Clara Teaches

Sotto Voce II- Speak Softly and Regain Control

2011-09-05T22:04:00.001-04:00

A long, long time ago, in a land far away, I once described my experience with my kindergartners on the day I had no voice. It was surprisingly positive, and taught me an important lesson in expectations and what it means to "control."

Nearly six years later, with a home-schooled four year old and the world's busiest toddler boy (seventeen months old this week!) it's easy to fall into the trap of trying to out-shout the crowd. When water is being spat upon the floor while simultaneously Lola, the super dog, is being vigorously petted with a toy screwdriver, my instinct is to go into drill-sargent mode: "WHAT ARE YOOOU DOOOOOOOOOING? NO!"

The ridiculousness of the words aside (I find "What are you doing?" and "What do you think you're doing?" to be some of the absolute stupidest questions any adult could pose to a child), the tone accomplishes nothing. Not that the instinct is any less because of this. But on the rare days that I remind myself to stop, take a breath, and use a very quiet voice, I surprise myself with the attention-grabbing power of just being quiet. This works much better for the four year old, as the seventeen-month old is still very much in the stage of "Talk him through what he needs to do, while escorting him through it," but it's still surprisingly effective.

What does this look like? Roll film:

Small girl-child decides to take a big mouthful of her Calm tea (oh, the irony) and then slightly whale-like, spouts tea all over the floor. She then glances at it, laughs, and takes another giant mouthful.

I observe this with the growing horror of someone who had just washed that floor. I feel a giant, rushing intake of air, and adrenaline that makes me absolutely spin- surely a loud voice will only make the situation better, yes? Um, no. Tea will almost certainly either splatter out, or be inhaled (and choked) in. My expression must be triggering the small girl-child's radar- surely this sort of behavior is just not done. I let out the air and kneel down next to the spill.

Small girl-child smiles and tries to dance away- the "after" of tea being on the floor is nowhere near as fun as the "during" of tea being sprayed onto the floor. I remind myself of my goals here- I do not want this to happen again, and I do want her to clean this up. Around here, what we do, we un-do. What we un-do, we re-do. Whatever it takes to make things right. And that rule pretty much covers every situation I can possibly think of, from messes to harming a sibling to breaking something. I focus only on the goals and very quietly tell her to put the tea cup down, and go find the towel near the sink. Whether from the super quiet voice or the potential for "Fun With A Towel," she complies and comes over to begin the process of skating around the wet floor with a towel on her feet. She explains, while wiping the floor, that she wanted to make her cheeks puff wayyyyyy out. I respond that it didn't work so well, and that I do not want to see that sort of thing outside of the bathroom again. The floor is cleaned, my voice doesn't go into "Screechy Anger Mode," the small-girl child is on to bigger and better things without being crushed verbally by an adult.

Fun in the Snow! In Only 800 Easy Steps...

2011-02-13T22:05:00.003-05:00

So much for regular blogging. A busy three and a half year old and a busy ten month old make for some very active days. We were able to get outside and actually play in the snow for the second day in a row, so I'm going to cross my fingers that bedtime actually took, and share a little glimpse of what it takes to get these two ready to go outside and play.

First, I do need to share that I'm a huge proponent of outdoor play. Kids need dirt and sunshine as much as plants do, and even in the winter, I know I am a happier person after being outdoors. Particularly as kids who play outside tend to sleep a little better!

So it was ironic that we've just exited an entire month of sub-zero temps, and windchill factors in the double-digits. The toddler-girl and almost-walking-infant-boy and I have been bouncing off the walls and going on little trips to various places just to see something new.

2:00 PM- We returned home from church and the fascinating trip to the car wash which followed, where the car wash guy woke Vincent up with his cheery booming, "HELLO!!!!!!!!!!! BEAUTIFUL DAYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!" which ended up entombing me in the car wash, with both a screaming baby and a highly-charged toddler. The toddler had been given red, sparkly cookies after church, and was high as a kite on red food dye. She attempted to comfort Vincent by treating him to a high-pitched soliloquy in her own language. Without taking a single breath. Home again, and now after noon, we'd eaten, cleaned up, and it was time to get us all outside. First, we needed play clothes.

2:05 PM- "Go get a shirt!" I told Gianna, as I changed Vincent. Changing Vincent requires the use of both arms and both feet, while he tries to crab-crawl away. Deep down, he wants to own and operate his own nudist colony, and diapers have no role in this dream. So I wrangled him out of one diaper when Gianna ran back with two pairs of pants. I reminded her that she already had pants, and she needed a shirt. She happily ran away. I returned my attention to Vincent, who was trying to stand up in the middle of the bed. I managed to wrestle a clean diaper onto him, in spite of his extreme protests. I set him on the floor and raced him to the bathroom to rinse out his previous diaper, while using my foot to keep him away from assisting me in this fascinating job.

2:15 PM- I grabbed Vincent, and ran into Gianna in the hall, who found a shirt and had now decided to cover her felt vegetable friends in "sparkly shiny treasures." I switch her into play clothes as Vincent made moves on her treasures and her vegetable friend, while each screamed at each other.

2:20 PM- We headed downstairs. I grabbed all of our winter gear, and tossed that down the stairs ahead of us. Vincent signals that he wants to nurse, and by this point I was pretty relieved for a break, so we take a milk break.

2:25- The science of order- this is very important. I always get myself prepped first, as I've found that if I don't do this, the whole operation crumbles and we need to start all over from step one. Gianna went next, and finally I popped Vincent into his Maggie-Simpson-style fleece snowsuit. This was met with diaper-esque enthusiasm, and during this endurance training event, Lola orbited us in increasingly smaller and smaller circles, very jazzed over the fact that the entire pack of us would shortly be outside together.

2:30- We exited, having spent thirty whole minutes doing what used to take me less than five to do. I consoled myself with the idea that in a matter of a few short months, leaving the house will require merely grabbing a spare diaper and sticking little feet into sandals.

Hug Your Babies

2010-12-16T18:57:00.002-05:00

I promise I haven't fallen off the face of the earth. I'm up to my eyeballs in toddler and crawling, cruising infant antics, and dog escapades.

I did want to circulate this for a few more eyes to read. I've read about Dana's family for a while at Roscommon Acres (http://roscommonacres.com) for a while now, and was devastated by the loss of their 22 month old son, Mattias. Here is a link to her blog entry, memorializing her little "Tiggy":

http://roscommonacres.com/2010/12/in-memory-of-our-beloved-son/comment-page-2/#comment-16302

God hold little Tigg for his mama. If you feel so compelled, the family asks that you donate to Tiny Hands International (an organization that works toward ending the child sex trade in Asia) in his honor.

Through a Glass

2010-08-25T09:40:00.004-04:00

Pop culture has turned Post-Partum Depression (PPD) into something of a fad, or an example of extremes, or the scapegoat to personal downfalls, or the extreme opposite: a falsity.

Here's a look at what it feels like from the inside- picture being inside a small, glass room. When you are inside this room, you can kind of hear what is going on outside, and if you force yourself, you can hear and interact in conversations. It's just muffled enough so that if you don't focus and concentrate on what is going on, you can easily tune it out. Time passes in weird rushes and pauses. Sometimes, you swear that you've been rocking and nursing your baby for only five or ten minutes, and you are startled when you look at the clock and realize it's been nearly an hour. Or sometimes you focus so hard on chopping vegetables for dinner, and think that surely you've just wasted thirty minutes on the stupid celery, and barely five minutes have passed. You know you love your children and your husband, and try to focus to make sure that they understand that, but feel guilty because every once in a while, your own flat affect (numbness, nothingness) becomes glaringly obvious to you.

And then something triggers a quick smash through at least one of the panes of glass in your small glassed-in room, and suddenly you feel something again. In my case, it was an odd event involving a small child (not my own). Anger and no small amount of instant "Mama Bear" defensiveness managed to flip that switch back on again.

I'm in a place right now where I vacillate between no feelings and then lots and lots of them. It does make me think, as always, where this can fit in the primal, natural state of mothering children. Did Cave Clara deal with this? Somehow, I doubt it, unless there were extreme circumstances that compounded the issue (loss, abandonment, a major catastrophic weather event, etc.) Pregnancy and birth and the post-partum period of time were treated as normal, natural, spiritual conditions that sort of flowed together and were assisted by the knowledgeable women in the family or tribal group. Extra hands were always available to help out with the children that Cave Clara already had, and to go grab some well-established herbal remedies to some of the nutritional deficits of birth. Food today is, even when carefully searched for and prepared, nutritionally inferior to food in its natural state. Even when food is bought from local sources, it's still typically something augmented in some way by factory-prepared chicken food (most likely created with genetically modified soy) or chemical plant treatments (pesticides or fertilizers).

Catnip tea, Motherwort tincture, and calcium helped me avoid a severe hormonal crash in the first four weeks following Vincent's birth. So effectively, in fact, that I felt fantastic, and stopped taking them. Three weeks after a birth, a mother's endocrine system starts doing a colossal tango, preparing her body to begin to be able to breastfeed her baby via the "supply and demand" mode that mothers and babies worldwide, for centuries, have perfected. By three months post-partum, the post-pregnancy hormones that supplied the colostrum and early, fatty newborn milk are replaced by the give-and-take of nursing of the infant triggering the oxytocin that maintains the perfect amount of milk for the baby- right down to the time of day. So three weeks post-partum is a prime time for new mothers to feel a "crash."

That crash didn't happen for me until a bit later. As typical for that sort of thing, it probably was from overdoing it. The facts are fairly easy to blame for this- we don't live near family, and out-of-state family members have their own lives and can only help out for so long. Mr. Clarateaches does need to work to support us. And active toddlers and rapidly growing babies need to have a mama that does things with them, all day every day (and all night, too, sometimes). Food, we already covered. I attempt to use herbs, but I really need some fantastic old crone to guide my path (and frankly, to do the work for me).

Post-Partum Depression is NOT some kind of character flaw in the mother. It's not a reflection of her children, nor is it a reflection of her feelings towards her children. PPD usually works the other way- it can cloud the actual feelings (rather than stem from them). PPD is not Post-Partum Psychosis, either. PPP is a rare, but very serious medical condition that requires intense, immediate medical and psychological help. It's not an excuse. It is indeed something that requires a lot of work to overcome, and some women do choose drugs and medical intervention. There is no weakness there, just like there is no heroism involved in choosing the opposite.

For now, I'm choosing a combination of things. Pilates in the morning, assisted by my baby (he makes a fantastic weight, and loves sitting on my lower legs while I do abdominal exercises) and my toddler (who grabs a baby doll and incorporates it into her gyrations) do a fantastic job of clearing my head. Keeping myself on a fairly regular schedule of accomplishing tasks and getting us out of the house means that my family has what they need, even on the days I don't particularly care. Sunshine, calcium (so important to the brain), and a diet that is a strange mix of Mediterranean and Weston A Price's "Traditional Foods" all seem to help. Re-reading Glasser's Choice Theory is also helpful, at least in as much as I am working hard to make sure my feelings (or lack thereof) are not affecting my actions. The support and love of Mr. Clarateaches is, always, crucial. Bit by bit, I'm getting there.

Off to start my day...

Three is a Magic Number, III: Trip and Fall Down

2010-06-26T21:13:00.002-04:00

Repeat after me, Grasshopper: Power is not taken away, but given away. A power struggle only exists when power (authority) is forced. The moment power is in the process of being proven, it is tossed out there and is up for grabs, like a fumbled football, and each player scrambles to try to gain control, and in the process does more extreme and intense actions to do so. Authority and power are better held, calmly and gently- and guarded from struggle be avoiding pushing it on anyone, especially children.

Say it, learn it, live it. Screw up. Repent. Make amends. Over and over and over. And somehow, one day, you will look back to where you were, see where you are, and find that you have improved.

Three is a Magic Number, II: Pre-Three Silliness

2010-06-25T16:02:00.002-04:00

Well-Baby Visit of Vincent

- We all trooped into the waiting room of our family doctor (a rather chatty osteopath and his wife, a PA, run the practice) to discover that there were not one, but two pharmaceutical reps in chairs. This instantly put a giant bunch in my shorts, as I wasn't in the mood to be trapped in an examination room with an active almost-three year old and a two month old. I can only keep her away from the tempting, candy-store style glass containers of cotton balls and tongue dispensers for so long before she decides that the battle must now commence.

The Astra-Zeneca rep immediately went into "people-person" mode and smiled at Gianna and said "Hi!" Gianna, not a fan of strangers interacting with her or potentially trying to usurp her role as "the big sister," made a derisive noise and flapped her hand at him in a shoo-ing manner. He wisely did not pursue the interaction further, but then made the grave mistake of clearly talking about her with the other rep in the waiting room. The two of them smiled and pointed at her and whispered together. I walked around the chairs where our Sherpas had deposited all of our gear and did the "Mom dance" to keep Vincent happy in the Mei Tai. Gianna suddenly whirled around in her chair and, while yelling, "I'm gonna SKUNK you!" she crouched in a skunk position. And then blasted an earth-shattering fart in the direction of the pharmaceutical reps. They died laughing, while I stood at the cross-roads of Laugh Hysterically and Die of Embarrassment. I decided, after nearly chewing off the inside of my cheeks, to remind her to make sure her body is safe when she is on chairs.

Vincent's First Beer

- I always sort of knew that at some point in the future, Gianna would supply Vincent with a beer, and yet, really didn't know it would happen so soon. As I cleaned up after dinner one evening, Gianna grabbed Mr. Clarateaches' almost-empty beer bottle and tried making train noises with it. After having a wonderful time blowing air over the top of the bottle, I heard her say lovingly to her most adoring fan (who was chilling in the swing), "Vin-Cent, do you want to try it too?" My attempt at flying around the counter top divider was too slow, and Vincent smelled like a sweaty frat boy for the rest of the evening.

Three is a Magic Number

2010-06-23T13:04:00.002-04:00

Veggie Tales are on the TV, the nearly three-month-old is sleeping on me, and the nearly three-year old has leaned against me, pinched "the squishy part" of my arm (her favorite comfort method) and has fallen asleep.

In only training pants. Couch, brace yourself.

As the water system is on the blink (is inundating my house with major iron and manganese) I am exempt from any type of cleaning involving water. By my own command. Thus sayeth the Clara. So I'll start another rambling series on my blog.

Three is truly "The Crucible" when it comes to ages and stages that children go through. A taller and more potty-adept version revisits around age 13, but it's really just the same thing. Three year olds wake up in the morning with the thought: "What shall I conquer today? And how shall I mete out the torture when I hit an obstacle?" And this is where parents can either help or harm: it's time to either jump right into the pool and help sort this out into appropriate manifestations, or to punitively squash and shame and ridicule. Being an "appropriate manifestations" fan myself, we're steering towards that direction.

It's easy to look down at your sleeping newborn, and your adorable, new-to-sitting 6 month old, and your freshly toddling one year old and say, "I will never harm you." Three is the age where the adults are sorted out from random infantile morons who happen to procreate. Strong words, yes, but adulthood is truly a state of being in control of one's own actions. Children have to learn this (hence the term"childish." If a child can't behave in a childish manner, when exactly can they? Post adolescence? By pop media accounts, one might actually be persuaded of that.)

So what, then? Should we allow threes to "rule the house?" To dictate every move we make? Somehow that seems to be the default option that most people like to leap to, when they discover that we fully plan on using gentle discipline methods with our children- no punitive, shaming, arbitrary,"take that you little brat," juvenile nonsense around here. It certainly would feel pretty satisfying to land a smack on my child when she's pushing all of my buttons at once, but what exactly would that teach her?

Adults who really do want to guide and teach and model grace and methods of amending mistakes, to the right. Those of you who are retributive, vindictive, and do not own your emotions and have no desire to do so, you have a seat over there. Everyone in between, who want to do the right thing but finds themselves caught up in how they were parented, perhaps it is time to examine how we were parented and "re-parent" ourselves. Especially those of us whose childhoods were "black and blue and red all over," mindfully owning our emotions will be one of the very best tools in our bag of parenting tricks. Our kids, wonderful and wild, loud and clumsy, loving and greeting each new day as exactly that- a chance for a fresh new beginning, deserve exactly that.

Here we go...

Victory

2010-04-19T13:20:00.003-04:00

8 pounds, 20 inches long; fuzzy, downy hair; caramel-colored, like Gianna's; Vincent John entered this world early in the morning on April 8. Even though Dr. Older Guy had ordered an OR team to assemble upstairs, I blasted through the apparent conventions of that hospital and successfully VBAC'ed my baby! Even though the doc seemed nervous and tense about the whole deal, he did crack a smile and say, "You've single-handedly altered (and then aside to a nurse, 'Or created,') the VBAC statistics of this hospital."

He wasn't kidding- The only other mama and baby pair in the birthing area when I was admitted was a planned induction. Later, that mom and I were moved upstairs to make way for two more planned inductions, and a planned Cesarean section.

I have so, so many thoughts and ruminations and deep ponderings, with regards to this birth and the hospital and birth in general. For now, though, I'm enjoying the newborn, otherworldliness of my wrinkly, curled-up little bug. And am in awe over the whole new family we have- I have a son! A girl and a boy. How very "dollhouse" of us, no?

You May Ask Yourself- Well How Did I Get Here?

2010-03-17T22:18:00.003-04:00

On a walk last night, I "saw" a young couple, with their year-old puppy, walking in front of me- the wife was heavily pregnant, and they were talking excitedly about the baby that would be coming. Who would this baby be? Is it a boy or a girl? What would this new little person bring to their lives?

Okay, I hallucinated a bit. I think it was the extreme deja-vous I was experiencing, due to the unnaturally high temps on a mid-March evening in Metro-Detroit, Michigan. It could almost have been June of 2007 again. Only this time, it was Mr. Clarateaches, a now nearly four-year old Dogasus, and an adorable, perky little girl who will be three years old this summer, along for the walk in her wagon. Just 25 days away from my "Guess Date," I found myself walking in my own footsteps of almost three years ago, thinking similar thoughts. Who is this individual I am carrying? Is this the little sister, or the little brother of my sweet baby girl? What will they bring to our group? What will change?

Life, of course, being what it has been for a little more than the last year (oh what the heck, a little more than two and a half years), has jaded some of the view. I know now what labor feels like, and I also know what it feels like when all the best laid plans fall horrifyingly to the ground and go up in flames. I know what the insanity of cognitive dissonance feels like when you simultaneously feel so fulfilled and complete while looking at the tiny baby in your arms, and at the same time feel like you don't know whose body this is, but it surely can't be yours, because your body just doesn't fail. I know the mind-numbing, head-banging-on-a-wall experience of battling hospital staff for the most basic of choices. I know the strange, "beyond the looking glass," "I am now blank and separate forever" sinkhole of post-partum depression. The repeated rise and fall of hope as I twice hold a positive pregnancy test in my hands, and follow it twelve weeks later with a tiny shell of a baby who is no longer earth-bound.

I also know the exhausting, exhilarating, boundless love of a small child who shares some of my genes, with some of the genes of the love of my life. I'm sure that she's just about as close to perfection as we will ever achieve. I know that the same little person who stretches me, as a mother, to the point where I think I can never be this tired or frustrated again, is also the same little person who amazes me with her capacity to learn and to come to her own conclusions, and be her own person. How could I be so lucky?

In approximately a month or less, my questions will be answered. The morbid ones, and the mundane- will this baby live? Will I actually have a living baby at the end of this? How will this baby arrive- will my body fail me again, or will my labor be hellaciously wonderful and result in a victorious VBAC? Who IS this little one, who, as I type, is bumping little limbs out at me, and waving around what is probably a little rear-end? Will Gianna have a little sister, or brother- is it going to be a new experience of what we already know, or will we embark on a new adventure, that of raising a little boy? How will I come out, on the other side of this? How will we all sort out the change from a family of three (plus dog) to a family of four (plus dog)?

I Would Be Remiss...

2010-02-24T15:25:00.003-05:00

WARNING: What follows is pretty blunt and ugly.

... if I didn't at least briefly mention the horrible Schatz case, wherein a 7 year old Northern CA girl named Lydia (originally from Liberia, adopted by the Schatz family along with two other Liberian children) was beaten to death over the course of many hours by her adoptive parents. With a length of 1/4 inch "plumbers line."

For mispronouncing a word, according to her "parents," the ones who beat her until her spirit quite literally left her body.

Her eleven year old sister, also adopted and from Liberia, was beaten to the brink of death, but was hospitalized until her liver stopped trying to shut down. A biological child of the Schatz', a ten year old boy, was also discovered to have bruising on his body.

So, from what kind of freak-a-zoid source would this self-proclaimed "evangelical family" ever get the idea to use a length of plastic tubing, usually used inside of a toilet, for beating their children? Why, from Michael and Debi Pearl's fractured Bible Tales, of course! Michael and Debi Pearl, of the Sean Paddock infamy; Michael and Debi Pearl, who somehow believe that one can achieve sinlessness and perfection right here on earth; Michael and Debi Pearl, who believe that only the husband of the family is sanctified through Christ's death, and that his wife is only sanctified through him.

Well, okay then, some might say- only a few really uber-fundie Christian cult members would fall in line with this sort of thinking. Only a few quacks would really use this, right? Not so much, unfortunately. The Pearls offer a quick fix, guaranteed to make your children achieve salvation, and force your home into perfect harmony. Who can resist? Your house is calm and orderly, your children follow your every command (CHEERFULLY!), Mom's soft-spoken and CHEERFUL, and Dad- well, according to the Pearls, it doesn't matter which of the three entities of God he is (the "commanding" Father God, the "dreamy" Holy Spirit, or the "merciful" Christ), he is just plain God to that house. I'll let others do the citation from their Child and Wife Abuse Manuals, respectively, as I refuse to link them to my blog. For more links, if your stomach can handle it, especially to the Pearl's website, check out the website, "Why Not Train A Child?" I want to strongly caution Christian readers especially- when I first started reading into these people about two years ago (during the time that the Paddock trial was still going on, and North Carolina was attempting-unsuccessfully- to indict them for an aspect of his death), I came away feeling very spiritually violated. My interactions with others, even my own husband, was very negatively affected by the experience of reading chapters of their book, "To Train Up A Child," and I had a very visceral reaction to such severe blasphemy and heresy. To be perfectly honest, I was literally tainted by what I feel to be the work of two people who are being operated as tools by Satan himself. This is no ordinary demonic possession within these "two old country folks," this is the handwriting of the Old Scratch himself. If you are a Christian and you take on the task of reading this pile of lies, surround yourself with spiritual people who can pull you from the brink, if it comes down to that. And so there- I've laid it on the line that I may be a little overly "religious," or a little over-concerned with the spiritual realm, but there it is. Consider yourself warned.

So many others have blogged about the insidiousness of this "ministry's" message, and how parents have been swept away by this. Because God knows, (and I'm talking the real God, not the Freaky God that the Pearls seem to worship) that no parent in their right mind would decide that they want to go with a program that beats kids to within an inch of their lives (if they're "lucky." And I would argue that poor Lydia is far better off having not survived such a horrific experience.) And others have blogged about the extreme contrariness this "ministry's" message has toward actual Scripture and fundamental Christian belief. A fairly comprehensive list of all of those bloggers, from Tulip Girl to Beauty For Ashes, can be found at the blog Roscommon Acres. Whether you are a Christian or not, it's well worth checking these out, as it seems to be (oh I hope, I hope, I hope...) the beginnings of the Christian body as a whole deciding that it's time to quit calling this "the extreme," and to start taking a stand and saying that the whole thing is evil.

There is not a whole lot I can add to the outcry, aside from my own cries that this IS NOT CHRISTIANITY. I will share a little bit of my own "joy," that completely fills our home on a daily basis, without the application of any sort of physical implements or withholding of love or any sort of shaming or screaming. And a possible look at what Mr Clarateaches and I would completely miss out on, if we decided that we needed to physically harm our child to make her do whatever is convenient to the adults:

While shrieking, the other evening, in the midst of the angst of "the witching hour" (the hour or so before dinner when everyone from newborns to probably centurions tends to fall apart a little) while I was changing Gianna's diaper, I reminded her that I can only help her out if she tells me what she wants- otherwise, I have to make the very best decision for her- in this case, finishing with the diaper and going back downstairs. She responded with a shriek. I told her that I would help her out by finishing her diaper, to which she immediately responded, in a totally rational voice, "Mommy, I only want you to be happy!" (To which I replied, obviously, that I am happy no matter what she does! My adult emotions do not start and stop with her actions, and I want her to be well aware of that.) But ponder for a moment, if I would have applied the Pearl methods of going ahead and "switching" her until she was cheerful? For one thing, I would have switched my arm off, because I don't know anyone who responds to physical pain with "cheerfulness." For another- I would have missed what was arguably the cutest and silliest thing she said that day.

And I could probably go on and on, and describe many more adorable interactions with the little Gianna-bee, and describe how proactive, "Get Off (My) Butt Parenting," style responses have somehow managed to create a peaceful and happy and intelligent little girl. I have to wonder what Sean, Lydia, and possibly many other un-recognized Pearl victims would be like, had they not only lived, but had been parented consistently, gently, gracefully, and positively. Lydia may have mispronounced words, but she would have been reading. Joyfully, no doubt. God rest her sweet soul.

Classical Toddlerhood

2010-02-22T13:09:00.002-05:00

Babe's gestating nicely... plans to VBAC as peacefully as possible are percolating...

And there is a short, intelligent little person who always wants to know more! After looking through different options and reading books and links, we've decided that the Classical, Latin-Based Curriculum looks like it will fit our style and Gianna's learning style beautifully! The very best part of this style of curriculum, I think, is the central concept of "Multum non multa." A broad amount of learning without extraneous "stuff." Much, not many.

Applying some principals of "multum non multa" to early childhood education is kind of fun and pliable- there really is not a lot recommended at this age outside of some fun and joyful childhood experiences- reading language-rich books that have a deeper meaning (such as, rather than "Dora The Explorer Saves the Day," read "The Hungry Caterpillar.") Explore the great outdoors, as much as possible, and with as much narration and child- originated activities. Bake together, explore art materials together, et cetera.

I had to "un-school" myself, to a certain degree, to get beyond the typical state-educated, teacher-trained mindset. Granted, I had already done this during my time teaching kindergarten at the Chicagoland public school. My class was comprised of students who were not the "typical" children towards which the curriculum was geared. So, a lot of times, the Houghton-Mifflin and Harcourt needed to be tossed aside. Working at the cult only exacerbated my extreme need to patchwork various types of curriculum together for a more precise tool.

While I have ideas about what I will use when it is time to use a more formal format for Gianna, here is just a bit of what we typically do together on a daily or weekly basis:

- Calendar time: Very loosely done, usually lasting no longer than five minutes per day. I have a pocket calendar and all of the stuff that goes along with it- right now we're mostly focusing on the month, day, date, and year. So it usually goes like this:
"What is the month? It starts with Ffff-" G- "February!" "Right! And yesterday was Sunday, so today is Monday! Tomorrow will be Tuesday." Then we say the whole date ("Today is Monday, February 22nd, 2010.") And then Gianna picks out a card depicting the day's weather- today the snowflake will represent the wet and heavy snow that is falling.

- Games: Hullabaloo, Memory, and Elefun do the trick for now, as well as a homemade ladybug spot-counting game that she enjoys. I think this blog would be much better with photos- I'll have to scrape up enough memory to take some photos and add them later!

- Baking: This is half necessity (heat up the downstairs and avoid buying bread at the store) and half fun. Just because Gianna doesn't understand the concept of "half" or "quarter" or "teaspoon" right now doesn't mean she can't be exposed to the sounds of the words, or to using the tools! Measuring and mixing and even some small amount of heavily-supervised cutting go into this. Math, sensory experiences, and language all fall nicely into place- as well as the social cooperation of working together and the natural rewards of following directions.

- Art: What don't we do?!? Gianna gets the full advantage of having two artistic parents who have a TON of materials around. Yarn, fabrics, various markers-crayons-pastels-pencils, paper of different types, watercolors and poster paint... it goes on and on. She first put marker to paper in June of 2008, shortly before turning one, and she's made it a point to do something creative ever since.

- Books: Mr Clarateaches has read to Gianna almost nightly since she was a little gestating belly babe. Currently, they either read three stories a night, or one chapter from the old, classic Winnie the Pooh book. During the day, she finds all kinds of favorites to bring to me to read. We also do a lot of environmental reading- she "reads" the cookbook (points out numbers and letters she knows, finds numbers in the junk mail we receive, and interprets road signs while driving).

- Recitation and Memorization: Perhaps controversial, but nothing I do is aimed at making people feel all warm and cozy about my decisions! We recite various Psalms and prayers at night as part of her bedtime routine. Soon, I will be adding classical nursery rhymes to her morning school time. I do this NOT so that she'll entertain other adults in social settings (because she probably wouldn't, anyway) but mostly because I want to grab her little brain while it's still forming connections and processes, and get some goodies crammed in there. The language and beauty of the content will add to her vocabulary and incidental understanding of the English language.

- Reading, 'Riting, and 'Rithmatic: Mostly still environmental, but I do plan on making her a chart loosely based on the Sing, Spell, Read & Write letter-sound song. SSR&W is a decent curriculum up to a certain point, where it sort of takes off in a direction that I wasn't totally fond of when I used it while teaching kindergarten at the cult. Calendar and other number cards on her wall have helped with linking numerals to their names, and counting to brush teeth have helped with rote counting. One-to-one correspondence has naturally followed a lot of what we do throughout the day.

