Well, 6-yo turned 7. She had a sleepover. I'm not a big fan of sleepovers, as I believe I'm mentioned before. However, it was what she wanted more than anything anything anything. She's in a little friendship group of four girls, and the other three, their birthdays in September, December and February, all had sleepovers. So it would have been difficult for the fourth member of the group to flake out.
It went really well, thanks for asking. I had a few activities up my sleeve, but mostly just let them play. I did get them to do a scavenger hunt, which they enjoyed, and it was very sweet watching them scuttling round the garden collecting blades of grass and small stones, and then sitting studiously drawing an animal and something that begins with B. The item they found hardest to collect, interestingly, was a list of 10 different girls' names, each one written in a different colour marker. When I put that on the hunt list, I thought it would be easy for them, but I hadn't reckoned with the way the mind of a 7 year old works. "I could write Bayley, but I'm not really friends with her, so I don't think I want her name on my list."
We watched a dvd together (they watched, I snoozed), and I had them in bed by 10.15 and asleep not long after that. Beforehand, 7-yo had been very adamant that they HAD to stay up till after midnight, because you HAVE to do that at a sleepover, and they did at EVERYONE ELSE'S sleepover. So I had prepared the ground by setting my alarm clock an hour ahead. (I was sleeping with them in the basement, where there are no other clocks.) Sneaky, huh? And if you're reading this in years to come, 7-yo, then don't be too hard on me. You'll understand when you have a daughter of your own. Perhaps you already do. I have no idea at what stage in life you'll decide you want to look up that old-fashioned thing that your mum used to write, back in the olden days when they used to do that thing called, what was it? "blogging" or something. But in any case, I didn't need to use the clock, because by that time the girls had already had a lot of fun, and the competitive urge to stay up later at this sleepover than at any of the others had disappeared.
They all slept till 7.00am. At about 5.00am, one of them got up to use the bathroom, and I lay in bed willing her to go back to bed and to sleep, and not to assume it was morning (I'd turned the alarm clock back to the correct time by then). I don't know if it was the force of my willpower, or what, but she did. So we all got eight hours of sleep, which is good going for a sleepover. Next year, I'm thinking that 8 year olds are probably more challenging than 7 year olds on the bedtime front, so I am definitely crushing up a few Benadryl to bake into the birthday cake.
7-yo is very much into writing lists at the moment. My favourite is this one:
I hate...
mean people
pikle
brokle
wine
I hasten to add that she's only ever dunked a finger into a glass of wine for a taste. Honest. (And I was joking about the Benadryl too.) As for pikles and mean people, I don't like them much either. But personally I do like brokle. Have you worked out what that is? It took me a long while.
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Quantum Jumping
Now then. The other day I was chatting to my younger brother on Skype. For some reason, his camera is at desk level and can't be moved, so I see a huge chin and big nostrils, and if he doesn't turn off the light behind him, it looks like he has a halo. Or perhaps since I saw him last summer he has turned into an angelic creature with a weird face. All things are possible.
Which brings me right to the heart of this post. Am I the only one, or is everyone else getting bombarded with adverts for Quantum Jumping? They're everywhere I go in my virtual life. They invade my gmail account. Whoever is organising the campaign must have a huge advertising budget (and no, this isn't a sponsored post, before you wonder).
This is what the Quantum Jumping website says:
The abundant you. The inventor you. The creative you. In alternate universes, everything you desire has already taken place. Tap into this infinite potential with Quantum Jumping...
Every decision you make in life causes a “split” in reality...
In these alternate universes, alternate versions of YOU are living out their lives...
And then:
This revelation may be a little hard to swallow...
Yup. That last one, I go with.
Help. I'm just getting to grips with the fact that something called 4G might exist. I'm not ready for alternative realities. Actually, and perhaps this is why I find Quantum Jumping a little threatening, I'm a really bad one for 'what if?'ing in my life. I have come to see that it's a very unproductive activity, so I've been trying to drop 'what if?' in favour of 'what next?' - a much more helpful approach. Quantum Jumping is the ultimate 'what if?'. Not only can you explore what hypothetically you might have been or done, but it seems that you can literally do so.
I asked my younger brother if he thought one day we'd be able to get beamed up and down by Skype, rather than just being able to see and hear each other through the medium of a screen. He said something about molecules.
So what do you think? Are you all getting the ads and links? Who is behind it all? Is it possible to explore our other virtual lives? Am I, perhaps, a brain surgeon or a rocket scientist, a supermodel or a kindergarten teacher, a hooker or a zookeeper, and I just don't know about it? And if we can hop about from one life to another, from real life to virtual life, will we all still need to go to Cyber Mummy to meet up?
.
Which brings me right to the heart of this post. Am I the only one, or is everyone else getting bombarded with adverts for Quantum Jumping? They're everywhere I go in my virtual life. They invade my gmail account. Whoever is organising the campaign must have a huge advertising budget (and no, this isn't a sponsored post, before you wonder).
This is what the Quantum Jumping website says:
The abundant you. The inventor you. The creative you. In alternate universes, everything you desire has already taken place. Tap into this infinite potential with Quantum Jumping...
Every decision you make in life causes a “split” in reality...
In these alternate universes, alternate versions of YOU are living out their lives...
And then:
This revelation may be a little hard to swallow...
