved in some sort of scandal which is rare with rich people. Or he just covered it up really well. Who knows.
That thought, the ‘who knows’ scared her. Who was she anymore? A potential story and her response is ‘who knows’? She has to get her head in the game. That’s what he would’ve wanted. No. That’s what she wants.
The mansion is posh, and the guests are just what she expected: rich people, all with dresses and jewelry that cost more than her year’s salary that they’ll probably never wear again. Mr. Yates is 30 minutes late, even though he is the host and it’s at his own house. He arrives wearing a Fioravanti suit, looking like he stepped out of a commercial. He is followed by four of his kids, all looking equally dashing in their suits and dresses. There’s music, and it’s nice, though it’s not really her favorite.
She socializes with the other reporters for a time while searching for a good story to tell.
It’s nearing the end of the night, and the only story that she’s gotten was the same one everyone else there had gotten, which, while not being the worst thing in the world, was not ideal if she wanted to prove herself again.
A new song starts. Someone taps her on the shoulder. “May I have this dance?” She turns around, about to decline, but she finds herself face to face with the man of the hour, Peter Yates. “Sure.” She says, while wearing her ‘you are beneath me but I will still talk to you’ face which she has perfected over the years of talking to rich entitled men.
It seemed unnecessary though, after she started talking to him. He was respectful and that was so refreshing. They dance for a while and made small talk and it felt so natural, like they could just talk and talk forever.
She barely notices that they’ve been dancing for far too long, and it seems like he did too. Guests start trickling out and a man taps Peter on the shoulder. The man is older, and has white hair and a timeworn face.
“Not to intrude on what seems to be a lovely conversation, but sir, you are not completing your duties as host. Your guests are starting to leave.”
Peter looks around, and when he notices that the old man is not, in fact, lying to him about the present-ness of the guests, he sends her an apologetic look, “I’m sorry, I have to- you know-”
“I get it” she cuts him off. “Go. Go off and fulfill your duties or whatever.” He smiles gratefully and weaves his way to the front of the crowd, starting to say his thank you’s and goodbyes to all of the guests.
The old man leans towards her a whispers into her ear “If you stay, he might just give you an exclusive interview” She looks at him, eyebrows raised with disbelief. “An exclusive interview? For real? Or is that a euphemism?” The man looks at her and his face reads ‘I don’t know’ or ‘you decide’, both of which are not helpful.
She does get her interview. She listens to Peter and his twin children, Samantha and Scott, talk about the charity they founded (the one the gala was about). Their story is interesting, hopeful and heartbreaking and inspiring, and she’s swimming in ideas for her article.
When the interview is over, Samantha and Scott go off to do who knows what, and Peter invites her into his kitchen.
It’s nice, and it doesn’t feel like the kitchen of billionaire. There are stacks of papers everywhere, there are dirty dishes in the sink, and the fridge is covered in magnets and pictures and flyers like any other house with lots of messy people.
“Coffee?” He asks.
She nods and sits on one of the stools at the breakfast bar, wanting to take off her heels, but not knowing whether it was okay. He goes to the coffee pot, a huge, bulky thing that probably made, like, six gallons a pot. He hums as he makes the coffee, an astoundingly normal thing to do. When the coffee is done, he pours her a mug and then makes himself one. He hands her a cup and it warms her hands and the warmth seeps into her bones. She smiles and takes a sip of her drink as he sits in the stool next to her. Sitting makes her notice how much her feet actually hurt from wearing heels for hours. She starts to push at her heel, uncomfortable, not because her feet ached, but because taking off her shoes felt like passing the line of professionalism into ‘I'm casually sitting in the kitchen of a billionaire drinking coffee’ and she’s not sure of the implications of that. Or maybe she is and she doesn’t want to think about them or acknowledge that maybe she would like some of the theoretical implications.
Maybe he noticed that she was halfheartedly trying to take off her shoe, or maybe the pain on her face was just really evident, but regardless of the reason, peter asked her “Do you want to take your shoes off? I can take them for you.”
“Sure, thanks.” She fumbles with the straps of her shoes and unintentionally shoves them too hard into his hand. He lets out a tiny yelp and she notices “Oh shoot, sorry.”
“It’s fine.” He smiles and makes his way out of the room, putting her shoes who-knows-where. She starts to halfheartedly rub her feet to ease the pain and waits for him to come back.
When he finally does, he seems to notice the awkward situations that his action had created. Letting her take her shoes off implies that he wants to let her stay longer, but it was nearly 11:30 and really, any later would be considered staying the night. They were both stuck, not wanting to say anything in fear of an awkward conversion, which, admittedly, was what was already happening. She gathered her courage first. “Can I stay the night? I don’t think that I’ll be able to make the drive home, and hotels here are really expensive.”
“Sure, it would be no problem at all.” He answered, looking extremely relieved. “Do you want clothes to change into? Sleeping in a dress doesn’t seem like a comfortable thing to do”
She nodded, laughing slightly, “That would be nice, thank you.”
He led her to a parlor with lots of big windows with a pretty view and comfortable-looking couches, where he told her to stay while he got her clothes. He returned with a sweatshirt and sweatpants and then left the room so she could change. She called him back in and they sat together on the couch next to the window with the best view.
They sat, staring at the stars, and talked about anything and everything they could think of. Sometime while they were talking, the sky darkened and it started to rain. At first it was a light drizzle, but soon it evolved into a full-on storm. Their view out the window changed from picture-perfect to blurry, but it made the city’s lights seem brighter. She leaned back onto her pillow and closed her eyes. She doesn’t know where this -whatever it was- will go, but she’s okay with that.
And maybe, in the morning, she'll regret it.
Maybe, in the daylight, he won’t be as good as she thought he was.
But for now, she's happy looking at him lit by the faint light leaking in from the crack underneath the door, the distant glow of the city, and the moonlight.
Wednesday, November 29, 2017
Dinner helper
I've been working on a big project at work, which – very unusually for me – has had me working extra hours at home some evenings trying to catch up. I guess maybe Reed has noticed?
Last night as I was working an extra 1.5 hours at home after working all day, he came up to the office and started asking questions about what I was working on (at that moment, our agency's annual report, another publication, and the huge website overhaul). He even seemed genuinely interested. Then he asked what was for dinner and I told him tortellini soup ("soup" is a bit of a stretch – it's chicken stock and frozen tortellini, that's it – but it's one of his favorite meals). He said he'd make dinner. And he did!
What a great feeling!
Thursday, November 23, 2017
What?!?
This morning during our annual Turkey Trot walk, Amy was chit-chatting away about everything comic book-related. She said the Justice League director was a bad person because he cheated on his wife "FIFTEEN TIMES!" Reed didn't miss a beat, he said "Meh, those are rookie numbers." WHAT?! We all LOLd.
Sunday, November 19, 2017
Guest post from Dad
As a wonderful 12 year old girl, Amy has fully embraced the idea that Dad is always wrong. Whether it is my handwriting on the family wall calendar or the level of sunlight during the daytime. She loves to point out my every little mistake like using the black marker on the calendar (black means the whole family) for an event that is only Mom and Dad (blue and orange). It is totally age appropriate for her to not let anything go and she excels at it. If I say I am 5 ft 8 1/2 in tall she will say, "No... uh.." Then she's not sure what to say, she just knows that I am wrong! Other times I'll say the clouds look white and she'll say, "No, the clouds aren't white they are off white with blue peaking through." Amy is never mean about it or condescending, she just says declares my error and makes a correction. It happens like 10 times a day! Mostly I need to just keep my mouth shut.