Something we are working on is forming a bigger social circle, so that Gianna is exposed to different children. I'm enjoying the ebb and flow of her learning style- she likes to have a lot of materials, and hear what things are and how to do it... and then she wants me to back off while she absorbs it. And then wants to move on to something else, and just when I've resigned myself to the idea that she won't be picking up on that particular concept, she just starts using it or demonstrating it one day.

Prenatally Pertaining Punitive Paradigm

2010-01-26T11:39:00.002-05:00

Ordinarily, the circumstances surrounding anything "punitive" would be in my railing against many behaviorist theories about raising children. I'll stick that on hold for another day (or another few days, unless anyone feels like reading a novel).

In talking to various women of various generations about pregnancy and birth experiences, a very common, common refrain is the lack of ownership in the language used regarding their own bodies.

"I wanted to... but my doctor didn't allow it. "

"What will your doctor let you do?"

"I knew I was in trouble, I gained a few extra pounds more than the doctor wanted me to."

"They require that I ..."

Depending on my audience, I sometimes make the effort to re-script. "Oh, you mean they objected to this because it wasn't what they ordinarily do?" Usually, they stand firm in their coy determination that the almighty doctor knew what was the very best for them. And for the other three-thousand patients at their care facility. Don't you know- we're all factory assembled. All alike, no variance between any of us! Naturally, a textbook is the first thing to consult when there is any question.

Now. I'm sure I don't have to tell you how the rest of their pregnancy and birth story goes. Even though the majestic, wonderfully masterful doctor controlled every square inch of what was or was not allowed with their bodies, they end the same way- mamas totally out of control of their bodies, the doctors stepping in to do *whatever,* and baby and mama ending up on meds, attached to tubes and/or wires, and the sensation that crisis was averted.

Mothers of the world- I ask you:

WHEN THE HELL DID WE GET TO THE POINT WHERE WE HAVE TO BEG PERMISSION TO USE OUR OWN BODIES TO PUSH OUT OUR BABIES????

Don't get me wrong. Humans are innovative and clever, and have derived genuine ways to revive and maintain the life of mothers and babies who are in very dire circumstances. But when the exception begins to become the norm, it's time to pay attention. A lot of attention is paid to the reasons why, and how come, and the many hundreds of facets behind the legal, political, economical reasons why human birth in the 21st century in one of the biggest superpowers of the world can be so colossally screwed up. All of those reasons do fit into the giant puzzle that makes this up.

Little is discussed about women and the choices they make. No one likes to think that sometimes, people themselves can be a reason (trust, not the reason). We are the most over-informed people of any generation that has ever preceded us. How can we know so much about the state of the Dow, where our stock portfolio stands on an hourly basis, and the current Facebook status of our neighbor's cousin, but we typically don't try to find out what really is going on with our very own bodies? When a doctor says that a woman isn't designed to push out a nine pound baby, why does that woman typically just accept it, shrug and tell the world, "Well, that's the way the ball bounces," without even bothering to look at actual medical statistics? Many people, upon receiving a forwarded email that states that a particular company is putting some slogan in teeny-tiny words along the edge of their product, or that a certain law is in the process of being passed, will Google or Snopes the claim. Part and parcel of this over-informed culture. But the doctor mentions that he only "allows" labor for a certain period of time, and then it's out with the scalpel? And this is blindly, overwhelmingly accepted?

I think a large chunk of it lies with how people, particularly girls, have been raised. The same strange cultural floop that makes it a crime to not be smiling while walking through a store ("Smile! It won't kill ya!" inexorably yells someone, directly breaking the concentration required to remember what I'm locating), and that makes my sister's auto mechanic rub his hands in wicked glee as he watches her approach, seems to turn women into the very stereotypes of obedient children in the presence of a white coat. Pee into a cup? Sure, gladly. Step right onto this scale- harmless enough. Here, read this printout of what I expect all women, of all ages, body types, races, and lifestyles to do during the course of a pregnancy. Aye-aye, Doc! Oh, and by the way, I'm not liking the shape of your belly. Oh goodness, now you're not dilating quickly enough/ you're dilating too quickly, time for an injection. Because, of course, you've gotten our "Required IV," so it's now easy for anyone to pop anything directly into your veins, whether we clear it with you or not. All the consent forms are mashed into one haze of a paper storm, so you'll sign yourself away before you know what's happened...

How would this fly with any other natural bodily process? In the course of eating, eliminating, having sex, and breathing, complications can arise. I can choke on my food, of course. I can eat something that causes an anaphlactoid reaction. I can have all kinds of gastro-intestinal troubles, that range from the mildly uncomfortable, to impending doom with some kind of intestinal impaction. I can suddenly develop an aneurysm during sex. Or simply fall off the bed and give myself a concussion. But during these typical processes, no one has someone standing right beside them, prepared to give the Heimlich or do a tracheotomy. Heart monitors are not hooked up every time someone decides to get some action. Helmets, at least in my experience, are not employed. And yet somehow, the addition of monitors, IVs, automatic drug pumps, multiple examinations and lots of bright lights and poking and prodding are instantly given to each and every birthing mother in hospitals, unless she declines them, whether she wants them or not. Since declining these things are so rare, mothers who do decline them are instantly flagged as a "problem patient." Declining is the exception, rather than the norm. And until more women choose to decline, until more women decide that they're not going to ask permission to allow their bodies to function in the way they've functioned for years before anyone was around to interfere, and until women start viewing themselves as capable, thinking adults- no amount of modification of laws and studies and action taken against doctors who abuse their profession will amount to squat.

Waking the Thought Police

2010-01-16T18:25:00.002-05:00

Subtitle: How to have an All-American VBAC.

Firstly, I need to make it clear that for some reason, I'm famous among family and friends for having to do things the hard way. And in this case, the "hard way" is actually utilizing a hospital. The "easy way" would be a home birth.

So, why in the name of all things good and crunchy and wild-strength-of-a-woman-unleashed are we purposely going with a hospital VBAC?

For starters, cash flow. Miscarriages when done at home are cheap. Ones that quickly turn into a frightening emergency are quite expensive. As we aspire to live as debt-free as possible, our home birth midwife fund fast turned into a hospital bill fund. And was instantly obliterated.

Secondarily, it seems that the previous miscarriages might have been hinting at some thyroid trouble. I would like this to be noted, from start to finish, what various levels of thyroid hormones are doing. I had a baseline reading at the onset of this pregnancy, and it remains to be seen what will happen later.

So after nixing four other obstetrics groups (and boy, do obstetrics groups hate to be nixed. Word to the wise- it's hard to keep a straight face while nixing someone who obviously has already started sharpening their scalpel at the sight of your positive pregnancy test), we landed on a small group that works out of the small Catholic hospital that we used for our miscarriage-turned-emergency last July. Even though this group seems slightly more VBAC-friendly than the other groups, there are still multiple brick walls.

Let's start by looking at some statistics. Click right HERE for a good table of statistics gathered in a hospital setting alone in 1995. I emphasize "hospital setting alone," because statistics gathered by many American midwife groups suggest that the VBAC success rate at home is statistically significantly higher than the success rate in the hospital. This is due to a lot of factors that we can explore at another time, namely the use of various chemicals that are given in hospitals that interrupt the bio-pathway of the cascades of hormones involved in a normal, healthy birth. The statistics at this website seem to correlate The American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology, as cited HERE. So now, we have the prior, research-based understanding that it seems that, "Dozens of studies report that for women who have had one prior cesarean birth with a low-horizontal incision, the risk of uterine rupture is 0.5% to 1.0%." This, readers, is fairly close (in other words, there seems to be no statistical difference) to the rate of a spontaneous uterine rupture in a woman who is having her first baby (in other words, has never had uterine surgery).

My surgical scar is the very best type to have- a low, horizontal incision that was repaired separately from the fascia (instead of sewing everything up together, my wonderful and brilliant surgeon- the one I have lauded in previous posts- took the care and time to repair the uterus separately from the skin). My risk level for a "spontaneous" uterine rupture (that is, one that wasn't augmented by drugs) is now back down to what it was before I ever had a C-section.

Which brings us back to the OB group. I have now officially met with all of the doctors/care practitioners at this group. This motley crew consists of:

- Dr. Fashion: My (female) main doctor. I originally chose her, as I don't feel comfortable with male care practitioners. She is aloof, albeit professionally friendly, and has so far refused to give me her exact C-section rate. Red flags.

- Nurse Practitioner: The nurse practitioner gave a loud, "Great!" when I affirmed for her that I was indeed trying for a VBAC. She shrugged and said, "Whatever you want!" when I told her that none of the flu vaccines were an option for me.

- Dr. Older Guy: As his name might suggest, he's an older, gentleman doctor. Contrary to my pre-conceived notions, he actually encouraged me about the VBAC saying, "I don't see any reason why it won't happen at this point." He also seemed thrilled that I was doing my own research, and agreed with me that there was no reason to take tests or perform interventions if I felt it was unnecessary (as in, I declined the Gestational Diabetes test, and the nurse nearly laid down on the floor before she passed out and fell).

- Dr. Younger Guy: This doctor was the one who performed my (outpatient, D&C) surgery when my last miscarriage went all kooky. He appears to be even younger than me, but it's possible he's approximately my age. He stuttered and stammered his way through my appointment with him, and simultaneously wanted to make sure "they" had given me the pamphlet on the safety of VBAC (Question: Do "they" give pamphlets about the risks of repeat, major abdominal surgery to mothers who choose an elective Cesarean after a Cesarean?) while at the same time, repeating, "Okay, okay, okay," as I responded that I am confident in my own research.

I do not know if the Nurse Practitioner attends births, but of that list, I really think that I'd prefer to not be near half of these people while birthing.

To be continued...

Well, Still, It's Been a Good Year...

2009-12-07T20:40:00.003-05:00

What do you even say? If I was the type of person to even attempt a serious holiday letter, 2009 would have been a pathetic list of GM job fear, two miscarriages, a freak flood that destroyed parts of my hometown (including most of my mom's house), an even freakier sudden heart attack and brain anoxia that has changed my sister-in-law's husband, and then- a third pregnancy. That started out tenuously- for 14 solid weeks, my body acted as though I would be losing this baby again.

This baby is still here. An ultrasound a couple of weeks ago showed a whole, healthy, perfect baby. Active, squirrelly, and as of right now, still wiggling and bumping around occasionally. That's not to say that I've been able to relax. Who knows when I will relax, but I'm hoping I can take a deep breath sometime before early April, when this little one will, by God's grace, enter the world and take a deep breath of his or her own.

My brother has returned from Iraq, whole and safe and sound. My mom's house is slowly being reconstructed. My brother-in-law (in-law?) is going through therapy, and is working his way back to a new normal. And I cannot wait for 2010. Whatever it brings.

Heavy Heart

2009-10-22T11:41:00.002-04:00

Mary Anaya's story has completed. Here is a link to an article written in the Omaha World-Herald.

http://www.omaha.com/article/20091022/NEWS01/710229910

About two years ago, when I first heard of her story and did some digging, I blogged about the atrocity of the removal of her youngest son Joel, from her home. With my own tiny one at home, the thought that someone could remove, at gunpoint, a newborn from his mother's arms, and it all was ordered by a judge, sickened me. Mary's crime was that she did not allow a state official to lance little Joel's heel and take five circles of blood from him, to test him for the state's mandated metabolic screen test. For that, many armed police officers burst through her door one morning, and in front of her frightened small children, grabbed baby Joel from her. The battle for her tiny baby went on for quite some time, while sympathetic social workers and the foster mother allowed her to (unlawfully) sneak visits five times a day to drop off pumped milk, and to nurse him. Joel eventually was returned, and this year, a higher court ruled that while Mary did indeed break Nebraska's (useless, stupid, liberty-killing) law, the lower court overreached their bounds by ordering his removal. I like to think my (and thousands of others) letter writing campaign played at least a small part! Surprisingly, that series of blog posts that I did was published in a Human Right's Advocacy project on the part of a group of lawyers that were collecting such violations.

Mary's tenacity and strength of character was truly something to behold. I never had the pleasure of meeting this wonderful woman, but countless people in many counties of Nebraska and Iowa benefitted from this woman's very giving nature.

Mary leaves behind a husband, Josue, and ten children, and a legacy that will be hard to fill. She joins her extremely tiny, far too premature little one, who died only hours before she did. God rest her peaceful, admirable soul.

Now I'm Dying to Know...

2009-10-12T18:22:00.002-04:00

Seen today on a small, hand-lettered sign near the gas station:

"Free Foot Exam. Call 248-XXX-XXXX."

Um, hmm...

Re-visiting an old cause

2009-10-11T17:37:00.002-04:00

Remember, many blogs ago, the online battle I helped wage against Nebraska's horrible invasion of privacy of a family who chose to homebirth, and to decline mandatory genetic testing of their little boy?

I have been, up until now, respecting the Anaya family's request for privacy involving something new that has cropped up. However, things have taken a drastic turn.

Mary Anaya, mama to 10, is right now fighting for her life. She was diagnosed only a couple of months ago with a rapidly growing lung cancer. Around the same time, she discovered that she is pregnant with her 11th child.

Recently, an ultrasound showed a beautiful little babe, kicking and growing, and as healthy as can be. Mary is currently being kept alive for the seven weeks or so that it will take for her baby to reach 25 weeks, and thus be able to live outside of her womb. Mary and her husband have desired this ever since they learned of the potential outcome of her diagnosis.

I'm going to re-post some info grabbed from a blog connected to her church.

The following is from Michael Ross, the Anayas' ministry partner from Christ for the City International in Omaha, Nebraska:

"The immediate prayer need is for the Lord to guide the doctors and nurses in the next steps they should take and that the antibiotics would combat the pneumonia. …Would you encourage your pastor to lead your church in prayer this Sunday morning? Would you add Mary Anaya to your church prayer list?"

Some of us have signed up for Mary's 24-hour prayer vigil here.

Some of us have given financially. Donations for medical costs can be sent to:

CFCI, PO Box 390395, Omaha, NE 68139.
(Checks payable to Mary Anaya)

Any questions about Mary's needs? Contact Michael at 402-592-8332 or mross@cfci.org .

***************************************************************************

This tiny, tiny baby will be taken very dangerously early. To give a good account of how early- Mary and I are actually due around the same time. My child is due to arrive around mid-April (and so far, a heartbeat has been seen AND heard!) My child will be born sometime around Easter, and hers was also supposed to be born around this time. Now, if this baby can make it until almost Christmas, it will be a miracle.

Strange Child's Mom

2009-08-03T13:27:00.003-04:00

Gianna, being a social creature, has been cheerfully engaging other children in conversation in the grocery store and any other place where children happen to be. I decided that it might be a good idea to bring Gianna to places where there are other children, as she usually spends time with other adults. This isn't necessarily a "bad" thing, but having other kids to play with would be fun for her.

So, off we go. Swimming in the community pool, playing in the community playground, and just as soon as they start toddler programs up again, listening to stories at the community library. Gianna is a very happy girl when she sees kids. Her first reaction is to yell, "HI, kids! Hi litt-uh girl! Hi litt-uh boy!"

If the kids are young enough, they are equally happy to see her. If they are a bit older, say 8 or 9, they seem kind of sullen. In fact, one little girl at the Northville Trader Joes snapped, "I'm not talking to YOU," and flounced away. She, alas, matched the rest of the shoppers in that store. Northville, trust me, you are not *that* posh that you can justifiably be that snobby!

So, they're usually happy to see her as well. A pattern I'm noticing is that we will enter a community interaction site, Gianna and Strange Child/ Children spot each other, and instantly, Strange Child's mother goes into super fussy disciplinarian mode. Especially if they were there first- it almost seems like Strange Child's mother is trying to verbalize "her" unwritten rules of the playground by talking her child to death.

Enter playground. Gianna and Strange Child spot each other, and each squeal, "A litt-uh GIRL!!!" Strange Child's Mom (SCM) and I give each other the "Hi, I am way too busy with my child to converse, but hello just the same" smile and nod. Gianna instantly runs to the stairs to the playground, with Strange Child in hot pursuit. Strange Child overtakes Gianna, and stands on the stairs, instantly uncertain. Gianna starts to climb the stairs, and stands on the same step. Both children regard one another. Instantly, the moms start coaching from the sidelines.

SCM: "Strange, move out of the way! The little girl wants to slide!"

Me: "It's okay- Gianna, let the little girl go up the stairs!"

Both kids stare at each other, fascinated. One or the other of us moms goes and helps their child move more quickly up the stairs (or down the stairs) and the process repeats until one of the kids spots the plastic climbing dinosaur. We all troop over to the dinosaur, SCM fretting the whole way, "Don't run! Be careful! Mulch is slippery! Watch out!" Gianna usually trips and falls flat onto the mulch, as she gets her sporting ability from me. The mulch does its job, though, and she bounces right back up with no trouble at all. "She's okay," I assure the SCM, who is restraining herself from hovering over Gianna and picking her up.

We reach the dinosaur. Gianna picks up some mulch and offers it to the dinosaur. "Eat mutch!" she bellows, and Strange Child laughs. Strange Child does the same. SCM frets in the background, "Don't throw the mulch! Be careful! Put it down, it's icky..." At the suggestion of actually throwing the mulch, both girls instantly begin to toss mulch on the dinosaur. "Dinosaur take a bath!" Gianna yells. As it doesn't seem to be hurting anyone except the dinosaur (I see a tiny, plastic tear fall from his eye, which has been scratched out by years of use) I say nothing.

SCM, however, is irate. Didn't she just say NOT to throw mulch? And now here they are, throwing mulch. And I'm not doing ANYTHING about it! She glances between me and the kids, and finally starts chanting, "Strange, stop throwing. STOP throwing. Don't you pick that up... don't you throw- didn't you hear me? Stop! Don't throw it again. I said, 'Don't throw it again!' Put that DOWN..." while standing perfectly still.

I walk over to Gianna, which mobilizes SCM. She springs to her child, grabs their little mulch-y fists and wrings out every last bit of mulch. Gianna gives one last toss and I recommend the swings. She agrees, and we head over to the swings. SCM finishes lecturing Strange, who has already joined us in our trek to the swings. Gianna climbs on, and I start pushing her. Strange decides to lay belly first on the swing, and kick instead of being pushed. SCM wants to match- "Strange, want me to push you? Push you like the little girl? Let's swing on our bottoms. Get off and I will help you-"

Strange wants nothing to do with what we are doing. She screeches, and SCM backs off with, "Okay, let me know if you want help. I'm right here. Want help? Do you want me to push you?" The next five minutes, she reminds Strange about 45 times that she's standing right there, and can push her if she wants. Shortly, Strange gets a bit tired of this, and heads away. SCM decides it's time to leave, and grabs a now kicking and screaming Strange and heads for the gate. We watch them go.

Then, head back to the dinosaur to give it another mulch bath.

"If You Want Convenience, Get a Doll..."

2009-07-25T15:55:00.002-04:00

Wow- someone read my mind! Then, traveled back through time, and wrote it down. That's my stance, and I'm sticking to it.

I stumbled across this article, originally written in 1994 and updated later, by Katherine Dettwyler. It describes exactly why scheduling the habits of a baby is detrimental to the baby (and perhaps mom as well).

She describes the phenomenon of scheduled feeding, which a lot of "mainstream" parenting "experts" like to champion. These "experts" (many of whom, oddly enough, are men and thus will never actually give birth, deal with the swirling, twirling and whirling hormones involved, and will probably never lactate. Unless they're dedicated enough to induce lactation. We won't go there.)

Dettwyler only focuses on breastfeeding (and touches briefly on co-sleeping, as it relates to nursing on a natural schedule) but one thing I have found with the "Baby Trainers" is that every function of a baby's body is somehow related to discipline. And by "discipline," they don't necessarily mean a practice or a form of guiding, but they mean a way to shape and mold a baby onto an adult's personal time table.

Let's define "Baby Trainer," first. Not everyone who writes a parenting book is a "Baby Trainer." Only those who guarantee that a baby will be compliant, complacent, and will fit neatly into the current 9 to 5 work week schedule, by ANY means, is a Baby Trainer. Someone who recommends particular foods or recipes, then, is not a Baby Trainer. Someone who states that if a parent does X, Y, and Z and that they WILL get the results of an infant sleeping all the way through the night, is a Baby Trainer.

The first three months of a baby's life are currently referred to as the "Fourth Trimester." Human babies, it seems, are born prematurely. Even if they come at 41 or 42 or (gasp- "How did your doctor ALLOW this???") 43 weeks, they are still about three months behind other primates at birth- they are very fetal in nature, prefer to be curled like a little bug, and still require the closeness, warmth, heartbeat, and constant nutrition of the womb. Only, mom gets to do this from the outside, now.

Gianna, at age 2 years and 1 week, is now doing the following:
- Sleeping through many nights, often in her own bed.
- Eating meals with us, and snacking sporadically throughout the day, depending on her hunger level. She is NOT a picky eater- she eats everything from marinated eggplant and pickles, to kale (white bean, carrot and kale soup is her favorite meal ever) to raw zucchini.
- Working on the potty. Two steps forward, one step back.
- Exploring the backyard while I hang out in the distance and let her do her thing, playing independently with many different types of toys, speaking to other adults and children, and showing empathy when other kids are sad, or get hurt, or are happy.

None of this was trained into her. God knows, we had some nights where I just wanted to poke my eyes out and run screaming for the hills- parenting is NOT easy. Nothing worthwhile is easy- every single thing in life that is worth having requires work. A successful career, a happy marriage, one's own health and well-being, etc. It doesn't just "happen," and it also can't be forced into place. All the time that I was nursing on demand (and at three weeks and then at three months, "on demand" meant, "May as well not even wear a shirt today," thanks to appropriate developmental leaps)... all the nights where she woke up every 45 minutes... every time she kicked me square in the eyeball in the middle of the night... she did not turn into a selfish monster, demanding constantly that I succumb to each and every whim. There are many parts of the day I don't have to entertain her- she does really well on her own. All of the "What if's?" and questions that the "Baby Trainers" bring up just did not come to pass.

Snake-oil salesmen. Professors of lies. Heretics, some of them, if they are writing that God intends for all children to follow a clock. Really, they're cheats. They grab the attention of parents desperate to do the right thing by their child, by using all the right words, and promising the moon. Parents who buy into this are by no means stupid or even necessarily abusive (to begin with), but want the very best for their child. These crooks are selling just the right magic beans.

Canine Rivalry

2009-07-21T10:25:00.003-04:00

I'm going to hold off talking about another piece of attachment parenting- avoiding "baby trainers-" until I can muster a few more constructive things to say. Something about all of the swirling, crashing and looping hormones following a miscarriage leaves little but vitriol when discussing people who try to convince parents to do harmful and bizarre things to their infants all for the sake of "scheduling" or "convenience." Who has children for convenience? People who want accessories and are allergic to dogs?

So, yes. We shall save the shysters and con-men (Gary Ezzo, Michael and Debi Pearl, the loony tunes who wrote the "What to Expect... series, et cetera) for another day.

Today, speaking of dogs, we will carefully examine the relationship between a two year old and her loyal pooch. To do so, we need to first analyze the two year old. Contrary to popular belief, "Two's" (as we will call two-year-olds) are not "terrible." Tumultuous, yes. Tantrum-y, of course. As tempestuous as the sea, and as tormented as the most sensitive artist, Two's are also very energetic, loving, and are adorably learning compassion and empathy. Or, at least mine is.

For example, she just tripped and fell over Lola. At 75 lbs, and black with white markings, Lola is very hard to miss. However, my two year old has taken to trying to walk without looking. I think she's developing her sixth sense. At any rate, she fell right on top of the dog, who barked and jumped up. After tears and cuddles and reminders that our eyes need to watch where we are walking, she flopped back onto the floor with Lola, who went back to the same spot on the floor and resumed her lounge. "I'm sowwy, Lola, sowwy bumped. Bumped Lola," Gianna explained to Lola, from a distance of approximately three millimeters.

(Note: Dear Baby Trainers- I have never asked my child to apologize, nor have I expositorily taught her to apologize. Having modeled apologies myself to and around her since birth, though, she somehow is miraculously managing to pick it up! No switches or spankings involved! Imagine that! What a strange phenomenon- I actually treated my child the way I like to be treated, totally neglected to cram "apologies" down her throat, and hot diggity damn, she's doing it herself! In the appropriate context, even! Love and mush, Clara. P.S.- Let's all hope we never meet in a dark ally. Mr. Clarateaches would love to spend my potential bail money on something different. Insert hearts here, Clara.)

Things are not always so fuzzy and warm. Lola vacillates between fear and loathing, and curiosity and nosiness. I do not leave Gianna and Lola alone together, especially since we leave markers and chalk here and there. Over time, these art materials have managed to procreate, and rogue bands of markers turn up everywhere. Using the powers of "slight of hand," Gianna can fashion an impromptu tattoo right on Lola's fluffy white chest within moments of my eyes aiming in another direction.

Recently, Gianna has decided that Lola needs another collar. My tape measure is just the right thing to make that new collar, and she follows Lola throughout the day, trying to attach it. Lola skitters through the house, ears back, eyes horrified at the thought of strangulation by standard measurement. However, when I re-direct Gianna's attention to something else she finds entertaining (some differential equations, perhaps, or some Greek translations. It depends on the day), in approximately thirty seconds, Lola is peeking around the corner, looking for her strange little girl. An ice cube tray crammed full of play dough was vigorously offered to the Dogasus yesterday. Lola declined. Repeatedly. Then she walked away, while staring back at Gianna. As soon as she flopped down into her new observation spot, Gianna followed with more delicious play dough cubes. I redirected Gianna to the center of the floor, enticing her with more plastic utensils with which to mangle the dough. As soon as Gianna was occupied, Lola lifted her head and stared at me. And at Gianna. And back at me. Before long, she was walking back to Gianna, sniffing and poking her head into Gianna's business. And the dance continued.

On Gianna's end, she lives with concern that the dog will get her things or food. On the way to the kitchen for a "Grow-Lola-bar," (granola bar) Lola will typically follow us and at some point pass us and run for the kitchen door. She knows that following Gianna means following the action. Gianna, seeing this, yells frantically, "Lola's grow-lola-bar, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! NO LOLA'S GROW-LOLA-BAR!!!!!!!!"

"Does Lola eat granola bars?" I ask her. "Nooo..." Gianna says uncertainly, and by the time we get to the granola bars, Lola is circling like a shark and Gianna is screeching to Lola. I put Lola outside, and retrieve a bar for the girl. Lola peers through the window while Gianna starts to eat the bar, and then Gianna squishes her bar into the window, screeching, "EAT! EAT GROW-LOLA-BAR!!!" This scene repeats multiple times a day, with various edible and inedible items.

Crying Babies- Not Just a Pain in Your Ass

2009-06-30T13:07:00.002-04:00

"Belief in Baby's Cries," as Dr Sears himself calls this aspect of attachment parenting, is the understanding that babies have a reason for all that they do. This really is the crux of it- babies are born hardwired to survive. They give off an alarmingly loud and heart-tugging wail when something needs to be attended to. Usually, it has anything and everything to do with food, sleep, comfort, and nurturing. Breastfeeding, by nature, covers all of the above- it's food, it is sleep-inducing (for Mama and Baby), it brings a sense of comfort to the baby.

Take away the food on demand, or the sleeping in close proximity, or being held, and the baby will cry. This seems fairly simple to solve- obviously add the missing component, and the baby will stop.

Some people, who have decided that they are the God-send (literally) to all long-suffering parents, advise that the cries are an instrument of manipulation. That babies are in training to be major brats if their parents just cave in and nurse on demand, or enable them to sleep close by, or hold them too much. I'm not that politically correct enough to stop myself from saying- these people are complete buffoons. Wonderful examples of ignoramuses. Applying adult, learned behaviors such as manipulation and negative intent to small, primal creatures is appallingly self-centered and probably a good indication of how these adults live their lives- through manipulation and coercion.

Attachment parenting does not mean "Let the kids do whatever, whenever." It doesn't mean that just because Junior cries for a dirt bike at the tender age of 4, that he gets one. It also doesn't mean your children will never cry. It DOES mean that if the needs of babies are attended to at a very small age, and they understand (through constant repetition and immediate cause and effect) that their basic needs will be taken care of, that later on in the difficult toddler and preschooler "big feelings" stages (in other words, when the meltdowns cause Mom to wish for an invisibility cloak and cause onlookers to wish for a tranquilizer dart) that children ultimately understand that even though they are full of outrage and frustration, that it is not the end of the world. Their little "cups" are still nice and full.

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Aside from the AP tutorial, and in personal news, our latest addition has already flown. In outline format, here are the order of events:

- Pregnancy detected.

- In May, right around 6-7 weeks, a heartbeat was seen on ultrasound. The baby was positioned perfectly, had a healthy heartbeat, yolk sac, and was developing a healthy placenta.

- Abruptly around week 9-10, all pregnancy symptoms (morning sickness, exhaustion, food aversions, etc.) stopped.

- Last Friday, the midwife listened for a heartbeat. Nothing. We tried to listen and doppler for more than a half an hour.

- Yesterday, an ultrasound confirmed that, at an even later gestation than last time, our baby has joined his or her siblings in the arms of God.

Very sad, and in an increasing amount of physical pain, we wait for everything to complete. We also are now on the path to some answers. Miscarriage and birth loss is a lonely place to be, even though it happens frequently. It's not spoken about until it happens, and then women whisper to one another, "I've been there too." It's still somehow seen as something to either hide, or forget, or put away. It's difficult to grieve for a person you never knew- while I know that this latest little sprout had chubby cheeks already, and looks on the ultrasound like a perfectly formed tiny babe, I have no idea what he or she would have been like.

