two boys

I was struck this morning by the vast difference between my two boys. Same parents, same parenting style, but if they were the last survivor of a Stand-like holocaust, my older child would be completely lost, unable to function or take initiative. My middle child would not only manage to survive, he'd reinvent electricity within the first month. (Or, in less extreme terms, my middle child is interested in becoming self-sufficient, taking initiative, and becoming independent. My oldest child ... isn't. Which in many ways makes him easier to deal with, if I'm being completely honest!)

Time will tell which direction the youngest goes in. Right now she seems an exercise in headstrong willfulness, but so did the middle child at her age. Perhaps she'll find a completely different direction.

the homebody and the gadabout

That would be me and my daughter, respectively. Veronica's last question before she goes to bed is always "Where am I going tomorrow?" (repeated ad infinitum, ad nauseam). Her first question when she gets up in the morning? "Where am I going today?" (see above for the repeats).

On the other hand, my general goal for each day is to go as few places as possible. I have never understood how my fellow SAHMs manage to get anything done when they're out and about all day from park to activity to gym to wherever else they go. And the great tragedy of Veronica's life (at the moment, anyway) is that her star is hitched to my wagon. Where I don't go, she doesn't go.

Summer will be very hard on my little girl, as will the parts of the end of this school year and the beginning of the next when her brothers are in school and she isn't.

oh, summer

The past week makes me worry for summer. You see, my children were home. And all my routines went to hell in a handbasket. Nothing got done. Which concerns me, given that they'll be home all summer ... and while one week might be okay in the loss-of-routine category, a whole summer is certainly not. I tremble for my productivity. (Either that or I will need to significantly adjust my routines ...)

school vacation week

The ups and downs!

Up: no alarm clock. Down: no quiet napping house in the afternoon.
Up: kids home all day. Down: kids home all day.
Up: get to do fun and exciting things with kids. Down: not home enough to get anything done.
Up: kids get quality time together. Down: kids fight a lot.

Overall, I look forward to school vacation week, but am quite pleased when it ends and we get back to our usual routines.

incomprehensible

I've been watching the lot of a recently purchased home in my neighborhood being steadily denuded of its greenery, and I have to wonder - what possesses a person to buy a house in a heavily wooded area and then cut down every tree on the (also heavily wooded) lot? Wouldn't it have been easier to buy a house in a different area on a lot with less trees?

I'm not opposed to the occasional tree chop (we've cut some down on our own property), but this is every single tree on the lot. Those trees must have been growing for decades, and now some random couple comes along and chops them down in a day. What a waste.

book reviews

Anne Perry, Bedford Square. This had a lot of potential, but fell short. There were errors and missteps in the history, attempts to prolong plotlines that were awkward at best ... and the final piece that put the puzzle together had been mentioned in the detective's presence at least 4 times before he got around to putting it in the puzzle. *sigh*

Frances Hodgson Burnett, The Lost Prince. It's a bit over-earnest, like a lot of 19th- and early 20th-century children's literature, but sweet for all that, and well detailed.

Roger Lea MacBride, Little House on Rocky Ridge. MacBride was as close to Rose Wilder Lane as family, and so his work rings true - he stays faithful to the overall feel of the Little House books. It's especially interesting to see some of the themes of Lane's own work appearing in the story of her childhood.

Oscar Wilde, Novels and Fairy Tales of. Wilde was an interesting man, with a lot of ideas, both affected and genuine. Which makes a compilation of his works tend to be hit-or-miss. But well worth reading, for all that.

sometimes you have to squeak

I dislike confrontation. Or anything that even seems like it. Twists my stomach into knots, makes me feel guilty and terrible, and overall ruins the day.

But sometimes it has to happen. This week, my beloved middle child was given his team assignment for his first season of Little League. As it turned out, all of the other boys in his kindergarten who are playing were put on a team together, while Charles was placed on a different team entirely, with no one he knew. Now, this situation would have been okay with me if the other boys had been split up, but having them all together and him separated was just asking for him to feel left out, and I wasn't looking forward to six weeks of having to talk him into going to baseball.

So I squeaked. Got in touch with the coordinator, didn't let him fob me off with the first email, and pushed the issue. And now Charles will be playing with his friends. I feel guilty and like "that mom" for having done it, but I think it will be worth it to watch him play with his friends.

Gathering week

Another April and Gathering week is upon us again. We're fortunate, actually, that Lou doesn't travel that much, so having him gone for most of a week is a pretty rare occurrence.

You would think I'd dread being left alone with the kids for most of a week (and there is some of that, to be sure!), but in a lot of ways I enjoy the time. For one thing, it leaves me with all my evenings completely free. Bedtime routines go a lot faster if I'm the only parent in the house, so I tend to have several hours of relative quiet to myself with Lou out of town. It tends to be a good time to catch up on shows Lou doesn't like and to immerse myself in games and books without feeling like I'm neglecting him.

Additionally, it tends to be a little bit like a vacation with the kids, as well. When I'm solo parent, I get to be a bit more indulgent than I otherwise have the opportunity to be - we eat out more, rules are a bit more relaxed, and I pay/bribe for good behavior more often. (Things that would be bad precedents if we did them all the time, but I can get away with when I have the "Daddy's out of town" card to play.) Since I'm generally the more authoritative parent, it's nice to be the pushover occasionally!

But then we get to the end of the week when Daddy walks into the house and things can get back to normal ... and that is very, very good.

summer and the lack of naptime

In the last month or so, I've discovered some new motivational tactics and have managed to develop Veronica's naptime into a 2- to 3-hour block of pretty significant productivity.

Of course, now that I've accomplished this, I find the onset of summer (okay, still over two months away, but it's coming) somewhat concerning, given that once the boys are home all day I will no longer have that block of quiet time in the afternoon. Plans will have to be made!

kindred spirits

This spring has brought about a bit of a lovely surprise - the advantage of sharing a personality with someone. In mid-year, kindergarten switched from morning to afternoon, and so my middle child has been home in the mornings. Twice a week, this means my middle child and I are alone in the house for the first (and probably only) time in our lives together.

Now, the middle child is widely agreed to be the most like me temperamentally, which can make him quite hard to deal with. (You'd think I'd have an edge in figuring him out, and sometimes I do, but those times are well made up for by all the special ways he can get under my skin.) What I'm discovering is that he also has my appreciation for solitude, and my ability to entertain himself. Where my oldest child would need to come talk to me every 10 minutes, and my youngest would require attention nearly nonstop, my middle can enjoy playing quietly by himself for hours. Or we can sit together, each doing our own thing, as now (he's playing with Play-Doh, and barring a few comments has not required my attention or assistance), happily.

It's nice to be reminded that some of my more easy-to-live with traits have been handed down as well! He may not remember these mornings years from now, but I will cherish them for the insights they've given me into who he is.