Reed, who just turned 15, is starting to struggle with social anxiety. In freshman English they do what the school calls a socratic seminar. The kids basically talk about a topic and the grading is based on their level participation. During the first 2 seminars Reed literally said nothing and earned grades of zero. Lara and I met with the teacher and counselor. Reed now participates in smaller seminars with few numbers of kids and some kids he is more comfortable with. His grades have been good in these smaller groups but we don't have a sense of how much he is really participating. Tonight, Reed and I went to Chick-fil-A for dinner. The deal was that he had to order the meal for both of us. This scared him to death. He admitted that he was afraid of messing up. We stood in line for about 10 minutes until he would only go to the counter with me standing right next to him, prompting him. He did the ordering and I am very proud of him, but he needs a lot of practice and to face his fears. In hindsight, this anxiety is probably why he doesn't go out for sports/activities and why he won't ride bikes to the store with his friends. We need to parent him better to give him tools to face his fears, put him in situations to practice social contact and be successful.
Love you both. Dad
Reed, who just turned 15, is starting to struggle with social anxiety. In freshman English they do what the school calls a socratic seminar. The kids basically talk about a topic and the grading is based on their level participation. During the first 2 seminars Reed literally said nothing and earned grades of zero. Lara and I met with the teacher and counselor. Reed now participates in smaller seminars with few numbers of kids and some kids he is more comfortable with. His grades have been good in these smaller groups but we don't have a sense of how much he is really participating. Tonight, Reed and I went to Chick-fil-A for dinner. The deal was that he had to order the meal for both of us. This scared him to death. He admitted that he was afraid of messing up. We stood in line for about 10 minutes until he would only go to the counter with me standing right next to him, prompting him. He did the ordering and I am very proud of him, but he needs a lot of practice and to face his fears. In hindsight, this anxiety is probably why he doesn't go out for sports/activities and why he won't ride bikes to the store with his friends. We need to parent him better to give him tools to face his fears, put him in situations to practice social contact and be successful.
Love you both. Dad
Sunday, November 12, 2017
Happy #15 Reed-o!
Baby Reed is now 15 years old. Fifteen! I swear I was just 15 a few minutes ago. He's celebrating his birthday tonight the same way he has for the last several years, by going to the movies with his best pals. We think he really looks forward to this celebration all year, keeping a close eye on the movie release dates so he'll know way in advance what movie they'll go do. They've gone to the Alamo Drafthouse the last couple of years so they can eat during the movie, and they also always have a great time goofing around outside the theater. So glad he's got good friends to celebrate with him!
Saturday, October 21, 2017
The drama of Socratic Seminar
Reed has had some bumps in his Honors English class as school has gotten underway. He was lucky to get a teacher with an amazing reputation....who delivered her baby three weeks into school and then took 12 weeks off. Yay for her, womp womp for her students.
Evidently a big thing in high school English is this "Socratic Seminar." This is certainly not something I ever did in high school, we had no clue what it was all about. Here's a description:
The Socratic seminar is a formal discussion, based on a text, in which the leader asks open-ended questions. Within the context of the discussion, students listen closely to the comments of others, thinking critically for themselves, and articulate their own thoughts and their responses to the thoughts of others.In a class with 30 kids, Reed found this task impossibly difficult. The first seminar he didn't talk at all. We consulted with the teacher, and coached him some, and thought he was all set for the second go-round. Nope. Not a word. He said he didn't know when/how to jump in, and also that everyone had already said the things he planned to say.
The substitute teacher was willing to give him the written assignment (the one a student would get if he/she were absent the day of a seminar) for these two sessions, to make sure the issue was social anxiety, not just that he didn't understand the material. The teacher warned him that the written assignment would be graded harder than the verbal one (that seems pretty unfair, but okay). Reed did very well on both, so the sub knew that it really was just social anxiety keeping him from participating, not a lack of knowledge on the subject.
So we needed a plan. We met together with Reed, his English sub, and the guidance counselor and they came up with a plan. The sub said that some other kids were having the same struggle, so the other English teachers agreed to do a small group version of the seminar, and eventually work up to participation in the regular classroom version. During this meeting, the sub said Reed was "wicked smart" and did a really good job on the written work.
The small group version worked well for Reed, and he got an A. Hopefully he will gain some confidence participating in these seminars, since evidently they will happen all the way through high school. Ugh. I feel for him...I also wouldn't feel comfortable participating in these.
There was lots more drama on this, with Reed thinking we were hassling him unnecessarily...but we all soldiered on. I hope it'll continue to work out well.
Friday, October 20, 2017
Amy - a flight danger (LOL)
Amy and Tod were preparing to leave for a quick, long weekend trip to Montana to see Kale's last high school football game, and take in one of Shane's college football games. They were packing up the Jeep, ready to head off to the airport, when Tod said "Okay Amy I know this is a weird question, but do you have any scissors or anything like that in your bags?" And at first she said no, and then she realized she'd packed her whole pencil case, which included a pair of scissors. Out went the scissors. Then he asked "Do you have anything else sharp, like an exacto knife?" And sure enough, yes she had one of those too! TSA would have had fun with her!
Friday, October 13, 2017
Long-haired hippies
The other night at dinner, we were talking about the new Thor movie that's coming out soon. I joked that I wouldn't go see it because Thor had lost all his super-powers when he cut his hair. (I mean seriously, WHY would Chris Hemsworth cut that beautiful hair off?!?) Tod told the kids that I'd inherited it from my Mom to like the boys with long hair. Yep. Guilty. (Well, except for the guy I married!)
I started thinking about that, and realized that Mom would have LOVED Reed's long hair. She is smiling right now as I'm typing this. She probably would have fussed over it so much that it'd really embarrass him (I do my best to avoid that...mostly for fear it'll make him want to cut it all off.) Yep, she's gotta be really happy with his hair situation.
I started thinking about that, and realized that Mom would have LOVED Reed's long hair. She is smiling right now as I'm typing this. She probably would have fussed over it so much that it'd really embarrass him (I do my best to avoid that...mostly for fear it'll make him want to cut it all off.) Yep, she's gotta be really happy with his hair situation.
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| Fun at the corn maze...the long-haired one had more fun than it looks like in this picture. |
Wednesday, September 27, 2017
The teenage brain
So when kids are little, you always read that you shouldn't get frustrated with them when they can't remember to do a chore or hang up their coat or whatever thing it is that's driving you bananas. They (the "experts") say it takes until the teen years for kids' brains to have the executive functioning that allows them to form habits and remember to do stuff.
Well I'm here to say that evidently that's true. Now this boy's brain isn't totally done baking, the center of the cookie is still a little doughy, but he's getting there. He's got some technological help, which I count as smart - setting a reminder on his phone for when it's time to feed the dog, for example. Hey, it works!
And Reed's always been an early riser, there haven't been all that many days when we'd need to wake him up for school. But this year he's finally using an alarm clock and getting up completely on his own. Plus he's showering in the morning - yahoo!