Nothing happens without reason. I may never know that reason, but it doesn't matter- my babies did not live or die without a specific purpose. Gianna may have to wait a little longer for a sibling, but ultimately, we will understand someday when we do look into the brand new face of an arrival, and see what we were waiting for this whole time.

Codetalker

2009-05-22T12:11:00.003-04:00

Strange circumstances happened to put me in the position of being able to carefully look at the roots of a beautiful little sprout.

Flashing!

Life is wonderful. Time to count down to a January harvest.

Great Day in the Morning

2009-05-21T20:55:00.002-04:00

Has it really been a whole month? So much for my theory that I will blog more if I have assigned topics for myself!

So where was I? Co-sleeping. Ah yes. The little devil of Attachment Parenting, which NY is currently spending mystery money (the mystery being- where does it come from? I thought the state was flat broke!) trying to campaign against. Radio and television ads are all over, trying to scare people into making their babies sleep flat on their backs in a crib, in a room away from parents.

The research that they use to conclude that co-sleeping (or "the family bed") is scary and causes SIDS includes data from accidental co-sleeping situations. Where geniuses decide to hit the bottle of wine and take a few drags from a crack pipe before using their child as a pillow for their drunken stupor. Oddly, the research doesn't include cases where babies are in their cribs and they pass away from SIDS.

True co-sleeping situations involve (as all parenting situations do) some foresight. Small babies need to be kept away from pillows, blankets, stuffed toys, people who are medicated or drunk, sharp objects, electrical devices, and for God's sake, spoiled pampered pets. Mattresses need to be pushed completely to the wall so that there are no gaps, and the bed needs to be secured so that bambinos aren't falling four feet to the ground. For some people, that means a securely attached bed rail; for others, that means putting the mattress directly onto the floor.

For us, it meant a couple of things- when Gianna was tiny, we had her in our Arms Reach Co-Sleeper, firmly attached to the bed. If she happened to fall asleep next to me, the farthest she could fall if she rolled away was two inches. Now that she's bigger and older, she makes herself at home for part of the night in the center 80% of the bed. Previously, Mr. Clarateaches' strange coma style of sleep made it dangerous to have her between us. Now, Gianna kicks and dances through the night, so the danger of overlay is really small. The danger of the three of us making a capital letter H is fairly high.

At this point, Gianna is sleeping for at least half the night in her own bed, and then moves in on our territory. She loves her own bed, and her room, and has slowly but surely gotten more inclined to be in her own space- the fear of co-sleeping children "never" leaving the family bed is just hilariously silly.

Baby-Wearing: AP Aerobics

2009-04-20T11:44:00.003-04:00

Baby-Wearing is one of my favorite AP philosophies. By using the pouch sling, wrap, or ring sling, I was able to stay connected with Gianna while getting things accomplished.

People who criticize attachment parenting philosophies often say that there is no time for anything else if you are constantly nursing or parenting to sleep or holding or interacting with a baby.

This is why slinging was used so many years ago. Let's hearken back to Cave Clara. There she is, pictured wearing her baby while she invents agriculture!

Ancient peoples from every part of the world wore their babies, when the oldsters of the tribe weren't babysitting. This was beneficial for many reasons- Cave Gianna (or Ancient Middle Eastern Gianna, or Mayan Gianna) wasn't on the ground, playing with snakes and scorpions. Also, wearing babies allowed for mothers to continue to contribute to their families and tribes while allowing babies to have access to their food (Mama milk, of course) and curbed the crying that could alert predators to a vulnerable situation.

Babies who are worn statistically cry less, have less reflux, and help tune parents in to who your child really is. The poor baby on the right, for example, is equally fascinated by the camera flash, and disgusted by her mommy's lack of proper mirror cleaning techniques. Wearing Gianna allowed her, from birth until recently, to be up where the action is. She was able to see things from a vantage point that allowed her to see beyond the ordinary low stroller view of legs and rear-ends. Not that I'm knocking strollers! But wearing ones baby even occasionally allows for a much broader educational experience, which relates to a higher comfort level with their surroundings.

Can you be an attached parent and NOT baby-wear? Gasp. Good heavens. Can you? Yes. Absolutely. Like everything else (and you'll see this pattern repeat when I discuss Co-Sleeping), as long as you are responding to your child in a caring manner, and adjusting the circumstances as necessary, you are still an attached parent if you don't baby-wear. When I had Gianna, the Cesarean incision made it difficult to wear her for several weeks. Currently, until I acquire a Mei Tei or other Asian-style carrier (better for carrying toddlers on ones back), Gianna doesn't fit too well in any of our current carriers. This didn't stop me last week when I plunked her in a ring sling and took her to "tea" in Lansing! (Wait a sec; this isn't a political blog...)

The basics: If you are in pain, you are either wearing that particular sling or wrap incorrectly, or it is the wrong baby carrier for you, or you have some health issues that mean that you will have to find another way to transport your baby. The first two issues are easily solved by finding a local chapter of NINO- Nine In, Nine Out, an organization dedicated to helping families find the best way to wear their baby. Another place to look would be local midwives or birth centers. Now, thanks to Etsy and Hyena Cart and lots of little self-organized sites by crafty moms, there is no limit to the types and styles of slings and wraps one can buy. Please, please, PLEASE do yourself a favor and test different styles out beforehand, if you can. My favorites for the tiny baby stage are the Hotsling pouch and Moby wrap. As Gianna got older, I liked the Hotsling as a hip pouch (the brown and blue striped sling in the photos) and the ring sling, where she cruised through life on my hip. I even got some use out of a Guatamalan rebozo (a loosely, but strongly, woven length of cotton) in a hip carry.

Mah-Milk! Breastfeeding and Attachment Parenting

2009-04-13T21:59:00.002-04:00

Breastfeeding is the second principle of Attachment Parenting. This is something that I believe instinctively nourishes a true, attached relationship, if done instinctively, and guided by both baby and maternal instincts.

Can one formula-feed and be an attached parent? Yes. Can one breastfeed and be a detached parent? Yes. Let me explain.

My first example of intuitive, attachment parenting was my mother, and the way she parented me and my siblings, but particularly my youngest brother. However, my first non-family example of attachment parenting was a very good friend I made while living in Chicagoland. At the time, she was a mother to two little boys. I was amazed at how calmly and naturally and instinctively she parented- she remained constant, consistent, very "in-tune" and receptive, no matter where we were or what we were doing. She may not have had any idea of the fact that her parenting style had a name, as it never came up when we talked. Her style was so intriguing, she helped to bolster my conviction that mothers truly do know what their baby needs, and that if we can quiet the baby-trainer noise and well-intended (yet, detached) advice surrounding us, that we can create and nurture a wonderful* relationship with our children. Yet, she did not breastfeed.

She was one of many mothers who have had poor advice and shoddy lactation advice tossed their way upon giving birth. While many are very caring and try to be supportive of the mothers in their care, maternity nurses learn only the very rudimentary basics of lactation during nursing school. They are also stretched very thin, time-wise, when it comes to what they do while at work. If three nurses are on a shift in a ward where nearly a dozen mothers and their babies are resting after various forms of labor, there is very little time to focus on a time-consuming task like supporting a proper latch (of a baby who likely has been as drugged as his mother was at birth). Plus, let's be realistic- the pen that the charge nurse uses to jot her reports (as well as the Post-It notes used to leave little reminders around their desks, as well as the clock ticking away on the wall) all have the name of various formula companies across their front.

I have said it before, and will say it again- going to a medical establishment, where extremely rich formula and pharmaceutical companies peddle their wares and leave their swag, and expecting anything other than a very commercially-laden, medical experience is like going into a Chinese restaurant and ordering a burger. You are not going to like what arrives on your plate.

My friend tried her darnedest, without the knowledge or support of someone skilled in trouble-shooting latch or supply issues. She tried hard with her second son, too. With both, she did end up formula feeding, as much as she did not want to. Persistence, and a good copy of So That's What They're For: Breastfeeding Basics by Janet Tamaro, paid off for my friend. Her third son was breastfed by a very happy and proud mama!

Let me make no bones about it- and this is not a judgement call, but a reiteration of what formula companies say themselves, if you care to read the fine print: Formula is a very poor substitute for breastmilk. It was originally intended as a way to help war orphans survive until they could eat solid food, and was never meant to be peddled as a "caring choice" for mothers. In the United States today, formula is offered as a wonderful idea for mothers who just simply decided that they were not going to breastfeed. Just because an option is offered, does not make it equal. There are actually a lot of fantastic articles and blogs on this very subject, and I could probably create a whole blog just about this subject and write in it every day. My point is- as poor of a food choice formula may be for babies, if a baby is fed while being held and spoken to, and responded to when cues for hunger are given, this is still attached.

So how can a breastfeeding mother be a detached parent? By following the ultra-anal, super operant conditioning ways of many of the self-professed "parenting experts" who write books aimed at selling "definites" to over-tired parents who already have sky-high expectations of themselves. Breastmilk is designed to zoom through babies rather quickly, so to expect a small infant to wait exactly two (or three or four) hours for another feed is both harmful to infants and harmful to mothers. The parents who fall for these peddlers of cookie-cutter robot kids who eat and sleep and poop to the tick of an arbitrary clock are not poor parents, either. Nor are they stupid. They are, however, very sucked into the idea that to be independent, and to function as a self-reliant adult someday, that babies need to be trained right now to do these things. The baby trainers in question (namely Gary Ezzo, but there are many others) offer some smooth-talking and glib pseudo-science (and even in Ezzo's case, very faulty and non-scriptural based theology) to try to back up what they are saying.

I always knew I would breastfeed. I didn't always know how difficult it would be at the beginning. The first two weeks were very miserable- while in the hospital, I had an IV in my left arm right where my elbow joint bends, thanks to the nervous teenage EMT who loaded me with toys on the transfer. Holding Gianna on top of a needle and tube in my arm was very painful. The after pains, coupled with recovering from abdominal surgery was excruciating, and nursing only made it more so, as the hormones involved in breastfeeding cause the uterus to contract down and return to normal. Most of my time nursing Gianna once my milk supply came in was spent with clenched teeth, and my feet constantly uncontrollably kicking.

I was DETERMINED to do this, though. I knew that there was an "after," which some women aren't really told. I knew that if I could just get over the initial hill, the rest would be better, and it truly was. At about two weeks, I battled a slight case of mastitis, but kept nursing Gianna right through it. At three weeks, when she hit her first true neonatal growth spurt and wanted to eat every 2.5 seconds, I settled right in and nursed her whenever she wanted to eat. I didn't crack or lose my mind, and she didn't turn into a spoiled, demanding brat- she simply grew, and then settled into a different pattern of feeding. Which changed a few weeks later, and then again another few weeks later, and so on. By nursing her "on demand," I was able to relate to her that I could cover her needs, and she didn't have to wonder about her livelihood- this in turn meant that she didn't need to panic when she became hungry. Win-win. Not to mention, I learned a very important parenting lesson- challenges do not last, and a baby's needs and demands change so often, that a very good mantra to have for both wonderful and not-so-wonderful times is: "This too shall pass."

* When I refer to "wonderful," let it be known that even in a "wonderful" parenting relationship, things like tantrums, crazy mommy days, screaming, crying, and sibling rivalry still happen. Why? Well, because we are all human, and these are the things that help us to learn and grow. Will our wonderfully attached children still sometimes do goofball things like flush watches down a toilet, attempt to mail a younger sibling to Abu Dhabi, loudly bray family secrets to all who care to listen in a post office, and perhaps wildly drive the family automobile smack into a fire hydrant? You bet. The goal is to make the "after" of these events something that all parties are proud of, in terms of how everyone handles themselves and one another.

I Want You To Want Me- Birth Bonding

2009-04-04T21:34:00.005-04:00

What did I say in the last post about NOT running to a trusty, well-thumbed-through tome of parenting wisdom? To write these blogs, I actually DO need to go grab my copy of The Attachment Parenting Book by William Sears, MD and Martha Sears, RN. Trust me that it is not necessarily that we "follow" this book, or even agree with all of Dr. Sears' advice (we do not), but in order to wander through the principles of "AP" (Attachment Parenting), I need to see what they are! The last time I read this book was during one of those late third trimester sleepless nights- where I was so tired I couldn't sleep, and my bladder was so compressed that I practically lived in the bathroom. Needless to say, I have none of these principles memorized, but do have an understanding that I nodded through the book saying, "Yup, yup, uh-huh...okay...sure..." Then, Gianna was born, and this book was shoved into a corner where spiders built their webs, and dust bunnies multiplied profusely.

Let's start at the very beginning.

BIRTH BONDING

Dr. Sears heavily encourages the first few hours after a birth to be undisturbed, as these hours are sacred to the bonding experience of the new family. Some people, driven to hysterical bouts of the "Always-and-Nevers," think that this means that if, for any reason, the baby and mother are separated in the first hour, then all hope is lost and the bonding ship has sailed. Let's all stop and remind ourselves that we human beings outlasted the wild beasts and moved on to bigger and better things. McMansions and Youtube, especially. We can still allow our hormones and our babies' natural instincts to glue us together.

Babies know their mamas, who know their babies. Ideally, everyone would have an undisturbed birth- that is, no unnecessary pokings and proddings, no injections of narcotics or 'caine derivatives, and no artificial hormones. Lights would be low, and voices calm (with the exception of the birthing mother, who can make any sound she pleases, thanks very much) and immediately after birthing their baby or babies, the new little family can immediately enjoy each others company without immediate scrubbing of vernix, and all of the pediatric (dare I type it) bullshit that ends up poking a minutes-old infant with holes and gooping up its eyes.

Wishes, as a local lawyer likes to say on his local commercials, do not do dishes. Even when the above birth was the original plan, plans sometimes change. Even when those plans change, and a birthing mother suddenly needs medical attention, the bonding can still take place. It does take a little thought beforehand, and some finessing of the "system."

Here's what we did: Our story begins about 35 hours into labor. My water had broken about 17.5 hours prior, I had pushed for about four hours, Gianna had been crowned and visible for about two of those hours, and we (the midwives, Mr. Clarateaches and my own hallucinating self) had just decided to call an ambulance to take us to the hospital. Instantly, my mind raced- I had no idea what the outcome was going to be, but doula experience told me that surgeons ten miles away were already lovingly caressing their scalpels in anticipation of my arrival. I understood Michigan birth laws- the only single solitary thing legally required was the metabolic "5 Screen" blood test- all else (Vitamin K, erythromyacin, vaccinations, circumcision, tire rotation, oil, lube and filter) was at the parent's consent.

As I've written in the past, I arrived at the hospital to an outstanding team of all female surgeons, nurses, and techs. All I remember of them were their expressions as I hoarsely screamed my list of "Do NOT Consents-" I did NOT consent to ANY of the above optional accoutrements. The only thing they did not acquiesce to, to my heartache, was putting the baby onto my chest after being surgically removed. For twenty-five long, agonizing minutes, while I was having all of my guts randomly assigned new placement in my body ("Bladder, you take Left Lung's place. Lungs, you get in the back. Lower Intestines, this is a snug fit, so I want all of you to squeeze in..."), Gianna was being examined and wrapped up about six feet from my head. Fortunately for our little triad of crazy, Mr. Clarateaches could (and did) stand by while the only male of the night, the pediatrician, gave a cursory exam of the "full-term neonate, female" and declared her A-OK before scurrying back to his natural lair. And then, she was back with me, where she would stay for our remaining time in that prison of a hospital. We bonded immediately- we were completely and totally immersed in each other, and the twenty-five minutes apart didn't come close to mattering. Was it ideal? Was it "undisturbed?" Nope. But we made it work because I had to have it work. I needed to bond to my baby to be able to function. I gave myself no other option.

In the beginning, there we were.

What ARE We Doing?

2009-04-01T21:22:00.004-04:00

I feel rather blessed. I rarely have people question our parenting style in a malicious fashion. I have fielded questions about why I baby-wear, why I breastfeed for so long, and why we don't make Gianna sleep in her own bed. Those are usually curiosity, and as I don't make general proclamations about many of our tricks, there are probably a lot of things that are unknown, and therefore not inquired upon.

Every family has to find its own rhythm and flow. It's said so many times, but bears repeating- what works for one family is unique to that family, and dependent on its current conditions. Add a child, or remove a job, or sprinkle in any other life-changing event, and methods and manners of operation need to be reassessed.

We don't technically follow a leader. We're not people who instantly run to some well-thumbed through book at the onset of a new developmental twitch to try to figure out what to do. I like to think that we parent instinctively- that is, that we view what Gianna is doing in the light of her environment and her developmental stage. How we generally operate does seem to look somewhat like Dr. Sears' Attachment Parenting. So far, it seems to be creating a joyful and intelligent little girl, with parents who are sometimes frustrated, sometimes overwhelmed, but always laughing. And, always amazed.

In an effort to prod myself to post a little more, I'm going to try to take some of the principles of Attachment Parenting, and explain how we've used them, or possibly how we've had to tweak them. I know like I know like I KNOW that if we would have done things differently, say, followed a "baby trainer," or sleep-trained, we would not have the child we do today.

I want to make a preemptive distinction before I begin: there is a huge difference between saying that "X method" or "Baby Trainer Y" is faulty for whatever reason, and saying that someone is a poor parent for using these methods. Parenting is a hard row to hoe, and many baby trainers are very convincing (I would be too, if I wanted to sell my books!) With the next few blogs, I do not intend to tear down another mother. If you get something from what I write, beautiful. If you get nothing, well, no skin off my back. There is truly something to be said for separating the wheat from the chaff in terms of what will work for you. I do urge you to be honest with yourself about what is "working:" if you have an eerily quiet baby who is not very active, and doesn't really explore, but follows a precise schedule made by a best-selling parenting book and gives you a fairly easy life, who is benefiting? Is this truly "working?"

When I was pregnant with Gianna, I met a woman with a daughter who was 6 months old. I never saw this baby out of its car seat, even for a feed- the mom simply stuck a bottle into the baby's mouth with one hand, and functioned without looking at the baby with the rest of her body. She gave me the advice of- "Make sure you get time for you as much as possible- I just stick M----- in front of Baby Einstein- it's very educational, you know- and I get so much done. I barely have to do anything!" I never saw the baby cry, or move at all, really. Its placid gaze gave me heartburn and I vowed to never do whatever it was that made this woman's child such a mannequin. I didn't. Stay tuned for what did work, and continues to work today.

Recession-Wear

2009-04-01T20:54:00.003-04:00

Today, Gianna and I went to JC Penney to try to use a gift card. I say "try," only because the last time I was in there, it looked like they were trying to "flash up" the place.

Fashion this season is virtually unwearable, unless you are preparing to march in Brazil during Carnaval. Bright colors and large prints abound, and most of the shirts I looked at had extra ruffles and even just extra triangles and rectangles of fabric sewn in fluttery disarray. For a brief moment, I glanced through the Junior section, where I last visited during the crazy clubbing days of college.

Then, I felt really old and had to race to the shoe section and beat myself senseless with a pair of Clark's that came really close to the "perfect pair," that Lola ate while I was pregnant. That little brown pair of slides was too beautiful for earth- an angst-ridden dog became convinced that I would never EVER return from the grocery store, and demolished them.

I examined the pair a little closer- Clark's used to be made in England. Now? Where else- China. I reluctantly put it back.

I did manage to find some basic tops and jeans that fit, thanks to St. John's Bay. I feel like I may as well just have "Little Old Lady" custom embroidered onto them, but they were the closest thing I could find to real clothing.

Gianna, in the meantime, did NOT want to be held. This was a first. She wanted, instead, to hold my hand and lead me around to the store. "Train, train," she chanted. Then- the jewelry department. "Neck-a-lace! Neck-a-lace!" she screeched. Rather than pry this season's wacky blobs of enamel out of her very strong and determined hands, I grabbed her and made a dash to the cashier.

Ahead of us in line was a woman and a small, elfin-looking girl. "Oh what a cute baby- say, 'Oh what a cute baby!'" the woman yelled to the little girl in an Eastern European accent. The little girl ducked her head and repeated the affirmation.

I thanked her, and then the woman prodded the girl, "Ask her, 'What is her name?'" The girl dutifully complied, and I told her, "Gianna. What's yours?" The little girl said her name, which I wish I remember- it was truly wonderful. Un-prompted, the girl then said, "I'm four!" Gianna stared at her with her fingers in her mouth. Then, she started picking her upper lip- a move that seems to happen when she's nervous. Or plotting revenge.

"Oh, look at her pick her lip! You're older than her, you better tell her to stop," boomed the woman. The four year old squirmed, and seemed instantly to realize that this was a social faux-pas, even though her mother (?) did not. To help the little girl save face, I looked at Gianna, who was picking a good sized flap of skin from her lip, and said, "Ouch! That's going to hurt pretty soon."

Gianna solemnly considered this, and then pulled the bit of skin from her lip and shoved it into my lips. The crowd went wild. "Ahhhh! Oh my goodness, did you see that? Did you see that?" the woman shrieked at the four year old. I removed the little skin bit from my mouth and mentally thought of all of the other disgusting things I've managed to get into my mouth since becoming a mother.

Fortune smiled upon us and a voice called out, "Next in line, please!"

Inhale Up, Exhale Down

2009-03-25T21:23:00.002-04:00

Pre-Gianna, I used to be a Pilates freak. Starting in high school, my sister and I read Joseph Pilates original books, and practiced hard to breath and stand properly. It helped later when I, for one whole summer, boxed with a former Golden Gloves contender. It was an entire year before the movie Girlfight came out, and the moment I saw the previews for that movie, I knew I could never box again. I still tried to maintain a strict conditioning routine, to keep up my fighting form. Because I knew that... it'd be tragic...if those evil robots win...

Where'd I go? At any rate, fast forward to giving birth via evisceration, and my core is just not the same. I tried doing "Mommy Infant Yoga" when Gianna was a baby, but it was a good way to either 1) irritate a baby who just wanted to nurse, or 2) find myself covered in regurgitated milk. So, we tabled Pilates for a bit.

Now that summer is coming, and I'm contemplating a future pregnancy, I decided that it's time to rip up the abs once more. A toddler can handle ten minute spurts of Pilates at a time, right?

I popped the instructional DVD in, pulled on the yoga pants, and got right down to it. Gianna observed this casually, eating a fistful of cheddar bunnies. As soon as I laid back and pulled in my core, she was on me. "Mama!" she crowed, drizzling partially-chewed cheddar bunnies on my cheek and neck. I paused the DVD, cleaned myself off, and resumed the tape. Lola grunted and stared.

In the middle of the "Hundred," I was body-slammed again- this time, she landed belly-first on my face. I rolled her off, and she screeched. I explained to her that I was exercising, and she could play nearby. She, as 20 month olds do, decided to clothesline me back to the ground. Lola walked over and sniffed, trying to decide if I was in peril.

Three weeks later, I can actually get through one, 10-minute workout with minimal interference. In fact, Gianna gleefully yells, "Plah-tees!" and earnestly touches her toes and flips her legs around. She does this exactly three millimeters away from me, though, and likes to sit directly underneath me to point out all of my 2,000 body parts while I'm trying to ronde de jambe.

Lola, in the meantime, aspires to be a girl boxer. Poser.

Out Came the Sun...

2009-02-27T13:00:00.003-05:00

A few days ago, I stood in front of the bathroom sink, preparing to leave the house. Gianna came marching in, carrying her stuffed rabbit. She plunked the rabbit onto the Baby Bjorn Little Potty, and commanded, "Sit. SIT! Stayyyy... stayyyy... Good. Cookie." (She then held her hand under the rabbit's face for a second). Suddenly she grabbed the bunny and whirled it around and crammed its face into the potty, yelling, "EAT! EAT!" and laughed uproariously at herself.

My sunshine girl. Right now is not easy at all, but she makes it far better.

I Feel Numb

2009-02-04T16:11:00.010-05:00

...Don't grab
Don't clutch
Don't hope for too much
Don't breathe
Don't achieve
Or grieve without leave...

A quick warning: Do not read if you are squeamish. There aren't necessarily graphic details, but it's a bit on the honest side.

After about a week or more of various signs and symptoms, and the exhilarating high of hearing the midwife announce that she did hear heart tones, reality shot me out of the sky this morning with the definite announcement of "No heartbeat." The very brisk and efficient ultrasound technician was clearly a member of the old "Impale them with all of your might" methodology. Note to ultrasound technicians everywhere- "Has previously given birth" does not equal "Capacity of 'Debbie Does Dallas.'"

Her spic-n'-span blunt ways were the complete opposite of the squishy-gooey love-fest the doctor was doling out. I mentally resigned myself to the upcoming platitudes as soon as I saw his gigantic button that declared: "Listen to Women." Sigh. I should have known that before I left that room, he would envelope me in a giant hug.

Long story short- the baby's life ended (or really, became eternal) about two weeks ago. I am not positive what heart tones the midwife heard days ago, but it might have actually been our combined hope of hearing a heartbeat that manifested itself. At any rate, it is over. I am not quite sure what I will be doing in August, but I will not be holding my newborn.

I had originally planned on describing the idiocy that captures people when they are near pregnant women for my next blog entry, and I will probably do that at some point. Today, however, I will list actual statements that were told to me today that should never be said to a mother whose body is slowly, but surely (and painfully) losing her baby at that precise moment:

- "Well, don't you have a living child? How old? 18 months?!? Well, okay then- you've got a baby at home..."

As though a subsequent baby would be a replacement, perhaps? Or I was creating one as a spare? I don't know what to do with that comment.

- "This was planned? Hmm..."

Again, no idea what that is supposed to imply. I think the nurse's filter was broken today, too.

- "Good thing this happened now, and you're not finding out about something being wrong at 6 months, and having to make a bad decision then..."

Yes, it's a GOOD thing. I'm going right out and celebrating when I leave here.

- "Now, you should wait until this baby and everything has completely left before trying to have another baby."

Because God knows, the first thing that someone who is contracting and bleeding wants to do is hop into the sack. Yeah baby.

Sigh. A few things that I did hear today that was helpful:

- "Drink some wine, eat some chocolate, do some yoga- whatever you want. Just do whatever you want for a while."

Got it!

And the most touching, from an online forum friend who has experienced loss:

- "...This child will never know the pain and heartache of a sin filled world. This child was born directly into the arms of Jesus..."

That is the image that will have to keep me from becoming unglued, especially this summer when I realize one day that it is August 22, and I am not preparing for a little warm, wrinkly, sleepy baby.

Stark Gravid Crazy

2009-01-26T12:54:00.002-05:00

My neighbors must suspect by now that I'm pregnant. It seems like every time they witness me doing something that seems (to the naked eye) to be a little insane, that I'm either in the "too large for maternity clothes" stage of the third trimester, or "large-eyed and starving with crazy hair" stage of the first trimester.

Ice
Our front area is covered in a thick sheet of ice. This is the first winter this has happened, and I absolutely hate it. No amount of salt or shoveling seems to do anything to it. I had the idea one day to throw a pot of boiling water on it- no change. If anything, it only became worse. So while Gianna napped a few days ago, I grabbed a claw hammer and got right to work trying to hammer it into chunks. Ice chips were flying, and little dents formed in the ice, and by the very edge of the step, small amounts of the ice actually chipped off. While turning my head to avoid flying ice shards, I caught the horrified expression on my neighbors' faces as they pulled out of their driveway and paused briefly to take in the scene. Freezing, and only slightly successful, I gave up.

Rocks
When I was enormously gigantic with Gianna (and I am not kidding- she stuck way out like some sort of bow of a cruise ship) I decided to calmly and harmlessly retrieve my mail. At that same moment, the man who graded our road at the time was directly in front of our house, on his tractor, paving his heart out. God bless his eccentric soul, this man is in his early 90's, and is missing about 1/3 of his total body parts, including an arm, many teeth, both knees, his hearing and goodness knows what else. For whatever reason, the sight of my girth and width looming in his direction caused a glimmer of chivalry to spark in his ordinarily curmudgeonly demeanor. (Note- Our latest Home Owner's Association minutes includes a reference to the five complaints received regarding "Mr. Road Grader shaking his fist" at people. I wonder- was it his driving fist, or his hook?)

He grinned toothlessly at me, and yelled over the tractor's engine, "Need them rocks moved?" I looked down to the base of the mailbox, where he gestured. There were two large (about the size of a basketball, and a bowling ball, respectively) decorative rocks placed on the ground as someones idea of the "finishing touches" to what they thought would be a profitable house-flip.

"No, thank you!" I hollered, trying to clearly mouth the words in case he was interested in actually reading my lips. He was not, and he ratcheted himself over to my side to pick up the smaller of the two rocks. "No, NO! Leave it there!" I said, waving both hands. He grinned and answered, "The hook's my good 'un, the other wrist is just bad," and proceeded to use his hand to flip the rock onto his hook, and then try to stand from squatting. He bellowed like an elephant, and I screamed. I was fairly certain that I was going to witness the dismemberment of his other limb.

Neighbors started to poke their heads outside while he limped over to the bucket of the tractor, and I hurried to try to grab the other rock and hide it before he could get there. His titanium alloy knees were too quick for me, and he made his way back over while yelling, "I got it, I got it!"

I desperately glanced in the backyard, where Mr. Clarateaches was blissfully mowing the lawn, completely unaware of the lunatics pageant going on in the front. I knelt down to get in front of the rock while waving my hands again. "NOOO! It's OKAY! Leave it THERE!!!" I yelled in my most authoritative "teacher" voice possible. The teenagers across the street stared, mouths wide open. "Aw, it's okay, I know how hard it is to do things when you're gettin' ready to have a baby. I don't mind!" he responded, grunting to kneel back down and hooking the rock into a cradle hold again.

