The Queen's Rambles

Grrrrrrr. Erik’s school situation makes me want to punch someone in the face. I absolutely hate that our school system is created and run by people who have almost no classroom experience or understanding of how children really learn. I know teachers also hate this. How can parents and teachers take the power back?

Our school district has started something they are calling Curriculum 2.0 with this year’s crop of kindergartners. I can tell his teacher is frustrated by it, but I think he and I are even more frustrated.

He was so excited to start kindergarten. I knew it wouldn’t live up to his expectations, but mainly he wanted to do “real math.” For him, this meant he wanted to do addition and subtraction problems. He does these at home all the time. I reward him for good behavior by giving him math worksheets. Sounds awful to me, but it works for him.

I knew they would ease into math. It’s a kindergarten class, after all. However, I had no freakin’ clue how slowly this would all happen. They do a lot of math concepts that Erik doesn’t view as “real math”–making patterns, learning odd and even numbers, counting. Oh my god, with the counting. I would be pissed too if I had to draw objects for every number. Not draw 20 objects and number them. Literally write 1, draw one object. Write 2, draw two objects. All the way up to 30. Is that not the most ridiculous thing you’ve ever heard of? That’s just too much repetition, especially for someone who can count to over 100 and understands one-to-one correspondence.

I have been in e-mail contact with the teacher. We are trying to work on solutions to get Erik to do his work in class. We both agree that he CAN do it. He doesn’t have any problems understanding. He just doesn’t WANT to do it. This makes him hate school with a red hot passion. I don’t want him to hate school. He’s only in his first year. How awful to be six years old and know that you hate school but have to keep going for the next 13 years. That seems like a lifetime to a child. It breaks my heart for him.

I have suggested that the teacher provide him with more difficult math assignments as an incentive. It seems win-win-win to me. And seriously, how hard is it to throw an extra worksheet at a kid? That’s all he wants. I would love to have some more advanced concepts taught to him in a way that meets his needs, but a worksheet is a good start.

I get an e-mail back full of a bunch of teacher-y mumbo jumbo that even I can’t understand. And I used to be a teacher. Excuses, excuses, excuses. She basically said that he wouldn’t hate school if he would just do his work so he would have time to do the more enjoyable activities.

DUH! If only he would do his work we wouldn’t have this problem.

I get what she means. It is frustrating to know that he would be happier if he would just do what he was supposed to do and quit his cryin’, but that is obviously not working for him.

I talked with a friend who used to work for the school district and is very involved in her school’s PTA. She has a daughter in 3rd grade and a son in Kindergarten. She is also experiencing the same frustration–this new curriculum 2.0 does not allow for kids to be advanced up when they are ready for more complicated concepts. It’s truly not the teacher’s fault, she’s just following policy. But it still sucks. The teacher said she was really frustrated because the kids don’t get to do any mathematical algorithms until 3rd grade. I honestly have no idea what that even means. He’s not going to get to learn to add until 3rd grade? What? What’s a mathematical algorithm?

So last night I decided I am just going to have to get him into some kind of alternative program. I don’t want to be annoying and claim he’s talented and gifted, but. . . well. . . he is pretty bright.

We live in a HUGE school district. According to the district website we are the 16th largest school system in the USA. There are 200 schools. There is ONE TAG school for grades 1-3. It’s located way, way, way far away. If he even got in (which is very unlikely, it is highly competitive), it would literally be an hour and a half commute one way. That’s so not going to happen. They have a few more TAG magnent programs for students in grades 4&5. One is right down the road from us, in the worst school in town. All the magnet schools in the district are in the roughest neighborhoods, at schools most parents don’t want to send their kids to even for the sake of the TAG program. I know several parents who refuse to send their kids to the TAG program because of all the bullying that goes on in the schools. We have a TAG program in a middle school in our town. There are always articles in the paper about how the principal is trying to integrate the kids into the regular classrooms, which totally defeats the purpose of a TAG program. The principal doesn’t think it is fair that the TAG students get to have more opportunities than the regular students. I can see the point to some extent, but those kids are working hard to earn those opportunities (you are not just admitted for good grades, you also have to prove you are a “motivated learner” and “responsible citizen”). Isn’t that the whole point of the TAG program? To have more opportunities to learn?