These kids might become responsible human beings one day after all! :)
Well I'm here to say that evidently that's true. Now this boy's brain isn't totally done baking, the center of the cookie is still a little doughy, but he's getting there. He's got some technological help, which I count as smart - setting a reminder on his phone for when it's time to feed the dog, for example. Hey, it works!
And Reed's always been an early riser, there haven't been all that many days when we'd need to wake him up for school. But this year he's finally using an alarm clock and getting up completely on his own. Plus he's showering in the morning - yahoo!
These kids might become responsible human beings one day after all! :)
Tuesday, September 5, 2017
"That was a great day!"
It's a little bit of an alternate universe to be in the big convention center for this festival. The world talks about how people don't read anymore...well, the 100-person deep line just to get in to the area to buy books (at FULL PRICE, I might add) tells a different story. We're among fellow readers there, and I think that's partly why we both wanted to go even though none of our favorites were going to be there.
Amy decided she'd like to go to the YA panel discussion with Melissa de la Cruz, Nicola Yoon and Sandhya Menon. I thought it was awesome to have such a diverse panel of women writers - such a great message. Amy enjoyed hearing them all talk about their writing processes, and then of course we went and bought all of their latest books.
Then we headed over to Busboys & Poets where we browsed more books while we waited for a table, and had a nice lunch. When we got home, Amy said "That was a great day!" and it made my heart smile.
Already can't wait for next year.
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| My lunch date ignoring me as we wait for our food. Hard to resist the pull of a new book. |
Wednesday, August 30, 2017
The cook strikes again – getting more resourceful all the time
And he scrambled up four eggs for himself, and ate them all - growing boy, I guess!
Saturday, August 26, 2017
Chore time
At the start of every school year (and sometimes at mid-year), we review the chore assignments and make some adjustments. This year was no exception. We decided to continue with the even/odd dish assignment days (leaving Reed with odd days, which he hates since sometimes there's a 31/1 and he has to do dishes two days in a row) and with switching off weeks mowing the grass (this was a new chore for Amy after she turned 12). We moved Reed's dog walking assignment to the morning before school, since he leaves so late (bus at 8:44) and then give Amy a new dog walking assignment for after school, since she's the first one home. We're continuing with Reed putting out trash/recycling on Thursdays and plan to do our best to actually get Amy to put the trash out on Mondays (seems to get forgotten more often than not). Reed feeds the dog and Amy (mostly) feeds the cat. That's about it. Oh I think Amy feeds the fish too. (No one pays them much mind in general.)
Each kid is supposed to bring their laundry to me on Wednesday mornings, but that's as far as I've gone with making them participate in laundry. I know I can't put that off forever, but for now I just do the whole family's laundry because I know what will happen - if they have do their own, they'll put laundry in the washer, then forget about it (it's all the way in the basement, after all) and then every time I go to wash, there will be a washer full of mildewy-smelling clothes already there. Heck, I know that happened when was a grown up living at my Mom and Jim's - it's pretty easy to forget the laundry when it's two levels away. So I just continue to hope that maybe they'll want to start doing their own laundry (yeah, right!) or I will finally draw the line then they're in their senior year.
One decent thing I have taught them is to make and use a grocery list. At this point they're pretty good about writing things on the grocery list if they use the last of it....not perfect yet, but not bad. That's a good lifelong habit - so much easier to write things down than to just try to remember them!
We have a cleaning crew that comes every other week, so none of us does any real "housework" like changing the sheets, cleaning the floors, vacuuming, or scrubbing toilets. We struggle with that a little...how will our kids know how to do these things when they're on their own? Well I guess they'll have to look it up on YouTube. It's another thing we're punting until they're closer to being on their own. Not the best plan, maybe, but if the alternative is all of us spending our weekends cleaning, then I'm okay with how it's currently going.
Hopefully we'll have two relatively responsible kids in the end, who can take care of their own houses.
Each kid is supposed to bring their laundry to me on Wednesday mornings, but that's as far as I've gone with making them participate in laundry. I know I can't put that off forever, but for now I just do the whole family's laundry because I know what will happen - if they have do their own, they'll put laundry in the washer, then forget about it (it's all the way in the basement, after all) and then every time I go to wash, there will be a washer full of mildewy-smelling clothes already there. Heck, I know that happened when was a grown up living at my Mom and Jim's - it's pretty easy to forget the laundry when it's two levels away. So I just continue to hope that maybe they'll want to start doing their own laundry (yeah, right!) or I will finally draw the line then they're in their senior year.
One decent thing I have taught them is to make and use a grocery list. At this point they're pretty good about writing things on the grocery list if they use the last of it....not perfect yet, but not bad. That's a good lifelong habit - so much easier to write things down than to just try to remember them!
We have a cleaning crew that comes every other week, so none of us does any real "housework" like changing the sheets, cleaning the floors, vacuuming, or scrubbing toilets. We struggle with that a little...how will our kids know how to do these things when they're on their own? Well I guess they'll have to look it up on YouTube. It's another thing we're punting until they're closer to being on their own. Not the best plan, maybe, but if the alternative is all of us spending our weekends cleaning, then I'm okay with how it's currently going.
Hopefully we'll have two relatively responsible kids in the end, who can take care of their own houses.
Friday, August 25, 2017
High school? WHAT?
Sent the kids off to school yesterday. Ninth grade for Reed and seventh grade for Amy.
I can hardly believe we have a high schooler, and Amy's mid-way through middle school. Time flies!
Amy was super excited to get back to school, especially since we missed the school's event where kids could bring in their supplies and locate their classrooms. She has friends in several classes and her teachers seem nice, so far so good.
Reed was nervous about the jump to high school. I asked him what he was worried about and he said "I'm afraid I'll mess up" - just a general kind of anxiety. I assured him it really isn't much different from middle school and he'd handle it just fine. And so far so good, other than issues with the bus (which showed up 10 minutes before it was supposed to, and is very overcrowded). Classes seem okay (other than getting a writing assignment in English on the first day) and he's got friends in a few classes and "the whole gang" at lunch one day.
Whew. Summer was a short one, doesn't seem like it could possibly be here already!
I can hardly believe we have a high schooler, and Amy's mid-way through middle school. Time flies!
Amy was super excited to get back to school, especially since we missed the school's event where kids could bring in their supplies and locate their classrooms. She has friends in several classes and her teachers seem nice, so far so good.
Reed was nervous about the jump to high school. I asked him what he was worried about and he said "I'm afraid I'll mess up" - just a general kind of anxiety. I assured him it really isn't much different from middle school and he'd handle it just fine. And so far so good, other than issues with the bus (which showed up 10 minutes before it was supposed to, and is very overcrowded). Classes seem okay (other than getting a writing assignment in English on the first day) and he's got friends in a few classes and "the whole gang" at lunch one day.
Whew. Summer was a short one, doesn't seem like it could possibly be here already!
The apple doesn't fall far from the tree
For her birthday, Amy asked for this "Heavenly Help-Mates" shirt.
This is a little more understandable to me, it's related to the Percy Jackson series of books that Amy loves, The Heroes of Olympus, by Rick Riordan. That much I knew! And then...
Then one day I got a package in the mail. It was a t-shirt I ordered...