By then, I gave up and silently watched him yell in agony at standing up again, and then inch back to the tractor, slide the rock into the bucket of the tractor, and cackling, drive away.

Peek-A-Boo
Lola was just about one year old when I was nearing the end of Gianna's pregnancy. She had just learned that the yard, complete with a brick-wall-bordered garden was perfect for a puppy steeplechase. One day, while trying to get some Vitamin D, I learned that she loved the game where I hid behind the side of the house and jumped out at her while she ran by, which caused her to run even faster, skirt around me and leap madly over the brick walls, turn and run all the way around the yard, and get back just in time for me to do it again.

Think of the confusion, therefore, when the teenage son of the neighbors to the back of our property, arrived home from school. To his vantage point, as Lola was quickly shooting behind the wall as soon as I jumped out at her, he saw:

- A pregnant lady jumping out from behind a wall, towards the direction of his house, hands in claws and yelling, "Rawr!" and then ducking back. He could not see Lola, I quickly realized.

As soon as I saw his horrified and perplexed, frozen-to-the-ground-in-fear expression, I slunk back into the house.

Hold On Tightly

2009-01-21T12:06:00.003-05:00

I was one of those kids- the kind that had to pull up growing plants by the roots to see how things were growing on the other end. It wasn't that easy to just trust that if there were little round leaves on top, that there were roots on the other end.

The choices that we make for growing healthy babies do not include routine (read: mindlessly done in the name of, "well, it's always been done this way") interventions. No ultrasound until week 20- necessary now only because there is now a question of where the placenta is located relative to the Cesarean scar. No unnecessary exams of the... um... exit strategy. No poking, prodding, injections, nothing.

The first trimester is chock-full of fear, however. Especially when a loss has happened once before. From the moment that second line turns pink, the questions invade the mind- "Is something really there? Really? Is it growing? How can I know for sure?" I still don't trust those little round leaves.

And now, a crossroads. Evidence today that things might not be going so swell, after all. Do I wait for the midwife appointment in a week, and see if we can hear a little heartbeat in the Doppler, or do I go ahead and look for a quick medical peek at this little plants roots- do I find a sonogram technician that can relieve my mind once and for all? Will I be relieved enough to trust that the roots are growing, if I can just see that little flashing heartbeat on a monitor?

The very core of faith. Oddly enough, the only other current question on the docket managed to resolve itself while I was settling Gianna for her nap. We have potential boys names, many, in fact. Girls names, on the other hand, are just not quite coming to us. We've had a few strong potentials, but nothing that reached out and grabbed us and said, "That's it!" Until today. Gianna received a pink, glittery deer as a Christmas gift topper, that was quite the amusement to her up to and especially when she picked out the deer's eyes.

Staring into the hollows where the little pink deer used to have eyes, it was settled. If this baby is to be, and if it is a girl, she is already named. If you happen to know a little bit about the saints, you might be able to guess what her first name will be.

Hold on, little growing babe.

Emerging

2009-01-14T12:38:00.003-05:00

"Baby fall!"
"Momma's chair."
"Daddy's shoes."
"Help, please!"

My little Pokemon has hatched the power of phrases, and it's a brand new day in communication. She can command and demand on a whole new level, now. We ventured out into the freezing cold weather to buy eggs and a chicken from our CSA farm one day, and after knocking on the door a couple of times to no answer, we headed back into the warm car to call them. Upon hearing that we would be attended to immediately, we returned to the door. Gianna craned her head around to look directly at me, and said, "This, Mommy- Knock!" and demonstrated the correct way to knock on the door. Naturally, the door opened this time, cementing Gianna's belief that she needs to carefully supervise any and all of my actions.

Lola still hasn't figured out what to do when accosted by a dandelion-puff-haired tot screeching, "NO! Sit! Siiiiiiiiiiiit!" She does love it when Gianna offers her food. Unfortunately for Lola, Gianna has discovered that it is hilarious to feed the dog non-food items, so odds are pretty good that if we hear a high-pitched shriek of, "Eat! EEEEEEEEEEEAT!" followed by raucous laughter, we had better go save Lola from a snack of any variety of small toys.

A new journey begins, as I passed a particular human chorionic gonadotropin test with flying colors early in December. Caring for Ramona Quimby the Toddler while trying to scrape oneself off the bathroom floor is not as difficult as I originally thought, as she readily passes time by peeling labels from nail polish bottles. Re-visiting meals of days past in the form of cloth diapers during this time is probably as bad as I originally expected, but I'm soldiering through. Many memories of Gianna's gestational past are resurfacing, and I can't believe the form of amnesia that wiped them out- there has got to be a primal, advantageous reason for this, as people continue to create more people.

What the heck was I saying? At any rate, the newbie will be here sometime in mid-August, shortly after Gianna turns terrific two. Stay tuned, as I spiral more deeply into the crazy throes of motherhood.

Enter Hypnos, Stage Right

2008-12-14T18:19:00.002-05:00

Oh, sleepless nights. Now that Gianna is 17 months old, I expect her to sleep through the night, make herself a PB&J, ride her ten speed to the store to pick up some groceries for me, and to deport herself with decorum and grace.

No, not really. Although a little more sleep and a lot less kicks to the bladder would be nice. I actually don't expect Gianna to sleep through the night yet. She still has teeth that need to come in (we've got 16 so far; up next are the 2 year molars), she's still hitting developmental milestones left and right, and let's face it: she's my daughter. My little "Mini-me," right down to the double-jointed thumb and birthmark on her left bun. I don't even sleep through the night. Or at least, I remember very vaguely not sleeping through the night before I became pregnant.

I am in the process of trying out various methods of maximizing her and my sleep performance. I'm not going to monkey with Mr. Clarateaches' sleep- he still sleeps like he did when he was in college, working on the Formula SAE car. For quite a while, I was convinced that he had narcolepsy. If ever there is a break-in, I will have to man the shotgun myself, and wake him up when it's over- to which he no doubt will (upon awakening): 1st- Look stunned 2nd- Loudly vocalize, probably not real words, and 3rd- Resume slumber.

Method 1- Play outside, and wear her out.
This actually did seem to contribute to more restful sleep when the days were crisp, cool and sunny. Lately it's been 13* and windy, so this isn't always an option. Out of 5 stars, I'll give it a good 4.

Method 2- Chamomile Tea.
This really doesn't have much of an effect on her. She doesn't drink that much of it, and was tipped off that it's sedating, so now she mostly runs away and laughs if I suggest a cup. 1 star for effort.

Method 3- Raw Honey.
Honey has a naturally sedating effect, and I had surprisingly good results with it, until I learned that it also can cause wild, vivid dreams. I had wondered why Gianna started waking up screaming until I spent one night in a tall pine tree with my mother-in-law, avoiding the calculus test for which we forgot to study. Night-terror inductions aside, this gets a solid 4 stars.

There are other elements- if she's really wild and has had an off-day, Rescue Remedy works fine to help get her settled. Lavender in the bath works occasionally. Why not just let her cry it out? Well, for lots of reasons. For one thing, I believe that mothers have instincts for good reasons, and to ignore those instincts is no good. My instinct is to not leave my child anywhere alone to cry. For another, there have been many occasions that her night time shenanigans have clued me in to something that was wrong- the night she had a massive rash from raspberries, the night she uncharacteristically pooped in the middle of the night (ick- who wants to sleep in that?), the night that Lola was somehow left outside in the middle of the night... the list goes on. Before she started her EC strike, sometimes it just meant that she needed to sit on the potty for a while. The main reason is that even among mothers that use CIO (Crying It Out), they all concede that it still has nights where it just doesn't work. Just as some people sleep differently, so do babies. For whatever reason, Gianna's just the type of person that needs to be wakeful. Which brings me to:

Method 4: Acceptance
When I accept that she will, indeed, wake through the night and chant "Milk, milk, ma-milk, mama milk," latch on, and then sleep, I'm a happier person all around. When she's hitting a developmental leap that causes me to wonder if she's growing the skill of flight, if I accept that she'll be wiggling and kicking and head-butting me into the wee sma's, I still am tired, but I'm not angry and frustrated.

Finally, I do need to concede to what more "established" mothers often tell me- it goes so fast. Soon enough, she'll be sleeping through the night in her own bed, and soon after that, I'm sure I'll need to deal with her wanting to sleep all day, and later, she'll be keeping me awake while I wonder where she is, and while I listen for her car.

Covered in Shells

2008-12-04T11:40:00.002-05:00

Through my head, this refrain repeats- How on earth did women in the pioneer days do it? Without microwaves, ovens, dishwashers or washers and dryers. How did they manage one whole day, not to mention prepare for holidays? Especially out there on the Oregon Trail? Food for thought on this busy Thursday morning, with a stack of Christmas cards that need some words of cheer, with diapers that need to be hung to dry, with stockings to stitch together, and with a dog that desperately needs for me to croon Dave Mathews Band songs to her. Don't confuse that Precious Moments dog eye look for anything short of admiration.

So, that could be my excuse for not blogging lately. Truth be told, though, I'm stuck in thought patterns that I can't seem to shake off. I do try to mix the deep thoughts with exaggeratedly hyperbolic representations of students of the past, toddler of the present, and no small amount of Dogasus. Bear with me while I purge.

Not so many years ago, there was a little boy with curly, dark hair, pale skin, and the berry-blue eyes of his Black Irish ancestry. He happily created machine guns with rolling pins and the waist-tie of his bathrobe, assembled complicated weaponry with Legos, watched GI Joe with rapt attention, and got into the various scraps and scrapes with neighborhood children, including his siblings. As he grew, he continued in his love of all things military, all things history, and organized with his friends a particularly memorable paintball ambush of some neighborhood riffraff that were vandalizing our house.

Life has a way of indiscriminately aiming some stunningly powerful elements at just about anyone and everyone. With this small boy, it was in the form of pretty strong family violence. He grew a very potent form of chivalry as a way of dealing with it. The Marine Corps was a natural progression. Today, he trains in the desert of California, awaiting an early spring deployment to the Middle East. I couldn't be prouder of my little brother. At the same time, my thoughts splinter in a thousand directions- why does he even have to go? I thought we were finished. What happened to the Senetors who were voted in on so many promises of bringing everyone home? Most important- who will he be when he comes back? Because he will come back- I'm not giving him a choice. I cannot believe that, in all that has happened in his 24 years, this is where it will end.

There is an ice cube in my shoe...

2008-11-05T20:11:00.003-05:00

Toddler shenanigans are in full swing around here. Picture a tiny tornado with fluffy, curly hair swirling and twirling through the house, leaving cheddar bunny crackers and the dog's hair brush and all of my shoes tangled with various cell phone and computer paraphernalia.

Shoes are a huge hit. Especially when they are my shoes, on her feet, and she triumphantly scuffs her way into the kitchen. This is a huge accomplishment- previously she would get as far as perhaps one shoe on one foot, and then it would all fall apart. She couldn't stand up, the shoe wouldn't stay with her as she walked, and it would all dissolve into screams, head banging, roaring terrible roars, gnashing terrible teeth, and showing terrible claws. Lather, rinse, repeat.

This is, after all, the life and times of a toddler: Wake up, nurse, inspect what Mommy's doing, see a task OH NO! FRUSTRATION FRUSTRATION FRUSTRATION hey, victory! Accomplishment! But then- FRUSTRATION FRUSTRATION FRUSTRATION oops, I'm distracted. Insert various eating and diaper changes and a nap if we're all lucky, and there it is.

The love/hate relationship with the dog has headed into smoother sailing. Lola has discovered that Gianna loves nothing more than to cram a tantalizing bite of toddler food (Yum, kale! I'm the best mommy...) into the dog's mouth, and then pull it out and give it a lick herself. Over and over. She also knows what the dog's treats are, and adores giving them to her. As soon as she spies the container and gives the yell, "Teeeeeeeet! WOWA TEEEET!" Lola comes galloping. Lola may act forlorn and put out at each dog anatomy lesson Gianna gives at the top of every hour ("Ear? Ear. Earearear. Butt? Butt. Buttbuttbutt. Eye?") but today acted genuinely happy to see Gianna when I brought her outside to play after a whopping two hour nap.

From the moment she wakes me up by cracking her skull into my nose, until she falls asleep while scratching contentedly at my side as if we're all just a pile of cats, she's on the go. I know I say this at every stage, but this is truly one of my favorite stages. Until she masters the doors leading to outside...

Girl's Mama

2008-10-28T11:17:00.002-04:00

Before Gianna was born, we had no idea if she would be a girl or a boy. We decided long ago that we wouldn't want to know the gender of our babies beforehand- there are so few surprises in life anymore.

This perplexed almost everyone around us. A coworker at the cult took it very personally, almost as if my choices were a judgement on hers: "I always found out the gender. I had to, I couldn't not find out." Hard glare. It's truly a strange society where people take the decisions and choices of others (particularly the ones that don't remotely affect them in any way) as a pointed judgement of their own.

We didn't want to live in a prenatal world of pink or blue. The sea of greens and yellows were quite consuming on their own. And then she was born- a little girl. The congratulations cards arrived in a wave of frothy pink.

Don't get me wrong- pink is wonderful, and my little girl looks very cute in pink. We don't even really worry too much about pigeonholing her into a specific gender role; as a little girl I was just as happy with my baby dolls as I was searching for crayfish, knee-deep in a creek bed. I'm fairly certain that she will continue to dig in the dirt for rocks and drive her cars all over my kitchen floor whether I dress her in pink or yellow or, in warmer weather, practically nothing at all.

I do wonder about myself, however. How am I parenting as a mother of a daughter? Am I the same person now as I would have been had Gianna been a boy? I'm certainly not the same person I was before I became pregnant, or had a child. My hair is a lot crazier, I have an eye twitch that won't go away, an ability to jump awake at the slightest cough, and I find myself saying things like, "We pet Lola's tail nicely; tails are not for tasting," and "Mommy does not need help going to the bathroom."

I wonder how differently I would have reacted to a little boy deciding to walk along the top of the couch. My first reaction was- absolutely not. Later, it was amended to- "With Mommy's help." Would I have been that quick to refuse access to what really is probably not that dangerous of an exploration?

Her hair is long enough for barrettes now. Yesterday I found myself thinking about polishing her toenails (how uncrunchy of me!) She wore patent leather Mary Jane style shoes to church on Sunday (and shattered my jaw into a million tiny shards each and every chance she had to kick me repeatedly in the face). Each of these events is shaping her bit by bit, like water on a rock. Not a bad thing. Neither is letting her hammer rocks with a wooden mallet in the yard, or dig in the dirt with her fingernails, or any of the other millions of events that go on during the day.

Cricket... Cricket...

2008-10-21T10:57:00.002-04:00

Ahem. Is this thing still on? I haven't posted in a while, mostly because my superpowers have been needed elsewhere. There is never a lack of things to accomplish.

I've also found myself in sort of a test pattern mode, thought-wise. Election dronings, economic "bovine feces," and other loud repetitive noises have killed my inspiration. I did have one thought that has been bouncing around for about the past 24 hours- what if people didn't vote for the candidates, but voted on the actual issues instead? Instead of flicking the switch for "Beavis" or "Butthead," in other words, there were the actual issues laid out in a simple, easy to understand, agreed upon by the candidates format. Perhaps the main twelve. Economics- do you lean towards a top-down, or a bottom-up method? Check here. Oil- do you want to drill, or don't you? Check here. The issues get tallied, and he/she that most matches the ideals of what people are looking for is voted in. Too difficult for someone to figure out? No voting for you, then. That method takes wayyyy too long! Huh. Well, crap. You mean it won't give us the results as fast as American Idol? Bummer, dude. Guess we can't do it that way. Besides, how will we know which ones are the good guys, and which are the bad ones?

But, what the hell do I know, anyway? I can't even figure out the daily mysteries I encounter. While sorting laundry to be cleaned, I found myself staring at a button-down shirt of Mr. Clarateaches this morning, wondering, "How on earth did he get out of this shirt? It's still buttoned! With a tee shirt still inside of the shirt!" I'd probably still be kneeling on the floor attempting to figure it out, but Gianna decided to scrub down the dog with some underwear and enlightenment was never achieved.

Instead, we ventured down to the freezing lower floor of our house, where I tried to distract my little overachiever from teething on the side of the garbage can by turning on Sesame Street. This show was definately written with the idea that parents will primarily be the ones watching this, while their progeny toddle about the living room while talking on the remote control and vigorously vacuuming the dog with the toy popcorn popper. One thing that does catch her attention is Elmo, the newer, cuter version of Grover. When I was small, Bert and Ernie and Grover ran the show, with Big Bird, Snuffy, and Oscar the Grouch supporting. Now, there are all sorts of speech-impaired little monsters running amok. A bear muppet substitutes "W" sounds for both "R" and "L" sounds (developmentally appropriate for the age range they're targeting, but bothersome to be modeling nonetheless) and Elmo consistently refers to him(?)self in the third person.

Enough dallying, I suppose. Time to go work on the ol' cottage industry. Or, some more haus-frauery.

When You Assume...

2008-10-07T12:12:00.001-04:00

Gianna the Foreman needs to supervise me closely while I'm cleaning, and we've got a pattern down, where in the mornings, I clean somewhere and she plays close by. This morning was the bathroom, and so I gave her this little plastic shoebox full of random things we've chucked in there that we don't use- all the pacifiers people gave us, a huge thing of Vaseline that we've never opened (DH is adamant about avoiding petroleum products), and some odds and ends of a J&J baby travel pack that were all still packaged shut. I assumed without checking that the Vaseline was somehow sealed, and she wouldn't be able to get into it.

So I'm scrubbing away at the rust in the tub, and she's chattering away to herself while looking through the box. She takes out the pacifiers and asks, "Dis?" while putting it in her mouth. I confirm that "in the mouth" is okay for the pacifier. I get back to scrubbing, and a few minutes later smell an overpowering baby powder scent. I turn and look and see:

Gianna, with a newborn-sized pacifier in her mouth, with a seriously grim, set face, taking her finger and sticking it into the open Vaseline pot, and applying a heavy dose to her eyebrows!!! They were swept way up in points. The look on her face, combined with the too-tiny pacifier, plus the eyebrows, was hilarious. She was so mad when I wiped her eyebrows off. I'm just glad she didn't eat it! That'll teach me to assume that things are sealed without checking!

Gray Day...

2008-10-02T10:45:00.003-04:00

"...everything is gray. I watch, but nothing moves today." Dr Seuss, My Many Colored Days

Upon looking into the mirror, I noticed a glaringly silver hair right in the middle of my part, towards the front of my face. Now, gray hair is nothing new to me- a college housemate used to amuse herself by yanking out gray hair she'd find in the back of my head, when I'd have my hair in a pony tail. This is the first time I've seen one out in the open, though. I think I'm going to call this little friend, "Bailout."

My usual distractions from the irritating, heart-sinking world of politics ranges. In days past, I would hop in the car and zoom around, finding something new. Or, I would argue relentlessly in forums (fora? foraminifera? Gewurztraminer, as my spell checker recommends?) dedicated just for that purpose. Sometimes I would attack a project. Bambina is napping, or else we'd be at Lowe's right now, looking for something to make a raised garden. I just need to hammer.

So, sometimes I fall back upon Food TV. I fell in love with "good things" a long time ago, watching Martha Stewart's "From Martha's Kitchen" and later her Living show. This escalated to watching Food TV and learning how to do incredible things with a roux, or with brioche. This may just be the spine to all of the organic, whole, local rigamorale I put us through on a daily basis. At any rate, if I'm going to make a chocolate chip cookie, rest assured, it will not be from a tube with a little dough man on it.

And here is what I see:

Commercial: The scene opens on an idyllic backyard, as one mom (Mom 1) pours red liquid for another mom (Mom 2). A party is implied, with kids in the background, and typical party fare about.
Mom 2: (raised eyebrows) "Oohhh, that has high fructose corn syrup in it."
Mom 1: (glibly, perhaps a bit archly) "So?"
Mom 2: "Well, you know what they say..." (trails off, fumbles a bit, looks sheepish).
Mom 1: "What? That it's made with corn? That it has no artificial ingredients? That it's fine in moderation, just like sugar?" She laughs at Silly Mom 2, and hands her a glass. Mom 2 looks at first embarrassed, but shakes it off to laugh with Mom 1 and enjoy her mixture of hummingbird food.

Dear GOD. What? The ad ends with the logo for the Corn Refiners Association at the bottom. Well, of course. That makes sense. Ethynol is slinking back into the place where New Coke and Clear Pepsi retreated, as it dawned on people that it creates a heck of an environmental impact just to get corn to a place where it works not quite so efficiently on cars as petroleum still does. Okay, so that's Food TV. Since Scripps Network took it over, actual chefs have left, and entertainment has taken over. Along with Sandra Lee, who probably won Miss High Fructose Corn Syrup at one point in time.

Click. Let's try my old pal, Martha. She still strives for the best. I page through the latest installment of her Everyday Food magazine, when lo and behold, there on page 41- what the HELL? It's an ad, adroitly placed opposite the "Between the Lines" column where the Martha Stewart Everyday Food people go through all the typical weird ingredients in packaged food to describe their impact.

And there, in the new MS Living magazine. Another one. Interestingly enough, the line that is repeated is that High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS) is safe "in moderation." Does anyone even know what moderation even is anymore? Let's actually let our brains do the thinking, rather than TV.

Ketchup, bread (yes, even high end whole wheat), salad dressing, canned soup, peanut butter, cereal... it's in all of these. If you are not going out of your way to avoid buying these items that contain them, your "moderation" card is already filled by the time someone offers you a popsicle or Red Liquid Drink.

Let's read further. So, if it's made from corn, it's "natural," huh? The type of corn that HFCS is made from is the type of corn that even cows don't like to eat. It's very high in starch (important for the process that the corn syrup goes through to become HFCS) and is very likely to be genetically modified as well. Here is a really good, step-by-step description of how HFCS is refined. It turned Mr. Clarateaches and myself off of the stuff for good. Do we occasionally partake in some fake frosting at a party? Sure. But do we refuse to buy HFCS products? Pretty much all the time. We're still working out the kinks, and occasionally notice that something (Dannon yogurt? Hello!) contains it where it really isn't necessary.

People can put any crazy thing they wish into their bodies. But an AD? Trying to convince people that avoiding it means that you're a blithering, stammering idiot? And that eating it purposefully is just fine, A-OK, and just like sugar?

I need to go hammer something now. Okay?

BonBons and Toenail Polish

2008-09-19T22:03:00.003-04:00

When I was teaching, there were some hum-drum days that came and went with no remarkable events. There were others that just plain stank, and I repeated to myself and my minions ad nauseum, "Tomorrow is a whole, brand new day." Then, there were the days where I slammed it right outta the park. The lesson was spot on, I'd have a breakthrough with one of my more intense kids, a principal or two would be overheard singing my praises...

Mothering is exactly that, only the pluses and minuses (meandering thought- why not minusii? Hmmm...) happen to your own flesh and blood. There's no paycheck to work for, but there is the carriage of your genetic material onward to a surviving new generation, so it behooves Mommy not to screw up. So some days go on in one giant blur of diapers-food-naps-dog shenanegins-diapers-bedtime and before you know it, you're thinking, "It's Friday? Really?" Others, you're practically sprouting demure heels and buffed pearls from your feet and neck, respectively. You've had time to (get this) floss your teeth, and use the diffuser that came with the hair dryer. Developmentally appropriate activities are going well with the bambina, local and organic home-cooked four square meals grace the clean table, and the dog is behaving as though she's just stepped off the faux-turf of the Westminster Dog Show.

Rarer still, fortunately, are the days where everything comically goes "all circus" on you. Mommy has to morph into an X-Men-type creature known as "Umbrella" when the gadget-oriented bambina decides to crank the shower all the way hot, and sheild the baby from the resulting lava flow while cranking it back (with shampoo in her eyes, no less.) The day is perfect for a walk, but Mommy's hairdo ends up looking less Angelina Jolie and very much more like "Doll From The Bottom Of The Toy Bin," and two blocks (or what I suspect was two blocks... these are the rural 'burbs here) into the walk discovers that Post-Partum Butt is no longer holding up Grey Pants the way they used to (where'd it go? I'd like it back now!) so every few steps is an adjustment to either pants, or former ideals of modesty and class.

These days, of course, are also days where the bambina decides that a 15 minute power nap is all she needs all day, so that by the time the usual "witching hour*" rolls around, she's turning into a gremlin and alternately laughing hysterically as she plays "Give Mommy a black eye with my forehead" and whining, falling over her own feet. PMS leaves you teary-eyed over the fact that you missed "Signing Time" on PBS, and pissy that the washable brown crayon with which you let the bambina tag the kitchen walls is just not as washable as advertised. Dinner semi-scorches, and the well water leaves manganese stains on the sink. You wonder why you used a tablespoon to measure out the cookie dough, and not an ice cream scoop. You wonder how chamonile tea would taste with a healthy jigger of Southern Comfort.

As always, with time and patience, grace prevails and sustains, and before you know it, the day is over, and you've learned that yet again, tomorrow is a brand new day.

* The Witching Hour, in small children, refers to the time period approximately between 3-5 PM, where they can become quite irritable, whiny, hyper, or just plain annoying. It has much more to do with circadian rhythms and blood sugar, I believe, than parenting or disposition, and only has to be endured with the understanding that a little dinner and a soothing bedtime ritual away is peace and quiet.

Babies, Babies, everywhere!

2008-09-15T11:21:00.003-04:00

A beautiful baby boy was born to a friend of mine on Sunday. All of her prolonged, off-again, on-again labor helped make it a short delivery. I can't believe that someone who gave birth around the time Gianna was born is actually having her second baby already! Congrats, Colette!

Also, in YAY HOME BIRTH news: Stephanie at Adventures in Babywearing welcomed her little Ivy into the world, in her very own bedroom this morning. Happy babymoon, you strong, home birthing mama!

Each story of home birthed babies makes me stronger. Soon, I'll be able to rip tall trees out of the ground, fly over buildings, and stop evil-doers with one crazy stare.

And, to birth my next baby at home. Empowering for me, frighteningly amazing for Mr. Clarateaches, educational for Gianna, and "knock-me-over-with-a-feather," "what-is-all-this," and "TOO MANY PUPPIES!" for Lola.

Americana

2008-09-10T20:52:00.002-04:00

The sign of the times:

Today I drove down a tree-lined street. It was garbage day, so the garbage truck was stopping, and a garbage man (or what used to be called garbage men- what is it now? Environmental Elf? Waste Management Intern?) was hopping out, grabbing cans, and loading them into the lift that dumped it into the big container.

As I got closer, I saw that he was lifting the cans with one hand, and emptying them, and then tossing them very skillfully back to where they belonged. For a moment, I thought- "Is he showing off? Is he exercising his "garbage can" arm?

Finally I passed him. He was on a cell phone, talking while holding it up to his ear. There are just no words for that kind of skill.

Rident Stolidi Latina

2008-09-07T19:20:00.003-04:00

So says my chocolate chip cookie recipe. My nine year old niece was giving me a reminder of what exactly to tell the naysayers when it comes up that Mr. Clarateaches and I are planning on using a Latin-Based Curriculum when we homeschool Gianna and subsequent bambinos. Now when I pull out my crusty, trusty notebook of recipes and see this (unintentionally) partial phrase, I can feel very smug and self-satisfied, until the occasion actually arises that someone does question our choice, and I completely forget what I was planning on saying, and I accidentally tell them, " Nauta precor procul mare." I need to pull out the Prima Latina and actually learn the mother tongue myself, one of these days.

She meant, "Rident stolidi verba latina," of course. "Only fools laugh at Latin." While this has so far only happened to us once, it does seem that as "terrible" and "failing" as public schools are perceived to be in the minds of many of the general public, the act of schooling one's child at home is seen as slightly insane by some ("What! You do realize you'll have your children underfoot all day long, right?") and as practically criminal by others ("By keeping your child out of public schools, the schools receive less money and therefore are not working as well for the other children, you selfish prig.")

I was sent an article by the eagle-eyed and bitingly witty Michael at Open All Night that both moves and troubles my soul. The article opens by saying:

NORTHFIELD, Ill. - More than 1,000 Chicago public school students skipped the first day of classes Tuesday to protest unequal education funding, a boycott organizers said would continue through the week with help from retired teachers who will turn office lobbies into impromptu classrooms.

I'm moved because the masses are actually coagulating and working as one, from the bottom up. This is always necessary, especially in a school system, as the changes are excruciatingly difficult to do from within. If the parents of my students ever had an issue with the school that they took up with me, I would heavily encourage them (in other words, I would carry them in a fireman's hold all the way to the office and inject them with sodium pentathol) to tell the office, and the school district administrators, as parents can get more fires started than teachers. I'm troubled, because as usual, the solution (as always) seems to be to toss more and more money at the problems, rather than to take a good hard look at where the money is all currently headed.

More and more and more money. And then what? More money still. Mitchell, in The Graves of Academe, argues that the perception of public schools failing is misleading. He argues that any institution that persistently does a shoddy job and continues to have money tossed at it is thriving well. I tend to agree- from the inside, a school is always searching, seeking, and finding (and going back to searching) for more money. When austerity budgets were instilled, the first things to go were usually the so-called "fluff" of the programs- art supplies, music, and finally sports. Yet administrators typically (and this is only my experience, which so far, including student teaching and substitute teaching as well as working as a certified teacher, is composed of six different public districts) do not initially option for pay cuts for themselves. These are people who are making six figures a year. The bulk of the "filling in" lands on the parents of students and then teachers themselves, pooling together for supplies.

