I don't know where he came from, but I'm glad he's here...

I've been reflecting on the drastic differences between children in the same family--same two parents, same upbringing, same gender, nothing in common.

How does this happen?

Jamey brought Jude (age 4) to work with him again on Friday, where he sat sweetly and silently for hours with nothing but some books and a few matchbox cars to entertain him. Jamey took him to a meeting and people were marveling at this tiny boy who could sit so still for so long, quietly sucking the thumb of one hand, turning pages with the other, occasionally smiling up shyly from behind his long, dark lashes.

I would love to take full credit for creating this masterpiece of (publicly) obedient boyhood. But I am also the mother of Isaiah, age 6, who has no brain/body connection most of the time and is prone to making startling and inappropriate comments in public places. Every Friday I sit with him in our homeschool Classical Conversations group and pray that he will make it through class without a major incident.

Usually, he commits minor infractions interspersed with mid-level distractions. One recent example was when he pulled the back of his shirt over the back of his chair, stretched the front of his shirt down over his knees, and then attempted to stand up. (Can't be done. Don't try it.)

He also likes to swing his head down between his knees and look at the children in the row behind him from under his chair. Sometimes he takes his shoes off and puts them on his hands. He falls off his chair at least once a week, usually more. He has shared the fact that he uses his siblings' toothbrushes sometimes, that he once threw up in the shower, and that his dad runs over frogs in the driveway "on purpose". ( Not true, by the way. Frogs are dumb and it is impossible not to squish them pretty regularly in the summer.)

His crowning moment this year occurred two weeks ago during Latin review, when he announced to the class (with an expression of complete incredulity) that he had forgotten to wear underwear that day. Such honesty! Such transparency! Such a lack of awareness of impropriety!

As usual, I blushed for him, apologized, and helped his tutor regain control of the classroom.

Yesterday was grandparents' day at the co-op. I sat right next to Isaiah in a very uncomfortable, toddler sized chair, ready to pin his arms to his side or even clap my hand over his mouth if necessary. I made sure that he was sitting by the sweetest, quietest, most docile girl in the class, thinking she might have a calming influence on him.

It seemed like a good plan.

Little Lexi was the picture of serenity--a tiny elf in a pink dress with a pink flower tucked behind her ear, dutifully repeating her memory work. Isaiah stared at her thoughtfully for a while and then, in a moment of silence, he blared, "Did you know that you have a flower growing out of the side of your head?"

Poor child. Every head looked her way, causing her to scrunch down in her chair and turn the same shade of pink as her dress. The various visiting Grandparents turned a stern eye on me, I began hissing, "Say you're sorry! That was NOT kind!" to Isaiah, and my mom began choking with laughter in the back row.

At least she got some entertainment out of it. Hopefully I won't get a bill for Lexi's therapy.

So after that, I moved Isaiah and myself to a new location at the back of the class. He did well there until we started on timeline cards, when he surreptitiously threaded the elastic waistband tightener on his jeans through a loop on the blouse of the girl next to him, and then buttoned her shirt to his pants. I didn't even notice until she tried to stand up and almost tore off her sleeve. Yet another golden moment in his career.

The silver lining is that I have become a lot less prideful about my parenting skills over the past six years than I used to be, and more tolerant of the parenting of others. For every one of Isaiah's challenges, he has a beautiful strength, and of course, I absolutely adore him. Someday--maybe in college-- I like to think he will sit through a class and not make popping noises with his lips. He will keep his hands to himself and he will NOT stuff his pencil into the mouthpiece of his tin whistle and break it off.

That hope is what keeps me from crying in C.C. every Friday.

A day at the park

Jamey and I (Sandra) took the children for a picnic dinner in the park tonight, and then stayed so the little ones could do the playground, and Jamey could try to smear the older ones at Bocce ball (it didn't work out so well). I sat on a park bench and watched my (not so) little crew in pure contentment. 

I hadn't realized before how much of each child's individual temperament comes out in their play. I guess I don't usually sit and stare at them for three hours straight.

Once again, I am struck by God's sense of humor. He must love a chuckle. Why else would He wire us all so differently and then have us live together in one big pile for 18+ years--or in the case of Jamey and me--forever! 