And I was so excited! The shirt is for a podcast I listen to, Pod Save America (which is hosted by former Obama staffers). And I also realized that few people would 'get' my shirt. But I also like it that way!
So I guess we're kind of two peas in a pod. (GET IT?! podcast pun!)
Well I certainly have no idea what this is about. Evidently it's related to the Flash comics. Not that this description really helps me, but....
Become an official member of the prestigious Heaven Help-Mates with this beautiful, hand-photoshopped shirt! Now it's not just Mopee who gets to be an all-powerful entity that controls anything and everything in the multiverse.She also has this purple "SPQR" shirt.
SPQR is an initialism from a Latin phrase, Senatus Populusque Romanus, which was the motto of the Roman Empire and translates to "The Senate and People of Rome".So she has these shirts and pretty much no one knows what they're about. Or they're like a secret decoder ring to find "her people" who know what these things are. I've heard a couple of people mention her Camp Jupiter shirt, but so far none who 'get' her Flash shirt. But that's how she likes it! And it's part of what makes her her.
Then one day I got a package in the mail. It was a t-shirt I ordered...
So I guess we're kind of two peas in a pod. (GET IT?! podcast pun!)
Thursday, August 10, 2017
Shrek-tastic!
There were 30 kids in the camp, but Amy was the only one who was interested in technical theater. The camp was really well run, though Amy didn't get to interact with the other campers a whole lot. She spent her days with the high schoolers who'd volunteered to help with the technical stuff. They painted signs and made props, and worked on the lighting and sound. Seems she got to observe a lot of that stuff, which was new to her.
On the night of the show, her job was to manage all the cast microphones. That meant mounting the mic pacs somewhere they couldn't be seen, and moving them between people since there weren't enough mics for all the cast members.
The show turned out way better than we expected. They crammed a whole lot of preparation into those 10 days of camp, and they were terrific! Totally smooth production, no flaws that we could notice. Afterward, we learned that her school's drama staff (Mr. K and Ms. Reardon) were in the audience as well...they were scouting the show because they plan to do the same one in the spring. That was a nice surprise to find them there, and for Amy to be able to tell Mr. K about the new skills she's learned. She's really hoping to be stage manager next spring!
After the show, she was so jazzed and talking a million miles an hour. It's so great to see her so excited about something!! She's only sad that she's got to wait all the way until spring for the school production to do it all over again. We're very proud of her hard work and dedication!! She's definitely found her "people" in the drama crowd, which is awesome.
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| Lead Student Technician! |
Wednesday, August 9, 2017
"It's a little small, don't you think?"
As I said, Reed's been baking all summer. He's back at it again today, and can you believe he just complained that the bottle of vanilla I bought is too small. We had a Costco-sized bottle before, this one is grocery-store-sized. So this is what it's come to. The baker needs jumbo sizes at all times, evidently. LOL
And he's also still texting me at work to ask if we have ingredients for a recipe. I want to say "I don't know, how about you ask someone WHO IS IN THE HOUSE, like maybe yourself?!?"
But we've all enjoyed the treats. :)
And he's even made dinner a couple of times, which is what I'm really rooting for. He made tacos one night and veggie chili another (though I had to be the sous chef and do the veggie prep...baby steps). Full disclosure...he only cooked dinner when it was his dishes day, since he knew someone would do that part if he did the cooking. Evil genius.
Thursday, August 3, 2017
Nice
Reed has logged some time 'customizing' Tod's Waze navigation app. He changed the 'child reminder' to this. Such a nice big brother.
Sunday, July 23, 2017
One year meat-free
Just looked back at our photos and confirmed it's been over a year since Amy decided to be a vegetarian (I didn't take a pic to mark the occasion, I just remember it was the day of Stevie and Nikki's wedding shower!). Only a little surprised that she's stuck with it, even when I've made the things she used to love best. Still haven't gotten her to branch out and REALLY eat more vegetables and fruit, still struggling with all the fake meat and carb-y meals. But hopefully that'll change at some point.
Saturday, July 8, 2017
Summer of baking
In keeping with his love of snacks, and in combination with his boredom level, Reed is doing a lot of baking this summer. He makes cookies or brownies at least once a week. And he doesn't want to make things from mixes because that's "less fun." I'd say he bakes in equal part because he wants a treat, and because he needs things to fill the day. It's hard work doing nothing all summer. :)
The best part is that he also cleans up after himself. I get cookies and a clean kitchen - win/win!
Friday, July 7, 2017
No more braces!
Monday, June 19, 2017
Snack time
Yesterday Reed asked me "Can you get some more varied snacks for us?" I asked what he meant. He said "Some non-grain-based snacks." Well okay then. Of course I asked for specific ideas and he didn't really have any (helpful!). But the way he put it just made me laugh – non-grain-based snacks. This from the kid who, several times a day, can be found with a box of Wheat Thins, or a bag of chips, or a bag of pretzels, or a bag of Goldfish.
Wednesday, June 14, 2017
Another one in the books
Somehow the school year has ended. Both kids had awesome years - Amy got straight A's all year long, and Reed had a couple of quarters of Latin II where he had B's, so he ended the year with all A's except a B in Latin II. Pretty impressive! Amy made lots of new friends in middle school and Reed still has his same gang of pals - they're both happy kids and we're very proud of them.
Now on to lots of summer camps for Amy, and a whole lot of nothing for Reed (well, other than chores).
We'll have a high schooler in the fall!
Now on to lots of summer camps for Amy, and a whole lot of nothing for Reed (well, other than chores).
We'll have a high schooler in the fall!
Friday, June 9, 2017
8th grade dinner and dance!
Heading into 8th grade, we knew the school year would culminate in a dinner/dance. We also knew Reed wouldn't want to go. So I'd mention it from time to time, and tell him that he would indeed be going. Just to give him a heads up. As it got closer, we told him that we were sticking with this and he would be going...and he'd have fun too. I checked with his buddies' moms and learned that at least two of them were also being forced to go, so we were in good company. Some boys go all out and wear jackets and bow ties...some are more casual. We thought somewhere in the middle was very much good enough for someone who was being forced to go. So I got him some nice gray pants and a button-up shirt. Tod handed him down some old Vans that he doesn't wear much. Perfect.
We drove his friend Robbie to the dance too so he wouldn't have to arrive by himself (awkward!). During the dance, the school's fire alarm system continued its recent habit of malfunctioning and they had to evacuate twice. Reed would never say that he had a good time, but he did. I asked if he'd danced, and he said "no one really danced...we all just jumped up and down" - so I'll go ahead and say he danced. Robbie and Reed were both very happy at the end, so I consider the night a fantastic success.
Oh and while I'm thinking of it, the other day Reed noticed he could pull his hair into a ponytail (it's long!). I told him "I just don't want to see you with a man bun." So of course he announced it'd be his summer project to be able to do a man bun. Let's hope he was joking.
Two thumbs up, ready for the dance!
One of the other parents took this shot at the dance.
Oh and while I'm thinking of it, the other day Reed noticed he could pull his hair into a ponytail (it's long!). I told him "I just don't want to see you with a man bun." So of course he announced it'd be his summer project to be able to do a man bun. Let's hope he was joking.
Wednesday, May 24, 2017
Where the heck did the school year go?