Yup. That last one, I go with.
Help. I'm just getting to grips with the fact that something called 4G might exist. I'm not ready for alternative realities. Actually, and perhaps this is why I find Quantum Jumping a little threatening, I'm a really bad one for 'what if?'ing in my life. I have come to see that it's a very unproductive activity, so I've been trying to drop 'what if?' in favour of 'what next?' - a much more helpful approach. Quantum Jumping is the ultimate 'what if?'. Not only can you explore what hypothetically you might have been or done, but it seems that you can literally do so.
I asked my younger brother if he thought one day we'd be able to get beamed up and down by Skype, rather than just being able to see and hear each other through the medium of a screen. He said something about molecules.
So what do you think? Are you all getting the ads and links? Who is behind it all? Is it possible to explore our other virtual lives? Am I, perhaps, a brain surgeon or a rocket scientist, a supermodel or a kindergarten teacher, a hooker or a zookeeper, and I just don't know about it? And if we can hop about from one life to another, from real life to virtual life, will we all still need to go to Cyber Mummy to meet up?
.
Saturday, March 19, 2011
State fair
In this post, I’m taking part in a blog party 'Around the World in a Day' at Happy Homemaker UK.
When we first arrived here, my oldest went into fourth grade, just at the point when the class was learning all the states in the US. This involved being able to place them on a map, and knowing their postal abbreviations and capitals. This was a rather daunting task for him, to say the least, so I said I’d do it with him. It was something of a challenge for me too, since my geography of the US was so bad that I didn’t get much beyond knowing that California was on the west coast, New York on the east, and we were somewhere in the middle. So we plodded through together, and now, if I’m ever on your pub quiz team, I will be able to help out with the location of all the states and their postal abbreviations (so many beginning with M, it’s just crazy - you darn Americans, you should have set a cap on the number of states allowed to begin with the same letter). I’ve forgotten all the capitals, though. Sorry.
So now my second child is in fourth grade, and has been through the same exercise. I didn’t volunteer to do it with him, but instead came up with a suitable bribe, and the deed was duly done over the course of a few weeks. But they’ve introduced a new project since oldest learned his states. Each child picks the name of a state out of a hat, and then has to research that state, and put together a report and a scrap book. I remember oldest doing a scaled down version of this (he got Wisconsin), but it’s since really blossomed into a magnum opus. The children wrote to the relevant state tourist office in class, so the first task was to intercept the brochure which arrived and not chuck it in the bin with the other junk mail. The report had to include a rough draft as well as a final copy, an outline (I never did quite understand what this was, but it involved writing in bubbles), and a bibliography citing at least three different sources. The scrap book was to supplement the report, with illustrations and… oh heck, you all know what a scrap book is.
Hurrah for the good luck with which 10-yo picked Colorado out of the hat. It’s an interesting and picturesque state, and we’ve been there, which surely helped. So, following the suggested format, Husband and I helped 10-yo put together a report about Colorado’s geography, history, flag, emblems, state government, famous people, main industries, places to visit, sports teams, and ‘fun facts’. You might know that Colorado has the highest mean altitude of all the states, but I bet you didn’t know that Colfax Avenue in Denver is the longest continuous street in America, or that Colorado is one of only two states in which all the water in the state flows out of it and none flows in. (Brownie point to anyone who can name the other one.) We helped him cut out pictures from the tourist office brochure, draw maps, and stick in photos of our own Colorado experiences.
Then last week, the children hosted The Second Annual Fourth Grade State Fair. (Yes, the Second Annual one… I don’t make this stuff up, you know). The school gym was duly decorated in red, white and blue, and each child had half a long table on which to display his or her scrap book and report, and any items that represented the state in some way. They were allowed to offer food items (this being America, where the policy ‘no snack left behind’ is in full operation). And they were to dress in an appropriate costume. Thus it was that 10-yo borrowed some ski goggles, and donned his snow boots, his winter coat and a woolly hat, and brandishing a couple of ice axes that I hardly even knew we possessed (maybe I really did marry an axe murderer by mistake), declared himself an ice-climber. His half of the table displayed a pair of hiking boots, a few boxes of ‘Celestial Seasonings’ tea (one of the biggest herbal tea companies in the world, which started with one Coloradoan gathering and drying wild herbs), and a little glass vial of iron pyrite, the substance known as ‘fool’s gold’ which we had panned from a stream when visiting an old gold mine on one of our trips (and which 10-yo insists is actually real gold). The food he offered was potato chips (crisps, to you Brits), because they grow a lot of potatoes in Colorado. By a stroke of happy luck, I just happened to be in a health food shop a few days beforehand, and spotted a brand called ‘Boulder potato chips’, which hailed from Boulder, Colorado. How clever was that?! (and they were even on special offer).
I thoroughly enjoyed the Second Annual Fourth Grade State Fair. It opened with the children singing a couple of songs, my favorite being ‘The Nifty Fifty’, which included a rapid run-through of all fifty states in alphabetical order. Quite a feat of memory and verbal articulation. Then the fourth graders took their places at their tables, and we all circulated round the displays, ‘we’ being the fourth grade parents, and kids and teachers from other grades.