I am not complaining! How dull it would be if everyone were exactly like me. My lifelong challenge as a firstborn, perfectionistic, melancholy, type-A individual is to appreciate the characteristics of my second (or third or fourth) born, free spirited, laid-back, spontaneous children. And to see that in fact, their strengths are a perfect balance for my weaknesses, and that my strengths are needed to help bolster them where they falter. 

Beautiful plan! I hope to learn to live within it better. 

So here is a rundown of what I saw tonight. I'll start with 2 year old Keira. Her main goal was to run as far as possible, as fast as possible, leading with her head, followed closely by her belly, with feet churning furiously behind her, as if struggling to keep up. She was like one of those wind-up toys that just chug forward in whatever direction you set them down. 

 I pointed her to the little kids' play set, and she went right up the ladder on one side, down the slide on the other, and then forward across the playground to the big kids' play set, where she scaled up another slide (backwards), crossed a bridge and barreled down an even bigger slide. She turfed at the bottom--pretty hard--picked herself up and headed straight out of the park before being rescued by Jude. 

Poor Jude--such a careful, concerned child! He was a bundle of nerves on the playground because of the sheer lack of foresight exhibited by his siblings. He went between Kaiden and Keira, cautioning, "That's too high! Come down! Don't go to the edge! Mom! He's on the edge! That swing is too fast! Mom! Keira is by the swings!" 

I would have gotten up off the bench if anyone had been in real danger, but Jude was so solicitous, that I never had to move. He scooped Keira off the ground, and guided her past all the obvious (to him) pitfalls. Keira thanked him by shouting, "No!", pushing his hands away, and running in the other direction. Kaiden, busy conquering the highest heights of every piece of playground equipment (and then jumping off), also gave Jude palpitations.  

I think by the end of the night, Jude's opinion of my mothering skills had fallen a few notches, despite my efforts to convince him that no one had at any point been in true mortal danger. He did manage to play with the "dig-digger" for a while and was amused and distracted for a few minutes by a fellow 4 year old who had wet his pants on the slide.

Kaiden (age 3) was absolutely determined to master every contraption at the park--and he did, even though he fell off, and slipped through, and bounced off most of them at least once. Even the climbing wall and the fireman's pole were mastered. (Those actually did give me visions of a possible trip to the ER.) I have rarely seen tenacity like that boy possesses, and so young! May God use it for good. He really could rule the world one day. 

Isaiah and Christina (second born children, both) played bocce ball and took turns accidentally hurting their team-mates, and entertaining them. Both of them are loads of fun to be around--and also a little dangerous, due to occasional lapses in foresight:) But they are so creative and funny that you almost don't notice the breakages and injuries they sometimes cause. And they have giant hearts. 

 I heard lots of laughing on the bocce field (of which I am sure they were the cause) and I also noticed that they both took a long time to play with their younger siblings at the playground. Lovely!

Elijah (age 9) played on the swings for a while, and then left us for Nottingham Forest, where he spent the remainder of the evening battling rogue trees and boulders with his trusty...stick. He needs no entertaining because his world goes right along with him, wherever he roams. He loves us all and enjoys being with us, but the door is always open to his fertile imagination. Sometimes when I go outside, and he is lying on his stomach making eye contact with some bug or another, I will speak and he will look up at me like I am a strange creature a long way off and he is trying to figure out how to understand my language. He reminds me of myself at that age...and sometimes of myself at this age. I still visit Sandraland sometimes:)

And then there was Rebekah, dressed in flowing white skirt, with her hair up in a floral ribbon, floating above the fray, like a benevolent (and extremely patient) fairy--wiping mouths at dinner, pushing swings, giving gentle correction, encouraging every little climber, swinger, and slider, and finally, throwing her bocce balls with the grace of a ballerina. She managed to be everywhere at once, doing everything for everyone. I am still trying to figure out how to do that. 

What a nice evening! Jamey and I are truly blessed, and I can't wait to see what God does with all these little bundles of potentiality. May I see them all as He does, and parent them accordingly. 

Amen.

On Chaos and Cleaning

I am taking a day off school to organize my house a little. Jamey threatened to burn it down if I don't reduce the piles of junk that are covering every flat surface in here. Where does it all come from? I submitted a video application to Hoarders in the hope that someone would come and tell me where to start.

Sometimes I think Jamey's standards are too high. If there isn't pee on the walls and no one is stuck to the floor in the kitchen, then I am pretty pleased. Jamey, on the other hand, is bothered by the dust bunnies in far corners and Playmobil pieces under the couch. 