I blinked and somehow there are just 11 more school days after today. Then Reed will be done with middle school. DONE! This school year has just flown by, it's kind of hard to fathom. Seems like we just got in a groove ten minutes ago and BOOM it's nearly over. But I suppose that's a good thing, right?
Saturday, May 13, 2017
Music
I often hear other moms talking about their kids listening to the Beatles or other "classic" music and wonder if I've gone about this music thing all wrong. When the kids were smaller, we only listened to "kids" music that they liked – Disney soundtracks and other music designed for kids. When we got the minivan, then we listened to the Kids Place Live channel on XM and that was pretty much the extent of their music exposure. I wanted them to hear music that was meant for them, music that would "speak" to them - and it did! But I now realize that they missed out on learning about other kind of music in their "formative years" and I hope they'll be able to recover! (only partly kidding)
When I was a kid, of course all we had to listen to in Mom's car was the radio. (Dad was fancy...he had an 8-track player for at least some of the time!) And she picked what we listened to – seems to me it was mainly oldies - 50s and 60s. Old country, too. When it was just the three of us, she also played music at night (loud!) after we went to bed, and it was a wide variety of stuff - the Eagles, Al Green, Emmylou Harris, Jimmy Buffett, the Commodores, the Beach Boys - it was all over the map. And that made an impression on me – I still love (most of) that stuff!
Their musical tastes are becoming more varied now, but it's mostly pop music. Which is fine, but it'd be awesome if they liked the stuff that I like! *Sigh* Maybe one day. Amy's on a big "Hamilton" kick and Reed surprised me by saying he like an album the Red Hot Chili Peppers put out last year. I know they'll eventually find their way to "their" true musical love one day.
I just hope they'll one day be able to sing along to Stevie Wonder's "Sir Duke"...
Music is a world within itself
With a language we all understand
With an equal opportunity
For all to sing, dance and clap their hands
But just because a record has a groove
Don't make it in the groove
But you can tell right away at letter A
When the people start to move
They can feel it all over
They can feel it all over people
When I was a kid, of course all we had to listen to in Mom's car was the radio. (Dad was fancy...he had an 8-track player for at least some of the time!) And she picked what we listened to – seems to me it was mainly oldies - 50s and 60s. Old country, too. When it was just the three of us, she also played music at night (loud!) after we went to bed, and it was a wide variety of stuff - the Eagles, Al Green, Emmylou Harris, Jimmy Buffett, the Commodores, the Beach Boys - it was all over the map. And that made an impression on me – I still love (most of) that stuff!
Their musical tastes are becoming more varied now, but it's mostly pop music. Which is fine, but it'd be awesome if they liked the stuff that I like! *Sigh* Maybe one day. Amy's on a big "Hamilton" kick and Reed surprised me by saying he like an album the Red Hot Chili Peppers put out last year. I know they'll eventually find their way to "their" true musical love one day.
I just hope they'll one day be able to sing along to Stevie Wonder's "Sir Duke"...
Music is a world within itself
With a language we all understand
With an equal opportunity
For all to sing, dance and clap their hands
But just because a record has a groove
Don't make it in the groove
But you can tell right away at letter A
When the people start to move
They can feel it all over
They can feel it all over people
And maybe a George Jones song or two.
(And I really feel like I've written about this before, but I can't find it if I did!)
(And I really feel like I've written about this before, but I can't find it if I did!)
Thursday, May 4, 2017
Amy's new-found love
Amy was so excited to get the opportunity to participate in the middle school musical. I thought she might want to do set design, but she decided on stage crew. That meant staying after school a couple of days a week, coming in for a couple of Saturdays, and being at school for hours during "tech week" (the week the play starts). The show was "You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown" and the kids all did a terrific job!
It was really great for Amy to get involved with the "drama kids" and find a space to belong. I think she gained a lot of confidence and more of a sense of belonging by being part of the play.
Since my friend (and mom to Amy's pal Morgan) Valerie was the parent lead with the play, I also had the chance to do a lot of helping out - selling tickets, setting up snacks for the kids, and helping with the end of play party. It was exhausting, but fun!
Mr. K, who was Amy's art teacher earlier in the year and was the lead staffer for stage crew, was so glad that Amy and a couple other six graders had such a great time with the play, since now he knows he's got lots of kids to help with the next two years' plays!
Grateful that the kids' school has such fantastic opportunities for the kids!
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| Stage crew, along with art teacher Mr. Kruczkowski, working hard on a Saturday afternoon, helping out the set design team. |
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| Everybody taking a bow, stage crew in the back. |
Mr. K, who was Amy's art teacher earlier in the year and was the lead staffer for stage crew, was so glad that Amy and a couple other six graders had such a great time with the play, since now he knows he's got lots of kids to help with the next two years' plays!
Grateful that the kids' school has such fantastic opportunities for the kids!
Thursday, April 13, 2017
A note from Dad
For Spring Break 2017 we spend 3 days on the beach in Sandbridge, VA. But the best quality time was after we got home. The house cleaning people were scheduled to be at the house at 8:30 a.m. so we wanted to get out of the house for about an hour and a half to let them work. We decided to walk to Starbucks for breakfast. That's about an hour round trip plus half hour to sit and eat. Amy was down with it and of course Reed grumbled but it turned out wonderful. It was a cool, sunny morning and both kids seemed to actually enjoy it (though they would never admit so). Amy talked about the musical Hamilton the whole way and Reed was curious and excited to prove that he knew of a better walking route.
And this from Mom:
Great minds think alike, because I was going to write something similar. Highlight was when Reed and I got a little too far ahead of Tod and Amy, he said "I can't hear Amy anymore so I think we're getting too far ahead of them." LOL - she really did talk the entire way.
An all-around awesome morning!
Sunday, April 2, 2017
Oh, I miss the book box!
Today I was putting the Easter decorations out and came across the Easter books. It made me so nostalgic! For the "big" holidays, we had collections of books that I added to each year. The kids just loved it when the holiday books came out, and we'd read them over and over during that "season." It feels like it was a million years ago that we'd both spend a half-hour in the kids' rooms each night reading book after book.
We also had the "Book Box" where I collected different books that I thought they'd like. When they'd been particularly good, we'd let them choose a new book or two from the book box. It was the biggest thrill for them! I'd also buy them each several new books that we'd give to them when we went on vacations to keep them occupied (for a little while, at least - Reed reads SO fast, and Amy's pretty quick too). Of course over time I got "less good" at picking books they'd like, and many languished in the book box, waiting to be chosen. Probably a year or more ago I finally gave up and donated all those books to the elementary school. But I hope they have positive memories of the book box, and maybe they'll even continue the tradition one day if they have kids themselves.
Tuesday, March 28, 2017
Happy happy #12!
Our baby girl has turned 12! Next stop...teenager! Ah, who are we kidding, she's pretty much a teenager already.