I was looking at the district website and it says that all classrooms are supposed to provide accelerated learning opportunities to students who need them. I am going to go back and ask Erik’s teacher about this. If she can’t get something going, I will talk to the principal. I am going to have to become a major pain in the butt parent, aren’t I?

You know what really enrages me? Stats show that about 30% of the students in our district qualify for TAG classes. That’s a damned lot of students who are not getting what they need! If there are that many TAG students in each school there is no effin’ reason they even need a separate school. Each school should have enough students in each grade to run a TAG class right in their home schools. Why is this not happening???? It can’t totally be about money. These students have to have a teacher, whether or not they are in a special program. In my experience as a teacher, a TAG teacher would not earn any more than a regular classroom teacher.

All this lip service about serving our kids, while doing jack all to actually serve them. It’s infuriating.

At this point I don’t even want to send Elsa to preschool. I think it is vital for social development, but if she’s just going to be bored in kindergarten and completely hate school because she’s learning how to do things she learned in her 3 year old preschool class what’s the point?

I should be queen of the world. I would fix this all up right quick.

ETA: Ok, I re-read the e-mail the teacher sent me and maybe I was too hasty. At the end she did say she was trying to work out how to do math in small groups and she hoped she would be able to do some higher order learning with him. Maybe she did hear what I was saying after all.

January needs to end. It has not been kind. And here I thought things were going to turn around in 2012. What happened to my positive attitude?

Mike, Erik and Elsa all had the stomach flu. Erik was out of school two days. I couldn’t go anywhere or do anything because I was too busy wiping up puke and cleaning stinky butts. Gag gag gag.

As all this was happening, my laptop started acting weird. Then it stopped booting up. Nooooo!

Happily, Dell sent a very dashing African gentleman out the very next day. He called me ma’dame, and now I must insist that everyone call me ma’dame (pronounced very differently from a brothel owner madam). I will wear a turquoise ball gown and fancy shoes. It will be super practical.

Now I have a new keyboard, new motherboard and new hard drive. Problem: hard drive had nothing installed on it. I couldn’t even get online until we got some drivers on it. It was driving me insane. I couldn’t connect to the internet. Oh noes! How do people LIVE LIKE THIS????

I was getting stir crazy and ready to explode by yesterday afternoon. When Mike walked in the door I growled that I was leaving, then took off for parts unknown. I hadn’t been outside in daaaaaays.

Thankfully I was able to get out of the house today because I pretended I was completely healthy. By 1:30 pm, though, I could no longer ignore the fact that I had a raging cold. I’ve been sneezing so hard that my back and shoulder muscles are all locked up. It’s going to be a long night. Hopefully Nyquil will knock me out.

Erik is all better. Mike is all better. Elsa is having issues. Every time she eats solid food she starts choking, gagging and puking. I don’t know if it is a stomach issue or a gag reflex issue (remember her gagging issues from age 6-12 months?). I guess I’ll give it a couple of more days, but then she’ll have to go do the doctor. It was so sad when she took a bite of cookie, started gagging it up, then started crying for her cookie.

This problem means she’s been exclusively breastfed for five days straight. She weighs over 30 pounds. She needs a lot of food. I am freakin’ exhausted. I really want to get her back into cloth diapers, because she’s back to having breastmilk poo explosions. It’s all really pleasant.

On the other hand, she is starting to really thin up and look like a girl. She even fit into a pair of jeans today. I should not be talking about my 1 year old like this. Let’s just say the poor dear won’t be starving any time soon.