The children were happy and confident, and as you approached their stand, they would readily engage you in conversation and share their knowledge about their state. This is one great benefit that my kids will have received from an education here. They are taught to present confidently and clearly. They have no problem addressing you as you walk up, saying “Would you like me to tell you about Vermont?” or “My state is Hawai’i. Would you like to sample some pineapple?” It will be a useful life skill, and not one we teach in the UK (not as far as I know). I loved the costumes: a cowboy from Oklahoma, a southern belle from Georgia, a scientist from Maryland, the Statue of Liberty from New York State. The snacks were fun and varied: fruit of many kinds, fish sticks, bread, cheese, green jello (looking at you, Utah), Ritz crackers (I thought they originated at the Ritz Hotel in London, but apparently they’re from Maryland), rice krispy cakes (did you know that Arkansas produces half the rice grown in the US?) and various drinks, including milk, which is the state beverage of several states. Who knew?
I loved the enthusiasm of the fourth graders to share the wonderfully random ‘fun facts’. The official state cookie of Maryland is the chocolate chip (yes… some states have official state cookies). In Oklahoma it is illegal to take a bite out of someone else’s hamburger, and you may not take elephants into the downtown area of Tulsa. Also in Oklahoma, women may not gamble in the nude, in lingerie, or while wearing a towel. Good to know.
All in all, it was a great event, an imaginative culmination to the state projects. If I was American, it would have made me proud to be American. As a resident alien (yay), it made me reflect on really how incredible the USA is. What a land of plenty, and variety, and beauty. So much to offer “from sea to shining sea” as the words of America the Beautiful go. You may not know, incidentally, that the words of that song were written by Katharine Lee Bates, after being inspired by the view from the top of Pikes Peak. Pikes Peak in Colorado, that is.
.
When we first arrived here, my oldest went into fourth grade, just at the point when the class was learning all the states in the US. This involved being able to place them on a map, and knowing their postal abbreviations and capitals. This was a rather daunting task for him, to say the least, so I said I’d do it with him. It was something of a challenge for me too, since my geography of the US was so bad that I didn’t get much beyond knowing that California was on the west coast, New York on the east, and we were somewhere in the middle. So we plodded through together, and now, if I’m ever on your pub quiz team, I will be able to help out with the location of all the states and their postal abbreviations (so many beginning with M, it’s just crazy - you darn Americans, you should have set a cap on the number of states allowed to begin with the same letter). I’ve forgotten all the capitals, though. Sorry.
So now my second child is in fourth grade, and has been through the same exercise. I didn’t volunteer to do it with him, but instead came up with a suitable bribe, and the deed was duly done over the course of a few weeks. But they’ve introduced a new project since oldest learned his states. Each child picks the name of a state out of a hat, and then has to research that state, and put together a report and a scrap book. I remember oldest doing a scaled down version of this (he got Wisconsin), but it’s since really blossomed into a magnum opus. The children wrote to the relevant state tourist office in class, so the first task was to intercept the brochure which arrived and not chuck it in the bin with the other junk mail. The report had to include a rough draft as well as a final copy, an outline (I never did quite understand what this was, but it involved writing in bubbles), and a bibliography citing at least three different sources. The scrap book was to supplement the report, with illustrations and… oh heck, you all know what a scrap book is.
Hurrah for the good luck with which 10-yo picked Colorado out of the hat. It’s an interesting and picturesque state, and we’ve been there, which surely helped. So, following the suggested format, Husband and I helped 10-yo put together a report about Colorado’s geography, history, flag, emblems, state government, famous people, main industries, places to visit, sports teams, and ‘fun facts’. You might know that Colorado has the highest mean altitude of all the states, but I bet you didn’t know that Colfax Avenue in Denver is the longest continuous street in America, or that Colorado is one of only two states in which all the water in the state flows out of it and none flows in. (Brownie point to anyone who can name the other one.) We helped him cut out pictures from the tourist office brochure, draw maps, and stick in photos of our own Colorado experiences.
Then last week, the children hosted The Second Annual Fourth Grade State Fair. (Yes, the Second Annual one… I don’t make this stuff up, you know). The school gym was duly decorated in red, white and blue, and each child had half a long table on which to display his or her scrap book and report, and any items that represented the state in some way. They were allowed to offer food items (this being America, where the policy ‘no snack left behind’ is in full operation). And they were to dress in an appropriate costume. Thus it was that 10-yo borrowed some ski goggles, and donned his snow boots, his winter coat and a woolly hat, and brandishing a couple of ice axes that I hardly even knew we possessed (maybe I really did marry an axe murderer by mistake), declared himself an ice-climber. His half of the table displayed a pair of hiking boots, a few boxes of ‘Celestial Seasonings’ tea (one of the biggest herbal tea companies in the world, which started with one Coloradoan gathering and drying wild herbs), and a little glass vial of iron pyrite, the substance known as ‘fool’s gold’ which we had panned from a stream when visiting an old gold mine on one of our trips (and which 10-yo insists is actually real gold). The food he offered was potato chips (crisps, to you Brits), because they grow a lot of potatoes in Colorado. By a stroke of happy luck, I just happened to be in a health food shop a few days beforehand, and spotted a brand called ‘Boulder potato chips’, which hailed from Boulder, Colorado. How clever was that?! (and they were even on special offer).
