The Queen's Rambles

Mike’s vacation goals have been met. I just put Elsa to bed. In her bed. Without me holding her. Without me nursing her. SHE FELL ASLEEP IN HER BED.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know many of you expect your children to do that on their own anyway. We are attachment parents (even though I’ve never read anything by Dr. Sears and don’t believe that there is one correct parenting style). She’s been sleeping in our bed since the beginning. When she was really little she would sleep in a moses basket, but she outgrew that pretty quickly.

Now, if she would just sleep through the night we’d be golden. She’s been waking up a couple of times a night, which isn’t so bad I guess. I think she’d sleep better if we’d get a fan in here, but I can’t seem to remember to buy one when we are out and about. That’s the bad thing about living in a three story townhouse. The top floor is always hella-hot and the basement is always freezing.

Erik is having a sleepover tonight. I know he will be just fine, but it feels weird not to have him around. Mike is off at a D. C. United soccer game. I got him tickets for his birthday. I didn’t realize I was buying them from a resale place (StubHub) so it was a bit of a surprise when the tickets arrived and had a different name on them. Mike and his buddy are convinced they won’t be able to get into the game, but I told them it’s a soccer game, not an airplane ride.

Elsa hasn’t had any boob since Sunday! She was asking for it tonight, but was easily distracted. I think we can officially say she is weaned! It is good, except for the horrific change in her pooping patterns. She used to poop at 1 pm. If we were very unlucky she would poop around bedtime, but that was pretty rare. I seriously do not remember ever changing a dirty diaper while we were out since she’s been in disposables (and she’s been in disposables exactly a year).

This week? She is a poop machine. I’ve had to change at least 7 diapers in public, in my van, or at friends’ houses. I can’t seem to keep enough wipes in my diaper bag. She has been eating a can of beans every day, so it’s not been pleasant.

My friend had her pool set up tonight and it was hilarious to watch the difference between her kids and my kids. My kids are. . . shall we say. . . not dainty. She has a “family size” wading pool in a rectangular shape. Elsa hopped right in and began pouring water over her friend’s head. Her friend, another two year old, freaked the heck out and refused to stay in the pool. It was too cold and she didn’t like the water.

Erik and his little buddy were doing jumps into the pool. They were running a long way, then jumping over the side and sliding across the bottom of the pool (splashing Elsa in the process). Elsa thought this was the most hilarious thing ever and would jump when they jumped. The other little girl thought she was being torturted by the Spanish Inquisition. Erik’s jumps were insane. I think he has a future in the triple jump. He could easily clear the side of the pool and land half-way across it. His little friend is much more timid and would run up to the very edge, stop, then do a small little hop across the side.

Erik may not have great handwriting or be able to focus well at school. He may hate drawing. But man, oh man, is that kid full of physical prowess. I took my camera, but the battery was at home charging. Doh!

Speaking of school. Grrrrrrr. His teacher said exactly what I thought she’d say in response to my e-mail about Erik’s hearing. I honestly don’t think he has a problem with his hearing, but I was trying to politely tell her to speak up. He never once has a problem hearing the sub as far as I know.

So she will try to enunciate more clearly, but Erik’s only hearing problem is “selective hearing” and a refusal to focus on the subject at hand. I honestly can’t say she’s wrong, but I find her attitude extremely off-putting for a kindergarten teacher. I’m trying to figure out if she’s like this with all the kids or if she has a special dislike of Erik. I think he’s a really charming, personable kid who is well liked by many adults but I can see how a teacher would find him exhausting and frustrating. I find him exhausting and frustrating. It’s hard to be an authority figure to a child who questions everything, has his own ideas and refuses to go with the flow. Those are all qualities we admire in adults (most of the time), but are very difficult to deal with in a small child.

Ok, maybe I will risk going downstairs and watching a little TV. It is very nerve wracking to be two floors away from Elsa. I need to find the baby monitor.

Erik’s regular teacher returned on Monday. The difference in his behavior is marked. She is such a nice lady that I just don’t get it. I guess he doesn’t like nice.

Last night he finally told me that he can’t hear her and never knows when she calls his name, so maybe that’s the whole problem? I don’t know. I e-mailed her and asked her to sit him near her and to speak louder when she is talking to him. We’ll she if she writes some e-mail meant to sounds educational and agreeable while at the same time giving me a big, fat no.