Back to these students in Chicago, who are symbolically signing themselves up for enrollment in a "better" district (more highly taxed, wealthier, that probably without looking has a higher retention and graduation rate than the Chicago Public School District). Back also to the adults who are with them picketing and working hard to do what they think is the very best for their children or grandchildren. I have to wonder- if the adults with them so strongly want better, and are able to hold days-long protests, what is stopping them from schooling their children at home? Are they on leave from jobs that are waiting for them to come back from demonstrating? Are they under the impression that homeschooling is expensive and only to be done by those who are "certified?" Do they feel that the omission of their children will leave the remaining children in even worse shape?

These students, as the article points out, already realize that what they are doing is largely symbolic. They can't reasonably expect to commute 30+ miles to a better district, while also paying out-of-district tuition. Michigan schools actually have a halfway decent idea, with parents having the option to bring their children to the best available school within their county as a part of the "School of Choice" initiative, which makes districts competitive.

We are choosing, as many others are doing in droves, to go one step further and go back to the way some of the most brilliant minds of the onset of this country were schooled. Gianna will have slightly more than a slate and a Bible with which to learn how to read, write, and "cipher," but it will be without the several useless administrative positions and without the state-stamped "approved material" and without the general mindless dance of the drones that accompanies the typical public school experience of all but the very best districts. Don't misunderstand- this is not without a great deal of thinking and guilt and consternation on my part. What about the others? What about the single moms working long hours who cannot homeschool and are not near a decent alternative? What about the hard-working teachers who do their level best, under the worst of circumstances (and I know from personal experience and deep personal expense what goes into this)? What about the special needs children who need the services that are only offered in a public school setting? Change, I tell myself, is never easy. Transitions are difficult for adults, too. If there is to be an actual "change" in the current public school system, the agents of change need to be those who remove themselves from the cycle completely. The rest will have to fall into place, or fall away.

Customer Service

2008-09-04T13:06:00.002-04:00

In accordance to Clarateaches Law, "Everything Dealing With The Car Has To Be The Hard Way." Aside from various and motley other little snafus with our new car, the dealership accidentally gave us the wrong interest rate, and had to find us a new car loan. They kindly did just this (and now I'm waiting for them to tell us that they accidentally sold us a car that was already sold) and so now we're dealing with a new bank. I called the bank to inquire about our new car's account. Ages passed, of voice-activated choices, repeatedly hitting "0" only to discover that the maze of options did not include the typical instant access to a human being, and lots of errors in the choices due to trying to get a sleek and shiny Dogasus out of my hair (Me: "Lola, NO! Sit!" Voice Activated Service: " 4...0...6... Is this correct? Press or say 1 if correct...")

I finally reached a human being around the time that Gianna found her indoor rock. Gianna has switched majors from dental hygienist certification to geology, and has to have a rock near her at all times. When we recently went to the zoo, she carefully pointed out "Ock! Ock!" at each exhibit. "Look, Gianna, there's a tiger!" I would say, pointing to a tiger lying on the ground, suffering extreme heat stroke. Gianna would be fixated on the false granite cave instead. "Up, up, UP!" she would demand, trying to climb into the tiger exhibit. "Ock!"

At any rate, Mr. Clarateaches found a rock that was large enough that it wasn't a choking hazard, and small enough so that it wasn't a broken toe hazard, and Gianna honed in on it right away.

She waddled over to me just as I was giving my account information to the Real Live Human on the other end. "Ock!" she said proudly, and banged it on my knee to drive the point home. I directed her towards the dog, who looked nervous as usual (but as yet can still outrun the baby, so I'm not terribly concerned) and the Real Live Human gaily asked, "How old is your baby?" I responded, "Thirteen months," and Real Live Human said, "Oh, I have one of those at home. Only, he's nine."

Okay... thirteen months is kind of like nine, I guess. At any rate, I was interested in getting information and getting off the phone. I don't call banks to chat. In the interest of classification, Gianna performed a vigorous Moh's Hardness Test on the rock using the glass kitchen door. I herded my little genius away from the glass and gave her a plastic bowl to repeatedly play "place and empty the rock," and Real Live Human asked, "What toy is THAT?!?"

I told her that Gianna was practicing her .22 with some clay pigeons and I just really needed to understand a few points about the car loan. She was able to give me this information in less than 30 seconds, and just as I was about to sigh a big old sigh of relief and check this task off my list, she started pestering me about signing up for a credit card. Fortunately, Gianna had started to try to force-feed Lola a spatula, so I was able to flee. Real Live Human huffed her way through a good-bye that I'm sure was not a part of her script.

Check. Ahhh.

The Journey Begins With One Small Tush

2008-09-01T17:43:00.002-04:00

Cloth diapering seemed fairly normal. I had the privilege of being the daughter of a mother who cloth diapered my youngest brother towards his potty-training years, and so I remember the eighties version- pins, prefolds, and plastic pants.

Trying to decide what I would use was a bit more daunting. Every cloth diapering mama, it seems, has come up with her own design and tricks and is marketing it to ecologically and economically friendly mothers everywhere. All have cutie-pie names that sometimes start to blur together: Bum Genius, Bummis, Fuzzi Bunz, Motherease, and Kissaluvs are just a handful of the more popular ones. On most mothering boards where cloth diaper use is prevalent, the alphabet soup of acronyms is just flying, as discussions of "BG's vs FB's" and "ME's with or without covers" go on and on and on.

I knew I would use pre-folds, whatever else I landed on. Prefolds are the typical cotton rectangle that most people think of when visualizing cloth diapers. Plastic pants are a crinkly, scratchy thing of the past, with the advent of wool covers (stay tuned for a mid-fall intro to my Etsy line of "Shorties;" a flashback to the good old days when Pa knew a new bun was in the oven when Ma started click-clacking away on the knitting needles, chugging out tiny wool shorts. That, or the massive morning sickness over the daily mucking of the cow stalls. Ahhh, the good old days...) or PUL covers (PUL stands for polyurethane laminate, a waterproof but soft fabric). Pins are even a thing of the past, as many (but not all) prefold users now snag the diaper into place with Snappis.

Aside from the "PFs," I was on the prowl. What marvelous, washable, soft and cozy item would catch my baby's excretions? The posh, but way too expensive Blueberry Minkies? Perhaps someday, when I find the buried treasure I've been searching for since third grade. As cute as they are, $42 is just too much for one single diaper.

Motherease was next on my list. Organic cotton, lovingly hand-picked by pixies by the light of the full moon*, woven into a comfy, yet moderately priced diaper that works from newborn on up to toddlerhood, thanks to a series of snaps that changes the size completely. Their Air Flow covers were also my main cover choice, as I wanted a breathable, "bubble cover" that would fit a range of thigh to waist ratios.

Bum Genius 2.0's were out when Gianna was born, and they upgraded to 3.0 by the time she was 6 months old. These also were "one size," and worked without a cover, as they were an "all in one" diaper. The only downside is that the fabric that contacts the baby's skin is synthetic, and for the summer, I've noticed that Gianna just does not tolerate the microsuede on hot and humid days.

After a full year of trying out different diapers, and stepping into the Wacky, Wild and Wonderful World of Wool, I've decided that, as in many things, simplicity is perfection. My typical set-up is a prefold, Snappi'ed shut, with a wool cover or a Motherease Air Flow. She's happy, comfortable, and rash-free, and I am only washing diapers every other day (or sometimes every third day, unless it's humid). The Motherease One Size with an insert snapped in, is what gets her through the night.

Any of my readers doing cloth? Any thoughts to share?

*Okay, I exaggerated a bit. I think the pixies machine-pick the cotton, and it's probably during the day. Every day.

Feeding Frenzy, Revisited

2008-08-26T08:29:00.000-04:00

It was in this post where I originally described the fun of nursing an infant.

Nursing a "waddler" (not quite a toddler, but certainly a walking infant) is just as hilarious, if not more so. Let's walk through it.

10 AM: Gianna walks over to where I am picking up blocks for the 11 billionth time that morning, and smacks me on the chest. "Nurse?" I ask her, signing as well.

She responds by doing the "nursing chuckle," "Uh huh, uh huh, uh huh..." She flings herself into my arms, and we proceed.

10:01 AM: Gianna's eyes squint, and suddenly her pointer finger looms into my peripheral vision. In an instant, my nose is being picked. I remove her hand. She casually zooms in again, and I remove her hand again. Repeat.

10:03 AM: She's disinterested in the nostrils now. Right now, she wants to rest her foot on my cheek. "Rest" is actually the wrong word. She wants to kick my cheek repeatedly while asking, "Dis? Dis? Dis?" Only, she's nursing, so it's more like, "Mish? Mish? Mish?" All of the above is dissuaded, as talking while nursing involves way more teeth than are comfortable.

10:05 AM: What to do... what to do... Ah yes! Gianna grabs my hair and pulls gently. Then, she lets go and pulls her own hair gently. Her eyebrows furrow. She has an idea. She grabs my hair, this time not so gently, and gives it a yank. Then, repeats on her own hair. Back and forth, she tests the tensile strength of each of our tresses until I actually reach my own breaking point before my hair. I encourage her to pull on my nursing necklace, a gift from my mother when I described the black and blue marks I was getting from my interactive nursling.

10:06 AM: I am strangled by my own nursing necklace. Examination of the nostrils resumes.

10:07 AM: Gianna leaps away, ready to play. I grab some tea, and cherish all the fuzzy hormones that nursing releases. Oxytocin, where would we be without you? Probably not nursing, that's for sure.

The Return of Saturn

2008-08-24T20:18:00.001-04:00

Epilogue (of sorts) to the car crash and subsequent mirth and merriment of living in a "No Fault State." Apparently, if you detest someone badly enough, you can ram some junker of a car right into their family-mobile, and give them three weeks of headaches and phone calls.

No matter. After hemming and hawing, and waxing and waning, and switching frequently from cat pose to cow pose, our insurance company decided to total the car after all. We then had a whirlwind week and a half of looking at used and new cars, weighing our options, deciding if a lease was a good idea or a bad idea (we voted, "BAD") and finally landed on a Saturn. A fairly nice, new Vue that will get the whole family too and fro, Doula-Dog and all.

When we bought the car, we did it at the last hour of the last day of the month, and as a result, didn't get the whole washing and detailing process, as the service center had gone home for the day. I went back the next day with one-year old in tow, and crossed all my fingers and toes that they could get me in and out of there.

At 9:00 AM in the morning, many very extremely elderly people converge upon Saturn dealerships for coffee and TV. I had no idea. Fortunately, they seemed delighted that a baby was in the vicinity, and cackled and encouraged her in her raucousness. "What a handsome little guy!" bellowed one man, as my pink-ruffled-with-flowers-frocked child swept all magazines from the coffee table to the ground. Two women, who had initially sat down next to each other and started to talk about various maladies, cheered on the bambina's attempts at walking. Gianna mistook this friendliness as an invitation to peel brightly painted, but seemingly necrotic toenails off one of the women's toes.

In between treating one and all to some good old fashioned lactation-phobia exposure therapy and the mayhem and madness of letting a near-walker loose around some caffeinated seniors, I frequently popped Gianna into our pouch sling and wandered over to the door that led to the service center. There, service personnel would cheerfully wave and continue to not detail and wash my car. In fact, I suspect that as soon as I'd leave their sight, they were taking turns changing all the pre-programmed stations on my radio and mooning one another from the back windshield.

Around and around we circled. Checked out the autos on the showroom floor. Peeked at the tiny, spoiled pooch that someone was wearing in a dog-baby-carrier (Gianna shouts, "no No NOT!" or sometimes, "Woof!" at strange dogs). Took a break at the waiting area, in order to completely dismantle the daily newspaper all over the floor (which delighted the caffeinated seniors). Peeked at car, wondered at the service people who were now playing a good old fashioned game of "Cram as many workers as possible into the car."

Finally, after hovering close to a salesperson trying to make his sale at a table, and allowing Gianna to add her two cents as necessary, they were able to get us out of there.

Without our free tank of gas.

We would... have to...

GO BACK ANOTHER DAY.

Hot Topic is NOT Punk Rock

2008-08-19T16:51:00.002-04:00

No matter how "anti-establishment" or against the grain, back to nature, outside of the box, or any way you term "different" you think you are as a parent, you always can fit into some sub-group. I happen to belong to the group of anti-consumer, anti-commercial, baby-wearing, breastfeeding, non-vax'ing, CSA-belonging mamas who heft around Robeez-wearing, organically fed children with amber necklaces around their triple-chinned necks. There are actually enough of us that we probably almost equal in numbers the Disney-and-Kraft-Mac-n-Cheese crowd, at this point.

What I'm going to do is causing me no small amount of cognitive dissonance, therefore. I'm about to do something that goes against my typical self, and I think I've come to terms with it. I think I'm going to go ahead and click the "Google AdSense" button, and add some commercialism to my blog. I've questioned myself and my motives long and hard, and what it boils down to is- if you want to click on an ad, click away. Click many times a day, if it makes you happy. If not, some servers will cut out ads, and you don't have to click on them at all. It will be a trial run, at the very least. It may mean more blogging, if Gianna will just sleep long enough for me to crank one out without saving it to draft, and then losing my vibe when I try to rev it back up!

A commercially driven blog, by an anti-consumerism mama. Wrap your heads around that one!

How Do You Measure A Year?

2008-07-29T09:45:00.003-04:00

It's amazing to think that a whole life can be lived a certain way, and suddenly, a new beginning can transform that life completely. Everything is high definition now. That doesn't necessarily mean that everything is one giant Candy Land, for sure, and some things are outside of how I ever could have imagined it to be. For example, I bought an organic, cotton baby doll that I imagined Gianna would snuggle to sleep. Right at this moment, my child has chosen a small canister of brightly colored sprinkles as her nap-time buddy. This is how I know she wasn't switched at birth.

I've spent the last couple of weeks, leading up to her birthday and beyond, pondering and meditating on Gianna's birth and first year. I can't remember life before her, although I think I faintly remember some nights where all we ate for dinner was a warm, crunchy baguette, some triple creme Brie, and all the Lambrusco we could drink.

I've posted multiple times about her birth, and the crushing disappointment in the "FAILURE" that is tattooed onto my heart. No matter how medical a term, the "failure to progress" still feels like a judgement of character to me. It still takes my breath away some days.

Those are the days where I must be determined to let myself be swept away by greater things: the wild golden/caramel cowlicks that are forming curls on Gianna's head; her asymmetrical dimple that lives only on her right cheek, next to her nose; and those eyes, which are a strange color that I can barely describe. It's like someone took Army fatigues and made it into an eye color. The centers are brown, and they radiate out to an olive green, that further lightens to a khaki, and then has a deep blue-brown rim.

She refuses to walk- I think she's going to follow in her Uncle Craig's footsteps, and be determined to crawl until about 14 months old. She cruises everywhere, and at top speed, laughing hysterically. She's even taken a few steps on her own, but crawling must be faster. More imposing, especially to Lola, who skitters nervously when she hears the approaching "slap-slap-slap" of baby paws on the floor.

She is, very simply, my Pearl; my wild child who personifies my own "scarlet letter." I am her mama, so I'm terribly biased, but I'm pretty sure my child is destined for something pretty amazing. As for me, I'm going to continue to enjoy the ride!

Little Signs Everywhere

2008-07-24T11:08:00.002-04:00

How do you know that you have a pre-toddler in the house? Besides, you know, the actual sighting of a mobile baby? Here are some signs:

- Even though you have a dog that spends a lot of time indoors, the floor is pretty clean. This can be the result of the pre-toddler playing the "Yuck*" game with Mom, Mom vacuuming and Swiffering many times a day, or the crawling, pre-toddler wearing static-y clothing that attracts absolutely every last follicle of dog hair and deposits it all into the dryer.

*Yuck Game- First, the pre-toddler locates a "yucky" object, usually a tuft of dog fur (AKA, a "Lola Tumbleweed.") Next, she gets Mom's attention, usually by chanting, "Mom-mee, Mom-mee, dis. Dis. Mom-mee, dis." When Mom looks at her, she grins a villainous grin, and pops the treasure into her mouth while saying, "Guck," and Mom leaps into the air saying, "Oh, YUCK!" as well.

- You have books and a spoon on your bathroom floor.

- You have a pile of shoes in the kitchen. Dinner will never be accomplished, otherwise.

- The stairs are usually barricaded, and the dog now leaps high into the air to ascend them, even when the pre-toddler is in bed and the barricades are taken down.

- The dog has a homestead under the high chair.

- Toys are ignored, and the vacuum attachments are the star of the day. So is the Swiffer.

- You find yourself saying, "Feet stay out of Mommy's dinner." "Only pat Lola where her fur grows."

- You narrate your entire day to the pre-toddler, and then later automatically narrate everything you are doing while on the phone with the recalcitrant auto insurance people.
("Now Mommy is taking her pen and writing the words, 'find new auto insurance when this is all over,' onto her 'To Do' list.")

Irony, Absolutely Everywhere

2008-07-15T12:58:00.003-04:00

Well, they did it. They finally got me.

The driving while texting teenagers, that is.

We're the smushed gray car on the left. Which shockingly, is actually NOT totaled, as I once thought. It is under repairs.

The tri-colored teen-mobile on the right belongs to a 16 year old who thought he'd cultivate his multi-tasking skills by texting a message on his cell phone while veering directly over the yellow line and into our lane.

Whiplash and scrapes and bruises aside, we are all okay. Gianna was rear-facing in her Britax Diplomat, and her only after effect so far is a loud, screaming cry when she's startled. Whiplash really hurts, readers. Planning a funeral would have hurt a whole lot worse, though.

The car seat has already been replaced, and I'm planning on rear-facing her until she's old enough to complain about it using full, properly tensed Latin sentences.

So, now I begin to collect info on other states that have better NO CELL PHONE laws. As if I needed another cause!

Where on earth did I put that arnica? And why does this spell checker try to helpfully suggest that arnica is better spelled, "fornicate?"

Attention Michigan Drivers

2008-06-23T14:35:00.002-04:00

Dear Michigan drivers,

On the left side of your steering wheel is a protruding object. You may think that the manufacturer placed it there to get in the way of your boss tiger fur steering wheel cover, but in fact, it does one of my favorite things- by merely pushing it forward or pulling it toward you, you can signal a turn. Can you believe it? Give it a try sometime. By the way- you do not save (noticeable) gasoline if you coast towards a red light, going slower and slower, without hitting your brakes. If the light is on a sensor, you may be delaying the progression towards a green light. A better idea to save gasoline would be to stay home. Especially if you eat a bowl of ice cream while driving (as seen two days ago) or feel the urge to engage in "relations" with your passenger (as seen a few weeks ago).

Ever so lovingly yours,

Clarateaches

Driving with a baby is something like driving a Brinks security truck, but without the safety in size (and bulletproof glass). You never really notice how fast things are hurling towards you until you strap a little munchkin into her $200 state of the art, five point harness car seat. Then, you go from being a defensive, cool-headed driver to being the inventor of Clarateaches Car Machine Guns ("What to use the next time you see someone texting at the wheel!")

Blasting tunes at top volume disappears as well (although Gianna does seem to like the Beastie Boys) and enjoyable music from my college days (where music will always remain, and my children will someday call me a fogie, to which I will respond, "Turn that crap down!") is replaced by ten rounds of "Six Little Ducks." Mr Clarateaches does not like her music one little bit, except for the funkified version of "Hickory Dickory Dock." He irritatedly punches the "Skip" button, going from Track 5 all the way to Track 30 without stopping, some days.

Each month that passes adds a small increase in the dread I feel when we face a road trip back to our natural habitat, Western NY. As Gianna grows more mobile and less apt to fall asleep within moments of getting into the car, it becomes more difficult to entertain her. Last time I resorted to letting her play with the pens in my purse. This time, I think it's going to take some cold hard cash. Or, a promise of her very own alpaca. Then and only then do I rue the safety of a car seat, and hearken back to the good old days when you could just take a baby out and hold them*. The first person who makes a safety device that allows this, receives a free alpaca from yours truly.

*Do not ever do this, ever.

Come ON! Really?

2008-06-20T15:16:00.002-04:00

Onward we march, towards women becoming passive breeders, and the government raising our children. My blood, if it is entirely possible, is reaching its boiling point.

This is older news, but I'll bellyache about it now, just because the past couple of days I've been up to my armpits in a baby that has discovered the joys of unrolling toilet paper. And a dog who stole and ate 16 oatmeal-raisin-chocolate-chip cookies. And also dug a hole the size of a horse. And then unrolled all of her fur all over the house in such a fashion that as soon as I finish vacuuming the entire thing, she's already made a huge mass of fur where I originally started, and the baby is making fur-angels in it. In other words, who the heck has time for the internet? I'm trying to evolve an exoskeleton so that Gianna will stop biting me out of boredom, and six extra arms so that I can continue to save the day. We won't even talk about the carpenter ants using the storms and rain to launch a resurgence, and the environmentally safe pest control company telling me to commune with them with a little more of the love vibes, and a little less of the anger aura before calling them to set up an appointment for a re-spray.

Prepare to sign petitions.

The AMA has declared that home-birth is unsafe, and that they will work hard to ban any birth outside of a hospital.

I'll wait while you read that again. And again. And think about it.

More than 95% of babies are currently born in hospitals in the United States. (American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology) YET, maternal death has steadily risen since 1977. (Gaskin) Infant mortality for the United States is higher than all industrial countries, and even higher than some developing countries. Recently released in the "news" (AKA, what people with common sense can already put together, albeit without the soundtrack and funky graphics and perky newsreader voice) is the alarming statistic that premature births are on the rise due to scheduled inductions and cesarean sections.

And the AMA wants less Home Births?!?

Don't get me wrong here. If a woman makes an evidence-based choice and values-based choice to birth in a hospital with an OB-GYN or CNM, that is her choice and it belongs to HER, just like her birth. Not everyone hates hospitals with my own passion, and a hospital stay is not necessarily a nightmare to everyone. Hospitals need to remain a choice. Home and Free Standing Birth Centers also need to remain a choice. The AMA is trying to tell us that, while I can choose to terminate the life inside of me for whatever reason I want, I should not have the choice to birth wherever I choose. People. Need. To. Pay. Attention. This is only going to get worse.

Action time: Who knows what this will actually do, but here's a petition to sign to keep home birth legal.

Better yet, if this is an issue that drives you, join Citizens for Midwifery, and make it clear to your state representatives (who vote and pass and push for laws based on whoever is the loudest voice... or whoever carries the most bucks) that this is not acceptable, and that Clarateaches will not only give birth on their front lawn if they pass anything resembling the AMA's resolution, but she will consume her placenta in front of them, too.

Drastic times call for drastic measures.

Mnemosyne

2008-06-07T22:44:00.002-04:00

I keep forgetting the blogs I want to post! I did catch a quick peek at the analyst, and it looks like my readership is at an all time low of 3. Oopsies. But, hey over there, Sydney, Australia! And Italy, oh my. Tourniamo subito, I promise; keep reading!

Major child development going on over here. I have hilarious little tidbits that I think, "Oh, I need to blog that," and then poof- it's gone. Good old Mommy brain. Somehow I still can remember a list of adverbs that Mr. Thompson required us to memorize in fourth grade- "Am, is, are, was, were, being, been, have, has, had, do, does, did, shall, will, should, would, may, might, must, can, could. Whew. I'll remember that on my death bed.

At any rate, I need sleep. Perhaps then the memory will return.

The computer's all yours, Mr. Clarateaches.

Exactly

2008-05-19T16:19:00.002-04:00

Hee hee. Oh Hathor...

See and Be Seen

2008-05-16T14:30:00.002-04:00

Someday, my child will embarrass me in public. This may or may not involve the loud chanting of things I would rather that people not know, or perhaps a tantrum or two. Or a tantrum times ten to the power of eight.

Someday, I will embarrass my child in public. Probably for being way cooler than the other moms. No, that's not it. Probably for having wacky hair and a skeletal system that looks like it was assembled by someone with the fortune of owning super-glue, and the misfortune of attention deficit disorder. She just won't care when I tell her that I used to appear normal, but co-sleeping with an active baby who likes to kick me in the face with both feet does a number on your entire system.

Currently, I endure the "unwanted attention in public because you have a baby" stage. Perhaps I should blame public schools- where else would random strangers get the collective idea that peering into my baby's eyes at a distance of three micrometers and bellowing "Ah-BOOOO!" is a positive thing?

We draw a crowd at church. Typically, I need to change Gianna as soon as we get there. It seems church has a laxative effect on her. This involves making my way through her crowd of loyal fans, young and old. Then, desecrating the nursery with the scent of three days worth of taste testing food, including blueberries, which never ever ever come out of diapers. Ever. Unless you sun them, and then they do. Unless you leave the diaper out in the rain, and then forever after you look critically at each one as it comes out of the dryer and wonder- are you the diaper I left outside so carelessly?

My parenting choices sometimes draw a crowd. Yesterday I was talking to two other moms at the park, while Gianna sat in the mulch and inquired about each one.

Me: "Blah blah boring grownup talk, blah blah"

Gianna, holding up a piece of mulch: "Dis?"

Me: "Mulch."

Gianna, holding up a different piece of mulch: "Dis?"

Me: "Mulch."

Gianna, holding up a different piece of mulch: "Dis?" And so on and so forth. She dug through all one thousand, eight hundred and seventy-two pieces in front of her until she hit dirt. Mmmm. After scrubbing her hand in the dirt very seriously, holding her hand in front of her even more seriously, and then going ahead and giving it a taste, she decided that it wasn't for her. With a ring of dirt around her mouth, she moved on to more of her interview: "Dis?" "Mulch." "Dis?" "Mulch." "Dis?"

Suddenly, a mom who wasn't a part of her group rushed over. "Ma'am, do you know your daughter is EATING DIRT?!?" She was quite horrified, and I'm sure she'd be even more horrified that sometimes, the dog creeps over to the highchair and gives Gianna's fist full of banana a surreptitious lick, before I roar and the dog flees to the comforts of the Neighborhood Dog Choir.

I glanced down. Gianna glanced up, telltale ring around her mouth. I couldn't hide that, could I? "Um, yeah!" I answered. Then I didn't know what to say, so I put on my best, "I'm not crazy" smile and waited. She stared at me, and walked back to her group. Probably to blog about the crazy-haired woman who fed her daughter dirt later in the day, who knows.

There just is no blending into the crowd with a baby.

He is close to the brokenhearted...

2008-05-14T16:12:00.002-04:00

I know I've beaten the shock and grief of an unplanned, but ultimately chosen, Cesarean section to death by this point. Emotions lead to actions that must be purposefully thought out, in the long run. Otherwise, you cannot call yourself an adult.

After the grief, the anger and betrayal by my own body, I look to the future. I choose to view future births in the light of moving right along. My choice, done in all types of research by even the most mainstream of academies (ACOG), leads me to VBAC. Nope, I'm not expecting another child... yet. Someday. In the meantime, I collect positive stories and accounts of victory over major abdominal surgery.

And THIS STORY is one of the most beautiful. The song made me cry. Only click if you enjoy graphic birth stories.

Sibling Rivalry

2008-05-13T21:16:00.002-04:00

Dog and baby. Baby and dog. Something tells me that soon, Lola will be trying to get up on her hind feet and cruise around the furniture.

It's truly a love/ hate thing with these two. If Gianna cries, Lola looks concerned and acts as though she may have to teach me a thing or two about parenting. If Lola barks, Gianna points at her and yells commands.

The one true battle remains the spot at the bottom of the stairs, in the living room. Lola and Gianna love this spot. Gianna loves it because she can thump her hands on the second stair up from the bottom, and pretend that she's giving her triumphant "I've taken over the world" speech. She also loves it because she likes to climb now. Lola loves that spot probably because Gianna loves it. Also, if she snuggles right up to the bottom stair, she is difficult to see, and I fairly regularly trip on her. She thinks she will be the Alpha Female if I perish.

Typically, Lola will walk to the bottom of the stairs and lay down, while staring at me. She knows exactly what she's doing. Gianna will immediately drop whatever she's doing, and crawl right up to her, and place both hands on the dog, commencing CPR. Lola retaliates by licking Gianna in the ear. Gianna will then, using a corn shucking motion, attempt to cleave Lola's tail in twain. Lola rolls over at this point, in a typical submissive dog stance, but this twists Lola's tail out of Gianna's hands, and all the wagging makes her crawl backwards to get out of the way.

The baby wins, of course. She just smells so irresistibly like bananas and Cheerios and all sorts of other lovely things that are thrown imperiously from the high chair. Lola creeps off to the kitchen to sniff around on the floor, in the hopes that she missed some tossed food the last time she checked, and Gianna crows in victory.

Destroy Your Kids in just a Few Easy Steps!

2008-05-06T20:22:00.002-04:00

Hey parents! Do you want to waste a lot of time and money and energy doing a lot of work and accomplishing nothing? Would you like your children to regard you as one whirling, twirling two-legged moron? You gotta try this! For approximately $100, you TOO can show your kids that you are a colossal, meaningless ass.

Ruth A. Peters, Ph. D. (We'll call her Dr. Rap) has come up with a really great way to make China a whole lot of money, and send thousands of young people straight to therapy in a decade or so. Actually, that's probably her goal. Let's take a closer look at her plan. Pull on those Depends, this really made me pee myself laughing.