I thoroughly enjoyed the Second Annual Fourth Grade State Fair. It opened with the children singing a couple of songs, my favorite being ‘The Nifty Fifty’, which included a rapid run-through of all fifty states in alphabetical order. Quite a feat of memory and verbal articulation. Then the fourth graders took their places at their tables, and we all circulated round the displays, ‘we’ being the fourth grade parents, and kids and teachers from other grades.
The children were happy and confident, and as you approached their stand, they would readily engage you in conversation and share their knowledge about their state. This is one great benefit that my kids will have received from an education here. They are taught to present confidently and clearly. They have no problem addressing you as you walk up, saying “Would you like me to tell you about Vermont?” or “My state is Hawai’i. Would you like to sample some pineapple?” It will be a useful life skill, and not one we teach in the UK (not as far as I know). I loved the costumes: a cowboy from Oklahoma, a southern belle from Georgia, a scientist from Maryland, the Statue of Liberty from New York State. The snacks were fun and varied: fruit of many kinds, fish sticks, bread, cheese, green jello (looking at you, Utah), Ritz crackers (I thought they originated at the Ritz Hotel in London, but apparently they’re from Maryland), rice krispy cakes (did you know that Arkansas produces half the rice grown in the US?) and various drinks, including milk, which is the state beverage of several states. Who knew?
I loved the enthusiasm of the fourth graders to share the wonderfully random ‘fun facts’. The official state cookie of Maryland is the chocolate chip (yes… some states have official state cookies). In Oklahoma it is illegal to take a bite out of someone else’s hamburger, and you may not take elephants into the downtown area of Tulsa. Also in Oklahoma, women may not gamble in the nude, in lingerie, or while wearing a towel. Good to know.
All in all, it was a great event, an imaginative culmination to the state projects. If I was American, it would have made me proud to be American. As a resident alien (yay), it made me reflect on really how incredible the USA is. What a land of plenty, and variety, and beauty. So much to offer “from sea to shining sea” as the words of America the Beautiful go. You may not know, incidentally, that the words of that song were written by Katharine Lee Bates, after being inspired by the view from the top of Pikes Peak. Pikes Peak in Colorado, that is.
.
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Bleueueueugh
OK, so on Saturday, I'm going to join in this fabulous blogging worldwide expat carnival thingy (it's here, in case you want to join in too), for which I need to write a post all about a marvelous aspect of my life in America - of which there are many. Trouble is, there is this really angry bleueueueueueueuegh feeling in me struggling to get out into a blog post, so I've got to let it free quickly, in time for normal 'not wrong, just different, yay for living in America' service to be resumed.
Here goes, then, with the bleueueueueueueueuegh Incredible Hulk anti-my-life-in-America bursting forth from my neatly buttoned oh-isn't-the-Midwest-just-the-place-to-be shirt.
STOP getting excited about St Patrick's day. You're not Irish. None of you. You might have ancestors who were Irish. That's not the same thing. And it's silly. If you don't wear green to school, other kids come up to you and pinch you. If you have a green dinosaur on your blue underpants, it doesn't count (looking at you, here, 10-yo - unless you really did show your underpants to all your fellow fourth graders, but I doubt you did). STOP selling green cookies, green chocolate, green everything, having people greeting customers at the door of the supermarket wearing green. It's silly. Stop it.
Stop being so competitive about sports. My daughter is 6. She wants to play soccer. I want her to have fun. I don't need her to be in a competitive league. I don't need her to have a team photo on 'picture day'. I don't want her to have a training session each week, and then a match at a variable time on a Saturday or Sunday. I don't want to build our week-ends round those matches. I don't want her to think that her soccer team is the be all and end all. I see that other people living here do want to do those things. What can I say? Bleueueueueueuueuegh!
You! Mr Sports Director of the local sports centre! Yes, I'm talking to YOU! When you have 16 girls aged 6 or 7 signed up for soccer, can't you SEE that it doesn't make sense to run a league? You are insisting on having 4 teams with 4 players in each. I have, politely and nicely, discussed with you on the phone how this isn't going to make for a successful experience. Kids get ill. Kids have other commitments at week-ends. Families have other priorities (well, some do). So sometimes there will be a team of 3 players or even 2 players. Can't you agree with me (and my daughter's team coach) that it would make a whole lot more sense to get the 16 girls together one evening a week, do training all together, split them into two teams, and play a game there and then. That way, we don't all have to trek out twice a week. That way, they will get a game, rather than turn out, only to find that the game is cancelled because not enough players have shown up. Four kids is not enough kids for five-a-side soccer. That isn't rocket science. I know you love leagues. I know you love competitive play. I know this is thinking outside the box in a very challenging and enormous way for you. But please, please, can't we just try my suggestion? Just once? You never know... it might work well. If it doesn't, then you can go back to your competitive league, where the coach is king, and picture day happens, and we end up with a winning team which gets a trophy, and runners up who get medals. But just this once, couldn't you just think a little sideyways?
Next rant point. Doughnuts are NOT breakfast food. Luckily, none of my children have breakfast at school. I see you have cereal and fruit on the menu, but I wouldn't trust my children not to go for the doughnuts. I wouldn't. Nor the 'strawberry toaster pastry'. I have to put that in quotation marks. Sorry. I just do.