His sub had been giving him math challenge homework, which was totally great. He would do the whole packet the day he got it, no complaints. He said they were the most fun things he’s done in Kindergarten.

His regular teacher did not continue with the math challenge work, which drives me nuts.

His weekly packet was partially reading/writing skills and partially completely below-his-level math. I’m not trying to brag, but when a kid can teach himself to multiply, filling in numbered blanks is about as boring as you can get. Example:

28, ____, 30, 31

We’d gotten through everything but one finally reading/writing assignment. He was complaining as soon as I said we needed to do it, but he sat with me and helped me read a story. Then it was time to write the characters, setting, problem and resolution.

Oh dear lord, the tantrum.

At one point I seriously thought we were going to have to take him to the ER for a sedative. Even when we said “never mind, let’s just skip this one if it makes you so sick” he couldn’t quit screaming and crying.

I don’t know if you are familiar with Ask Moxie, but she has the theory that some kids wind themselves up when they cry and they can’t stop. These children are not able to cry it out for sleep training. Other kids need to cry a little to wind down and then they go to sleep. Erik has always been the type that winds himself up if he starts crying, so I guess that hasn’t changed.

I guess at some point Mike told Erik that if he’d just do the homework he would take him fishing after school tomorrow.

That must have really sunk in because Erik was up at 6:30, wanting to finish his homework. Crazy child.

And guess how long it took to complete the page? Seven minutes. I timed it.

At least it’s done and we put the whole thing behind us.

I just finished reading Siblings Without Rivalry. I didn’t realize it was by the same people who wrote How to Talk so your Kids will Listen and Listen so your Kids Will Talk. Excellent books, both of them. I already do a lot of the things the book advocates since it is just an expansion on the How to Talk. . . idea, but I was so glad to read a few things. You don’t have to tell your kids that you love them the same! They don’t want to hear that anyway! Instead, you tell them “You are my very own Erik. [List all the ways that Erik is wonderful]. I would be miserable without you.” They don’t want to hear that you love them equally. They just want to hear that you love them uniquely.

It also talked about how to keep from putting kids in roles. I’m already guilty of this. Elsa is my shy, quiet, focused one. Erik is my loud, outgoing, friendly one. I need to stop thinking that way immediately, even if it is true.

I should know just as well as anyone how damaging putting a child into a role can be. I was the smart, responsible one and took my role seriously. I just wanted to be the pretty one, but that was not to be. My sister was the pretty one. I never had any fun because I thought I HAD to be responsible. It was so ingrained in me that I don’t really even know how to explain it. I never want to limit my kids in that way.

Anyway, if you haven’t read those books and you are a parent I recommend you do so immediately. Granted, I do love to read parenting books. These particular books really revolutionized my parenting and taught me that I don’t have to say no all the time. In fact, it’s better to say “I really wish we could go to Disneyland today” instead of “No, we can’t go to Disneyland today!” I never in a million years would have guessed that, but it truly makes for a happier home.

And now I have to go shower and get on with my day. I’m taking my box of hurricane food to the food bank this morning. I kept some of the stuff we might actually use, but the rest of it looks disgusting. What was I thinking when I was shopping last year? I guess I was thinking that gross food was better than no food.

I thought we were going to drown today. Weather talk is so boring, but dude. It was raining. The end.

I am actually drowning in breast milk. Perhaps drowning is not the word. My breasts are made of stones. Stones full of milk.

Elsa has not nursed in almost 60 hours. My boobs HURT.

I am trying to hand express the milk, but it is not easy. I don’t have a pump. It is worth the pain, though. She is almost weaned! She is sleeping in her own bed with just one wake-up at night. Mike is taking care of it all! Exciting things are happening in our family life. Maybe I shouldn’t say she is almost weaned. Maybe she is totally weaned.

Yesterday she was so desperate that she lifted Mike’s shirt and tried to nurse. The look on her face was priceless. Hairy nips are not tasty, apparently.

Mike has been extremely motivated on a few household projects. We have a huge pile of stuff for a charity truck to pick up. So nice to get some of this stuff out of the house, including the highchair and a bunch of shorts that I will never wear again. Even if I ever manage to lose weight and fit in them, they are way too short and silly looking for a woman of my age. They are probably fifteen years old. My styling choices back then were not what I would choose now. Ha. Light denim with cutesy heart appliques? I think not.