Amy has matured so much in the last year. She's better able to take light-hearted ribbing, which is wonderful (she doesn't get furious if we say "there's no post on Sunday," for example). She's thriving in middle school, grade-wise, and has also made lots of new friends. She's just recently started working as part of the stage crew group for the upcoming middle school play, and she's having a lot of fun with that. She's still enjoying taking weekly tennis classes, which just started back up again for the spring. She still loves to read, but has become more narrow in the styles of books she chooses - she very much prefers realistic fantasy (an example she gives is Harry Potter). Amy tends to become what one might call "obsessed" with things - a month or two ago, it was Robin (of Batman and Robin.....not interested in Batman, though) and now she's circled back around to the Percy Jackson book series. She will talk endlessly to us about her obsession, without much regard to whether we're actually interested (or even listening, probably!). She still draws constantly, and she still won't really share her drawings with us (so sad!). She is still a collector of "stuff" which usually ends up in piles all around the house.
We're so proud of Amy and all that she's become! We think we'll keep her. :)
Monday, March 20, 2017
"I am my only teacher."
This popped up in my Facebook "On this day" from 4 years ago:
Just found an old notebook from when Reed was in 2nd grade. He wrote a note to his teacher which said (among other things) "You help me learn in fall, winter, and spring, but not in summer. Summer I am all alone. I am my only teacher." Hysterical.
Just found an old notebook from when Reed was in 2nd grade. He wrote a note to his teacher which said (among other things) "You help me learn in fall, winter, and spring, but not in summer. Summer I am all alone. I am my only teacher." Hysterical.
Tuesday, March 7, 2017
Typical day at our house
I often find myself wishing for a magic way to go back and observe a day in each year of my life. Really see how my days went, how I actually acted (could be frightening!), and probably appreciate it all a lot more in hindsight.
So with that in mind I thought I'd write about a 'typical' day in our house now.
On weekdays, usually Reed gets up on his own, otherwise we wake him up a few minutes after 7. I am not sure Amy's ever woken up on her own at 7 (maybe once in a blue moon), so usually we wake her up at 7. And then again at 7:10. And then again at 7:20.
I leave for work at 6:30 a.m. on the days that I go in to the office (Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays). So Tod's home with the kids, and usually they eat breakfast together and prepare for the day. On days when I telework (Wednesdays and Fridays), the kids eat by themselves since I start working (and doing laundry) at 7. Amy likes to get her lunch made and then leave a little early for the bus - right at 8. But Reed likes to wait until nearly the last possible moment to go to the bus stop, which is around the corner - usually at 8:05 on the dot, after he hastily throws his lunch together. (The bus is scheduled to come at 8:07, but amazingly he's never missed it.) Both kids have headphones on pretty much all the while, listening to who knows what.
The bus brings them back home around 3:45 p.m. Reed texts me to say he's home, if it's an office day. If it's a telework day, I'm usually on my way home when he texts, and I get home a little after 4.
Amy does homework if she's got it (Reed almost never has homework...a mystery we don't truly understand, but we don't question since his grades are great). The headphones are again glued to their ears (can you tell that frustrates me?). Both of them have to spend a half-hour outside doing something at least semi-active. Reed tosses the football to himself in the driveway, or sometimes on the trampoline (well he's back to that recently, after a long break). Amy hits tennis balls against the garage or sometimes shoots hoops. Amy is VERY careful to not spend one millisecond more than 30 minutes outside. If they end up outside at the same time, that's inevitably a recipe for disaster and fighting. Sometimes it seems they're still 3 and 5 years old, not 11 and 14.
Then it's back inside where Reed hides out in the living room probably having screen time when he's not supposed to (he very carefully keeps a pillow in his lap to try to keep up the illusion that he's not looking at his phone). Amy's usually at her desk, drawing or doing typing practice tests lately. Or if she can grab the living room couch, she'll be there drawing and listening to whatever she listens to. (There are frequent fights over the couch.) There they stay until dinner's ready. Phones are not allowed in their rooms, so unfortunately they don't want to spend a lot of time there. Tod usually gets home not too long before we eat dinner at 6.
Dinner. The food aspect can be a little fraught. I'm still struggling a little with making meals that work with Amy being vegetarian, and also trying to accommodate Reed's pickiness. It's a challenge. Reed will also complain if I get repetitive with serving his non-favored meals (which are many). Food aside, I think we have pretty good dinner times. Growing up, the TV was usually on during our family dinners, tuned to the Channel 9 news, waiting for the sports report with Glenn Brenner. But we never have the TV on until later in the evening. We talk about our days during dinner, sometimes talk about current events, we talk about what's on our upcoming calendar. Amy talks about Batman (well, more accurate to say she talks about Robin, her current obsession). Once in a while the kids really share things with us about their days or their studies.
After dinner, we're on an even (Amy) / odd (Reed) schedule for the dishes. There is much complaining when one or the other discovers the dishwasher needs to be unloaded (we usually only have to run it every couple of days, so that can be problematic with them switching off days). Their hand-washing skills still leave something to be desired, so we're still working on that. But mostly they've accepted their dish-doing fate and they don't complain as much as they used to.
Then it's on to the coveted screen time for the rest of the evening. Both kids on their separate computers (Amy has a laptop and Reed has a desktop). Reed plays Overwatch these days (a first person shooter game...blech) and I think he still plays Civilization sometimes. He hasn't been playing the X-box One in the basement for quite a while...guess he finally tired of Madden NFL. The super fantastic thing about online gaming is that Reed talks to his friends over the headphones....not loudly, but loud enough that it makes watching TV in the next room a little challenging. That's probably why some of his friends are allowed to have computers in their rooms (we're holding out on that one...too much temptation for gaming when he's not supposed to, and other possible shenanigans that I'm not even going to mention).
Amy is nearly always dual-screening....watching something on her phone, positioned just in front of her laptop, while she draws on the computer. She still doesn't like to share what she's drawn with us, unfortunately. I try not to push it, but I'd love to see what she's doing. I really miss the days when she wanted to show us every thing she'd drawn (and she's always been a prolific artist). Sometimes she watches TV in our room, since we're usually downstairs watching TV.
Yes I guess I should mention what Tod and I are doing in these evenings. Lately after dinner we've been taking Shelby for a 15 minute walk, enjoying the weirdly mild winter we've been having. Then since Tod's working on his Ph.D. through an online program, most days he does school work for an hour or two. I'm usually knee-deep in Facebook (such a time suck), or I edit photos, or watch TV, or read, or this time of year I do Girl Scout cookie business. I piddle around doing whatever it is I do. When Tod's done with school work, we watch TV together. These days it's the opening segments of Stephen Colbert and Seth Myers, or we watch "This is Us," or "The Daily Show" or some comedies. We don't really watch too terribly much TV, since we're usually in bed pretty close to 10.
Back to the kids...they're busy having way too much screen time. Amy showers a little before 9, and is supposed to be in bed at 9, but in the last few days she's taken to reading after she gets in bed, and deciding for herself that she'll go to bed a half-hour after her scheduled bed time. We've been just giving in on that one, because she's reading....she hasn't been doing all that much reading of late. She claims she takes forever to fall asleep, but we don't really know. Reed goes up to shower at 9:30, and the trouble we have is that because the kids' bathroom is right between their rooms, it's super loud in Amy's room so we've been letting Reed shower in our bathroom. Which ties our bathroom up for a half-hour, when frequently we find we'd like to have done our bedtime preparations before 10 and we find ourselves out of luck. We figure eventually he's going to want to shower in the mornings and we'll be rid of this problem. Their bedtimes are 9 p.m. for Amy and 10 p.m. for Reed, with a half-hour extra on weekends.