We’re supposed to go to Elsa’s baby gym class tomorrow, but I guess it would be pretty rude to go and sneeze all over the other babies and equipment. Erik already puked in their garbage can (there as no school on Monday, so he went there for an open gym. He didn’t stay long). They will really love me. It’s disappointing because her class is one of my favorite parts of the week. She’s so joyful when she’s climbing on the ladders and swinging on all the equipment.

At least I have Carbonite, an internet computer back up system. Thank you, Beck! It is still working on restoring all my files, but at least I am not having a total panic over losing all my pictures again. They are all backed up and safe. Well worth the money, since we all know I’m a procrastinator and wouldn’t have kept up with it on my own.

So what ever happened with Pottermore? I was looking forward to it, but it never really got going I guess?

And how do you deal with a child who can’t correctly answer a true/false question about a story because all the questions are obviously false because the story is fiction, therefore the story itself is false so by definition none of the answers can be true? Did that make any sense to you? Because it seriously hurts my brain. Erik is literal in the extreme and sometimes I just don’t even know what to make of him. The only bright spot is that I can call my mother and she can understand what he means. She is also extremely literal. That’s why she and my dad or my sister can having screaming, raging fits at each other and be talking about the exact same thing and hold the exact same opinion. She doesn’t understand metaphor or simile or most other literary devices. I hope Erik’s super logical brain is just the result of being a child, not something he will have to struggle with all his life. It truly has been a struggle for my mom.

I wonder if I should ask his teacher about it. I haven’t seen any true/false tests come home from school, so maybe it is not something that is developmentally appropriate. We have a set of early reading books from the library that have true/false quizzes in the back. Maybe the publishers just don’t understand kids or intend the books to be used with slightly older children.

I guess I should go and find some Nyquil and try to get some sleep. Here’s hoping no one starts dry heaving at 1:30 am, like last night. At least there was no clean up involved.

What do you get when you hear a little “gurgle gurgle gurgle” at 1:30 in the am? A bucket load of puke all over the place.

This poor girl is a pukey little thing. I remember Erik having the stomach flu a couple of times, but nothing like this. I’ve got the sound of the puke down pat, and can have her lifted up and held over the floor in about .4 seconds. Usually that’s enough to make most of it land on the floor instead of in my bed. Isn’t that charming?

I was starting to think she has some kind of food allergy, but then she spiked a fever, so maybe not. I hope not. One of my good friends has a little boy with a crazy amount of food allergies–eggs, soy, dairy, nuts, sesame. Poor kid can hardly eat anything. You don’t even realize how many social events revolve around food until you are planning them with a 3 year old boy in mind and realize that he’s going to be a sad panda if you don’t think of some alternative ways to have fun.

Speaking of food. Ugh. I need a way to quit craving sugar. I was looking up ways to stop sugar cravings, and found a lot of herbs. Unfortunately every website lists a different set of herbs as the answer to the sugar problem. This tells me that NONE of them are the answer. Bah humbug.

I was talking to a friend last night and she said that Dr. Oz says the body needs three things: sleep, sex and food. If you miss out on one, the body compensates by craving another. She was specifically talking about sleep at this point, but I don’t get any sleep or regular sex, so my mind latched onto the sex. Gimme sex and I’ll be skinny! That’s how it works, right?

One of these days we won’t have a baby in the house that wakes up at unfortunate times. I guess this is why you want to live near the grandparents and let them take the kids on overnights.

I know one way to stop the sugar cravings is to just stop eating sugar and white flour. After about five days the cravings will be gone. I KNOW this. I NEED to do this. I can’t seem to do it though. I start with good intentions and can hold out until after Elsa’s nap, but then I’m like an addict with an urge. I gotta have a little something sweet. Then it’s all downhill the rest of the day.

I found a new-to-me source of fat lady clothes that I’m excited to try. I guess if I keep up with the sugar eating, I might as well do it while I’m well dressed. It’s a new online only store through The Limited called eloquii. They are having an excellent sweater sale right now (all sweaters for $20.12), so I ordered a few. They have free shipping and returns, which makes me very, very happy. I basically refuse to shop online if I have to pay for the returns. That gets really expensive, really fast.