He was also supposed to do a bunch of landscaping, but that’s hard to do when the rain won’t let up. He finally had a sunny day yesterday and planted a bunch of grass. I’m not confident that anything will grow. I’m sure the seed all floated away today. He was so protective over his poor seeds that he was throwing soccer balls at the squirrels. He has an uphill battle if he thinks he can beat down the squirrels.

Speaking of seeds, Erik has another reproductive question. What happens if two seeds from the daddy get to the egg at the EXACT SAME MOMENT? I told him that’s not possible, but he believes it is possible and that it would make a super baby. I told him if it happened the egg would not be good anymore and it would just go out of the mother before it made a baby.

A few minutes later he declared that he and his little girlfriend would not BREAK APART EVER. He is planning on moving into her neighborhood. I’m not sure where he’s going to get the money to take out a mortgage or pay rent.

Mike has a ton of vacation time, but rarely has the time to use it. He certainly can’t do it the Swedish way and take off five weeks at a time. Living in Sweden would have its perks. I have no intention of ever going down that road again, but it sure would be nice if the US would adopt some more socialist policies. They make life better for everyone. Go socialism! Hello FBI agents!

Anyway!

Vacation! At home!

That means one thing: projects! And exclamation points!

Big project number one: Weaning Elsa and getting her in her own bed in her own room. I am the wimpiest mother in the world when it comes to my babies and toddlers. I can’t tell them no when it comes to things that sustain them and give them comfort. I can happily and easily tell them no to hitting, biting, running in the grocery store, and climbing tress. But nursing? Cuddling? Sleeping with mommy? How is this negative? How can I tell my sweet, innocent, loving child no?

Mike has to do it. That’s the only way. Plus, Mike doesn’t have boobs so nursing temptation is completely removed. It is hard to be the booby-lady and have a very strong toddler clawing at your clothing and ripping off your bra.

So far the process is going really well. I leave when the going gets rough, so I don’t have to deal with it. It’s a guaranteed path to Carrie success.

That doesn’t mean I wasn’t awake the whole first night, just waiting for the screams. I couldn’t stop thinking of my poor, lonely baby. She only woke up twice, though.

I am not going to go into full detail. I’ll be honest. When my friends type out their whole sleep routine I skim. I have enough sleep issues. I can’t take on anymore. But! I will say one thing: things are progressing with textbook accuracy and we might end up with a weaned child at the end of the week. Score! Erik was potty trained before he was weaned and sleeping in his own bed. And he was not potty trained early.

New topic: I don’t think I ever posted about the bizarre home surgery incident that took place while my mother was here.

Those new to the blog need to know that I have a little problem. My scalp is full of pilar cysts. They are basically sacks of gunk, probably keratin. They are completely harmless and I only get them removed when they start showing through my hair line. The doctors always shave a big hunk of hair for the surgery, and who wants to have a hunk of missing hair?

Instead, I decide that I am so smart I can remove them myself. They feel like giant zits, so I’m always convinced that if I could just poke a big enough hole, I could drain them myself. I’ve even seen youtube videos of people doing it. Trust me, you will never see a youtube video of me performing home surgery, so don’t think I am going to share with you. I don’t want to become a gross viral video.

In all the years that I’ve had these cysts, I’ve successfully removed exactly one prior to last month. That’s after 18 years of attempts.

I cut a big triangle out of it with an X-acto knife, and started squeezing. Nasty stuff kept coming out over the course of several weeks. I think I even got most of the sack out, so it didn’t even come back. Despite my failures over the past two decades, I decided this success meant I was a super surgeon.

Despite my failures over the past two decades, I decided this success meant I was a super cyst removing surgeon. The next time I got a cyst that had certain characteristics (mainly it was so big that it didn’t hurt to cut into it), I did the same trick. Only this time nothing came out. I was really irked because it seems so simple. Pop it. Done.

It created a big scab, which was continually annoying. After several weeks I decided I was going to pull the scab off no matter how badly it hurt because it was time for the scab to go.

I pulled.

And I pulled.

And I pulled.

And suddenly I was holding what looked like a clear plastic ball, stuck to a scabbish thing.

No wonder this sucker never popped. If I hadn’t known it had come from my head I would have sworn it was a piece of plastic. I showed my mom and she thought it was a small rubber ball.