And on the subject of school food, please don't make my 6 year old stand in the lunch line (what am I saying? the lunch QUEUE QUEUE QUEUE!) for half the allotted time, and then make her tip half her food in the trash because there isn't enough time left to eat it. Please. That one isn't rocket science either.
Bleueueueueueuegh. I had other things to say, but I just hit publish by mistake, so let's call it a day. A bleueueueueueueueueugh day.
Here goes, then, with the bleueueueueueueueuegh Incredible Hulk anti-my-life-in-America bursting forth from my neatly buttoned oh-isn't-the-Midwest-just-the-place-to-be shirt.
STOP getting excited about St Patrick's day. You're not Irish. None of you. You might have ancestors who were Irish. That's not the same thing. And it's silly. If you don't wear green to school, other kids come up to you and pinch you. If you have a green dinosaur on your blue underpants, it doesn't count (looking at you, here, 10-yo - unless you really did show your underpants to all your fellow fourth graders, but I doubt you did). STOP selling green cookies, green chocolate, green everything, having people greeting customers at the door of the supermarket wearing green. It's silly. Stop it.
Stop being so competitive about sports. My daughter is 6. She wants to play soccer. I want her to have fun. I don't need her to be in a competitive league. I don't need her to have a team photo on 'picture day'. I don't want her to have a training session each week, and then a match at a variable time on a Saturday or Sunday. I don't want to build our week-ends round those matches. I don't want her to think that her soccer team is the be all and end all. I see that other people living here do want to do those things. What can I say? Bleueueueueueuueuegh!
You! Mr Sports Director of the local sports centre! Yes, I'm talking to YOU! When you have 16 girls aged 6 or 7 signed up for soccer, can't you SEE that it doesn't make sense to run a league? You are insisting on having 4 teams with 4 players in each. I have, politely and nicely, discussed with you on the phone how this isn't going to make for a successful experience. Kids get ill. Kids have other commitments at week-ends. Families have other priorities (well, some do). So sometimes there will be a team of 3 players or even 2 players. Can't you agree with me (and my daughter's team coach) that it would make a whole lot more sense to get the 16 girls together one evening a week, do training all together, split them into two teams, and play a game there and then. That way, we don't all have to trek out twice a week. That way, they will get a game, rather than turn out, only to find that the game is cancelled because not enough players have shown up. Four kids is not enough kids for five-a-side soccer. That isn't rocket science. I know you love leagues. I know you love competitive play. I know this is thinking outside the box in a very challenging and enormous way for you. But please, please, can't we just try my suggestion? Just once? You never know... it might work well. If it doesn't, then you can go back to your competitive league, where the coach is king, and picture day happens, and we end up with a winning team which gets a trophy, and runners up who get medals. But just this once, couldn't you just think a little sideyways?
Next rant point. Doughnuts are NOT breakfast food. Luckily, none of my children have breakfast at school. I see you have cereal and fruit on the menu, but I wouldn't trust my children not to go for the doughnuts. I wouldn't. Nor the 'strawberry toaster pastry'. I have to put that in quotation marks. Sorry. I just do.
And on the subject of school food, please don't make my 6 year old stand in the lunch line (what am I saying? the lunch QUEUE QUEUE QUEUE!) for half the allotted time, and then make her tip half her food in the trash because there isn't enough time left to eat it. Please. That one isn't rocket science either.
Bleueueueueueuegh. I had other things to say, but I just hit publish by mistake, so let's call it a day. A bleueueueueueueueueugh day.
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Marvellous mothers
As you know, these days I am hot on the case of Mummy Guilt. I am the masked crusader in the cape (the freshly laundered cape), battling that particular evil vilain. And in that spirit, I thought I'd just tell you what a fabulous mother I've been this morning, before rushing away to my secret hideaway, changing out of my superhero identity, and emerging into my real life as a humble toy store sales assistant. Ha! If only they knew...
The best 'fabulous mother' bit of the morning was the 15-minute car journey from the State Chess Tournament (10-yo participating) to the soccer pitch (13-yo participating). So for that to happen, you already have to imagine the whole mullarkey of getting two children to two places at the same time, each wearing different kit, needing different equipment, bla bla bla, which involved calling in favours from friends. Overnight favours on this occasion. So let's take that whole bit as read.
Then I need to tell you that I was on check-in duty at the Chess Tournament. This is a front-line job. It's not a front line you want to be in. I don't want to say too much, because I've never organised a big competition and I imagine it's not easy, but I think it is true to say that those who are good at chess (strategic thinking skills), are not necessarily those who are good at designing and supervising check-in systems for large numbers of children (organisation skills, people skills). Suffice to say, that one element of my job was to comfort a child in tears who'd been shouted at by one of the other organisers.
So anyway, after an hour of front-line duty and disorganisation, I then drove to the soccer match.
In the course of the journey, I answered the following questions:
what happens if you break a law?
how do the police find out?
how much is a fine?
what's a trial?
how do pet shops get birds to sell?
what does 'breed' mean?
can you unbreed animals?
what's the biggest pet you can have?
you can't really have a horse if you live in a town, can you?
do we live in a town?
what kind of party did you have for your 7th birthday?
when you play soccer, how do you not be the goalie, if you don't want to be the goalie?
would you like to be an ant?
really? did you know that they only live two days and they have people trying to squish them all the time?
would you really really really like to be a bird and be able to fly?
