Christmas In July

Our friends throw an annual Christmas in July party. This is the first year we were able to attend. They take this theme very seriously. They played Christmas carols, and decorated the deck with a Christmas tree and garland. Everyone was instructed to bake Christmas cookies, make an ornament for the tree, and bring presents to be delivered by Santa.  Santa arrived in an ice cream truck in full uniform, bringing presents to all the children in attendance and posing for pictures. Jack loved it all, except for maybe Santa, and he really enjoyed seeing some friends.
 

Santa arriving via ice cream truck.

Jack's surefire way to end up on the "nice" list.







Vivi hanging out in Jack's chair.



Jack doing what appears to be evil plotting while waiting for gifts to be passed out.

 

Present time!



The party coincided with midyear reviews at work. When shopping for Jack's gift, I considered giving him a mid-year review as well. I imagined his report looking something like this:

1. Plays and works well with others: Most of the time, unless her name is Vivian

2. Shows self confidence: Yes! If nothing else, Jack is confident 

3. Displays self control: Most of the time, unless frustrated by an obstacle 

4. Respects authority: Some of the time

5. Follows directions: Yes, when he chooses to do so (see no. 4).

I was tempted to get him coal for the party as a warning of what could happen come Christmas. I decided that might scar him for life. Plus, if I could review him, then he should get to review me.  I imagine my review by him would look something like this:

1. Spends time with me: Mom is good at reading books but she needs to really learn how to play Cars2 Angry Birds Star Wars (no comma here because it really is somehow all one activity in his mind).

2. Puts me to bed on time so that I can always get enough sleep: Some of the time, but who really wants to sleep anyway?

3. Treats me with respect and tells me she loves me: Most of the time, but I thinks she loves Vivian more. Why does she carry her around all the time?

4. Cooks me healthy meals: hmmm... needs improvement. I don't know why she even tries to make anything other than peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

5. Enforces the rules: needs improvement, we have rules?

I guess it's good that we don't do performance reviews on family members (although there are a few I would like to do). I do think regular feedback is important. When it comes time for any review, there should not be surprises. You should already be aware of strengths, weaknesses, things you've done well and things that need improvement. Sometimes we don't do a good enough job at recognizing our own strengths or pointing out and celebrating our own success and the successes of others.

We are more than half way through 2013 now (as unbelievable as that is). Are you exceeding the goals you set for yourself this year? 

 

"Nothing can stop the man with the right

mental attitude from achieving his goal;

nothing on earth can help the man with

the wrong mental attitude."

- Thomas Jefferson

Run or Dye











Whenever I see a new race and it sounds interesting, I'll mention it to Bernie and Nick to see if just maybe they would like to run with me.  Bernie sighs, particularly if the race is longer than a 5k or has an entry fee of more than $1 (he wonders why anyone would actually pay to run), and Nick rolls his eyes at me. Once in awhile they will decide to participate but they always tell me it is under duress. Jack loves to run, so I am hoping he will want to do races with me someday; and it is just to early to tell with Vivian.

 My nephew, Colin, ran cross country this past year in school and plans to run again in the fall.  I finally found someone who gets excited about races! We had planned to run other races together and those plans did not work out.  I found a Groupon for the Hartford Run or Dye event around Easter and I immediately signed us up.  Run or Dye is really just a celebration.  It is not a timed event, there is no pressure to do anything but have fun. This worked out well because the weather was extremely hot and humid, and it turns out Colin's races at the middle school level are 2.1 miles as opposed to the 3.1 miles in a 5k.  I don't know how many people participated in the Hartford event, but it was a lot. There were so many people, it probably took us about thirty minutes for our group to get to the starting line.  Bernie waited at the start/finish line for us along with Jack, Vivian, my sister Gayle, my nephew Tyler (Colin's twin), and my niece Kerrigan.  I felt bad for them because they baked in the heat and humidity waiting for us. I was hoping Jack would get into the color, but he was afraid to get dirty so he just hung out in the stroller.  Vivian bonded with her Aunt Gayle.