1) Buy a refrigerator magnet, treats, and a glass jar: Dr. Rap has parents drawing smiley faces, crossing off smiley faces, keeping track of treats and smilies and misbehaviors and time-outs. Oh my. What the ever loving hell? Doc Rap breaks the first cardinal rule of children- they just DO NOT CARE about rewards after a while. Especially the cheapo, lead-filled dollar store junk or tantrum inducing, red dye #40 filled candy that she recommends. (Quick thought- if they are super good children, and "earn" one or all of their treats per day, doesn't this cost about $365- $1095 per year PER KID?!? Not to mention a bajillion pieces of paper with schizophrenic smilies scribbled all over them, X'ed out or otherwise?)

Clarateaches says: If you have the time and energy and even half the money that she thinks this involves, you can find things to keep on hand to occupy children (without the High Fructose Corn Syrup and other various crap, and without sending a paycheck or two to China) when you cannot be directly involved with them. Be proactive, not reactive. What 7 year old on the planet is going to put up with this kind of crap? The shy and quiet ones will retreat, and be cute little pigtailed houseplants with no life or movement, the sneaky ones will figure out how to act out while getting the plastic crap, and the hard heads will decide that watching you draw smiley faces and cross them out all day is more fun than anything else.

Sigh. Moving on...

Digital Timer: Well I'll be. She actually has something right. Kids need concrete, not theoretical. They have no idea what five minutes means, especially if they have a highly distracted adult telling them, "Just five more minutes and then I'll get off the phone and play with you... five more... five more." This holds parents accountable as well- if you mean that you will go to the park in five minutes, you better hold yourself to it!

Poker Chips: Well why not? Let's get these little gamblers started early. Hee hee- look, she says, "I strongly believe that kids should earn their privileges (money, extra clothing and special activities) and not be given these just for existing." But Dr. Rap, in the whole smiley face, glass jar, time out, stand on your head, genuflect, cross yourself, turn around and touch the ground dealie- don't the kids get all kinds of treats for just merely existing? Technically, some waif of a kid can wake up, perform the act of eating and excreting, sit in a chair and do nothing, and win all three of their fabulous prizes, all hand-crafted by someone their own age in the People's Republic of China. Can I just say this again- WHAT parent has the time to dole out the chips and remember who gets what, who has what, and who lost what? If you're the type of parent that has all the time and memory to do this, couldn't you invest this in getting involved with your child in some type of activity that benefits the whole house, or whole family?

Clarateaches says: Involving kids in age-appropriate activities that contribute to the family as a whole is a great idea and involves little more than simply making it a part of their day from the time that they are small. Wear your baby in a sling while you vacuum, play "pick up toys" with your toddler to the beat of a catchy tune, have your preschooler stand at the sink and rinse dishes as you wash them... this is not rocket science, people. Model, model, model.

Ok, these next few take the cake. Videotape tantrums to mock them? Threaten them with sending the tape to family members?!? SHRED CDS AND DVDS IN A PAPER SHREDDER?!?!?! What are the values these are teaching children? Let's just throw money away- I don't like what you are doing, so when I don't like what you are doing, I will ruin something that belongs to you. Don't be surprised if Junior, on a rage at 16, burns the house down. And the tantrum thing- for once and for all- KIDS HAVE BIG FEELINGS. They need a safe place to let them out. If you are the type of person who drags a sleepy, hungry child to the mall for two hours in the afternoon and chats on your cell while going into and out of stores just for little old you, you deserve the whopper of a tantrum that, trust me, will happen.

Clarateaches says: Model, model, model. Do not give items just to use them as something to take away. Tantrums will happen- stay physically present, but don't hover; stay calm and for God's sake, keep your own adult mouth shut. They can't hear you, anyway. When it burns itself out, stay close and hug them- tell them that they were very angry, (scared, sad, frustrated...) and it was a big anger, and now it's all done. And move on. The more accurately you help them to describe what they are going through, the better they will cope next time. It's not permissive in the slightest. Nope, you don't cave in, they don't get to paint the dog's toenails with nailpolish after all. But, you don't make a screaming magenta baboon's ass of yourself in the whole rigamorale of capering about with a cheapo video camera, desperately thinking of all the people in your address book who can be sent your child's tantrum. Which, by the way, if you threaten it- be prepared to actually do it. Trust me on this one- no one wants to see your child's tantrum. There probably are only so many times that you can send Aunt Beatrice your child's tantrum before she starts sending you her toy poodle's droppings through media mail. Be an adult and model appropriate behavior. BY THE WAY- If you're the bright red-faced, screaming individual honking his horn at an elderly man making his way across the street while you were trying to turn right on red the other day, you pretty much have your own self to blame if Screamy the Second uses his "dog whistle voice" every time life runs contrary to what he originally imagined.

There you have it, folks. Right there is where it all goes to hell. "Why are kids so disconnected? Why can't they learn the value of their property? How come they don't value their family?" Shred their property while at the same time give them endless plastic junk just for staying under the radar. Laugh and mock their feelings during the age where they are trying to learn what the hell to do with them. Spend your day so busy trying to remember which of your three darlings has retained all of their smiley faces and which has already had two crossed out, and which time-out which one is on, so that you cannot spend any on showing them the appropriate way to behave. You, too, can have kids coked to the gills on all kinds of pharmaceuticals by the time they graduate high school. Way to "parent."

Bathliness is next to Bedliness

2008-05-05T13:06:00.002-04:00

As un-crunchy as it might sound, I love a good routine. This is no doubt a carry-over from my days as a wide-awake teacher, just brimming with youthful sleep and energy. Back then, I planned my day to a T, and even planned in some planning time. There is nothing more satisfying than a list, other than completing that list.

Routine for many of my fellow AP style parents is sort of a four letter word. I think this is because many of the baby trainers have purloined the word "routine" and attached a sinister connotation to it (namely, that babies will fit into an adults life, even if it takes some strange and unnatural gyrations). I would like for that to change! There is a way to have a general routine while being responsive and attached and family-centered. Hats off to the moms that don't need one, and live well without one- I just can't do it! The trick is to be flexible. Teething, dogs rolling in rotten chipmunk, traveling, and the rare utility sink overflow demand that when the routine needs to be put on hold, that is just the way the ball bounces.

Round these parts, Gianna has a well scripted evening before bed. Bath, followed by the Great Diaper Chase (diapering a mobile baby should be a part of the Olympics. Cloth diapering a mobile baby, my friends), followed by Hylands Baby Crack (if teething), followed by Mr. Clarateaches' Story Time, prayers and lullabies in the glider, and then into the Pack n' Play she goes.

This child LOVES her bath. There is no other time of the day where she gets to work her pre-engineering magic the way she can in the bathtub. Forgetting the colorful toys bobbing around, she spends about 75% of her bath twisting the dial until the drain stopper rises enough to be pried out and poked into the faucet. She stoically tolerates the shampoo that releases her tresses from the cement that is banana, and does remarkably well with water being dumped over her head. She also has discovered that a washcloth is more efficient at bailing all of the water out of the tub, and onto Mommy and the floor. This experiment is repeated enough times to make sure it really does work, and it's not just a fluke.

Lola likes to wander in and peer into the tub. Her tail droops nervously, and she shifts from paw to paw, looking at me anxiously to determine if she will be thus tortured next. I assure her that she will indeed have a bath if she doesn't get her dog booty out of my way. No one has to ask her twice.

They all rolled over, and none fell out

2008-04-25T10:31:00.002-04:00

Attention: If you are afraid of co-sleeping, this is not the post for you.

For some reason, the hospital where we ended up bringing Gianna into the world was practically shaking and trembling in fear over co-sleeping. They had a parenting channel that would broadcast several times a day and night about how babies do best on their backs in a crib with nothing but a mattress, in a room far far away. Anything else would immediately cause them to stop breathing and die on the spot.

Granted, SIDS is no joke, and there are proper and improper ways to share a bed with a baby, just like there are proper and improper ways to have a baby sleep in a crib. No water beds, of course, and no drugs, alcohol, saggy mattresses, animals, or other booby traps. There are lots more, but somehow, Cave Clara managed to sleep with her whole family and not kill any of them. Could you imagine if they had to find another little cave for Cave Gianna?

Being as contrary and defiant as I am, I repeatedly told the hospital staff that we would use a "Co-sleeper." Confused, they just clarified to make sure that it would be not in our bed. "Not yet, No," I would answer.

Blink, blink.

So, there was no way that I was going to drag my post-surgery body all over the upstairs of the house to breastfeed this kid. In our room she stayed, and now spends half the night in her own bed, and half the night in ours. Usually Mr. Clarateaches curls up on his side with 95% of the blankets and sheets, I cling to my side, and Gianna does jumping jacks in her sleep in the middle 65% of the bed all night long. We are slowly phasing her to her own bed, but this arrangement makes it easiest for all of us to get sleep, and for me to nurse her through the night.

Here are a few things we will miss, when she is in her own bed:

- One night we accidentally left Lola outside. At 1 AM, Gianna started whining and growling and acting pretty demented. She didn't want to nurse, she didn't want to snuggle, and she for sure didn't want to open her eyes. Suddenly, I heard a muffled, "Whoof... whoof." Lola was whisper-barking outside the kitchen door. I prodded Mr. Clarateaches awake, and he went to fetch the grateful pooch. Once the dog was safely inside, Gianna fell back to sleep.

- (This is sort of immature, and teenage boy humor, but oh well) She toots in her sleep with all the forces of a grown man. One in particular, but he will remain nameless. Let's just say her other X chromosome came with some extra exhaust. The hilarious part is that she has to point both feet into the air before she can let it rip. So, she will be sleeping very adorably, with all of the adorable-ness of a cute, tiny innocent being, and then whammo- feet point to the sky, and trumpets blare. Resume cute, innocent little lamb, sound asleep.

And what I won't miss:

- Sleeping in the letter "K" position. I have to sleep so that she can have access to the chuck wagon, and also so that she doesn't accidentally go anywhere at night. In the meantime, I'm giving myself scoliosis of the spine, crunched hips, and arms that randomly go on strike or try to pop out of their sockets.

On that note, I'm going to go review "No Cry Sleep Solution" and remind myself that she will be in her own bed, and eventually in her own room soon enough. In the meantime, I will enjoy my very attached, somewhat hippie-style baby. She won't be a baby for much longer!

She's a Contendah

2008-04-22T20:39:00.006-04:00

My little bambina is a total ruffian in her quickly mastered mobility. She moves very quickly now, and climbs anything just for a chance to stand. When she's not playing with the "No-no's," (the cable outlets for who-knows-what, but we're the proud owners of a wall full of them) she's trying to reconstruct my face.

Today we went on a trip to Lowe's for Mr. Clarateaches, to return what looked like the arms of a robot. On the way into the store, we passed the garden center, which deposited a snoot-full of pollen my way, causing my eyes to well with tears. Just before we entered, Gianna Ali reared back her very hard head and smashed my lower lip into my teeth. The combined effect of a quickly swelling lip, teary eyes, and hair that hasn't seen a stylist in a good solid nine months (and is rapidly looking more and more like it is styled by The Polygamy Ranch Salon each day) was one hell of a doozy to the Customer Service people inside. They rapidly ushered through my return of the robot arms, and gladly accepted my reason for return as "entirely too wimpy."

We've been teaching her facial parts- eyes, ears, nose, and mouth. Mr. Clarateaches gets a little carried away ("Cheekbones... upper left incisor... frenulum...") but that's fine. My girl's a genius, and she can handle it. Only now Gianna gets the urge to show me that she knows "Eye" in the middle of a grocery store by poking her little chubby finger all the way into my optic nerve. Or sometimes, after giving the dog a few healthy grabs on the undercoat, she then feels the need to inspect my teeth.

Quite on her own, she's discovered Mommy's freckles. These vex the hell out of her, and whenever she's bored with her toys, she tries to pick them off. I try to dissuade her, as it makes me look like a meth addict. Thank goodness for Mr. Tea Strainer- the tea strainer that came on the top of a Tazo Chai canister- it's her favorite toy!

Onward and ever upward, we teach, "nicely..."

Blurb

2008-04-10T09:00:00.002-04:00

"Nnndah!" Little hazel eyes narrow, and a chubby little finger points down at Lola, the Dogasus supreme. "NDAH!" Lola obediently sits. Triumphant, Bambina kicks her feet from her hip-side perch and screeches like a monkey, which causes the dog to leap to her feet and bark.

Dog and baby have been diligently training one another of late, and they've got their own unique patois working. It's amusing to watch for now, even though I realize that eventually, the duo will pull off capers that I can't even begin to imagine.

Lola was an only child for just ten months when Gianna arrived, and while she probably doesn't remember the pre-baby days, I do sometimes feel sorry for her status as low man on the totem pole. Only sometimes. Then she will be the Tom Green of dogs and nose the business end of a diaper that I hadn't had a chance to rinse off, or do a celebratory Snoopy dance over bird droppings on her brick walkway, and the sorriness vanishes.

Gustatory Fun and Games

2008-03-28T14:49:00.003-04:00

I originally thought that the fact that Gianna is now regularly using a precise and swift pincer grasp to pick up single dog hairs, lint, and the smallest particles known to mankind (anyone? Anyone?) that she would be ready for picking up food and putting it into her mouth. Nursing is obviously no sweat for her, and eating from the spoon of pureed organic goodness that I shove her way is also fairly effortless.

Whole food experiment #1- banana. She likes it as a puree, so she'll perhaps like it as a whole piece of food. While visiting NY, her aunt broke off a piece from her banana, and handed it to her. While Gianna did get the banana to her mouth several times, her aunt likes to eat bananas just as they flip from green to yellow, and so I think the taste was a little too tart. Who knows- I think all bananas are gross. Gianna did find that banana chunks grind nicely into my shirt, and used the banana like sidewalk chalk all over the high chair tray and all over me.

Whole food experiment #2- barley teething biscuits. In general, I try to be as difficult and contrary as possible when it comes to my child. Or so they think. Dear, dear world: my use of cloth diapers and rejection of even the images of bottles has nothing to do with you. Not one thing. So soothe those bruised little emotions, and find something real to be enraged over. In the process of letting my little co-lactivist taste new foods, I had been buying real fruits and veggies and steaming and blending them on my own. This cuts out the Gerber middleman, and I don't have to fear a disgruntled factory worker putting rats or band aids into the grinder. However, I saw a box of teething biscuits, and thought we'd give them a try. Gianna banged it on the high chair and blew on it and looked at me with wide, questioning eyes as if to say, "This isn't the dog's hairbrush. It's also not a zip drive- how am I supposed to want to put it into my mouth?" The biscuit ended up going over the edge of the tray into the dog's eager jaws.

I'm not sure yet what I will try for WFE #3, but it will have to be disguised as a freshly plucked dog whisker for it to even get close to her mouth. Maybe I'll even place the food onto the dog.

Five For Fighting

2008-03-25T15:34:00.002-04:00

... is donating money towards autism research and early intervention funding every time THIS VIDEO is viewed. Feel like 4 minutes of autism activism? It's as easy as clicking a button.

Fragile Lives, Shattered Dreams

2008-03-18T10:44:00.002-04:00

What are we made of? What makes one child grow up to be reasonably functioning, and self-sufficient, and what makes another grow up to be a complete wreck?

By some fortuitous chance (or provincial chance, if you must) each and every teaching job I have had, save some subbing in an upscale high school, has been with kids that we can call "At Risk." "High Risk," even. These are kids who live in poverty and have lived the lives that little punk ghetto wannabes in suburbia think that they wish they were doing. Some of these kids would, in the same breath, tell me about how their cousin "got jacked up, with a knife, and Mrs. Clarateaches, the cops came," and then go on to tell me about their favorite show on the Disney channel. (Rochester, NY- during student teaching). Somehow, these sprouts would come bouncing into my room ready to play, even if they had spent more than two hours that morning kneeling on a concrete floor of their basement as a punishment for God-knows-what (south of Chicago, 2005).

Some of the kids fared worse. My selectively mute Angel-Girl from the Chicago area school faced countless issues, and simply decided to rarely speak. The world could do whatever it wanted to, but it couldn't make her speak unless she absolutely wanted to.

So, you do what you're trained to do, make the reports to the school nurse, social worker, DCFS, and carry on with your day. Have a panic attack on the way home from school and wonder what the hell you are doing in a place that is showing you just how hard it had to have been for your own teachers to make calls about your own fractured life, so many years ago. Then go back and do it all over again. The story ends happily, right? The magical wonderful ways of the Teacher sweep in and save the day, DCFS does their job, and the credits roll. It's all over- right? RIGHT?

Gobs of books and movies have been made about teachers and students and rotten home lives and how just a little hope and encouragement can boost students out of a bad situation. Everyone passes the test, wins the game, goes on to "Just Say No," and the screen fades to black. The collective public sighs a huge sigh of relief, and thanks their lucky stars that all is well. What happens next, though?

External resiliency factors are not to be taken lightly, of course. Supportive adults, community, religious organizations- these are all important in the lives of high risk children. What about the internal resiliency, though? What makes two kids in the same neighborhood, under the same single-mother-working-two-jobs, abusive-rotating-door-of-boyfriends, drugs-and-crime-everywhere circumstances grow up to have two completely different lives? What about the kids in suburbia with the facade going on- two parents, middle-class income, and unspeakable crimes going on behind closed doors- where do they end up? Especially when they are in the same classroom, have the same external resiliency factors, and are given the same opportunities?

The collective society has handed down such a twisted, convaluted message. On one hand, victims have an excuse to perpetuate the cycle of violence in their own lives, because after all, they had horrible things happen to them; and on the other hand, don't ever talk about these things happening. It's just too sad, gross, and terrible, and no one can do anything about it anyways, so can we just change the subject? Please? You can be as disturbed as you want to be, but it's okay, because you're on the Springer show, and it's fun to laugh and be scandalized. Don't worry, we'll add to the insurance kitty; go ahead and take all kinds of drugs. You are the victim, after all. It's easy to cluck our tongues and shake our heads in sorrow when we hear of children on the news suffering acts of crime that would bring an adult to their knees, but then what?

I hold my own baby girl and rock and nurse her to sleep for her nap. In her warm clothes, in her warm house. While I watch her fall asleep, I continue to be haunted by the ghosts of former students. What is my Angel Child doing now, two years later? Is her abusive step-father still in her life? What about my other ones- what are they thinking of when they fall asleep at night? Dear God, did I do enough for them, or did I do enough for me to just get through my day?

Tick...Tock...Tick...

2008-03-13T13:13:00.002-04:00

From the moment one becomes pregnant, there are hills to climb. Some of these hills, like finding pants that fit, are pretty easy. Some are straight-up in the air and appear endless, like weeks of prodromal labor that turn into real labor that also lasts forever. Then, ahh. The baby is born, and life continues...

...to be hilly. When the baby arrives, all kinds of hills pop up, and some are full of raging creeks of breastfeeding issues and bracket-y thorn-patches of vaccination decisions, and the occasional student nurse that tries to rip out your Foley catheter without completely deflating the balloon.

It's a sleepless life. For mama and baby. Especially during those times when the baby is going through some sort of developmental leap. Gianna is on the very brink of crawling, and her brain is working so hard, her sleep has taken a giant step backwards. So has mine. I try to think of things in terms of primal necessity- how did this benefit Cave Clara, and Cave Gianna? Perhaps a more awake baby and more awake mama meant that Cave Gianna couldn't all of a sudden put the pieces together and learn to crawl right out of the cave in the middle of the night and hop a mountain lion and disappear into the night.

Outside of cave life, it makes for some interesting days and nights. I swear I saw Yoko Ono drive past me in a Jeep Rubicon today. It's hard to say, though, because I have mentally devolved to somewhere around a mollusk, and have myself a ripping case of aphasia. I tried to have a phone conversation today with my sister about Turbo Tax, and described it as "starry" instead of "easy." At the butcher today, I also accidentally ordered a salmon fillet in the voice I use when talking to Gianna. Which isn't baby-talk, by the way, just higher pitched and super-enunciated. I'm sure I sounded super starry.

I need to just keep putting my feet in front of me. I'm sure sixteen years from now, she will be giving me a whole new level of sleepless nights, so I better savor this while I can. Now to go figure out where the heck I am... this house is kinda nice...

CT Lite

2008-03-03T09:46:00.003-05:00

Okay, I've been pushing my agenda quite a bit in recent posts. Time for some fun!

I have some valuable advice that I hope each and every reader takes to heart. Ready?

Never, ever, EVER feed the dog leftover pureed peas. Pureed pees are excellent for the baby, but cause the dog to release toxic, pepper-spray style fumes. Repeatedly. And audibly.

In baby news, Gianna has learned to clap her hands and say, "Ayayayaye!" I don't believe in praising children for every single move they make, but it's too adorable not to join in when she flops herself back to a seated position after some push-ups and claps and grins and says, "Ayayayayaye!" In the march towards mobility, she's been training herself with the determination of a Navy Seal. Her favorite exercise is to use her hands to creep the upper part of her body forward over her legs, and try to flip her feet and legs behind her. I tried it myself, and it's pretty killer. She does this for long stretches of time, and sometimes is successful in scooting a leg or two out from underneath her. This, startling her, causes the whole operation to come to a halt, and Mom has to save the day.

The Brilliant Dogasus has some kind of weird masochism going on. She knows that the baby is working on her pincer grasp, and loves to carefully and precisely pinch small objects between her fingers and yank on them with shocking strength. Yet, she sits very close to the baby, and places her whiskers tantalizingly on the baby's leg, and then rolls her eyes back towards me, and looks pathetic.

"If you don't like it, move," I tell Dogasus. I plant myself beside them, ready to intervene.

"But, I want to smell her," replies the dog. *Snifffff* "She's pulling my whiskers! Tell her 'No!' and put her in a crate." I move Gianna's hand.

Gianna, hand poised for another attack, stares in wide-eyed fascination at the dog, who is missing her chance to move her dang bod. I put my hand over Gianna's, and nudge the dog. "MOVE!"

Sigh. Finally, the dog very slowly inches away from the painful pleasure of the baby pulling out her whiskers and fur, and settles at a safe distance. Only to repeat the same process in about an hour.

Today is a mind-blowing 40 degrees Fahrenheit, so the plan is to go to the fabric store for the makings of Gianna's Spring/Summer wardrobe. I ordered (and quickly received) a cute Finnish sewing magazine with some great patterns, and now I can only pray that I can get enough time to actually do the projects. I think that if I take advantage of naps and Mr. Clarateaches, this may happen!

KnowledgeEducationIntelligenceWorth

2008-02-27T11:36:00.000-05:00

Disclaimer #1- I writes what I thinks. I am formally trained as a teacher, a labor doula, and whatever you want to call someone who on a daily basis springs out of bed, attaches a cape, and spends the next 18 wakeful hours lactating/ cleaning/ changing diapers/ tormenting the dog/ fielding the press/ budgeting/ cooking/ summoning Captain Planet/ singing invented songs to the baby and dog/ and trying to boss other people around. Mainly my siblings. Who now ignore me. Where was I going with this? Oh yeah- do not quote me for any sort of term papers or medical journals- I do not have a $30,000 piece of paper that says I can officially philosophize. I do, however, have a $30,000 piece of paper that says I can give standardized tests to children, but will be sued to within an inch of my life if I give them a hug.

Disclaimer #2- While I no longer have the energy driven by the radio discussion from the previous morning, I do have the energy produced by the contempt I feel after watching A&E last night on mute with closed captioning- primarily to have a little light to see what I was doing to feed Bambina. A&E was airing some sort of show that follows around meter maids. Are they called meter maids? Meter officers? At any rate, this show and this show alone makes me weep and wail and gnash my teeth and cover my body with ashes. I live in utter fear now, knowing these yahoos are driving about.

Disclaimer #3- I may ramble. Bambina-lina is asleep, but I still need to rush, as she may wake up at any moment.

Where, oh where, oh where can I continue this line of thought? I'm not going to touch the industry issues surrounding production and importation and the arrogance in presuming that the USA can actually (snort) be the leader (Oh lordy, can I even say it) of the (chuckle) "knowledge industry." When the Math Regents passing grade in NY State is 55%... nope. Not going to go there. None of us have the time.

Farming? Nah. Another day, I will rant about genetic engineering (and as a Biology minor who actually did take classes involving this, I am slightly more prepared) and we can all talk about the issues involving the many many MANY problems with the quality of our food, the quantity of fake food that is killing so many, and the pharm industry and kookalooka crapazoid surrounding the hilariousness that is ethanol.

I think I will take this in a slightly more personal direction, and loop off of the "Almanzo" dilemma. What do we do with him? Even more importantly- it is significant that Almanzo is a "him." Males are having an outstandingly difficult time in this current era of college education. This is not just me spouting off- this is something that all corners of the educational world are finally admitting to. While we've greatly enhanced the learning opportunities for girls, we've gone right ahead and committed the crime of "robbing Peter to pay Paul" in the sense that we've had a deleterious effect on boys instead of merely enhancing the girls. As such, we have a nation chock-full of very confused young men. Now, not all young men are confused- some are successful, and feel that they've found their place and are fitting quite well. The amount of young men who finish high school and suddenly feel as though they've fallen through a trap-door into some kind of limbo where they have no place is staggering. Where my grandfather and his peers could easily leave high school and find employment in line work that would feed and clothe and house their families, their grandchildren are finding themselves at a stand-still.

Let's look at some high school graduates. Let's sort these high school grads into four categories:
Cat A- Are "college material," desire a college education, and understand their strengths and interests;
Cat B- Are "college material," do not necessarily desire a college education, and understand their strengths;
Cat C- Are not "college material," do, however, desire a college education, understand their interests and strengths;
Cat D- Are not "college material," do not desire a college education, and still understand their strengths and interests.

Cat. A is all set. They fit the criteria for entering college, and make it happen. Go them.

Cat. C is also all set. While they do not fit the criteria for entering college, they can still use their money or find the federal or state or private funding to get them there. At college, they will find something that interests them enough to limp along until graduation. After which, it will not matter- they have the degree, and can join the rest of the mooing crowd into the workforce.

Almanzo, from my sixth grade class, is Cat. B. He can certainly get into college with his grades. He will almost certainly be heavily encouraged by his school to apply for grants and loans and college applications, as college is the Thing To Do, whether he likes it or not.

As for Cat. D- we'll call this individual "Boog," after someone who was in my graduating class. This unfortunately-monikered boy was somehow still enrolled in high school when I was hired, two years into my bachelor's degree, to substitute teach at my old high school. Talk about awkward. At the time of my subbing, he was about to be aged out of the high school program anyway. He just did not have the grades, nor the desire for the grades or any other post-secondary education.

Almanzo and Boog. Boog and Almanzo. What do we do with you two? How can you enter adulthood successfully and perhaps enjoy a family as well? Importantly- who defines what "success" looks like?

Probably, if they both work hard, they can manage. It will be without the accoutrements, for sure- Buffalo Bills tickets will not be just a credit card swipe away, unless they want to spend the rest of their lives buried in debt (which a great proportion will end up doing, if you believe the money reports). Their spouses will probably have to work, whether they want to or not. Where do they fit along this "knowledge industry," though? How will the rest of the world view them- and how will they be trained to view themselves?

When we, as teachers, support the mindset that college is THE means to an end, rather than one way we can achieve our goals, where does that send the non-college crowd? When we make college abundantly accessible- what does this do for the people who do desire an ongoing education? What happens when lecture halls are filled with a mix of people who want to be there, and people who don't feel they have a choice? As our country increasingly mixes and mingles with the rest of the globe, what does this sort of graduating class do for us?

Scio

2008-02-25T11:11:00.000-05:00

"...cogito, ergo sum" Descartes

This morning, I listened to a local talk radio show. The host was describing a new incentive for Michiganders to do something with themselves. A grant is available to attract talent and something "greater" to the area. During his discussion with his guest, they both referenced something called the "knowledge industry," and how the state and the nation will need to start boning up on "knowledge," as that is where we will be headed. No more will we be involved with production technology, and forget any kind of hands-on trade.

My mind traveled back through time to another lifetime ago, to when I was a wide-awake student teacher. I had a 6th grade assignment at a rural, Western NY wine country middle school as a math and science teacher. It was one heck of a jam-packed ten weeks with those kids.

We'll call the protagonist of my memory "Almanzo." Almanzo was a typical farmer's boy. He woke up in the morning, helped his parents and siblings on their farm, and then after a solid three or more hours of hard work, boarded the bus and headed to school. He worked and played with his friends, was polite to his teachers, and then headed home for more chores, homework, and whatever else 12 year old boys like to do. This was a fairly intelligent kid, although his grades were less than wonderful. He sort of blended into the background of the other 80 or so students who were temporarily in my charge.

Until the day we looked at triangulation. My lessons were NOT boring, but hands-on, minds-on innovations. In fact, I had the extreme pleasure of assisting two other sixth grade science teachers in the district in revising the quarterly science exam. I did messy, loud, and dramatic labs- we shook various gradations of rocks in a tall glass vase and watched the sediment fall, we built bridges and put them to a torture test, we fingerprinted one another to find out who "kidnapped" their regular teacher. I was inspiring them left and right, boom-boom-boom. My class was going to result in a wave of rural kids entering college in six years, and they all would rock.