You have to admit, that for someone who has been up since 6.15, doesn't drink caffeine, has been dealing for an hour and a half with the potent cocktail of chess officials under pressure and members of the public, is mentally preparing a strategy to winkle out small shreds of information about her oldest son's first formal dance (yes, age 13) the previous evening while also enthusing about the goals he has scored... to be able to find the brain space to explain the judicial system in language a 6 year old can understand, recall childhood memories, ponder the metaphysical questions of creaturely existence, AND keep a car on the road in a straight line... I think it's pretty darn impressive. And let's admit it, this is standard fare for most mothers. You've all done this stuff too. You do it all the time. We are marvellous things, and should stop feeling guilty and inadequate.
Oh, and did I mention that Husband is away at the moment for nearly two weeks? Did I hear someone offering me a gold star to sport on my cape? Ooh, yes please (so long as it's an iron-on one).
.
The best 'fabulous mother' bit of the morning was the 15-minute car journey from the State Chess Tournament (10-yo participating) to the soccer pitch (13-yo participating). So for that to happen, you already have to imagine the whole mullarkey of getting two children to two places at the same time, each wearing different kit, needing different equipment, bla bla bla, which involved calling in favours from friends. Overnight favours on this occasion. So let's take that whole bit as read.
Then I need to tell you that I was on check-in duty at the Chess Tournament. This is a front-line job. It's not a front line you want to be in. I don't want to say too much, because I've never organised a big competition and I imagine it's not easy, but I think it is true to say that those who are good at chess (strategic thinking skills), are not necessarily those who are good at designing and supervising check-in systems for large numbers of children (organisation skills, people skills). Suffice to say, that one element of my job was to comfort a child in tears who'd been shouted at by one of the other organisers.
So anyway, after an hour of front-line duty and disorganisation, I then drove to the soccer match.
In the course of the journey, I answered the following questions:
what happens if you break a law?
how do the police find out?
how much is a fine?
what's a trial?
how do pet shops get birds to sell?
what does 'breed' mean?
can you unbreed animals?
what's the biggest pet you can have?
you can't really have a horse if you live in a town, can you?
do we live in a town?
what kind of party did you have for your 7th birthday?
when you play soccer, how do you not be the goalie, if you don't want to be the goalie?
would you like to be an ant?
really? did you know that they only live two days and they have people trying to squish them all the time?
would you really really really like to be a bird and be able to fly?
You have to admit, that for someone who has been up since 6.15, doesn't drink caffeine, has been dealing for an hour and a half with the potent cocktail of chess officials under pressure and members of the public, is mentally preparing a strategy to winkle out small shreds of information about her oldest son's first formal dance (yes, age 13) the previous evening while also enthusing about the goals he has scored... to be able to find the brain space to explain the judicial system in language a 6 year old can understand, recall childhood memories, ponder the metaphysical questions of creaturely existence, AND keep a car on the road in a straight line... I think it's pretty darn impressive. And let's admit it, this is standard fare for most mothers. You've all done this stuff too. You do it all the time. We are marvellous things, and should stop feeling guilty and inadequate.
Oh, and did I mention that Husband is away at the moment for nearly two weeks? Did I hear someone offering me a gold star to sport on my cape? Ooh, yes please (so long as it's an iron-on one).
.
Friday, March 11, 2011
Medical result
I recently had a Dexa scan. At least I think it's called that. It checks your bone density. It's a routine thing which they do for women of my sort of age, to check if you are showing signs of developing osteoporosis. The scan, said my doctor, would give me a benchmark. Yay for benchmarks.
I got the results in a letter from the doctor's office. It said the findings were 'normal'. Which is always nice to hear.
This last week I was at the doctor's about something else (a sports physical for 13-yo, since you ask), and I wanted to know more about the Dexa results. It struck me that 'normal' wasn't going to be a very helpful benchmark. "Do they give you a number, which you translate into 'normal', or do they just tell you 'normal'?"
"They just tell me 'normal'," he replied. "And I have to tell you, I don't often see that. Usually they ask for more tests to be done."
"Hmm..." I said. "So it's not 'normal' then. If you don't see it very often, it's not 'normal'. I think it should be 'good'."
"Well", said the doc, "It's 'normal' in the sense that it means there's nothing to worry about."
I'm on a mission though now. "But if you don't have many people who get 'normal', then I think it shouldn't be 'normal'. It isn't 'normal' unless that's a kind of average. If it's unusual to be 'normal', I think they should call it 'good'. Or couldn't it even be 'excellent'? I'm wanting a gold star here."
I think it's to do with being a third child. And having had too many medical tests in the not-too-distant past.
"OK", says my nice doctor. "I'll call it a gold star, then. You got a gold star."
I love my doctor.
.
I got the results in a letter from the doctor's office. It said the findings were 'normal'. Which is always nice to hear.
This last week I was at the doctor's about something else (a sports physical for 13-yo, since you ask), and I wanted to know more about the Dexa results. It struck me that 'normal' wasn't going to be a very helpful benchmark. "Do they give you a number, which you translate into 'normal', or do they just tell you 'normal'?"
"They just tell me 'normal'," he replied. "And I have to tell you, I don't often see that. Usually they ask for more tests to be done."