So did it have anything in it? That was the question. I cut it open with my trusty X-acto knife and found that it was filled with white powder.

Lack of popping explained. There was nothing really poppable in it. Am I growing cocaine in my scalp?

Oh, hello FBI agents. I forgot you were here. I don’t think I can really grow cocaine in my brain.

I guess I am done with my career in home surgery. I have several more cysts on my head and they tempt me, but if they aren’t actually giant pimples I guess I better leave them alone.

Besides, the blade on my x-acto knife is rusty. Can’t do anything without a new blade. Maybe a trip to Micheal’s is in order. . .

I hate parenting in public, but so much of parenting DOES happen in public. I’ve gotten used to it over the years. I know longer give a shit what other parents think of me, which has made me a much, much better parent. I am not always trying to be perfect in the eyes of the world anymore. I am trying to do what is best for my children and my family and use the techniques that I have had success with.

But then there are times when the public parenting becomes so intense and there is such a crowd that I want an escape hatch. Push a button and suddenly find myself in a nice, warm bath with a fun book and no children in sight. Why don’t they make a button like that?

We had a MOMS Club potluck at a local park last night. They’ve been remodeling the park’s landscaping a bit, which is annoying. They used to have a big grass covered hill in front of the parking lot. The tore up the grass and put down mulch. They planted a bunch of little bushes which I assume will grow into big ground cover bushes. Apparently they do not want people on the hill.

Even after they did this I would let Erik climb up through the mulch. He’s a kid. Kids climb. It’s silly to walk all the way around to the end just to take the sidewalk.

Last night they had a split rail fence along the edge of the hill, giving a very clear “STAY OUT” vibe. Sure, it was just split rail. It would be very easy to climb over or under, but it is a social cue. I decided we should respect that.

As we’re leaving the park Erik announces that he’s going to climb under the fence and slide down the hill through the bushes. I tell him no. I suppose it would not have been the end of the world but it is obvious that you aren’t supposed to do it. And I said no. End of story.

He kept right on trucking, climbing under the fence. I can not stand defiance. It sets me off like nothing else.

There were three families I knew right behind me, two families I didn’t know, and a bunch of college students leaving a bbq. I wasn’t thinking of them at all during this, but they all got to witness a battle royale.

Me: If you go down that hill, you will go straight to bed when we get home.

Erik: I’m going down the hill.

Me, starting to yell: Get away from the fence. It means you are not allowed to go down the hill. Do you really want to go to bed before it’s even dark?

Erik, still planning on going down the hill: I’m going to break the fence! I hate the fence! I’m going down this hill!

Me, full out yelling because now I am pissed at his insubordination: Get away from the fence and come here right now.

Erik: NOOOOO! I’M BREAKING THE FENCE!

Me, more calmly because I just spotted a police car and know it will scare him: Look, Erik, there’s a police car. If you break the fence the police man will take you to jail for vandalism.

So I won the battle, but not without the threat of jail. Not sure how it would have played out if there wasn’t a police car sitting there.

One of the ladies behind me (a stranger) laughed and said “I was wondering if the policeman would come tell him to get off the fence.”

Whew. It’s tough work being a parent, especially when the child does not think he has to listen to a word you say.

The whole time we were getting in the car and all the way home he kept saying that he was going back to the park tomorrow with an axe and he was going to break the fence and chop up all the bushes. No policeman could stop him.

I asked how he was getting there and he told me “You’ll have to drive me mom. I’m only six, you know I can’t drive.”

It was exhausting. I seriously hope I can win the war. I can’t take many more battles like that.

I am so glad I have my online journal friends to talk about parenting with. I have a lot of friends in person, but many of them do not share my ideas about parenting/life/the universe. That’s ok. We can still be friends. As much as I love all of you, it’s hard for us to babysit/prepare emergency meals/carpool with each other when we are scattered around the globe. I couldn’t live without your intelltual stimulation, though.

Example: birthday parties.

Give me a mother truckin’ break on the damned birthday parties.

I may be a liberal, mamby-pamby, love everyone, tolerate everyone, be nice and inclusive and kind type of person, but I friggin’ HATE whole class birthday parties.

I’m not saying a child should have a party and be able to invite all the kids but one. That would be cruel. I’m saying, why the flying effity-eff does the majority of the class need to come to the party?