An ongoing theme in my lessons was always "Ask why." I would tell them that textbooks were written and edited by grad students, and sometimes, information was stuck in just to make a book. Find out why, question, and verify sources. One day, they did just that. As I talked about triangulation, a student asked, " What is this good for? Why do we need to know this?" My answer, lost to the dredges of forgettable answers, included college. Almanzo raised his hand. "I don't want to go to college. I just want to stay here and farm. I like farming, and I'm good at it."

He stared at me, and I instantly thought of all he would miss- standing in line with a bunch of other people for warm beer pumped from a keg, eating his body weight in Top Ramen, hook-ups, break-ups, and all of the other things that the rank and file do in the name of extending adolescence. I told him to do what he loved, and that no matter what, we lived in a country where you could do what you wanted with your life. I did not tell him about government farm subsidies, the importation of foreign grains and products, and the lock-step all farmers needed to fall into with Monsanto in order to avoid being turned inside-out. I wanted him to do what he loved.

But can one do this? In the past, not everyone graduated high school. College was something that people did if they had the brains and the means. Now, college is practically mandatory if anyone has a prayer of a chance at getting a job that covers a living wage. In a sense, college has morphed into a giant Vocational-Technical institute. I didn't go to college because of a love of learning, or a hope of increasing knowledge. I went so that I could fill out all the appropriate paperwork, and gainfully employ myself out of my own small rural town. Should this be? Should universities be places where teachers, business people, social workers and the like are career-trained? What of Almanzo- do we invent a major, call it "rural studies," fill his days with classes to justify the tuition bill, and send him right back to his farm?

Ask the universities- they will say that everyone MUST HAVE a college education. Ask any Human Resources rep for any of the major companies. They are looking for college-educated individuals (to then hire, and give "Job Readiness" seminars, so that they understand that coming to work on time is not an option but a requirement, and that the prohibition of pajamas in the office is indeed NOT fascism, and so forth). Why? Oh, everyone will start off on the same foot, they will say. It will equalize. Are we not already equal? Will college ascertain this equality? Does that mean we all need to know the same things, and are thus equally certified? My Lockean stars, no. It will open people's minds, broaden their horizons and give different perspectives, they will say. I doubt anyone who has sat through classes and ingested material, which was then regurgitated onto a Scan-Tron sheet feels like they've gained any other perspective beyond that of a sponge. Those who have worked in a variety of venues, or have traveled, on the other hand, have fairly been able to see beyond their own vantage point.

The way must lie somewhere in the "via media" in a way that most recognizes and allows for personal choices and liberties. To educate without knowledge will perpetuate the current "overfed and undernourished" syndrome that pervades the country. Universities will discharge even more young men and women who suffer from a sort of Peter Pan syndrome that tells them that because they are educated, they deserve toys and giant HD TV's and Manolo Blahniks and daily fluffy lattes, and none of the responsibilities. When real life doesn't go according to their plans, and bosses get pissy when they call in sick over a hangover, or when credit card companies must have their payments for all of the fun, matching furniture in their pimped-out crib, they feel fully entitled to whine and cry and pop some fully-insured Valium to deal with the fact that everyone is out to get them.

To be continued...

Bacillus Aroundus

2008-02-08T10:56:00.000-05:00

Ah, germs. Back when I was teaching, I did several lessons on handwashing, germs, sickness, and anything else that could possibly induce compulsive handwashing in small children. You would too, if approximately 70% of your audience at any given time had their fingers in their noses. I heart kindergartners. I need to open my own academy.

Fast forward to the present. It's about zero degrees, and I despise the delicate balance of feeding, changing, bundling, and re-changing the baby just to get out and go somewhere, so the only time we actually escape is to retrieve food, and observe Michiganders in their natural habitat. Mr. Clarateaches is really the only one bringing foreign germs into the home.

Now, Mr. Clarateaches is an engineer, so it's not like he even interacts with a lot of people to begin with. As I've explained before, the brain fog rolls in and my eyes glaze over if he ever tries to explain what exactly he does, but the magical world of make-believe fills in the blanks. I imagine a large, cubicle-filled building with shiny corridors. And people in lab coats, standing and joking around a water cooler, telling the one about "101111001, 1010111, 10001101!" And all the rest of the engineers laughing adenoidally. Perhaps some taped-together glasses are involved. Oh, and whiteboards are everywhere, with lots of equations on them. And once in a while, one of the engineers will put dots in the middle of a couple of zeros to be hilarious, and the adenoidal laughter continues. They are a jokey bunch, these engineers. Nothing's more hilarious than a pair of boobs. Or, what they imagine boobs to look like.

So, someone with a child must have had a social interaction with my husband, because he came home with some sort of illness. It wasn't a very nice one, and during the evening, I decided to go to the store for some meds. Mr. Clarateaches is more apt to reach for the meds, instead of traveling my route of what he perceives as burning sage and chanting. After digging out my car, and packing up the perturbed baby, we headed into the night. I must not have purchased medicine in a while, because I had no idea that you get carded for Nyquil now. I can see suspicion involved if someone tries to buy a case at a time, but I am dying to know how I can MacGyver some meth out of a single bottle of Nyquil, some oranges, and the chocolate that was going to be the manna to get me through the night. I'm pretty sure I looked suspicious, too- wild hair, wearing a hands-y baby that was trying to give me a hickey, and a pair of jeans that had seen many infant excretions that day. Which had been lovingly licked by Lola, the Tom Green of dogs.

Fortunately, I was in the Express, Self-Service line that was manned by a truly pissed off teenage girl. When the screen flashed "Show Associate ID," she was able to simultaneously approve the transaction, signal to me that it was okay to proceed (by flashing me the middle finger), and continue to dream about how she was SO leaving this place, as soon as she could save enough money.

Wash your hands. Every germy, slimy one of ya. Stay AWAY from that so-called "Anti-bacterial" hand gel, hot soapy water is so much better than rubbing "hand sanitizer" on.

Land of Confusion

2008-02-01T10:52:00.000-05:00

Well, that title's just downright poetic.

I received my answer from the Nebraska Judicial Qualifications Board. According to them, after reviewing my complaint filed against Judge Elizabeth Crnkovich, they have decided that all is totally fine, and nothing will be done in response to my letter. Now, as for how things are going for the whole Anaya family and their due process, I can only hope that her lawyer and possibly the ACLU stick with this and justice is done.

In case you are unfamiliar, read http://clarateaches.blogspot.com/2007/11/this-is-what-nightmares-are-made-of.html and consider yourself informed.

I can take a small amount of solace in the knowledge that I added my voice to those protesting the baby steps towards the government completely controlling our children.

Now, who wants to be cynical with me and imagine what really happened when my letter and others like it came pouring in? A form letter was typed, my name and address were programmed into one of the copies, and my letter was simply filed in the cylindrical, under-the-desk, used tissue holder.

At any rate, there we are, and here we are. This is the world we live in, and the hands we're given. So instead of laughing over the irony of the fact that Judge Crnkovich's name quite readily rhymes with a name that is fun to call mean people, I'm going to go sniff my sleeping baby's head. I'm going to switch the laundry around, make some pizza dough, clean the bathroom, and otherwise enjoy the rise and gradual fall of a daily victory. I'm going to strap on my Mom-bat boots and prepare myself for the inevitable battle that will come from any of the parenting choices I make that run contrary to things that arbitrarily (and monetarily) benefit the government. If you are a person who happens to enjoy the fact that you can choose if and how long you breastfeed your child, if and when you will vaccinate, what location you birth in and how many, if any meds you will have, I suggest you do the same. Your choices and mine could be entirely different- but that we have this choice is CRUCIAL.

One last pitch- if you're in the Lansing area, head over to the MSU campus from 7-9 PM on Sat the 23 and Sun the 24th at 3-6 PM for a screening of The Business of Being Born. If you're not in the Lansing area, take a look at your community events calendar to see if this is coming to your area any time soon.

Also, I have hidden two patches of lyrics in this entry, from two entirely different songs. One is easy, one is maniacally hard. If you can see the easy one, give yourself a pat on the back. If you can locate the maniacally hard one, and tell me where it's from and who sings it, you are a superhuman, and you totally rock.

Wild Child

2008-01-23T12:51:00.000-05:00

Dear World (in particular, Michigan),

I know my child is the very cutest baby on the planet. I created her myself. However, babies that are not yours do NOT want you to touch them. I cannot stress this enough. Especially on their hands, which spend about 80% of the day in their mouth. One of these days, I will install Wolverine's claws, or maybe Edward's scissorhands onto my own, and then you will be sorry. But in the meantime, AND ESPECIALLY when I'm wearing her in the Moby, and touching her requires you getting within micrometers of my chest, paws off.

Ever so lovingly,

Clara

Unless I was related to them, or caring for them in some capacity, I never really had the urge to touch someone else's child. Admire them, yes. Grab their little paws, no. Somebody dare me to give the next old coot a noogie on his bald pate the next time he grabs my child by the hand and shakes it vigorously. Or grab a handful of middle-aged lady butt and squish it like Play Doh the next time she wanders over and sticks both hands in the Moby (AKA, direct vicinity of my chest) in order to manhandle the baby. C'mon, dare me. I need that little whisper that says, "Go ahead, Mr. Clarateaches will never know how crazy you are acting in public."

I mean, I guess I do care what Mr. Clarateaches thinks of me. Especially since he's the only other person on the planet that I know of besides myself who, way back in the 80's, watched an obscure cartoon called Cops: For Kids.

(Pause while I retrieve the baby, who was just woken up by the diabolical dog. Don't worry, I retaliated by singing "Sunny Days" in an off-key fashion into her Lab ears.)

New in the land of babies: My little girl is sitting up! This opens up a whole new perspective in her world. She has an ongoing list of things she must explore when all the gears finally kick into place and mobility occurs. This includes, but is not limited to:

1) Taste test Dogasus' food
2) Obliterate contents of shelves under TV
3) Conquer the stairs
4) Organize the craft table

So, add "baby-proof the house" to my haus frau list. This might actually be quite a challenge, as Gianna seems to already be showing signs of "The Knack." Mr. Clarateaches has "The Knack," which is why he is an engineer and doesn't flinch when it comes to things like tearing my old car completely apart. Or Linux. Indeed, while the babies of some of my peers are busy playing with actual toys, Gianna wants (and tries) to pry off the lid to the water purifier. She chirps and kicks her feet when she sees the water heater and well tank, which means she wants a closer look. She spent a huge amount of time on a trip to NY eschewing toys to stare at the warning label of her car seat, which contained diagrams. Untying and un-threading laces to booties, attempting to remove the covers to batteries, and operating handles and levers at every opportunity complete the list of fun and games. Time to focus the donations to RIT with legacy in mind.

Gianna Bright and her Mighty Dogasus

2008-01-09T19:02:00.000-05:00

Day 1- "Lola, meet the baby." Lola, the doggess, looks mightily interested, baby sleeps. Lola tries to eat the stupid, dinky hat that the Hospital from Hell magnanimously gives away.

Month 1- Baby tries to track Lola, who moves too fast. Lola attacks a stuffed bunny.

Month 2- Lola discovers that Baby is a magical source of regurgitated breastmilk. Lola instantly grows wings and is a Dogasus, an intelligent, winged, breastfed dog. The Neighborhood Dog Choir is instantly smitten by her blindingly shiny fur. Baby still gives nary a crap.

Month 6- Here we go...

Gianna has discovered the dog, and is now full of love for this licky, furry critter. She jabbers to the dog in a high-pitched screech, and Lola walks around on high auditory alert now- ears pulled all the way back. It makes her cheekbones look awesome, and that combined with her super shine is just too much. Dang dog. She shows her love for the baby by licking her feet, while the baby buries her hands in Lola's bouncin' and behavin' fur. This is truly the beginning of a force to be reckoned with.

The Things We Do For Love

2007-12-20T11:45:00.000-05:00

Five months, two days out. And some days, the Cesarean section is still firmly on my mind.

I think there are a few different types of people out there. To some, having a C-section is sort of like getting a cavity filled. No huge deal, it's done every day, blah blah blah. To others, of course a vaginal birth is ideal, but good old technology is always there to lend a helpful hand, so get over it. As always, there remains that ever-present refrain:

"At least you have a healthy baby."

Of course I do. I grew her myself. I prepped my body for one whole year pre-conception. I ate organic produce and milk, took prenatals, ran and did Pilate's. I read, did research, and listened to my instincts. During pregnancy, I ate organically, took prenatals, did Pre-natal Yoga, did research, and listened to my body. The big difference is- we did not choose a hospital birth. Not for us, and sure as hell not for our baby. Not at first. A huge difference in our eventual C-section was that it wasn't programmed out by doctors, our labor wasn't on the clock, and together, in the dark bathroom of the green room at the birth center, Mr. Clarateaches and I both made the gut-wrenching decision to choose something we absolutely did not want, in order to make sure that tiny, wrinkly little girl was okay.

One persistently asynclintic head later, one ambulance ride later, one hoarse command-fest to the entire OR staff later... my abdominal skin, muscles, peritoneal cavity, and uterus were sliced open and my little girl was pulled out of me. My incredible surgeon, God forever bless her, took a lot of time stitching everything separately so that a VBAC is a huge probability in the future. I think she realized, as I was shouting (in my laryngitis voice) at the surgeons, anesthesiologist, nurses and techs all of my "Do Not Consents," that even though I was a first time mom, I had clearly done some research. She saw my heartache, and she was what she is supposed to be- a doctor. Not a medical business practitioner, she was a true, good old fashioned service provider. She did no harm.

Laying on the OR table, with my arms stretched out to my sides (and blissfully, not tied down), in my darkest moments, I tried to imagine what Mr. Clarateaches was going to do by himself with a baby. Surely I was dying- this had to be the way dying feels. It feels like your world is upside down and everything you worked so hard for was shaken and blended and poured onto the ground and stomped on. As the doctors worked, I mentally wrote my will.

Then, she was there.

With my nose. And my forehead. And my cleft chin. What an odd thing for a girl to have. There was the bump on the side of her head where she originally crowned, so many hours ago, when I left the birth center. Death vanished. I had a job to do. Even though I had made this choice for her, I still remained firm and unmoving about everything else we had decided: no over the top meds for me, we were breastfeeding and she was not leaving our room without one of us, and no one was injecting her with a single, solitary substance. Each and every shift of nurses made sure to mention to me that they don't give out medals to C-section recovering moms who only take Tylenol 3 and breastfeed their baby over the layers of incisions. They had obviously never failed their child on her first birth-day before.

The next several weeks were not pretty. Baby Blues is a song about eye color, not the name of what I went through- not even close. They need to rename it- maybe call it Dark Time. Nothing Time.

Five months out, though, I can safely say I'm fine. I'm good. In fact, some days I feel great. The new me actually believes in her body again. Most importantly, I look at the way Mr. Clarateaches and I are forming our family, and feel blessed. I'll always mourn my C-section. That has nothing to do with my little Gianna, though. The best part is that the C-section gets further and further behind me every day, while my girl grows and thrives.

These Dreams Go on When I Close My Eyes

2007-12-17T15:21:00.000-05:00

4:06 Am. Darkness. And then, from somewhere to my left...

"Tsssst. Thhhhhht. Tsssth." Rustle, rustle. "Ah Da? Ah dadadadat." Then, in Batman fashion, KABAM! White fireworks as a little fist punches the air, seeking an audience, and landing precisely on my eyeball.

Sigh. All it took was one early morning of thunder, lightening, snow plows, and snow to totally convince the Little Nipper that we all wake up at 4 now. There was little more to do than lay quietly, and hope she'd soon go to sleep. I was also able to ruminate on the fun of sleeplessness. I don't know how mothers who work outside of the home do it, other than they must trade off with their spouse and probably not breastfeed all night. (Ha- you thought I'd get through a post without breasts. In a Chris Griffin voice I say to you, "Boobies!") For those single, working, nursing moms, I totally bow down and kiss your feet.

This isn't college anymore- sleepless nights don't mean I get to down a Red Bull the next day and wander about, all wide-awake and with a cute belly showing anymore. Or, that one memorable Biology exam that I stayed awake all night studying for, drinking an entire six-pack of one liter Mountain Dews, to have the professor come up to me mid-exam very concerned that I hadn't blinked in the previous 45 minutes. Sigh. Nope, these are the days where I have to plan my caffeine carefully, as it zips like lightening to the child, who is more than willing to then spend the day all wide-awake, and with a cute belly showing.

Sleepless, but the day must go on. Go on, it does, and usually consists of more than one occasion of staring at the calendar, wondering which day it is. Or, standing in the kitchen for ten minutes, searching high and low for the lid to a raisin canister, to find it in the other hand when I reach the point of despair and try to fashion a new one from plastic wrap. Very often, the day ends with the baby finally going to sleep as I sit in my dark bedroom, Mr. Clarateaches sleeping blissfully unaware that the most hilarious local news at 11 is happening on the muted, closed-captioned TV. Hilarious laughter is very hard to do without waking up a baby.

Fortune smiled on me- by 5:20, my little babbling bambina fell back to sleep and I was able to catch 25 more minutes of sleep before Mr. Clarateaches' alarm clock went off. Time for a new day... where the heck am I?

Chomp, Chomp

2007-12-15T15:56:00.000-05:00

Let's go backwards in time to the four month well baby visit on Nov 16th:

Me: "I think she's teething. She drools, chews on her hands, and is irritable sometimes."

Physician's Assistant: "Nah... She's too young."

Fast forward to the week after Thanksgiving. What's that, there on the bottom gums? A tooth? No.

Two teeth! There on the lower jaw are two of the sharpest things on the planet. What's better is that she's decided that Christmastime seems like the perfect time to start anew with some more teeth.

We all have our methods for dealing. I like the Hyland's route- it's easy and natural and Gianna likes it a lot better than the teething gel, which burns like a mo-fo (I tried it on my own gums- yeeeowch!) When the times get tough, good old Infant Tylenol does the trick, albeit in a less crunchy (but much more direct) way.

Mr. Clarateaches likes the Jim Beam method. He fills up his shot glass, generously douses the sprout (who LOVES whiskey and happily licks it off her gums- good grief, who knew?) and then shoots the rest down and heads happily to sleep, while I spend the night feeding a slightly buzzed baby.

Gianna has decided that she needs to chew fabric, and will also only suck her thumb after carefully maneuvering her sleeve or a blanket over it. It's like a moth attack, but whatever works.

Alas, this also means she can do some serious damage to me now. She bit me in her sleep a few days ago, and I almost passed out trying not to scream (I didn't want to wake her up, and I'm so sleep deprived, a wildebeest could have torn off a limb and I wouldn't have woken her up). Last night though, she was crabby and potentially sprouting a new tooth (or God help me, new teeth) and she bit me HARD. I screamed like I'd been shot, and the look of anguish on her face broke my heart. We both cried, and then when we pulled ourselves together, we went ahead and put an earring into the little hole she made.

She clearly has no idea that Mommy has feelings of her very own, and won't know this for a while, so I feel bad. We're going with the "stop nursing when it happens, and eventually she'll equate biting=stop nursing immediately" and that'll be the end of it. I've heard some random goofballery about poking or thumping or flicking babies when they bite, but it sounds like a quest for more ways to need to comfort a hurting baby. Or ignore a hurting baby, which is more sad.

Yup, still on this

2007-11-10T14:21:00.001-05:00

I just wanted to post some further information. I belong to a message board for Christian mothers who parent naturally and gently, and Mary Anaya has recently joined. She asked that those who are blogging about this post addresses (including a new one which I will post below, as well as her quote along with it) and most importantly, her request that people PRAY for her and her family, and those who are fighting this situation right now.

Please remember, this has nothing to do with whether you believe the genetic test should be done or not- this has everything to do with armed men coming into an American citizen's home and kidnapping her newborn, over a test that indicates diseases that all together, have a 0.16% chance of happening. That's sixteen hundredths of one percent.

When I was still teaching outside of Chicago, I had one of the roughest, most high-needs classroom in the school. I distinctly recall having to contact DCFS on so many sad situations in my class. Two in particular stand out- both because nothing was done about it. One was when Limited English made allegations against a family member that they "hit (him) with one of those things you hang shirts on," (his words to me) and later Little Cutie Boy, whose 22 year old brother hit him on the face on the way to school, and he came into my classroom with blood from his forehead to his chin. DCFS told me that as neither was life-threatening, they had no time to do anything about it. Yet somehow, a Nebraska Court spent how many tax dollars prosecuting (persecuting?) a family for not allowing their son's heel to be cut and his blood spread on dots on an index card.

Here's the DCA's address:
Nicole Goaley
Deputy County Attorney
Juvenile Division
ngoaley@co.douglas.ne.us
(I imagine she can be reached at the same Supreme Court address as posted in the last post).

From Mary- "She is the one who made the decision to seize custody and refused to dismiss the case until the test results came back. None of the previous county attorneys prosecuted us and she had the power to dismiss the case from the beginning. She had indicated initially to our lawyer that she was powerless to dismiss the case until after the hearing before the judge. However, we later learned that was not true. Even though our lawyer asked her to move the case out of juvenile to district court like it stated in the statute, she refused. That meant our lawyer could not present legal arguments and Joel was held as a hostage. "

Please write. Please write, and if not a NE citizen, at least write and explain that the nation is watching, and this is unacceptable. If for whatever reason you cannot write (and if I can type a letter one handed while nursing and burping my baby, who is scratching me and gnawing on my shoulder, well...) please pray.

Regarding previous blog

2007-11-08T15:34:00.000-05:00

For everyone who wants to get off their rears and take some action (with letters; let's not get dramatic), here are important addresses:

Judge Elizabeth Crnkovich
Suite 600
Hall of Justice1701
Farnam Street
Omaha NE 68183

And here are her superiors. Hathor, the lovely "cowgoddess" (bear with me here) has suggested writing to them, and copying the letter to the dishonorable Judge Crnkovich as well.

Nebraska Judicial Council
Administrative Office of the Courts
1445 K Street1213 State Capitol
P. O. Box 98910
Lincoln, NE 68509-8910
Phone: 402-471-3730
Fax: 402-471-2197

Commission on Judicial Qualifications
ATTN: Secretary
Nebraska Supreme Court
PO Box 98910
Lincoln, Nebraska 68509
Please mail in an envelope marked CONFIDENTIAL

If you have any kinds of feelings of outrage about this, particularly that the judge ordered the baby out of the courthouse, when it was crying to be fed by his mother, and demanded that the distraught mother continue her testimony, write a letter. It takes very little time, a stamp, and will hopefully, en masse, have an effect. Let's get this sorry excuse for a judge disbarred!

This is what nightmares are made of...

2007-11-06T14:00:00.001-05:00

Seriously, chilling to my core. Brief synopsis: a couple birthed their ninth child in the state of Nebraska, which has a rigid rule regarding blood testing of newborns for rare genetic diseases. This couple declined the test, and their five week old was forcibly removed from his nursing mother to foster care for 5 and a half days. The social workers were ordered to give the baby formula.

Get this: if for some reason this small baby did have one of the diseases (PKU) that the test was looking for, formula would have killed him.

The social workers and foster mother, fortunately, took pity on mom and baby (hey how about that, the system actually worked in that respect) and called the mother every few hours to come and feed her son on the sly, as the visits were technically unauthorized.

Here is a link to the blog of this family's attorney, and the segment that appeared on Rush Limbaugh.

http://www.nebraskainjurylawreport.com/category/constitutional-rights/

Here are a few links to the people who can make the change that NEEDS to be made, for the sake of babies and families in this state (directly taken from a message board that the mother posted to:)

"For 2 legislative sessions, State Senator Synowiecki has proposed exemption legislation. The 2nd time we had high hopes. We had more people testifying in favor of the bill than against, signed testimonies of the trauma the screening had caused other parents, and a petition signed by over 100 people. There were only a couple of testimonies from the state against the bill. However, it was killed in the health and human services committee and never made it to the floor for a vote. Here are e-mails for the committee:"

perdman@leg.ne.gov;
jjohnson@leg.ne.gov;
astuthman@leg.ne.gov;
tgay@leg.ne.gov;
dpankonin@leg.ne.gov;
ghoward@leg.ne.gov;
thansen@leg.ne.gov;

Think of the choices you make every day, not even necessarily parenting choices. What if, one day, one of those choices turns into this type of nightmare for your family?

When we had G in a hospital in Lansing, we were harassed every day of our five day stay over our decision to forgo the antibacterial eye drops, the Vitamin K injection, and the Hepatitis B vaccination. We had nurses, residents, and finally the doctors themselves coming into our room scratching their heads and wondering about our reasoning. We have our reasons- mainly, that there is so little risk of G needing any of the above, that the risks involved with injecting or dripping her with any of it outweigh the benefits. Above all, I AM THE MOTHER, AND I SAID SO. The blood test that is described in Nebraska law is also demanded by MI law, and we did allow this. However, had we decided to decline consent, our rights as parents should be respected.

Please write to these government officials.

One Year Later

2007-11-03T15:05:00.000-04:00

One year ago today, I POAS (To those of you not up on your conception lingo, that means "peed on a stick." Ewww.) and received the happiest sight ever (unless you happen to be the head cheerleader)- a bright pink line! I screamed and yelled and danced with the dog, who to this day wonders why we never do things like that anymore. I tell her that when she quits digging under the compost, we'll talk.

Clever me- I wrote little poems and stuck them all over the house, and had Mr. Clarateaches go on a hunt for clues. He happened to have worked from midnight until 8 AM that morning, deep in the engineering lair, doing something fun with engines, so he was exhausted. But, hunt he did, and when he at last came upon the positive pregnancy test, he turned to me and said in his most romantic voice....

"Does this still have pee on it?"

Babies are fun. Apparently, everyone thinks my baby is public property, which is why I want to carry a firearm. I settle for carrying her in a sling, usually her Moby wrap. This, according to my fellow crunchies, will stop people from using their gross, never-washed-after-the-bathroom, always-in-their-noses, petting-strange-dogs-hands. What it really does is turn us into an elaborate spectacle, as people don't usually see anyone wearing a baby 'round these parts. The name of the game for some people is to be as hands-off with their sprouts as possible, but by God, I wanted this bambina for so long, she gets to be my baby kangaroo.

This will be the post of many run-ons.

Where was I? Oh yeah, the masses of the great unwashed who wish to touch my child. Or, who wish to offer me crackhead parenting advice.

On one occasion, in my favorite little gourmet and produce store, a woman who probably could have been a linebacker beelined right over to me. She did the usual, "Oh, what a cute baby," but then sealed her fate by touching my arm sympathetically and asking me in a hushed tone usually reserved for fatal diseases, "Um, isn't she a little small for her age?" I stared at this lady Leviathan and said, "No, she's pretty normal."

On another, I was in a mega-grocery with La Bambina in her wrap, who had fallen asleep sometime in the coffee aisle. I was at the cashier, trying to watch the teenager scanning my groceries so that she didn't do something silly like chuck four pounds of apples on top of squishy things, or put the five pound bag of potatoes and gallon of cider in the same bag so that it hilariously smashes to the parking lot later (ahem- I'm looking at right at you, cashier of today). A woman was behind me with her teenage daughter who was a "Spoiled Brat" if you believe the glitter on her rear. "Spoiled Brat" blathered into her cell phone to someone about the gala time that they all were going to have tonight when mom and dad drove them to the R rated movie. The mother stared at me and my peacefully sleeping girl (Not a "Spoiled Brat") and said, "That looks uncomfortable."
Ever ready to convert others to babywearing, I started to describe all of the reasons why the Moby was very comfortable, how it distributed the baby's weight to my entire body and held her in the middle. She interrupted me. "No, I mean, the baby's not comfortable in that."

Beg your effing pardon? I looked down at my angel, peacefully sleeping and sucking on her lower lip. She couldn't have been more comfortable. "Hmmm," was my response, and I turned my back to her completely to focus on the credit card reader. In NY, that would be a signal for the woman to mind her own beeswax if she knew what was good for her, but in MI it seems to mean "keep right on talking."

"I always put them right there, right in the cart. Got 'em used to it," she said wistfully, hearkening back to the days of "Spoiled Brat's" youth. "Where's her shoes?"

I looked at G's little socked feet. "No shoes yet," I said. "Her feet are growing too fast to keep up, and besides, she's not walking."

The woman shook her head. "Tsk, tsk. I always put shoes on their feet, got 'em used to it."

Why was I talking to this person? I turned my back again, and waited for the cashier to finish. The woman behind me gave me the once over. "Looks like you got your shape back real quick, huh?" OH MY LORD.

I turned and loudly said, "Yup, she sucked all the pregnancy weight right off me." I almost squirted her in the eye with some breastmilk, but I think that's what Mr. Clarateaches was talking about when he said that sometimes my interactions with strangers go "too far." The woman stared at me, mouth agape for a few beats. The cashier smirked and handed me a receipt. The woman regained herself long enough to say to the cashier (whispering when she talked about the actual breast), "Oh breastfeeding. I breastfed my girls too, you know. Not too long though, got to get 'em used to..." I walked away at that point. No use wasting a good strangle on this hopeless woman.

My little girl- one year ago today, you were the size of a lentil, and making me sick all day long and only able to eat Ramen and lemonade. Today you are busting out of the 3-6 month clothing and making sure I don't accidentally get more than 5 hours of sleep in any 24 hour period. My sweet girl!

Feeding Frenzy

2007-10-15T12:25:00.000-04:00

Growth spurt time! Gianna is eating like, well, Animal. In both quantity, and demeanor- and she has one heck of a nursing blister to show for it! Her favorite method is to roll her eyes back in her head, give a battle cry, latch on like a shark, and flail her arms wildly for the first five minutes or so, grunting like a little pig. Then, as milk-intoxication hits, she relaxes into her food coma and, eyes-closed, uses her little nails to happily scratch me for the remainder of the feeding. It's nothing like the misty, extra goopy photos of mothers calmly nursing their little tame nurselings. These are the Baby X Games. Thank God- I'd otherwise be bored to tears!