 

Colin did awesome.  His natural stride is faster than mine with little effort. I fully expect that in the near future, he will be a force to be reckoned with where running is concerned. The race had various color zones in which volunteers threw a specific dye color on you as you ran through. At the end was the "dye zone" where every twenty minutes or so, the crowd gets doused in Holi dye.  Kerrigan and Tyler participated in that part with us.  This is Tyler trying to get a packet of dye.

 

 

 

Bernie got this shot as they released the colors in the dye zone.

 

 

The four of us after the dye was released.

 

From left to right - Colin, me, Kerrigan, Tyler

 If I am around, I am usually the person that Vivian chooses first.  When I went to get her after the race, she clung to Aunt Gayle for dear life.  She didn't recognize me with all that dye on me.  LOL. 

 

 

 I sat in the back seat with Vivian on the way home and she kept looking at me, trying to figure out whether I was really her mommy. The dye easily came out of my hair, I still have traces of it on my skin, I can't figure out how to get it off the seat in the car (yikes) and my running shoes (no big deal). All in all, it was a great morning.

 

I am trying to figure out what race to do next with Colin.  Kerrigan wants to run next time and Gayle said she would walk.  Bernie even said he would run a 5k, but we all know that its only because Kerrigan can get Uncle Bernie to do just about anything. A zombie race would be fun but the kids are not old enough to participate in the ones in our area.  Bernie said next time we definitely have to wear something that stands out so he can find us easier in the crowd to take pictures.  Colin suggested tutus and head boppers.  I'll be on the lookout for those items as Halloween costumes begin to show up in stores. I think that is a great idea!

 



"Run when you can, walk if you have to,

crawl if you must; just never give up"

- Dean Karnazes

Yard Sale-ing

I will start with a legal disclaimer: this is going to be a picture intensive post.  If you don't like seeing adorable children, stop reading now.

 

I took Friday off.  We did lots of things, but one of them was just to go to the playground.  Vivian isn't really into the playground equipment yet, but she does enjoy walking (almost running) as fast as she can from mom.  She has plenty of room to explore at the RecPlex in town.  Some of the things she did were incredibly cute and caused me to take pictures.  I had not planned on taking pictures, so I only had my iphone camera. I am amazed at the quality of these pictures.  I did edit them a little, but only as much as the Adobe PS Express App allows.  I think this may be my favorite picture of Vivian yet:

 

 

Here are a few others:

 

Of course, I took some of Jack too:

 



"I believe I can fly!"

 

After the park we stopped at the Federated Church for a yard sale.  It was Uncle Gary that pointed out that Jack has coined a new verb, "Yard-Saling," which of course, is the act of attending yard sales.  A few weeks ago we attended a few (Jack's first time) in search of an outdoor playhouse and a bike for Jack.  We got lucky and quickly found them.  Jack got a few new toys and he was hooked.  We are still working out the kinks in his idea of what yard-saling means.  He doesn't understand that not every tag sale is going to have cool things for him.  Nor does he understand that we do not need to always buy something at a tag sale; we have more than enough "junk" of our own.  There wasn't much for him at the church tag sale and before I had to talk him out of leaving with junk, he scored a full-length Scooby Doo DVD for $0.25! We pay more than that to watch them on demand.

Bernie's mom had given Jack $5 for yard sales.  It was burning a hole in his pocket so I promised him we would find more tag sales on Saturday.  He proclaimed that since he had $5, he was going to buy 5 "stuff."  Thus began his lesson in economics and how not everything costs $1 (it sure would be nice though if it did). The first tag sale we went to was at a farm.  I got yet another cute Vivian, iphone photo:

 

 

Here is Jack ultimately spending $4 on a nerf-like dart gun set, new in the box (boys and guns of any kind are a very bad idea)!

 

Later, at an other tag sale, Jack tries very hard to find something that is only $1, but he is unsuccessful.  Next week, we will work on the art of negotiating.