This is a real concern for some of my friends. Some schools have as many as 25 kids in a class, and a birthday party for that many kids (plus non-classmate friends and siblings) gets hella expensive, hella fast. The majority of these parties are held at bouncy places, pottery studios, children’s gyms, etc. Most people simply don’t have the room in their townhouses to host 30+ kidsd. And who would want to? Imagine the mess you’d have to clean up.

So I hear my friends groaning and crying and griping over this and I can’t figure it out. JUST DON’T DO IT. I don’t. I refuse. And I don’t feel one iota of guilt about it. They seem to think there is a rule that you MUST invite all these kids to a party, but there isn’t. There’s a rule that you can’t pass out invitations at school unless you invite the whole class. I think that’s reasonable. There are other ways to get an invitation to a child.

Yes, I moan and groan about the birthday party expectations, but that’s mainly because I am mother to a complete party animal who wants to invite random strangers to his party. My rule is that you can only invite people that you A) like and B) know their name. So far our parties have been quite manageable. We’ve topped out at 12 kids, which was just about perfect. I have no plans to start inviting kids he doesn’t even like. Basically he can invite a few from MOMS Club, a few from personal friends, a few from the neighborhood and a couple from his class. Some of those overlap.

He has been invited to NINE parties over the next four weeks. I’m accepting 4 of the invitations. I RSVPed no to the other five and one lady started giving me lip! I was really nice about it “Hi, this is Erik’s mom. Thanks so much for the invitation, Erik would love to attend but we have other plans that day.” Her response was unreal “Erik won’t come? Why not? What are your plans? Change your plans!” Ummmmm. No thanks, lady. Our kids may be in the same class, but as far as I understand they don’t even like each other.

Honestly, Erik would go to every single party but I don’t have the time to drive him all over the country or the money to buy that many gifts in the span of a month.

I’m so glad I have my online friends to keep me grounded about things like this. So many of you have the same feelings and don’t get all into the keeping up with the Jones’ like my real life friends tend to do.

I love living where we live. There is a ton of family friendly things to do, tons of really nice parks, lots of classes, zoos, pumpkin patches, etc. But it is also a very snooty area with a lot of upper middle class people or people wanting to be upper middle class. I just do not give two shits about keeping up with the Jones’ and it is nice to have friends who also understand that living a life should be about making your immediate family happy and doing what is best for the immediate family, not living a life to look good for outsiders.

I am deeply, deeply unhappy with my weight right now. I know it is a boring topic. I should just take care of it. I know that. But here I am, talking about it again. We’re back to self-loathing. I can’t stand looking at pictures of myself. I hate that I am starting to get out of breath when I have to walk too far. I hate this.

My weight has been a struggle forever. I always thought “one day I’ll be thin and beautiful.” That day never came, and at 38 I realize that day is never coming. It’s all downhill from here and I need to get my ass in gear, stat!

It was so easy to lose weight when Erik was a toddler. The kid never slept. The kid never sat still. He RAN everywhere. I would take him to the park for hours at a time and would literally chase him for three hours straight. I had to, or I would lose him. Plus, I would go to the gym for an hour and a half every day for the low-cost babysitting.

I had no idea how good I had it.

Going to the gym with Elsa has been almost impossible. I couldn’t leave her there for the first 15 months because she would have such a horrible melt-down. Then she was sick every other week. I was sick every other week. We were never sick at the same time.

I take her to the park, but she doesn’t run. I don’t have to chase her. She’s such an easy, easy toddler. Yes, she’s very two and has her moments of extreme tantrums. I’m just not doing all that extraneous running.

I never even connected my lack of weight loss with Elsa’s lack of running until an old friend pointed out that I was lucky I didn’t have to run all the time like I did with Erik. In her words, “that kid ran more than any kid I’ve ever seen in my life.”

I’m not blaming Elsa. Not at all. It just made me realize that I need to bump up my activity levels because I am not getting any natural exercise.

My goal was to lose 10 lbs from the date of my surgery to my physical. That gave me eight weeks. It’s been four weeks and I’ve gained two pounds.

Suuuuuuuucks.

I’ve cut down on snacking and I’ve been taking the kids for walks or to the gym. It just all feels so helpless. I need to do something extreme. I need to find a diet I can stick with and make work. I just don’t know what diet that would be. I’m not asking for suggestions. Please, please, please for the love of all that is unholy please do not make a single suggestion. I am just venting, not seeking advice. I’ve been struggling with this weight loss thing for 30 years. I’ve heard of every diet out there from Shangri-la to Paleo.