Ugh. I have nasty mommy duties to attend to. I don’t know which is worst: tending to Elsa or trying a bit of the recipe Erik invented. Three words–carrots, strawberries and cocoa powder.

What a day we’ve had. The crazy started when Erik couldn’t find his Wii-mote, which meant he couldn’t play a video game for five minutes before getting ready for school.

If there were reports of earthquakes in the DC area, my home was probably the epicenter. He did a full on meltdown, complete with laying on the floor kicking and screaming. He doesn’t do that very often because it has never once gotten him what he wanted. Is it bad that it makes me laugh more than anything else? It is just so ridiculous. I know it’s totally fake because I told him his friends were going to think he was a baby if they heard him when they walked by the house and he stopped it instantly. That was probably the wrong thing to say according to the book I’ve been reading, but it made him pull himself together. I’m not so sure about this book. I am trying to do things like reflect his feelings back to him and let him know I am listening, but it just pisses him off even more.

The good in this whole debacle? He was throwing such a tantrum that we left the house with about 60 seconds to spare. That meant I didn’t have to stand out in the freezing cold for very long.

I went down in the basement and found the Wii-mote next to the pillow he was sitting on. I swear that boy is blind.

The day was very peaceful until he arrived home seven hours later. He was calm and happy when he got home. I fed him a good snack. He got to watch a little TV. Everything was cool. We were enjoying life.

He very kindly asked if Elsa had a turn to watch Elmo today, since he usually has to give her an Elmo turn. I totally thought he was being nice and offering to turn it to Elmo but he completely FLIPPED when I told him that she doesn’t get to watch TV much while he’s at school, so it was her turn to watch Elmo.

He was going off the deep end with another tantrum, but I got Elmo going and Mr. Noodle was doing his weird stuff. Erik couldn’t maintain his rage in the face of Mr. Noodle. He got interested in the show and calmed down.

These outbursts are almost making me think he needs some counseling or anger management–something!

In other news, I have been a busy little bee trying to take care of MOMS Club and Campfire stuff. I can’t ever seem to just sit back, relax, and let other people take charge. I suppose it is good to keep my brain busy.

We went on a tour of a super fancy preschool-8th grade academy on Wednesday. It was really pretty and colorful, but all the teachers were dressed up and had that kind of phony interaction with kids that drives me crazy. I can’t really put a finger on what makes it phony, but I’m sure you know what I mean. The words are perfectly nice, but it just feels like a show?

I’d actually love to send Erik there for elementary school. They have small classes, lots of outdoor time and are not constrained by state tests. They get to follow the children’s lead and do things the kids and teachers actually enjoy. It’s just a dream, though. Their preschool is double the price of my little church basement preschool. I didn’t even look at the tuition for elementary school.

I am quite happy with the preschool Erik attended. The teachers are all older women who love their jobs. They wouldn’t be doing it if they didn’t love it. You can just tell they are genuine when you talk to them and see them interact with the children. They love the kids and don’t sound fakey-fake when speaking to them. They have seen it all and don’t let anything fluster them. It may not be fancy, but it is certainly Just Fine. And way, way cheaper.

I took my neighbor along on the tour just to give her something to do. I think I am about to give up on this pseudo-friendship. She completely wears me out. I hate to be a judgey pants. But. . . ha. . isn’t there always a but? I don’t give a crap about the average mommy war stuff, but when someone hands my toddler a king sized pack of candy without asking me, I’m going to get irked. When that same person calms her 8 month old by giving her a sour gummy rope my eyes are going to pop out of my head. She even told me that her 2 year old doesn’t drink water or milk–she only likes Coke.

She also told me that I was mean because I strapped both he girls into the car seats and fastened them properly. Apparently she only ever uses the chest clips and not the five point harness part. Ho-lee Crap. I can’t really deal with a person who doesn’t understand basic child safety guidelines.