"Hmm..." I said. "So it's not 'normal' then. If you don't see it very often, it's not 'normal'. I think it should be 'good'."
"Well", said the doc, "It's 'normal' in the sense that it means there's nothing to worry about."
I'm on a mission though now. "But if you don't have many people who get 'normal', then I think it shouldn't be 'normal'. It isn't 'normal' unless that's a kind of average. If it's unusual to be 'normal', I think they should call it 'good'. Or couldn't it even be 'excellent'? I'm wanting a gold star here."
I think it's to do with being a third child. And having had too many medical tests in the not-too-distant past.
"OK", says my nice doctor. "I'll call it a gold star, then. You got a gold star."
I love my doctor.
.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Where has blogging taken me now?
Have you noticed how sometimes there’s a topic in the blogosphere that becomes flavour of the month? You read a post about it, and then come across another one. A few days later someone else is talking about the same thing, sometimes linking back to the first post you read, but sometimes seemingly unconnected. Then maybe there’s a little flurry of discussion that might lead you to BMB or beyond. I’m guessing that if you Twitter, this happens more than if you simply blog. It’s as if ideas are birds, flying and settling, here and there. Perhaps it’s just that if something catches your interest, you’ll spot it and it won’t pass you by. Perhaps it’s your own antennae that are responsible, tuning you in to a theme that’s of relevance to your life at that moment. Or perhaps the ideas really are like flocks of noisy starlings, circling and wheeling companionably. Who knows?
The subject that I’ve caught notice of recently is that of why we blog. Ah, the hardy perennial. I’ve seen that one come round more than a few times. When blogging was newer, less established, it was aired more often. Just why, exactly, are we doing this? The idea of a virtual friendship was something that had to be justified. It wasn’t yet normal. A virtual community? How does that work? We needed to talk about that. Now, experience allows us to take it more as read (rather an apt phrase, when it comes to virtual communities). Friendships that started off in cyberspace have been cemented at blogging events, or simply when two or more bloggers decide to meet. We no longer need to tell ourselves we’re not weird for doing it this way.
I’m glad that we seem to have got going on the old chestnut again. Yes. Why indeed do we blog? Time to re-evaluate. Has blogging morphed into something different altogether? Or has it just grown up a little? How long is a piece of string, and what is the price of fish?
Here are the posts I’ve come across recently that have got me a-pondering, from across the pond.
The Potty Diaries: Blogging Changed My Life
More Than Just a Mother: 8 Ways Social Media Changed My Life
and BMB is starting a new feature: Why Do You Blog?
So there we have two bloggers who claim that blogging has changed their lives. Could I say the same for me? Yes, I could. I’ve found a voice, I’ve found I can hold an audience, I’ve found friendship and community, I’ve found confidence. I've had articles published in a local women's magazine, which I wouldn't have attempted to do before. I know I can write. Most of all, I’ve found that writing helps me make sense of life. Daily mundane trivial life, and great big gut-wrenching life. It all seems to benefit from being wrestled into words. I didn't know that before I blogged. From the outside, you wouldn't see much that looked very significant from that. I haven't written a book. I haven't become a journalist. I'm not earning any money from writing. But it is important to me. I have found something out that I am exploring. It's taking a while to find direction, but I'm not too worried about that.
Here’s the new thing I've done with it recently. I’ve started journalling – which I don’t think I’d ever have done if I hadn’t first blogged. It’s just for me, and it really wouldn’t be very interesting for anyone else to read, so it’s a different animal to a blog. I’m not choosing words that will convey my meaning to other people. I’m choosing words that convey my meaning to myself. (Did I just write that sentence? Does Private Eye still run Pseuds Corner?) Actually, it’s not really about choosing words. It’s much more about picking up the pen, and letting thoughts, feelings, random mental preoccupations flow out onto the paper. I have to do it in a notebook with a pen; it doesn’t appear to work so well at a keyboard. I don’t know why. Here’s the odd thing about journalling. It seems to create more time in the day. Somehow I make better use of time available. Maybe it’s something to do with freeing up some mind space for yourself, so that you are an emptier receptacle for whatever the day brings. Maybe it puts you more in touch with yourself, so that you are a more defined person in meeting whatever comes your way. Maybe you access parts of yourself that otherwise lie a little dormant. Maybe Pseuds Corner does still exist.
I don’t journal daily – though you’re meant to. Perhaps that will come with time. I think it will, as I now look forward to my journalling time. It’s a joy, not a chore as it was at first (though only at the very beginning – I discovered the pleasure in it quite quickly).
Does anyone else keep a journal? Did you come to it through blogging, or was it the other way round? Perhaps blogging appealed because you were already in the habit of writing. I’m interested to know.
.
The subject that I’ve caught notice of recently is that of why we blog. Ah, the hardy perennial. I’ve seen that one come round more than a few times. When blogging was newer, less established, it was aired more often. Just why, exactly, are we doing this? The idea of a virtual friendship was something that had to be justified. It wasn’t yet normal. A virtual community? How does that work? We needed to talk about that. Now, experience allows us to take it more as read (rather an apt phrase, when it comes to virtual communities). Friendships that started off in cyberspace have been cemented at blogging events, or simply when two or more bloggers decide to meet. We no longer need to tell ourselves we’re not weird for doing it this way.