Nick needs to get his senior pictures done.  Let's just say that doing so is not at the top of his priority list.  Since I had gotten such great iphone pictures, I thought we could do even better with our Nikon D-SLR (especially since Bernie has taken a few photography classes lately).  Everyone complained about going on a field trip as they piled in the car, but seemed happier once we got to the "haunted castle" according to Jack (aka Gillette Castle). Just my luck, it started pouring as soon as we got out of the car. 

Even so, we got some very good pictures:

Emma and her two boyfriends - LOL

One more of Vivian:

 

 

I think they are almost as good as professional photos!

"So keep your head high, keep your chin up, and most importantly, keep smiling, because life is a beautiful thing and there's so much to smile about." - Marilyn Monroe



Two Flags



I took Monday off and we headed to Six Flags for the day (“Two Flags” according to Jack).  All five of us went, plus Nick’s girlfriend, Emma.  I think Jack loves Emma as much as Nick does. Jack is always competing with Nick for her attention.  Emma sat next to Jack in the car and they watched Star Wars together.  At one point, Emma was holding Jack’s hand and Nick was walking behind them (I wish I had a picture of that).  Bernie says Nick should be happy that Jack isn’t ten years older.  Jack says he wants his own Emma.  Bernie told Jack that when he’s older we can go to the “Emma store” and get him one.  LOL. 

 

We spent the majority of our day in the water park.  Jack has never been a big fan of the water.  He is getting braver this year.  He was going down some smaller water slides and floating in shallow pools in his lifejacket.

 

The Runner's World Quote of the Day today is:

"Courage is only an accumulation of small steps." - George Konrad

 

That quote made me think of Jack and how he is overcoming his fear of having water in his face; and really trying to learn how to swim.  It also made me think of our loved one who is beginning a difficult journey tomorrow.  When we have to face our fears, whether or not the circumstances involve a life altering event, we just have to put one foot in front of the other. We have to keep moving forward.  Eventually those small steps add up to something much greater.

 

On the other end of the spectrum, Vivian loves the water for the most part and exhibits little fear. Although she did not appreciate going through the waterfall on the Adventure River.  They both enjoyed playing in the fountains:

 

 

 

 

Before we left "two flags," Jack and Daddy played a water race game.  If you won one race, you could pick from a few prizes.  If you won two races, you could pick any prize.  When they started playing, no one else was around.  In fact, Bernie had to play because the game required a minimum of two players.  Jack easily won:

 

As they finished that race, other people started to crowd around.  Not sure if Jack would win a second race if there were a bunch of competitors, Bernie told Jack to pick one of the smaller prizes.  Jack had his heart set on a giant octopus and refused to choose anything else.  Bernie chose a gecko for Jack and Jack pouted all the way back to the car and half way home. He hated the gecko and he "hated the day."  Well, apparently he didn't hate anything nearly as much as he said, because this is what I found when I went to turn his lights off that night (yes, that is said gecko):

 

Overall,  it was a great day. I think even Jack would agree.

 

Living in the Moment

Vivi loves to do things herself.  She gets very excited about tasks most of us consider mundane and don't even think about.  One of those things is brushing her teeth:

Here she is actually brushing her teeth.  Obviously we still do it for her, but we do let her try first. 

Watching her take pure joy in the thing that she is doing right in the moment, reminds me of Thich Nhat Hanh's book, "The Miracle of Mindfulness."  A friend suggested that book to me when I was going through a difficult time.  Hanh is a Zen master.  He tries to get you to think about living in the present by really feeling each moment.  He uses an example of washing your hands and goes through each step in excruiating detail, feeling the water flow, hearing the water flow, etc. If you are completely immersed in the here and now, there is little room for worry about the future. Regardless of what turmoil you might be feeling, if you are ok and safe in this moment, then that is enough. 

I have to admit that while I appreciate the principle, I never actually finished the book.  I quickly lose patience with authors who use too many adjectives or describe things in finite detail. I do however recognize that the detail is actually the point of the book, and that I clearly hadn't fully embraced the message.

I tried to put this in practice this morning. As I walked Jenny, I tried to listen to my breathing, to feel the hot pavement beneath my flip flops, to watch Jenny's movements, to listen to the birds, to feel the warmth of the sun. I found myself more relaxed and in tune with the world around me than I have been in a long time.