On weekends if we've got nothing going on, Reed's still usually up at 7:30 or 8. Amy, on the other hand, is our late sleeper. Sometimes even past 9:30 (I'm so jealous!). Then they're allowed to have 3 hours of screen time (WHY did we get in this terrible habit of allowing them so much screen time?!?). They're each supposed to spend at least an hour outside during the day. Amy, again, spends only exactly that much time, and not one second more. Reed gets more bored and will go outside several times a day. We recently had to forbid them from having their phones/headphones on during outside time, because it seemed every time we'd look outside, they'd be standing there fiddling with the phone.
Reed very much wants us to plan absolutely nothing for the weekends. Amy's a little more interested in leaving the house. Both of them have gotten really good about keeping an eye on our family calendar to know what's on the schedule, which is nice.
That's all I can think of. I'll see if Tod has anything to add. Wish I'd thought of doing this kind of documentation many years ago, I think even I will appreciate looking back at it!
So with that in mind I thought I'd write about a 'typical' day in our house now.
On weekdays, usually Reed gets up on his own, otherwise we wake him up a few minutes after 7. I am not sure Amy's ever woken up on her own at 7 (maybe once in a blue moon), so usually we wake her up at 7. And then again at 7:10. And then again at 7:20.
I leave for work at 6:30 a.m. on the days that I go in to the office (Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays). So Tod's home with the kids, and usually they eat breakfast together and prepare for the day. On days when I telework (Wednesdays and Fridays), the kids eat by themselves since I start working (and doing laundry) at 7. Amy likes to get her lunch made and then leave a little early for the bus - right at 8. But Reed likes to wait until nearly the last possible moment to go to the bus stop, which is around the corner - usually at 8:05 on the dot, after he hastily throws his lunch together. (The bus is scheduled to come at 8:07, but amazingly he's never missed it.) Both kids have headphones on pretty much all the while, listening to who knows what.
The bus brings them back home around 3:45 p.m. Reed texts me to say he's home, if it's an office day. If it's a telework day, I'm usually on my way home when he texts, and I get home a little after 4.
Amy does homework if she's got it (Reed almost never has homework...a mystery we don't truly understand, but we don't question since his grades are great). The headphones are again glued to their ears (can you tell that frustrates me?). Both of them have to spend a half-hour outside doing something at least semi-active. Reed tosses the football to himself in the driveway, or sometimes on the trampoline (well he's back to that recently, after a long break). Amy hits tennis balls against the garage or sometimes shoots hoops. Amy is VERY careful to not spend one millisecond more than 30 minutes outside. If they end up outside at the same time, that's inevitably a recipe for disaster and fighting. Sometimes it seems they're still 3 and 5 years old, not 11 and 14.
Then it's back inside where Reed hides out in the living room probably having screen time when he's not supposed to (he very carefully keeps a pillow in his lap to try to keep up the illusion that he's not looking at his phone). Amy's usually at her desk, drawing or doing typing practice tests lately. Or if she can grab the living room couch, she'll be there drawing and listening to whatever she listens to. (There are frequent fights over the couch.) There they stay until dinner's ready. Phones are not allowed in their rooms, so unfortunately they don't want to spend a lot of time there. Tod usually gets home not too long before we eat dinner at 6.
Dinner. The food aspect can be a little fraught. I'm still struggling a little with making meals that work with Amy being vegetarian, and also trying to accommodate Reed's pickiness. It's a challenge. Reed will also complain if I get repetitive with serving his non-favored meals (which are many). Food aside, I think we have pretty good dinner times. Growing up, the TV was usually on during our family dinners, tuned to the Channel 9 news, waiting for the sports report with Glenn Brenner. But we never have the TV on until later in the evening. We talk about our days during dinner, sometimes talk about current events, we talk about what's on our upcoming calendar. Amy talks about Batman (well, more accurate to say she talks about Robin, her current obsession). Once in a while the kids really share things with us about their days or their studies.
After dinner, we're on an even (Amy) / odd (Reed) schedule for the dishes. There is much complaining when one or the other discovers the dishwasher needs to be unloaded (we usually only have to run it every couple of days, so that can be problematic with them switching off days). Their hand-washing skills still leave something to be desired, so we're still working on that. But mostly they've accepted their dish-doing fate and they don't complain as much as they used to.
Then it's on to the coveted screen time for the rest of the evening. Both kids on their separate computers (Amy has a laptop and Reed has a desktop). Reed plays Overwatch these days (a first person shooter game...blech) and I think he still plays Civilization sometimes. He hasn't been playing the X-box One in the basement for quite a while...guess he finally tired of Madden NFL. The super fantastic thing about online gaming is that Reed talks to his friends over the headphones....not loudly, but loud enough that it makes watching TV in the next room a little challenging. That's probably why some of his friends are allowed to have computers in their rooms (we're holding out on that one...too much temptation for gaming when he's not supposed to, and other possible shenanigans that I'm not even going to mention).
Amy is nearly always dual-screening....watching something on her phone, positioned just in front of her laptop, while she draws on the computer. She still doesn't like to share what she's drawn with us, unfortunately. I try not to push it, but I'd love to see what she's doing. I really miss the days when she wanted to show us every thing she'd drawn (and she's always been a prolific artist). Sometimes she watches TV in our room, since we're usually downstairs watching TV.
Yes I guess I should mention what Tod and I are doing in these evenings. Lately after dinner we've been taking Shelby for a 15 minute walk, enjoying the weirdly mild winter we've been having. Then since Tod's working on his Ph.D. through an online program, most days he does school work for an hour or two. I'm usually knee-deep in Facebook (such a time suck), or I edit photos, or watch TV, or read, or this time of year I do Girl Scout cookie business. I piddle around doing whatever it is I do. When Tod's done with school work, we watch TV together. These days it's the opening segments of Stephen Colbert and Seth Myers, or we watch "This is Us," or "The Daily Show" or some comedies. We don't really watch too terribly much TV, since we're usually in bed pretty close to 10.
Back to the kids...they're busy having way too much screen time. Amy showers a little before 9, and is supposed to be in bed at 9, but in the last few days she's taken to reading after she gets in bed, and deciding for herself that she'll go to bed a half-hour after her scheduled bed time. We've been just giving in on that one, because she's reading....she hasn't been doing all that much reading of late. She claims she takes forever to fall asleep, but we don't really know. Reed goes up to shower at 9:30, and the trouble we have is that because the kids' bathroom is right between their rooms, it's super loud in Amy's room so we've been letting Reed shower in our bathroom. Which ties our bathroom up for a half-hour, when frequently we find we'd like to have done our bedtime preparations before 10 and we find ourselves out of luck. We figure eventually he's going to want to shower in the mornings and we'll be rid of this problem. Their bedtimes are 9 p.m. for Amy and 10 p.m. for Reed, with a half-hour extra on weekends.
On weekends if we've got nothing going on, Reed's still usually up at 7:30 or 8. Amy, on the other hand, is our late sleeper. Sometimes even past 9:30 (I'm so jealous!). Then they're allowed to have 3 hours of screen time (WHY did we get in this terrible habit of allowing them so much screen time?!?). They're each supposed to spend at least an hour outside during the day. Amy, again, spends only exactly that much time, and not one second more. Reed gets more bored and will go outside several times a day. We recently had to forbid them from having their phones/headphones on during outside time, because it seemed every time we'd look outside, they'd be standing there fiddling with the phone.