I will still be kind. She is still in a pretty dire situation that I can’t even imagine. I will have a really hard time keeping my mouth shut, though.

The weekend started off a little rocky, mainly because Erik's behavior has been so frustrating lately.  Saturday afternoon, though, we kind of put our foot down and said we were going to have nothing but fun this weekend.  I think it was a very much needed attitude adjustment for us all.

On Saturday we played game after game of Uno, Qwirkle, and Memory.  We baked cake batter blondies*. We laughed and giggled and had fun. THANK GOODNESS. That’s how I want our family life too look.

We get way too bogged down by school, cooking, cleaning, laundry, homework, grocery shopping, responsibilities all the time. We need to stop and relax and let our kids enjoy their childhood.

On Saturday evening I thought we needed to continue the fun weekend, so I looked through my stack of Groupons and found admission tickets to Port Discovery over in Baltimore. I can’t believe we’ve never been. It was totally amazing. Easily the best children’s museum we’ve been to, at least for youngish children.

A couple of years ago someone made a negative remark about the place and said it wasn’t really for little kids, which is why I’ve never wanted to go. I do agree that it wouldn’t be worth it to take a toddler (admission can be pricey, plus parking, food and gas all add up to big bucks for a day trip from Germantown), but I think it would totally be worth it for ages four and up. Not something we can afford to do every weekend, but something we will have to do again sometime. I’ll have to keep my eye on all the Grouponesque sites.

Erik and Elsa couldn’t get enough of the “urban treehouse” in middle of the place. There was a huge, huge climbing structure in middle of the lobby. Instead of going up the stairs or elevator, you could climb up various ropes, go through tunnels, and all that fun stuff and end up at different floors. You could get back to the ground level by taking a big slide (if you could find the entrance). It was a little scary to have two kids running around this giant play area, even with two adults. We lost Elsa once, but quickly found her before I started screaming hysterically. It is big enough for adults to join in (and adults are encouraged to do so), but I didn’t find crawling around in tunnels to be all that fun. Call me a cranky old woman.

They had a ton of other stuff, including a toddler room. Elsa was totally unimpressed and ran out at the first chance. After climbing rope ladders intended for ages 4 and up, who needs a gently sloping maze?

Erik’s other favorite part was the water room. You can put on a rain jacket and crocs (sadly I didn’t see the crocs until after his shoes were soaked) that they provide, and have at it. He spent a long time trying to put together a big fountain.

I think it’s safe to say a good time was had by all. We did have a moment of panic when we went to leave. No one told us that our arm bands were number coded. As soon as we put our coats on, Erik started ripping off his arm band. When we got to the exit, they started checking our numbers to make sure we weren’t kidnapping some random child. Erik had no number. Thankfully they took our receipt as proof that he belonged to us, but I had a moment of mama bear panic.

One of the really nice parts of the trip: the drive was much faster than usual.

They opened up a toll road from very near our town to very near Baltimore just a few months ago. It was an easy, breezy drive with hardly any traffic. In fact, it was such a smooth road that I was sure we would get a ticket. I kept wanting to tell Mike to drive faster because it felt like we were sitting still, but then I’d look over and he’d be doing at least 70.

We also accidentally missed all the Ravens traffic. We had no idea they were playing, but we had to drive right by the stadium. The game was just letting out when we drove past on our way out of town. I’ve never seen such a seething mass of humanity. Everyone looked so grim that we were sure the Ravens lost. I guess they were all just thinking about their drive home.

Lessons for next time: Pack a lunch! This is always my lesson. They didn’t have any food available and there were not really any low cost options around. It is in a little square with a bunch of clubs and bars, so not really child friendly. There was a Subway, but there was hardly any seating. We walked a bit and found P. F. Changs, which was ok I guess. Port Discovery does have a set of tables where they encourage families to picnic, so we’ll have to do that. Next time I will also leave the diaper bag in a locker. It is no fun trying to haul a big diaper bag up rope ladders and though tiny tunnels.