So bah humbug to me. I hope I can flip a switch in my head and turn my motivation on. I guess I just don’t want it bad enough. Or, more likely, I know that it takes a hell of a lot of work to do it and I’m not even sure it’s worth it.

I had an excellent Mother’s Day yesterday. Mike made sure I had gifts, plus I bought myself a new camera. The new camera isn’t blurry! I am taking clear pictures! You have no idea how happy this makes me!

I’ve had craptacular cameras for several years. Looking back at the clear, light pictures from Erik’s toddlerhood reminded me that I wasn’t always a horrible photographer. It is not all my fault that I can’t take a decent picture of poor Elsa. Sure, she does move around a lot and won’t look at the camera and nothing can fix that, but look at the picture above. I never would have gotten such a shot with my past three cameras.

The new camera? Total impulse purchase on sale at Costco. Fuji, waterproof, ugly green.

Anyway, Mother’s Day. After a good morning of sleeping in and opening gifts we headed out to a petting farm. Click through the pic for the full set if you care to see my kids around a bunch of animals.

Elsa was really scared of the animals at first, but by the end she was enjoying herself. She fell in love with the Flemish giant pictured above and didn’t want to leave. She also had a great time chasing chickens. I guess they weren’t as scary as cows and goats.

When we got home I had several e-mails from people wanting to buy all my diapers. I finally got off my duff and took care of all my old cloth diapers. I cleaned them up, sorted them, and listed them as a lot on Craigslist for a fair price. I think I will have them out of the house by this afternoon. Here’s hoping! They take up a lot of room and mental space. Mental space because I feel like I should maximize the amount of money I get for them, but to do that I would need to do a lot of work and deal with a lot of buyers who want something for nothing. I finally figured out that getting less money with less work on my part was better than getting no money because I procrastinated so long that the elastic crumbled. I have heard a couple of horror stories of the elastic crumbling on diapers that sit unused.

I tried to make cupcake ice cream cone things last night. Bethany posted pictures of some and it inspired me. My mom used to make them all the time, so I thought it would be funny to make them and frost them to look like real ice cream and trick Erik. Unfortunately he chose to be curious about what I was doing. When I wouldn’t tell him he called my mom and asked her what I was doing. How would she know? He described the process and she told him. He thought it was hilarious. Too bad I had no idea how full to fill the cones, so every single one totally overflowed and made a huge mess. I also didn’t have much luck making the frosting look ice cream like, but that didn’t stop the kids from enjoying them.

And now my handyman is gone, so it is time to run to the store in the pouring rain. Why, rain, why? It’s been pouring down for several hours with no hope of a break. We are out of groceries so I guess I have no choice but to brave it.

I made a chile colorado sauce last week and need to add more pork ribs to it to make a delicious soup. I am seriously addicted to everything I’ve made from Aaron Sanchez’s cookbook. Elsa and Mike agree. Erik? Not so much. If it has any flavor at all he opens his mouth and starts screaming. Kid doesn’t know what he’s missing.

If you’ve been reading long, you know that Erik and I struggle with homework. He kicks, screams, yells, tantrums, sulks, cries. Anything to get out of doing homework. It has been a lot better since he has a different teacher (current teacher out on mat leave), but he still doesn’t enjoy it, probably because it is way too much writing.

So yesterday he’s doing a math worksheet and asks me how do “do that thing with the x instead of the plus or minus.”

Yeah right. Like I have a clue how to teach a child how to multiply. Like he’ll actually sit still and let me explain it. I told him he would learn it in 3rd grade.

He brought it up again today and promised he would do his homework if I would just “pretty pretty pretty pretty please teach him the x thing.”

How the flying f-ck am I supposed to teach a 6 1/2 year old to multiply? I didn’t really grasp the concept when I first learned it and I was much older than that.

So I quickly showed him the idea of the “x” meaning “sets of” so 3×3 means 3 sets of 3. I drew it out with little dots and he immediately understood it. He started asking me to give him questions and he got them all right. Every damned one, even 8×8. And he did them all with mental math. Then he begged me to make him a worksheet, so I wrote out a 20 question worksheet and I sat there in shock as he did every single problem correctly. He only had trouble on the Zx0 problems, but quickly got that straightened out in his mind as well.