Reed very much wants us to plan absolutely nothing for the weekends. Amy's a little more interested in leaving the house. Both of them have gotten really good about keeping an eye on our family calendar to know what's on the schedule, which is nice.
That's all I can think of. I'll see if Tod has anything to add. Wish I'd thought of doing this kind of documentation many years ago, I think even I will appreciate looking back at it!
Saturday, February 25, 2017
SOTM!
Well this time...I wish we'd gone to Amy's. She was recognized as "Student of the Month" in her house (Rhinos...each grade is divided into subsets and each has an animal name) in the area of Responsibility (there are four areas of recognition – ROAR: Respect, Ownership, Achievement and Responsibility). Unfortunately the school forgot to tell us Amy would be getting this recognition, so we weren't able to be there. But we are SO proud that her teachers chose her for this recognition! She thinks it's not really a big deal, but it is. Near as I can figure, less than 40 out of 500 kids per grade receive this recognition in a school year, so that puts her in pretty good company...which we know is where she belongs. To celebrate, we got her a couple of new sketch pads.
Way to go, Amy!
Thursday, February 9, 2017
70s on 7
Last night we were on our way to dinner to celebrate the kids' great report cards (such as they are...no paper report cards anymore, it's weird!) and I had the XM "70s on 7" channel going. Queen's "Bohemian Rhapsody" came on, so of course I turned it way up. Reed was perplexed by the song -- "Are you sure this isn't like 7 different songs, not just 1?"
Yep, I'm sure!
Yep, I'm sure!
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| Party on, Wayne! |
Tuesday, January 31, 2017
Same.
Reed likes keeping his room the exact same. We decorated his room not long after we moved in this house, in early 2005, with a farm theme. A blue sky on the top half and green pastures on the bottom. Even when we were talking about possibly remodeling the house, Reed didn't want his room to change in any way. He didn't want to take his many, many posters down and face the prospect of putting them back up. Too much work. We did manage to get him to sign off on replacing the farm bedspread with a sports-themed one several years ago, but that's it. He doesn't want new paint, he doesn't want new anything. He just likes things the same. Always the same. We've offered to redecorate his room several times, but he is just not interested. Oh well, I guess that saves us money!
Good times
We don't socialize much, never really have. We are just people who prefer to be at home, alone. All of us. Well, less Amy than the rest of us. The unfortunate side effect is that our kids don't have a lot of experience socializing with non-family members. It's a small regret that I have.
So our friends the Davises invited us over for a family game night, and we were a little bit excited and probably nervous a tiny bit too. Their oldest son Nico (oh he's' Nicholas now, I forgot) was in Reed's Cub Scout troop, and they still hang out sometimes at lunch and get along pretty well. Their younger son Kendall is in Amy's grade, and was in her fifth grade last year, and one of her classes this year. They get along pretty well. And Amanda and Kyle are super-nice.
Anyway we went, and we all had a great time...all 8 of us, I think. We played Telestrations (the Davises' first time playing it) and some other game, then Reed and Nicholas disappeared to play video games while Amy played Trivial Pursuit Family Edition with the grown-ups.
I think we were there for about 4 hours. It was a rousing success. So we CAN be social after all! We're hoping to host the Davises at our house for games sometime soon.
So our friends the Davises invited us over for a family game night, and we were a little bit excited and probably nervous a tiny bit too. Their oldest son Nico (oh he's' Nicholas now, I forgot) was in Reed's Cub Scout troop, and they still hang out sometimes at lunch and get along pretty well. Their younger son Kendall is in Amy's grade, and was in her fifth grade last year, and one of her classes this year. They get along pretty well. And Amanda and Kyle are super-nice.
Anyway we went, and we all had a great time...all 8 of us, I think. We played Telestrations (the Davises' first time playing it) and some other game, then Reed and Nicholas disappeared to play video games while Amy played Trivial Pursuit Family Edition with the grown-ups.
I think we were there for about 4 hours. It was a rousing success. So we CAN be social after all! We're hoping to host the Davises at our house for games sometime soon.
Monday, January 30, 2017
Marching for women
About 200,000 people were expected for the march. My first sign that it was going to be bigger than that was on the drive into Arlington. The pedestrian bridge over Route 66 at the Vienna Metro station was jam-packed with people. I saw on Facebook that lines to get on the subway were extremely long. When we got dropped off around 9:15 a.m., there were lots of people – a group of Mennonite men and women singing a beautiful and carefully practiced song. Tons of people in pink hats, carrying signs. There were men there, I'd say more than I expected.
We tried to figure out where best to position ourselves so that we might see at least a screen that was broadcasting what was happening on the stage. We ended up in a nook near the American Indian Museum, where we could look through a tree to see a screen - we figured it was probably the best we could comfortably do. So there we stayed. We watched in amazement at the scene behind us on the National Mall....
The people just kept coming and coming – it was truly a sea of humanity, many of them in their pink hats. It was quite a visual. I wish any of my pictures did it justice, but they really don't.
Unfortunately we weren't able to hear much from the stage, as the speakers only worked intermittently, and they weren't loud enough anyway. We "listened" to the speakers for about two hours, and did a lot of people watching, checking out the wide variety of incredible signs people brought.
By this time it was about 12:30, with the march scheduled to begin at 1:15. With so many people there, there was minimal internet access or even cell service. But we could tell that the day had far exceeded all expectations. And we knew there was little chance we'd actually be able to make it to the march route - what little online info and word of mouth we got actually even said they'd called off the march because there were too many people – I think that was briefly true, but quickly rescinded. It took us 45 minutes to go about two blocks, so we just followed the non-marching crowd, and ended up walking down Pennsylvania Avenue, which had been shut down at the last minute. The Capitol Building behind us, and still a sea of pink hats and protest signs. We walked and we followed the chants of a girl, probably 8 years old – "Tell me what democracy looks like!" – "THIS IS WHAT DEMOCRACY LOOKS LIKE!" I've never participated in a chant before! LOL
I've been in lots of crowded situations, but never anything of this magnitude. And you know what, it was truly incredible – I saw nothing but patience and kindness, the entire day. No one was impatient, no one got belligerent at the close quarters. Just kindness. Can you imagine? And while it's hard to know exact numbers, the DC crowd was estimated to be 500,000. And there were sister marches all around the country, around the world, on every single continent. Absolutely astonishing.
I will say that there were lots of hysterically funny but vulgar signs, which I appreciated but could've done without...let's not sink to that level. But it was about freedom for people to express themselves, so even if it wasn't my thing, I respect that it might be yours.
Some folks evidently weren't too keen on the Women's March, or didn't know what it was about. I read this online, and it works for me...I am proud to have been there.
We march for EQUAL PAY
We march for THE RIGHT TO CONTROL OUR BODIES
We march for A LIVABLE PLANET
We march for THE END OF VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN
We march for HEALTH CARE FOR ALL
We march for PUBLIC EDUCATION
We march for THE CONSTITUTION
AND THE BILL OF RIGHTS.
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