*Cake Batter Blondies Review: Really fun and easy for kids to make. Kids love sprinkles, I guess. We didn’t use the white choc. chips in our first batch and I thought they were the most disgusting things I’ve ever baked. Seriously gross. They tasted strongly of boxed cake chemicals. Oddly, adding the white choc. chips changed everything. I don’t know how, but those white chips make this one of the best things I’ve ever tasted. Magic. I think Erik will be the Box Tops now that we have this recipe.

I am so irked with my neighbor’s kids. I am not in a good mood today anyway, but these kids have been rubbing me wrong for months.

When they first moved in I was really excited because they seemed nice and they have involved parents. And they are nice on the surface. But they are also human beings and human beings are not perfect.

There is a 9 year old girl (let’s call her Jane) and a 6 year old boy (let’s call him Henry). He’s in first grade, so at least we don’t have to deal with them being in class together.

The parents are nice people, but they definitely have a different attitude towards life than we do. The dad is really short and very muscular. Think classic Napoleon complex. He has to prove he’s a macho man and wants his son to be tough. You know the type. He brags about not taking crap from anyone and talks about his gun.

So his son is tough, at least when it comes to dishing it out. I’ve seen him full on kick Erik in the stomach, punch him in the face, throw him on the ground. You get the idea. He’s good at fighting because his dad teaches him fighting moves and expects him to practice. Erik always wants to fight, but this kid is way too intense and Erik is finally learning to opt out sometimes.

Of course Erik tries to dish it out as well. He’s just not very good at it. They BOTH start crying when the other gets the upper hand. I usually tell them to either suck it up or quit fighting. Today I yelled at both of them and told them I didn’t want to see their bodies touch each other or Erik had to come in. Then they both cry that I’m mean. So frustrating.

I could handle this level of annoyance, but the big sister kicks things up a notch. I guess she’s just doing what big sisters do and defending her brother, but I’m sick of it. She’s constantly tattling on Erik. She even tried to get one of the safety patrol boys involved in this tattling. She gets really pissed when I don’t instantly punish Erik for picking on her poor, poor little brother. She doesn’t understand that they are equally at blame with all the fighting non-sense and that her brother is more than capable of taking care of himself. Half the time she tattles, I’ve seen the whole exchange and her brother started it. I will not get mad at Erik for defending himself.

Today Erik took his pogo stick outside and I was helping him try to use it. Henry was there and we told him he could have a turn, but then his mom came out and he had to go somewhere.

When they got back, I was down at the park with Elsa and Erik was at home in the bathroom. Jane ran up to me and demanded that Henry get a turn on the pogo stick. I told her that he could have a turn later, when I was at the house, but that wasn’t good enough. She became very rude and pouty, telling me that it wasn’t fair to promise him something and then not give it to him. I told her that I was not leaving the park to go get the pogo stick and he could have a turn the next time we have it out. Ugh. As if I am going to re-arrange my whole life so an annoying kid can have a turn on the freakin’ pogo stick.

And now Elsa is back from her bath and crawling all over me, so I better hit post.

The dryer vent guy just left and it is already smelling better in there. I really hope that was the problem. I had no freakin’ clue about cleaning dryer vents. My childhood home had the dryer right next to an outside wall. It probably had 2 inches of hose. My dryer vent goes up an all the way across my house. The guy said we ha 0% airflow and a few loads away from a house fire. Scary!

Moral: Go get your vents cleaned right now!

Elsa started randomly puking in middle of the night, so that was fun. She only puked two times (midnight and 1 am), but I was awake all night just waiting for more. The first time I caught her before she really started puking (sad that I recognize the subtle sound of a pre-puke stomach gurgle) and was able to hang her over the side of the bed. I’m sure my carpet thanks me. Not so lucky the second time. I have a ton of laundry to do today. Bah. At least I can do it without killing us all.