None of us knows what tomorrow will bring. We have to enjoy what we have now and try not to worry so much about the future.

"Yesterday is history

Tomorrow is a mystery

Today is a gift That is why it is called the present."

- Eleanor Roosevelt

You Are Braver Than You Think

I have a pretty small audience on this blog, and I'm ok with that. One of my most avid readers got some alarming news today.  I won't share it on here unless I have permission, but I will say that there are likely going to be some bumpy days ahead. 

So, in honor of this loyal reader, I'm going to make it a higher priority to blog over the next several weeks. I'll try to post more pictures of the kids and stories of their adventures (because let's be honest, they are adorable - LOL).  I'm also going to post motivational quotes, stories, etc. to hopefully provide just a teeny bit of inspiration. 

I've quoted AA Milne before, but I love this one too. I've thought about putting it up on Vivi's wall in her room:



"You are braver than you believe,

stronger than you think,

 and smarter than you seem..."

 

- Christopher Robin to Winnie the Pooh,

AA Milne

You have lots of people praying for you and pulling for you.  We love you.

Redshirting

We are "redshirting" Jack. According to Wikipedia, "Redshirting is the practice of postponing entrance into kindergarten of age-eligible children in order to allow extra time for socioemotional, intellectual, or physical growth. This occurs most frequently where children's birthdays are so close to the cut-off dates that they are very likely to be among the youngest in their kindergarten class."

Jack is age-eligible for Kindergarten. In our town, you have to be five by January 1st. Jack will turn five shortly after Thanksgiving. Many parents "redshirt" boys because generally their vocabulary is 12-18 months behind girls. That isn't an issue with Jack. His vocabulary is amazing. Academically he is just about ready for Kindergarten.  Socially, he seems a little immature to me but he definitely steps up when mom and dad are not around.  Is he ready for Kindergarten? Probably, but probably isn't good enough for me.  

When Jack was in daycare full-time I struggled a little with the fact that he wasn't in a "school" environment. I worried that he was somehow missing out on learning to navigate through an ultra-structured environment. Time will tell, but honestly I think the years of nurturing and individualized attention he received from Kellee has made him better prepared for school and life generally than the curriculum Nick went through both at Montessori preschool and at the Montville preschool. 

The biggest reason I am "holding him back" if you can even call it that, is self confidence. Early success in school will only foster his faith in himself. I don't want Kindergarten to come as a challenge to him. I want him to be a leader in his classroom simply because that is his natural role. Does that make me a bad person? The people that argue against redshirting seem to say yes.

Our friends who have older kids with late birthdays say they feel like their kids are always six months behind in school and they wish they would have waited. Others are sending young 17 year olds off to college feeling like they aren't quite ready. The first time I spoke with Jack's preschool teacher, she praised our decision saying she wished more parents would consider this option. 

Is it really wrong to give him one more year with Dad? One year to try out a traditional nursery school, and to continue to develop his reading, writing and math skills? I can't see how that harms anyone.

Then there is the mommy guilt. We are watching his 4 and 5 year old friends graduate from preschool and preparing to ride the big yellow bus. It makes me wonder whether we are doing the right thing. I feel like "holding him back" is somehow the opposite of what I should be doing, which I guess is pushing him onward and upward.

I worry about whether he will be teased. He is tall for his age. Will the kids wonder why Jack is turning 6 or 8 or 12 ahead of them?  When we moved here I was peppered with those questions. I started school in a system where you had to be 5 before September 1st. I have a December birthday so I had to wait another year. It was a simple explanation and I shrugged off the questions. What will Jack say? ("My mommy didn't think I was ready?") Lol. I guess we'll have to work on that.

When I see this picture, I am immediately reminded of how Jack is still in many ways only four, just a little guy.  He and Bernie waited in line for 90 minutes to meet Jack's hero. When it was Jack's turn he was too shy to shake Darth Vader's hand, give him hug, or use the force on him.

I suppose anytime you make an unconventional decision about your child, you will second guess yourself.  I just want to give him the most solid foundation possible.