I’m glad that we seem to have got going on the old chestnut again. Yes. Why indeed do we blog? Time to re-evaluate. Has blogging morphed into something different altogether? Or has it just grown up a little? How long is a piece of string, and what is the price of fish?
Here are the posts I’ve come across recently that have got me a-pondering, from across the pond.
The Potty Diaries: Blogging Changed My Life
More Than Just a Mother: 8 Ways Social Media Changed My Life
and BMB is starting a new feature: Why Do You Blog?
So there we have two bloggers who claim that blogging has changed their lives. Could I say the same for me? Yes, I could. I’ve found a voice, I’ve found I can hold an audience, I’ve found friendship and community, I’ve found confidence. I've had articles published in a local women's magazine, which I wouldn't have attempted to do before. I know I can write. Most of all, I’ve found that writing helps me make sense of life. Daily mundane trivial life, and great big gut-wrenching life. It all seems to benefit from being wrestled into words. I didn't know that before I blogged. From the outside, you wouldn't see much that looked very significant from that. I haven't written a book. I haven't become a journalist. I'm not earning any money from writing. But it is important to me. I have found something out that I am exploring. It's taking a while to find direction, but I'm not too worried about that.
Here’s the new thing I've done with it recently. I’ve started journalling – which I don’t think I’d ever have done if I hadn’t first blogged. It’s just for me, and it really wouldn’t be very interesting for anyone else to read, so it’s a different animal to a blog. I’m not choosing words that will convey my meaning to other people. I’m choosing words that convey my meaning to myself. (Did I just write that sentence? Does Private Eye still run Pseuds Corner?) Actually, it’s not really about choosing words. It’s much more about picking up the pen, and letting thoughts, feelings, random mental preoccupations flow out onto the paper. I have to do it in a notebook with a pen; it doesn’t appear to work so well at a keyboard. I don’t know why. Here’s the odd thing about journalling. It seems to create more time in the day. Somehow I make better use of time available. Maybe it’s something to do with freeing up some mind space for yourself, so that you are an emptier receptacle for whatever the day brings. Maybe it puts you more in touch with yourself, so that you are a more defined person in meeting whatever comes your way. Maybe you access parts of yourself that otherwise lie a little dormant. Maybe Pseuds Corner does still exist.
I don’t journal daily – though you’re meant to. Perhaps that will come with time. I think it will, as I now look forward to my journalling time. It’s a joy, not a chore as it was at first (though only at the very beginning – I discovered the pleasure in it quite quickly).
Does anyone else keep a journal? Did you come to it through blogging, or was it the other way round? Perhaps blogging appealed because you were already in the habit of writing. I’m interested to know.
.
Monday, March 7, 2011
ADHD
Don't you hate it when a juicy blog post dies on you? Here's one that's done just that. This is what I wrote earlier.
I thought I'd open a little can of worms here. I'm going to report a conversation I had with 10-yo the other day, and not reflect on it at all, but see what you all think. I suppose that's a bit disingenuous, since by posting the conversation at all, I am implying that I think there's an issue here. But I'm not sure what my opinion is, and it would be a very uninformed opinion in any case (though that doesn't usually stop me) so I thought I'd just ask and see what you all think.
Him: Mum, do I have ADHD?
Me: No, you don't. Why do you ask?
Him: Lots of fourth graders do.
Me: They do? How many kids in your class have ADHD?
Him: Oh, six, I think. [out of a class of 17]
Me: So do they take medication, or do they have special routines, or what?
Him: Some take medication, but I don't really know much about it. I just wondered if I had it too.
What do you make of that conversation?
That would have made for a good discussion, wouldn't it? Trouble is, I casually threw a question over my shoulder, just as I was finishing up.
"10-yo, how many kids in your class did you say had ADHD?"
Must have been some journalistic instinct that made me want to check my facts.
"I dunno."
"You said 6, the other day."
"I think it's just one. And one or two in the other class."
"You said 6, I think."
"That was an exaggeration. Why do you want to know?"
Bother. Or as we say in blogging circles, aaaaargh...
.
I thought I'd open a little can of worms here. I'm going to report a conversation I had with 10-yo the other day, and not reflect on it at all, but see what you all think. I suppose that's a bit disingenuous, since by posting the conversation at all, I am implying that I think there's an issue here. But I'm not sure what my opinion is, and it would be a very uninformed opinion in any case (though that doesn't usually stop me) so I thought I'd just ask and see what you all think.
Him: Mum, do I have ADHD?
Me: No, you don't. Why do you ask?
Him: Lots of fourth graders do.
Me: They do? How many kids in your class have ADHD?
Him: Oh, six, I think. [out of a class of 17]
Me: So do they take medication, or do they have special routines, or what?
Him: Some take medication, but I don't really know much about it. I just wondered if I had it too.
What do you make of that conversation?
That would have made for a good discussion, wouldn't it? Trouble is, I casually threw a question over my shoulder, just as I was finishing up.
"10-yo, how many kids in your class did you say had ADHD?"
Must have been some journalistic instinct that made me want to check my facts.
"I dunno."
"You said 6, the other day."
"I think it's just one. And one or two in the other class."
"You said 6, I think."
"That was an exaggeration. Why do you want to know?"
Bother. Or as we say in blogging circles, aaaaargh...
.
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