I’m sure you’re all dying to know whether we are alive or not. The smell has decreased significantly, but it is still there. The smell of burning is gone, and now it just smells like some kind of paint or chemical. I had my firefighter neighbor come over and sniff it tonight. He said it didn’t smell electrical at all, but suggested we clean out the dryer vent. We’ve been meaning to do that since we moved here, but kept putting it off. I have an appointment to have it done on Wed morning. I hope that solves the problem. I just really don’t understand what is going on.

I also took down the light fixture and found that the lining was all messed up. It had a spongy lining with an adhesive backing. It had been messed up and part of the adhesive backing was exposed and clearly old and crinkly. I don’t know. If the dryer vent cleaning doesn’t help, I’ll call an electrician. I no longer feel like we’re on the verge of a tragic death. *knock on wood*

In other wonderful and exciting news, my son came home with a bad note today. He was supposed to bring it home last Wednesday. He had to move his card to orange because he wasn’t listening. He had to eat lunch on the stage (where they put troublemakers) and he missed recess. He also had to write a note home for me and Mike.

Except he never brought it home.

Today he came in and told me I wasn’t allowed to look in his folder. As if that was happening. He was totally freaked out and tried to fight me for it.

In addition to the offense last week, he specifically did not bring the note home even though he was told he had to bring it home. He only brought it home when his teacher told him she was going to call me about it. Then he told me the teacher was lying about everything.

I don’t know what to do with this child. He has been crazy the past two weeks. Refusing to listen, running around in circles, being mouthy. Ugh.

I am trying to “find his currency.” He hates going to bed. HATES it. So tonight I made him go to bed 15 minutes early for the orange card plus 15 minutes early for the hiding it. We were supposed to go swimming on Wednesday afternoon, but I also cancelled that. I don’t know if that was harsh enough, but it sure did make him scream. It is hard to figure out the balance between putting too much pressure on him and making him totally hate school and feel like he has to lie to me even more and giving him consequences so he gets things through his brain.

I’ve been looking into an alternate discipline system because time outs just aren’t doing it. I don’t see how any of them are going to work if he doesn’t care. Here’s something I came up with tonight. I would prefer something with a more positive spin, but I mostly need something that will work.

I’m going to make some sort of big clock and make a little Erik to go on the minute hand. It will start out at 8 pm every morning. When he doesn’t listen, the clock will get moved back five minutes. That will be his bedtime, so it will be up to him if he has to go to bed super early or on time. If he is able to redeem himself, he may be able to earn back minutes. I need to think on it a little more. I want to incorporate something that rewards the positive behaviors I’m looking for.

No lie, parenting is the hardest job I’ve ever had.

I hardly slept last night. I kept waking up to make sure we were all alive, though I suppose if I didn’t wake up I would never know the difference.

The room doesn’t have the burning smell as much, but it has a horrible chemical smell with an underlay of paint. We really have no idea what it is. I don’t know if I should call an electrician or what?

Yesterday I noticed a weird smell in the house, but it wasn’t totally pervasive and Mike couldn’t smell anything (he has a bad cold) so I gave up on finding it and just figured it would go away.

This morning the smell was worse than ever. It was like burning paint–fire and chemicals mixed together. Just the sort of smell you want in your house. Or not.

I was ready to call 911, but then we went into the basement and finally figured out it was coming from the laundry room. We have a super old fridge down there, plus a semi-old washer and a brand new dryer. It seemed like the smell was coming from the fridge, so we unplugged it and started airing out the house.

That didn’t help one iota. I still wanted to call 911.

Next, we unplugged the washer.

No change. I still wanted to call 911.

So now we have the brand new dryer unplugged and Mike thinks the smell is finally starting to dissipate. I’m not so sure and I still want to call 911. I don’t want to sleep in a house that smells like burning chemicals. I don’t want my little family to be a story on the nightly news.