Who even looks under the couch? The dust bunnies just want to live their peaceful lives in remote crevices. They have never caused a moment's trouble. In fact, I think they are there to watch over us with their kind, little, fuzzy eyes. Like watch dogs, but smaller and quieter. And cheaper.

As for toys under the couch, since that is where they end up all the time, why not just have the kids put them there on purpose? How much easier it would be to say, "Kids! Daddy's home! Kick your cars under the couch, throw your shoes behind any random door, and shove your Playmobil pieces into the southwest corner of the living room. It's OK! The dust bunnies will watch them for you."

I should have my own show. I would put cameras in a home for one week, watch where everyone naturally puts their stuff down, and then I could just come in and put labels on it.

As in, "See how Mr. Blandford drops his wallet and keys in the middle of the kitchen island every night? I have made a little sticker and put it right there so that Mrs. Blandford will not constantly move them to the basket by the door when she is trying to cook and serve food to her family at the island. 

And little Buford Blandford is prone to leaving his train tracks on the stairs, so you see how I have labelled the fourth stair from the bottom as his "Train Tread", so that people can plan ahead to step over that particular board."

So practical! And it follows Oprah's--and Lady Gaga's--excellent advice to love yourself exactly the way you are. Embrace your squalid self and throw aside those pesky twinges of conscience that tell you to improve your habits to the point that others can actually stand being around you. Because out of the 7 billion people on the planet, the universe is only concerned with YOU and your constant contentment.

Um. Now that I have followed my idea to it's natural end, I am in total agreement with Jamey. The dust bunnies have got to go, and Playmobil needs to get re-acquainted with Rubbermaid.

I am going to round up my children and set them to work. Oprah and Lady Gaga have handlers to clean up their messes, both physical and emotional, but the rest of us had better learn change our natural inclinations toward selfishness and sin, and learn to serve one another.

Hello everyone, this is Rebekah reporting! Seeing as how nothing has happened since last year, it should be no problem updating you, right? (sarcasm) Okay, let's see. I hope you like to read because this might take a while. We just got back from visiting family in Vermont! The drive was about seventeen hours in total including stops because we weren't able to drive through Canada. Everyone did okay, including our two foster kids, Kaiden and Keira. The weather was beautiful and we spent as much time outside as possible. My uncle has sheep, fourteen lambs and ducklings. Christina and I enjoyed helping take care of them (feeding, moving to new pasture, etc.) We are looking forward to seeing them again when they come down in June.

On a more personal note, I finished my school year in early May. I have to say this year has been my favorite high school year yet and I just completed my sophomore year. For my main subjects, I took Challenge I with an awesome teacher named Dawn Knott. Besides having a cool name, she was extremely patient with my class. I was one of seven students and the rest were boys. To make it worse, they were all (excepting one) over six feet to my astonishing five three and a quarter. As I recently told my dad, when you're as short as I am, you know exactly how tall you are since you claim every centimeter. Anyway, I'm getting sidetracked. My subjects included Latin, Physical Science, Literature, and Debate to name the subjects we did both semesters.

One of my other favorites was Drama, which we did first semester. We read Shakespeare's Taming of the Shrew and for our assignment, we acted the last act of the play where the shrew is finally tamed. If you must know, I was the shrew, Katherine, and got to memorize and give a three minute speech. My mom said she's going to post the video she got of it but I'll try and talk her out of it. It's actually quite funny. Outside of Challenge, I took Chemistry and Algebra.

As for my musical studies, I have been continuing my harp and loving every minute of it. My cousin even asked me to play in her wedding!!!! Christina will be playing her viola with me. In total, we probably have an hour and half worth of music. I asked my cousin some details about where it would be and it's going to be over a lake. When I told my teacher, she started laughing and said I will be getting quite an experience for my first wedding. If it's windy, the sound will be blown away and the humidity will change the tuning. Needless to say, I have a couple things to work out with my cousin before the rehearsal.

Anyway, I am looking forward to my summer and have many plans before Challenge II starts in September.

Oh! I just remembered! I'm taking Driver's Ed. in June at the high school down the road. I'm so excited. I will be taking it with two of my friends so that will make it fun. Okay, I'm done now. :) We'll write more next year!