He truly is his father’s son. I am not trying to brag, even though I know this is totally braggy. I am just amazed that his mind can understand the concept of multiplication with barely any help from me. I learned multiplication tables in third grade, but it took me forever to understand how the numbers made sense and what we were actually doing with the numbers.

The worksheet has been tucked into his folder because he wants to show his teacher. I think this substitute teacher will be happy and congratulate him on a job well done. I don’t know what his real teacher would do, but I wouldn’t anticipate a big pat on the back from her. I find it sad that I don’t believe she would have been impressed or happy. I think any teacher should be happy and supportive when a student shows an interest in a new skill, especially a fundamental math skill. Even if the kid does talk too much and can be annoying because he won’t. Shut. UP. I know that’s why she doesn’t care for him.

I need to come up with a great teacher appreciation gift for his sub. I think her last day is May 22, but will have to confirm that.

For the curious, I went over to my neighbor’s house today and she was still pregnant. I was very relieved! She is on medication to keep her from going into early labor. I don’t really know all the details because her English isn’t great. The babe would have been about six weeks early. Doable, I know, but not ideal. I don’t know how she would handle a NICU stay with the baby plus deal with her two toddlers. Logistics gets so difficult when you start adding multiple children to the mix.

I went over to offer to watch her girls if she needed rest, but I was happy to see another neighbor was already there. When I first met the Pakistani girl I knew she could be friends with my Indian neighbor, but she didn’t even want me an introduction. There was no way she was going to become friends with an Indian. I know that the two countries have a lot of strife politically, but in our neighborhood people from both countries tend to flock together because the cultures are similar.

They finally did meet each other and now they hang out all the time. I am so happy for them because they both really needed a friend. I can’t fulfill that role for either of them more than on a superficial level because. . . well. . . I’m just not interested. I tried with both of them, but we were not kindred spirits.

Change of topic:

When my mom was here she brought a little SD card full of photos that I made for her a few years ago when I bought her a digital photo frame. I downloaded the whole thing to my computer and have been sitting her tonight, teary eyed, looking at pictures of Erik when he was a baby and toddler. I love who he is now and I love watching him grow up, but he sure was a cute little guy. I’m so glad to have these pictures back! I didn’t know they had survived the death of the old computer.

It was also fun to track the progress of his “tuft.”

Can you spot the tuft?
For the newer readers, Erik was born with a weird, purple birthmark on the back of his head. Even though he is a total blondie, it had black hair growing straight out of it. The hair just kept getting longer and longer and longer, sticking up higher and higher and higher until it finally got enough weight to fall over backwards. The doctor was so concerned about it that she ordered an MRI to make sure he didn’t have anything growing into his brain. I don’t know how parents with real medical issues don’t just curl up in a ball and die. Having my four month old put under general anesthesia was about the most stressful thing I’ve ever done. Granted, I think I had undiagnosed PPD, which made everything much worse than it really was.

He still has a big purple birthmark on the back of his head and the hair in that spot is darker than the rest of his hair. The ladies at the gym used to call him Patchy because it was really noticeable when he was younger. His hair is getting a lot darker now so it isn’t that obvious anymore.

You want to know the weirdest thing about his new soccer class? Almost every kid on his team is blonde! That just does not happen around here. This is such a culturally diverse area that my kids are usually the only blondes in sight. He was pretty upset about being the only one with blond hair and blue eyes in his kindergarten class earlier this year. He just wanted to be “more brownish.” He seems to be over that now, thankfully, because there’s not much I can do about making him more brownish. I find it’s very convenient to have a kid who sticks out. I was having trouble at soccer getting used to identifying him by more than hair color. I would be cheering for a blond head, but then the kid would turn around and not be Erik.

Someone asked about Erik’s dance class. He LOVES it. I love it! Instead of coming home and trying to kick us, like he always did with karate, he comes home and dances. It’s a break dancing class of all boys ranging from age 6-12. The teacher looked like he was about 15, but I am old so he could be much older and I wouldn’t know it. I sound like my mom, calling her doctor a kid. The boys get quite a work out and are exhausted by the end of the class. Unfortunately I can’t watch the class so I have no idea what’s happening. I just know he comes out with a big smile and cool moves that put me to shame.