We have lots of smoke alarms and a carbon monoxide detector all in working order. We’ve cracked a couple of windows for the night, so maybe we will get some fresh oxygen. I am going to be too scared to sleep.

Could it really be the brand new dryer? I don’t understand what is happening and I don’t know who to call to fix the problem.

In other strange news. . .

As we were loading up the van for our weekly lunch outing, a neighbor lady came up to me and told me she was from social services. If there’s ever a sentence a parent doesn’t want to hear coming out of some random lady’s mouth, “I’m from social services” tops the list. I was doing a run down in my mind of all the horrible and abusive things I do to my children–let Erik go out in the cold in his crocs! Yell too loudly! Get really angry and make a very mean face!

It turns out she wasn’t really from social services. I guess she used to be a social worker and thought saying she was from social services would be a good introduction? I don’t know. She said her church did a toy drive for Christmas and she had a ton of left over toys, so she was giving them to all the children in the neighborhood. She wanted to give Erik and Elsa something. It was all very strange, but I let her pick something for the kids. Erik got a little car set and Elsa got a very cheap talking baby doll that came with a couple of bottles and other stuff. I’m sure the people who donated the toys would be thrilled to know their stuff went to kids who are already pretty spoiled. I was going to turn around and re-donate them, but the kids saw them and that option was quickly eliminated.

All the money I spent on Elsa’s Christmas, and guess what she’s obsessed with? The ten buck Wal-Mart doll. She sticks the bottle in the mouth and calls it water. She’s obsessed. She also likes to take its clothes on and off.

Usually we put Elsa in a two piece pajama set, but tonight we were out [unplugged washer and dryer on my laundry day] so had to put her in a one piece set. Her baby doll has the same type of pajama set.

She kept screaming “No! Me not baby! Not mine! Not baby! I don’t wear baby shirt!” and having a conniption over these jammies. She even managed to get to the zipper and get them half off before Mike laid down the law. It is still so shocking to me to hear her speak so clearly and in such complete sentences when she’s only 20 months old. Erik didn’t really start talking till his 2nd birthday, so I’m not used to being able to communicate that well with a toddler. It sure does make it a lot easier to deal with a toddler who can adequately convey her wants and needs. She still does her fair share of screaming, but it is nothing like how Erik was at this age. It must be very, very frustrating to be non-verbal but KNOW in your brain exactly what you want.

Speaking of Erik, I ordered a book about six year olds yesterday. I really need some insight into his psyche. One moment he’s completely clingy, which isn’t fun with a giant 50 pound child who is made of sharp bones. The next moment he is sulky. And some moments he is completely happy, silly and fun. It’s those clingy and sulky moments that I need help understanding.

I’m sure most of you have heard of the very outdated Bates-Ames child development books. Though they were written in the 70s, I find the developmental information to be spot on. Their solutions are ridiculous and their assumptions about family life are laughable, but they know their basic kid psychology. I find it extremely helpful to my own mental health to read that Erik is perfectly normal. He’s not acting crazy because he wants to make me blow a gasket. He’s just being [insert age here].

They took the series out of our library awhile ago. I never read the 5 year old book, but maybe the very title indicates why I didn’t feel the need to pursue it: Your Five-Year-Old: Sunny and Serene. I do agree that five was a good year for us. The title of the six book seems spot on so far: Loving and Defiant.

We had Campfire today and I was ready to tear my hair out. Erik would not participate or pay attention. He wanted to sit behind me and kick at my back, while hiding from the other kids during the lesson (totally not like him). I hope that book is shipped quickly! It’s not like any of the kids were strangers, either. His best friends are in the group.

Ok, time for me to go downstairs and see if the laundry room smells any better. I feel like we are total fools to sleep in a house with this sort of problem. Hope you hear from me soon!

I guess I shouldn’t leave you hanging. I’ll go down, sniff, and let you know what I think before I go to bed.

Conclusion: It must have been the dryer. It is still a little smelly, but nothing like it was this morning. I feel much better about sleeping in the house now. Thank goodness!