More later- let the games begin!

Clara Plans, Dog Laughs

2007-09-29T15:28:00.000-04:00

Quite recently, I found myself home alone for a week and a half while Mr. Clarateaches went on an all-expenses paid trip to Engineer Land to do God-knows-what. He tried to tell me, but the brain fog rolled in.

For the most part we functioned pretty well. Until the day the newly super-charged Lab/Border Collie became a Real Dog. Perhaps it was her new high-protein dog food. At any rate, Lola managed to catch one of the chipmunks that have been darting around. It must have been asleep at the wheel, because Lola can't even catch a squirrel, and the chipmunks are faster than the squirrels. So, she tossed it about, and shook its little lifeless body and pranced back and forth in front of the rest of the Neighborhood Dog Choir. They, of course, seethed with jealousy.

Amused, I promptly forgot all about it until the next evening, when Lola decided that the scent of decomposing chipmunk was too alluring to deny herself any longer. She rolled around happily in it when I sent her outside for what I thought was her last potty break of the night. Seems she didn't think I had quite enough to do. One whiff of her, and I sent her back outside while I worked on Gianna's bedtime routine. This typically looks like: Bath, Massage, Nurse and rock to music, Sleep for 30 minutes, Wake up to nurse again, and out by 11. I originally planned on scouring the dog during the half-hour rest.

Not this night. Gianna laughed and pinwheeled her arms and was very much awake. Lola mournfully barked at the door. However, as I learned when teaching, there is always a Plan B. So I plunked my little ten-week old party animal in her Neglect-O-Matic and went to fetch the dog. Lola happily trotted up the stairs until it dawned on her that a bath was in her future. She went into Passive Resistance Mode, ignoring my commands to get into the bath, pretending to be invisible by crouching flat on the floor and looking away from me, and finally laying on her bed while panting happily at me, saying, "Get in the bed? Okay!" I finally dragged her and her bed into the bathroom, while she quietly hummed, "We Shall Overcome." It took another few minutes to hoist her front paws into the tub. I shoved against the rest of her 70 pound body while telling her how FREAKING SERIOUS I was.

Gianna contemplated this new, odd addition to her bedtime routine while practicing her newest trick of cramming both hands into her mouth. She was becoming more awake as the clock ticked on. I scrubbed the stink-hound until she smelled more like an organic oatmeal and aloe covered rotten chipmunk. One hour later (and one scrub of the hair-covered tub later), the dog was completely taken care of. Gianna needed another hour after that to calm down from the insanity. After about a mile worth of pacing the floor in the light of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air on mute, she was finally out.

Too bad I was now wide awake. I think I have a new idea for a reality show.

Babies Eatin' Good in the Neighborhood, TOO!

2007-09-08T14:51:00.000-04:00

Gianna had her first Nurse-Out today! More than 96 sites nationwide participated, and if the turnout was anything like the one in the Metro Detroit area, that means thousands of nursing mommies!

She, of course, chose to represent by sleeping in the Hotsling the whole time. I had the fun of holding a sign (I chose "Human Milk for Human Babies") and chanting. The Madison Heights Applebees was really accomodating, and handed out ice water. No idea what was on the paper they handed to the news guy with their "official statement" from Corporate Headquarters, but I'm sure it had something along the lines of, "We respect state laws that protect a mother's rights, blah blah blah..." Well, that's fantastic. Now make it a Corporate-wide law, make sure staff are all appropriately trained, and for Pete's sake, please do not humiliate a mother who is nursing her 7 month old to the point of tears. No, babies probably do NOT want to eat with something over their head- do you? Nope, babies also do NOT want to eat in the restroom, while someone in the next stall is depositing their "Ultimate Trio" to make room for dessert. Would you?

And as I always told my kindergartners, "You are the boss of your own bodies. No one else's." In other words, if you don't like to see a woman feeding her baby the very best way possible, simply turn your head and look at something else. Like, turn your head and look at some things that people don't seem to bitch much about, which means they must be so much more pleasant- the guy chewing with his mouth open. Or the slightly Rubenesque teenage girls with their low-rise jeans and halters squishing their bellies into a nice little fat belt. Or the lady loudly lambasting her children. Or any of the things I do not like to see while eating or shopping or plain old anywhere.

New Mama Land

2007-08-30T12:20:00.000-04:00

Well, SHE is here! Gianna Maria was born on July 18, 2007 at 1:30 AM.

My peaceful, natural birth center birth turned into an ambulance ride to a hospital in the state's capital after 18 hours of labor and more than five hours of pushing. The C-section that followed was something that we chose after all options were used up. Lesson one in motherhood, I suppose- plans often just do not pan out.

Am I sad that, instead of photos of Gianna being peacefully birthed in the birthing tubs, we have a few photos of me immediately post-op? Even sadder that the hands that guided her into our world weren't mine or her fathers, but of two eager surgical residents? Definitely. I have a five inch long angry purple grimace slashed across my lower abdomen that will fade to white in time, but never go away. I still hear the sounds of the retractors cranking my body open, and smell the surgical smells, and feel my body being thumped about while they crammed my organs back in after Gianna was born. I still feel guilty that the "What if" thoughts keep going through my mind- even if my little girl decided to tilt her head to the side at the last minute, preventing her from exiting the way we had hoped. Guiltier that we have a healthy, beautiful, clever little girl who grows by leaps and bounds, and I still have this sadness. I should be grateful, right?

Another C-section mama very aptly told me that an unplanned C-section and a healthy baby are sort of like finding out you've won the lottery while watching your house burn to the ground. Well put. I love my girl, and am happy she's safe and here, but frankly, people were touching my guts. While I look forward to a glorious VBAC with my next child someday, I still feel invaded and bruised. We made the choice we had to make- the tough one. Motherhood lesson- the tough, crappy decision that sucks sometimes is the best one to make. It's still okay to be sad about the crap part of it. It doesn't take away any of the joy or beauty or thankfulness for the new life.

A provincial turn of events- two weeks after Gianna was born, her dad found this, which helped me tremendously. I have never really been big into the saints, but this was a comfort. A bit scary, as in "How the heck does life have these sorts of coincidences?" but still a comfort.

Gianna is now six weeks old- she's about ten lbs, 23 inches long, and has such cute chubby cheeks! Breastmilk is pure magic. She smiles and is starting to make noises when she sees us. Pooping requires lots of grunting and drama, which never fails to bring her dad to hysterical laughter.

We're completely in love.

Aftermath

2007-06-12T10:20:00.000-04:00

We're done!

Graduation went well. The Pastor's Wife couldn't get my cd to work (that we've used all year long without a hitch) for the program, but my kids are awesome about being flexible, and they sang without music. H2O (who hates any kind of attention whatsoever) wanted to bail before we hit the stage, so I promised him two icy cold packets of Capri Sun if he could just go up on the stage and pretend. He managed to get halfway through the program, and then couldn't take it anymore- he methodically removed the cap, then the silk sash, and then lost the gown. All three items were thoroughly stepped on and smushed into the stage. I have to say, after the whole "graduation costume" idiocy, I was pretty triumphant.

The Idiocy: On an ordinary day, in an ordinary school, Kindergarten teachers generally help students create paper caps that the students can decorate. It's child-produced, and means something special to the student. All my kids loved theirs last year, and their parents were completely tickled over them. This year, in the land of the cult, the Admin decided to order some expensive silk caps and gowns and have silk sashes made with 2007 sewed onto them. And offer the sashes for $5 apiece! The sashes did not cost $30 in materials, I can tell ya that much (one of the kindergarten moms offered to sew them). I was asked my opinion, and as usual, when it didn't match theirs, was totally disregarded. Throughout the program (which I kept down to a brisk 15 minutes), the sashes and caps fell off repeatedly. None of the kids wanted to put on the gowns, particularly the boys, until I started calling them "graduation capes."

Hilarious moment- I was presented by the staff with what my husband and I can only call "Sad Little Whore Flowers:" for $3.99 apparently one can buy daisies and chrysanthemums that are painted bright blue and purple, and sparkled with glitter. When the presenting staff member ceremoniously handed them over to me, for one long horrible second I was frozen solid at the sight of such a thing. I sorted myself out pretty quickly, and instantly became covered in glitter when I took them.

Lessons Learned-

1)Never ever EVER again take a job with a cult. As satisfying as it may be to cross out "Work for a cult" on life's list of things to do before I die, it pretty much almost made me completely lose my faith, and my mind.

2) A little dash of "the crazy eye" can save your life. I recommend that everyone become proficient in silently staring at someone in such a way that your eyes contract to pinpoints. Especially when people start to try to convince you that "It'll be okay to talk to these prospective parents about kindergarten, but they don't know you won't be here, soooo... don't tell them, m'kay?" Let me tell ya- a few seconds into "the crazy eye," and they become edgy and uncomfortable and back away slowly, saying, "Well, maybe I'll just talk to them. That's okay, never mind."

3) Create a gathering of the parents long before the end of the school year. It took me until 13 days before school was over to discover that no two families were paying the same amount of tuition. And not a single parent could tell me what exactly they were paying for.

The last two years of working with the kindergarten crowd has been quite an experience. I look forward to returning to it again- just not now. At this point in time, I know that I can be my child's best teacher. In about 4 weeks, we will be putting this to the test. Little Baby Teaches will be arriving sometime between the end of June and mid-July. I haven't decided yet if I will continue this blog, or start another one... in the meantime, peace and blessings to all of you who have read this insanity for the past two-ish years.

What Would YOU Do For a Klondike Bar?

2007-04-13T13:13:00.000-04:00

January 2, 2007- Upon returning to work after Christmas break, the main site director greeted me with the frenetic news that I could order $300 of supplies for my classroom. The catch was that I needed to order them TODAY, as the order was going out the next morning.

Three hundred WHOLE dollars, you say? Hot diggity day-um. I didn't know whether to cartwheel or do the Snoopy dance. Or whether I should think about the thousands of dollars in tuition that my students' parents spent in total, and the fact that this was the very first time I was approached with this chance to order supplies.

After careful consideration and the realization that the Almighty Pastor's Wife decreed to the parents at kindergarten orientation that their 4 year-olds would in fact be "fluent readers" by June (as she is not a teacher, and in no way has had any literacy training beyond Google, she has no clue what this means), I knew what to do. So, I ordered plain, two-sided whiteboards and three sets of leveled readers for Guided Reading Groups.

February- No word on the stuff. Site director says that the bill had yet to be approved by the home office.

March- Ya kidding?

April- I was greeted with the excited news that the supplies had arrived. Not that it mattered in terms of half my students, I had bootlegged some other readers and supplies to make a fairly passable Guided Reading format, but hey. I look at the stuff and see-

- Lined, one-sided whiteboards
- An alphabet puzzle (For kids ages 2 and up! According to the box)
- A toy kit for growing and viewing roots
- Story wands that inquire about plot and character
- Beach balls that inquire the same

Well, fuck me silly. I asked the director about the location of the leveled readers, and received a rambling answer that included a shipping special, a doctor's appointment, a sick child, and as usual for either director, blame that the other one was prodding for results. My poker face held, and my pregnancy hormones did not cause me to reach out and strangle-lift her over my head. I mentally reminded myself that this freckled-faced poppet of a director before me was a good year younger than my younger sister, and had no single clue at all.

C'mon, guy from That 70's Show, will you just pop out from behind the giant drum set which is front and center in the sanctuary, scream that I've been "Punked," and let my life continue?

Mice and Things

2007-04-05T09:18:00.000-04:00

The one thing I always HAVE to do, when I taught preschool and now kindergarten for the second year in a row, is to have a Leo Lionni theme. There is just something about that collage style of illustration, and vocab-rich writing of the dearly departed Lionni that just makes me feel all school-y.

So this week, instead of the Reading Group Gulag, we've been kicking back with an assortment of Leo Lionni titles, and doing some fun projects to go along with them. Yesterday, we read Frederick. This classic fable is of a little mouse who doesn't help gather food for the winter, but has other gifts for his mice friends when the winter days are long, cold, and dark.

I wanted my kids to hear a few messages from this story. One was that words are important! Lately, some of my kids have inexplicably returned to whining. Whining is at the very top of my list of things I will not tolerate, no way, no how. You can certainly chatter nonsense to me all day long, you can forget to raise your hand to speak a billion times a day, but whining will absolutely turn me into the Wicked Witch of the MidWest. I also wanted them to hear the "everyone has a special gift" message, and I wanted them to see an example of a habitat.

So, some things they noticed about the book, right away:

H2O- "That mouse over there, (gesturing) he's glaring at those ants."

Very Young Boy- "I read this book. He's not glaring at the ants. He's just tired."

H2O- (glaring) "He's glaring, see? Right there. You're not looking at the right mouse."

I started reading the book, stopping at a few enticing vocabulary words and letting them guess what they mean. I'll have to look at the book to jog my memory, but it's always fun to see what they think a word means. After talking about the stone wall where the mice lived, I stopped and said, "I see a mouse habitat! Did anyone else hear it?"

Confused Girl: "Mouse! It's a mouse!"

Me: "CG, my question was- where is the mouse's habitat? Where do they-"

Confused Girl: "Berry! Ant! Habitat! I know, Mrs. Clarateaches, Habitat- it's their habitat."

We finished the story, and my kids were still a bit confused. They didn't understand why Frederick didn't go ahead and help gather the food if he was going to eat it. H2O was very worried about their drink situation. Serious Girl and Very Young Boy both seemed to understand, but the rest of the kids were more concerned about the prospects of real mice somewhere out in the snow starving.

On a serious note- there really is something to pulling books and expressing an interest in them. When I brought out the five Lionni titles on Monday and set them up along the front wall of the room, I explained that they are very special books to me, and I wanted to share them. I once read a literacy theorist's quote that teachers simply by reading a book can "bless" a book for a child, and spark a desire to explore for themselves. This entire week I have had the books out on display during the day, and the majority of the kids have made a beeline for the books as soon as they have some time to kill. The most popular ones to be snapped up are the books we have already read (and therefore, blessed).

Read to your children. There, my PSA for the day.

Counting Down

2007-03-28T09:51:00.000-04:00

After Easter Break, there will only be 38 days left to go in the strangest job I have ever held. This is including the summer spent working at a bakery from 2-10 AM with a sociopathic midget, and the holiday helper job at Pier 1 where my manager insisted I allow a woman to charge up a storm on her senile, wheelchair-bound mother's credit card. Even after the credit company flagged the transaction and I ended up on the phone simultaneously with the FBI and the credit company. Ah, those warm Christmas memories of giving a physical description of a senile, wheelchair bound woman to the FBI whilst my manager, eyes all aglow, hisses in my ear that she is NOT going to lose this sale, as it would bring our totals for the night at an all time high.

Yes, this has been one doozy of a job. Not because of the kids, to be sure- my students are perfect in every way. No, this year has truly been unique in that I've never been hired by con artists before. Let's just highlight by summing up what was said at hire, and what has been discovered over time:

At hire: "You'll have about a dozen students."
Reality: Five students, until late October. Then the walls really started to bulge out as the sixth was added.

At hire: "Main Director has created schools before for corporations."
Reality: It seems I am the only one in the building with a teaching certificate for this state. In fact, it seems I am the only one with a bachelor's degree in the building, save another staff member from another country.

I could go on and on, but that will have to wait until I extract myself from the uber-intense, syrupy-sweet, Gothardesque-fake-smiling, money-grubbing claws of this place. In the meantime, some more silliness from the super fantastic students of mine!

As one might suspect, my current gestational state is a large topic these days. While they know I am planning on somehow acquiring a baby in the summer, some seem to have no idea where it is. H2O asks me on a near daily basis, "Is your baby in the baby room?" while Theological Boy (who gained a baby brother last summer, and seems to know quite a bit about the process) yells out, "It's in her UTERUS!" So in the meantime, little bobbly heads ricochet off my belly on a daily basis, and still half the kids look around and wonder aloud, "Where will you get your baby from?"

Yesterday we were exploring the world of subtraction. Very Young Boy kept eyeballing my rather large belly and raised his hand.

Me: "Yes?"
Very Young Boy: "Um... um... My dad is really fat. Like this (holds hands in front of belly). He has a really fat belly."

The toy horses have also been very busy in the small toy area. Apparently it was plastic equine orgy night some odd months ago (what the hell is the gestation of a horse, anyhow?) because each and every one of them is birthing, every day. Thanks to the extreme detail of Theological Boy's birth knowledge (he may have been present at his brother's birth), the toy horses are guided through the loud and vocal pushing stage each day by six very intense midwives. Each birth of the same miniature plastic red horse is greeted with cheers, tears, and the passing around of cigars.

I decline, obviously, as I currently cannot partake.

Bloglette

2007-01-31T17:15:00.000-05:00

So, now that I'm getting much bigger, I'm getting myself up off the floor much like someone who is balancing a glass plate on her head. I have to lean back, brace myself sideways, push up off the ground with my arms, carefully walk my arms up my legs and then I'm there (whew!)

The hilarious part- this is now exactly how each and every member of my classroom is standing up from the rug! Ah, my minions...

H2O- future OB-GYN

2007-01-25T18:46:00.000-05:00

I just love my unconventional students. Nothing against the boring ones that turn in their homework and stand in line and tuck in their shirts- I just wish they would climb a cabinet or develop a perseveration every once in a blue moon.

So, another H2O story.

At the end of a hairy day shortly after school resumed in January, I lined up the rugrats at the door for dismissal and their daily pep-talk.

Me: "Listen up, folks! Tomorrow is a NEW day. A day where I will not give the same direction to six different children regarding tipping in your chairs- if I tell Very Young Boy that he may not tilt in his chair, then by golly Confused Girl, don't stare directly at me while tipping in your chair. You know what I'll say."

Confused Girl: "Mrs. Clarateaches, I like your shirt. And your hair."

Me: "Thank you, CG- but please tell me what I just said about tipping in your chair."

Confused Girl: "Mrs. Clarateaches, how come you said 'your chair'?"

During this dizzying exchange, H2O, who was the line leader for the week, was busily patting my belly as though he had a small fire to put out. His head was tilted to one side, and he was smiling and nodding slowly like he was involved with an engaging conversation with my belly button. This would have been disconcerting without the Amelia Bedelia pattering of Confused Girl, but together the effect was really quite something.

Me: "H2O, why in the name of all that is holy are you manhandling me?"

H2O: *great big grin* "I'm petting your baby!"

Hooooooo boy.

How the heck did he know?

That's right, readers. I am currently gestating. Clarateaches Jr. will arrive sometime mid-July, and is currently at 16 weeks. That means he/she/ dear God them? is the size of a large avocado right now. At the time of H2O's mysterious voodoo though, I wasn't really showing, and had no real intentions of telling the class until it was fairly obvious.

The line exploded.

Theological Boy: "Nuh-uhhh, No she's not..."

Super Girl: "Can I see it?"

Confused Girl: "Baby Jesus?"

So, I told them that sometime after we closed shop for the summer, I would be having a baby. And ever since then, I've been fielding questions about when I'm going to bring my baby in. I keep telling them to just wait until I'm large enough to take someone out with one turn of my belly. After all, they're about that height.

Baby Steps

2007-01-12T18:02:00.000-05:00

One of my tasks at this school is to teach five year olds how to pray. This involves just a few basic things- asking forgiveness of sins, giving thanks for blessings, and prayer requests.

An excerpt from today, Day 81 of the school year:

Super Girl and Theological Boy take the stage. They tussle for a few moments about who has to go first, and Super Girl caves first.

Super Girl: "Ok everybody- fold your hands... close your eyes... (shoots a glare to Very Young Boy, who is trying to squint so his eyes remain open)... bow your heads. Dear God, thanks for giving us sins. Um... (looks at me)"

Me: (stage whisper) "Thanks for blessings..."

Super Girl: "Oh yeah! Thanks for lessons, and thanks for my friend, and I'm going to her house today! Did I tell you that Mrs. Clarateaches? We're going to play Barbies-"

Me: "Super Girl, tell it to God. We're praying."

Super Girl: "Oh yeah!"

This goes on and on, until it's Theological Boy's turn. TB takes a different approach to prayer. He sees this time as his own personal time to air grievances, and publicly denounce his peers' sins while they are required to stay silent.

Theological Boy: "Dear Lord, give us our sins. God, tell H2O to eat his lunch so he isn't crabby at the end of the day. Tell Confused Girl that she's not making right choices when she keeps on picking on H2O. And she keeps smacking me with her hair, God. That's pretty bad. And tell Super Girl to chew with her mouth shut-"

Me: "AHEM."

Theological Boy: "What? Well, it's gross. We're trying to eat." (sighs) "Anyway God, make them make right choices."

TB then makes his way back to his seat, while his peers form alliances against him.

There is some happy news for the day- I gave my 19 weeks notice! They seemed bummed, but didn't seem too surprised. Upward and onward, my friends. Just four days shy of five months to go, and it will all be a dream...

If it quacks like one...

2006-12-20T09:49:00.000-05:00

A moment in time with my little H2O-

Me: helping H2O with a math paper. We're still mastering that pesky number 3.

H2O: (smiling) "You have duck breath!"

Me: (frantically breathing into my hand, and recalling the Altoid in the car) "What does a duck's breath smell like?"

H2O: (gives a happy little sniff in my direction) "It smells like yours!"

Continues coloring glasses of water on his math sheet...

The least of these, my brethren

2006-12-15T09:50:00.000-05:00

Oy.

Sometimes, you feel like you are living in an SNL skit. Not the funny kind, but the type where it's just so long and pointless and you just are crawling out of your own bones trying to get away.

And then you change the channel. Problem solved.

So, when I compose my resignment letter, the gist of the letter will be that I cannot work for a place that perpetuates the "Christians as the elite, better than YOU" kind of BS. It's one thing to think that you know the Truth, it's an entirely different thing to exclude people based on how you thought it would all work in your head.

Ramble ramble. My new student- let's call him H2O due to some psych issues that he has surrounding water. I kid you not- this lad is obsessed and perseverates throughout the day on water. Which is really kind of ironic, that this kid is so "thirsty." You'll see why as I meander onward.

He's a smelly kid. He's got horrible teeth, and is never quite prepared for school. He is one of the kids of Michigan who are suffering the effects of the rotten economy. He's also been abandoned by his mother, and is being raised by a father who works pretty much 100% of his and his brother's waking day.

He's never been to school before, but he's being absorbed into my classroom pretty nicely. He still can only recognize one or two letters, but he's actually recognizing and WRITING his name now!

The trouble- the Powers that Be (aka the Pastor's wife, and the admin) are pretty disgusted by his existance. To them, he is the fly in their perfect little pie. How did the Pastor's Wife put it at my last meeting with them? Ah yes, that next year I would have a pared down, more "elite" group of youngsters, ones whose parents are all going to be aboard this merry ship, ones whose parents can dress their kids in appropriate uniform attire (and truthfully, we're about 90% there. The kid can't afford shoes, which these well-coiffed ladies tut-tut about, and flutter their manicures, but are they buying him some shoes?)

Stunned silence.

I did not participate in the type of training that I chose at Geneseo to work with kids who really don't need me. Don't get me wrong- I'm not the "Great White Savior." My goal is not to go spread my holy goodness to all the little poor children of the universe. However, I did not sign up for this particular brand of bull shit. I was in a classroom of H2O's last year, and we did swimmingly. My strengths and my trainings are stagnating in this class where they are not used. This job is really meant for the type of gentle, loving, soft-spoken lady who refuses to drive in the city, and has no clue what to do when a parent goes ballistic in their classroom because their family was reported to DCFS. Or squirms when a high-as-a-kite mom who was just released from jail gets in her face in the hallway between classes.

So, as I teach my students the basics, as well as Bible classes, and teach them that we believe that those who drink from the well of God will never be thirsty again, The Powers that Be are trying to finangle the expulsion of my little H2O. Who remains a very thirsty boy.

I'm leaving in June. Unless he goes. Then I go.

Yes, that's the sight organ for me...

2006-11-02T21:25:00.000-05:00

Blurb day:

Taught my little children-of-the-corn a new song today in Bible class- The B-I-B-L-E. There is a cd that goes along with the curriculum, in case you are a teacher with an inability to sing and read music at the same time.

So, we listened to the song (very short- "The B-I-B-L-E, yes that's the book for me, I stand alone on the word of God, the B-I-B-L-E!") and at the end, the man on the cd yells, "Bible!"

We gave it a try. My kids sang the song through, and at the very end enthusiastically yelled, "Eyeball!"

Must... refill... flask...

Subversive Indoctrination

2006-10-17T21:53:00.000-04:00

No matter how hard one tries, the combination of background and attention spans can really screw up the way something is perceived.

These past 31 days I have been teaching my little minions about Christian doctrine and the beginning stories of the Old Testament. This includes the concept of sacrifice, salvation, and the offerings of little burnt lambs upon alters (as well as the reasons why we as Christians no longer do this, as Christ was offered as the ultimate sacrifice).

So, coupled with gory flashcards depicting such an alter with a lamb, I have been wording this all as- "They usually killed a lamb, and then put it on a fire they made on a pile of stones."

Somewhere in Super Girl's head, this got all twisted and tangled, as seen today when we reviewed the story of Noah and the Ark. I asked her, "What did Noah and his family do when they got out of the Ark?"

With a smile gleaming from her sunshiny little face, she said, "They made a cat fire!"

*Try to hide look of horror/ growing hilarity from face.* "They did what? Super Girl, what did they do?"

"Oh yeah. They um, they burned a whole bunch of cats. That made God happy."

Suddenly, I had to look really interested in the book. So interested in fact, that my face had to be hidden. I hate internally laughing- it gives me the hiccups. Note to self- really REALLY explain what is going on, before these kids go home and give their parents the impression that we are practicing some Lifetime Original version of the occult.

BioHazards

2006-10-14T20:56:00.000-04:00

Let's set the scene, shall we?

It is a Thursday morning. A carefully coiffed, spritzed-all-over-with-Designer-Imposters-perfume mother comes in with her child. Child looks dazed, and something about their faraway look seems familiar.

Mother scrapes child off at the door, and blissfully skips away, off to see her masseuse, or coffee club, or illicit lover, or whatever it is that some of these people are into.

Child begins to hallucinate- "They're coming to get me! THEY'RE COMING TO GET ME!!!" Ahh, yes. I remember now- this glazed-over look is that of someone on some major drugs. At Geneseo we called them Bio majors. With dread, I realize that this child is carrying some form of pestilence that will soon make my life revolve around laying on the bathroom floor and praying for quick death. I can kiss my weekend goodbye. As I pick up the phone to call Child's parents right the hell back here to pick up their kid and at least have the decency to share in these lovely germs, Child vomits a mixture of Dimatap and Lucky Charms all over my shoes.

It's gonna be a lovely winter...

The Return of the Kindergarten Teacher

2006-10-03T20:00:00.000-04:00

Dare I? Post so long after I last posted? Do I look at my old posts, which make me miss all of them- my angelic G. , my delinquently Quietly Instigating N.?

Here we are in Michigan. Due to the several hurdles put into place by the state of MI, it is taking forever and a lot of red tape and calling people who do not actually exist to try and get my MI teaching certificate.

In the meantime, I am now working as a Kindergarten teacher in a private Christian academy. They desperately needed me, and I desperately needed a job.

In a nutshell- I have only five students right now. This fact was significantly glossed over until I actually accepted the job. I am in a career twilight zone. My pay is also around the level of what illegal grape planters are making (and as someone who once worked at such a place, riding a tractor with illegal grape planters and popping a plant into the ground every time the little yellow paint line on that tractor wheel came around right along with them, I say this with some certainty.) There are also many other various nuisance type things, but let me introduce you to a new cast of characters:

Bored Girl- She is operating above everyone else, and in terms of behavior- is quite possibly better behaved than I am. I will recommend her as my substitute teacher in case of my absence.

Super Girl- This girl is so enthusiastic, it verges on not funny. Every suggestion or comment is greeted with cheers and the phrase, "GOOD idea, Ms. Clarateaches!!!" She's also pretty hyper, and sings in a super-high falsetto with a serious face. I love this child.

Confused Girl- This child is not on this planet. No matter what we are doing, her mind is somewhere else. We were in the middle of the Lord's Prayer today, and her eyes popped open, her prayerful hands unfolded, and she loudly announced, "I love making W's. They're my favorite." She loves to raise her hand to answer questions, but never really knows what to say when called on, so she has an answer that she has decided fits every situation.
Mrs. Clarateaches: "Confused, what is our pattern on the calendar this month?"
Confused Girl: "Jesus?"
Mrs. Clarateaches: "Confused, do you remember which of our five senses uses ears?"
Confused Girl: "Jesus?"
Sigh. Auditory processing delay? Head in the clouds? Future nun? Time will tell.

Very Young Boy- This lad is way too young for kindergarten. All my students are too young for the cut-off for public school (one more thing the Powers that Be did not tell me), but this boy in particular is not going to be five until February. He tries hard, but clearly has no idea why he is here, or why I keep pestering him about such inane things as writing his name or counting little bears, when all he wants to do is play.

Theological Boy- "TB" is a boy who is spoken to at home. TB is not afraid to postulate and query about many facets of the religious doctrine we work with every day. TB is a fun, arrogant little boy. So far, he's my only five year old.

So there we have it, folks. I'll save the hilarious adventures in "Chapel" for another day.