Days 5 & 6: the return of Daddy March 7, 2008
Posted by spacemom in : Parenting 101 , 2 commentsYesterday was Day 5. It was a long day. We got out of the house in a timely fashion. I even got Luna to daycare early. Then I got in the office and got overwhelmed by the sheer amount of work to be done. Time to do a break down of tasks! 
Oh wait, I’ve done that recently!
We had a team meeting at 11, so I got what I could get done in the morning, testing new code for the detector housing heater turn off and other fun things. The team meeting ran until 12:30, followed by a quick lunch at my desk and then it was time for temple school.
Normally, Jay works from home on Thursdays. This way, he picks Soleil up from school and drives her to temple school. Then he goes to the library and works some more (thank you for free wi-fi!).
I was not so lucky. I drove into work because I had to take Luna to her daycare anyway. Then I drove 11 miles back home to get Soleil from school. 5 miles to the Temple. I met with a friend. Then I drove 6 miles back to get Luna and met another friend for dinner and her daughter.
Whew!
I got a text on my phone this morning. Jay is back in the country. We spoke for a few minutes. He should be landing about..oh…now! (10:30EST) and he’ll be at the office in about 1 hour!
We survived!
Now we just have survive until March 20! The deadline for the Chandra proposals! Jay will be working hard on those!
Day 4: Meet the Space Family March 6, 2008
Posted by spacemom in : Parenting 101 , 2 commentsOkay- The title works better with our real name there, but hey, Not going there!
We watched Meet the Robinsons tonight. Very nice. I enjoyed it, although the scene with the peanut allergy freaked Soleil as she has a friend with a peanut allergy.
Luna ran away the first part of the movie. I remember that Soleil went through this phase of being afraid of the movies. It will settle out. I know it will.
All in all, we had a great day/night yesterday. Jay switched his flights a day early. He’ll be home Friday morning instead of Saturday! Yippie!
This weekend is Girl Scout central. We have Girl Scout Shabbot on Saturday, Girl Scout Sunday on Sunday, and our meeting and ceremony for the winter on Sunday afternoon. But we will get it all done! I know it!
Day 3: The scream of the Nazgul March 4, 2008
Posted by spacemom in : Parenting 101 , 5 commentsIf you have seen Lord of the Rings, you know what a Nazgul is. Tonight, Luna was one.
I tried to send them towards bed early. They were given a time to get jammies on so we could chose a TV show. They asked to play longer. Fine with me! So I set up the timer, warned them when it was getting close to zero and let them play.
Then Luna lost it. She didn’t want to have snack, books and bed. She wanted to watch TV. She knew they made the choice not to watch it. Sigh. Then she screamed because she didn’t want snack. Then she wanted a different book than Soleil. Then she screamed because I used the Superman toothpaste instead of the Princess toothpaste. Not that we HAVE Princess toothpaste. Apparently, that’s at the store. But she wanted it. And then she screamed because she got a blue flosser instead of a red flosser.
I finally got her in bed at 8:25. And THEN the fun began. She started sobbing for Daddy. Daddy daddy daddy daddy. Screw mommy, just want daddy. I stayed very calm during all of this. In part of my mind, I feel that we baby her too much. She is 3.5. She should be able to not need someone with her. Of course when Daddy is gone, it throws her into a panic, so she doesn’t sleep as well. So of course I need to give her more attention. But of course Soleil more attention. Which is why Luna finally feel asleep at 9:50 and Soleil is watching the Vancouver vs Colorado hockey game with me.
I made lunches at 10. Put the garbage and recycling out at 10:15. I am exhausted.
How do you single parents do it? Or parents who have the partner travel a great deal? HOW?
Day 2: I’m F*cked March 3, 2008
Posted by spacemom in : Life...otherwise, Parenting 101 , 2 commentsDay 2 did not go as well as the start of this trip. Fortunately, the kids have school for the rest of this trip!
Mondays are home with mom days. At 2 am, Luna came in and told me she was lonely. She fell asleep quickly, but then snored all night..and stole the covers… Grrrr At 7, Soleil came in and the PBS love fest began. They watched TV until my alarm went off. I showered, fought with Luna over what she was wearing. She currently has 2 dresses she loves. She wants to wear these EVERY SINGLE DAY!!! UGH
Finally, we’re all dressed, fed and the girls run off to do art work while I am trying to herd them for gymnastics. Needless to say, we were VERY late to gymnastics. Sigh.
After that, we cleaned up our mess so our cleaner can actually clean tomorrow. This took an hour. Oy!
Then we had lunch and Luna’s ear appointment. As a baby, When I started this blog, Luna had to get ear tubes after 6 months of ear infections. At that point, she had hearing loss in one ear. Lovely. In the past year, she’s often asking us to repeat ourselves. It worried me. We met with my ped and the tests showed her hearing looked okay, but maybe her adenoids were causing problems. So in to the otolarengologist. Great. So we went. Today. Of course her hearing is absolutely perfect and there’s no sign of fluid in her ears. The doctor talked to us and after a quick discussion, we decided to check the adenoids. They are blocking her nasal passages by 90%. And this is when she doesn’t have a cold. It’s entirely possible that when she has a cold, it affects her hearing. It also explains why the child snores like a lumberjack. We could have them removed, but since they normally shrink after the child is 5, I don’t want to put her through surgery. Sigh
Of course, Soleil complained the ENTIRE VISIT. I swear if I heard "I’m hungry" one more time I was ready to toss her through a wall! And we had lunch RIGHT BEFORE we went! UGH! We already had "consequences" for being snotty to me this morning, so I was running out of options.
We did have a good time adding another layer onto the fort, but it was tough. My back is sore and all of this snow lifting is a pain on my back. We had a snow ball fight and had fun, but then the girls started demanding. I hate when that happens because I get so upset with the I want I want I wants
We managed to get ready for swimming, but we were running late (again!) and I thought we would only be 1 minute late, but no, we hit a traffic jam caused by an accident and were 10 minutes late. Grrrrr. So I had no time to work out myself.
The one redeeming part of today is that I have a set of sisters who are watching the girls for 2 hours while I am sitting less than a mile from home at Starbucks. I need the calm…..
And wtf is up with my fav bloggers going away? First Figlet, now Mrs. Figby? I am so sad!!!!
Editted with: HEY! I won the Leapster backpack on ebay! Woot! I couldn’t find it anywhere. It was "out of stock" at every online retailer!
Day 1: In which we do pretty damn well March 2, 2008
Posted by spacemom in : Parenting 101 , add a comment(this post is backdated to keep the chronology correct)
Last night, Jay flew to Sunny Santiago Chile. He has a meeting on Star formation down there. When the meeting came up, he mentioned it to me in passing. I told him to GO. He thought about it and it turns out that he was accepted to give a talk. This is good. He keeps deprecating himself on his career, but I see that he is becoming more and more called upon in his field. He’s been great for the past 6 years, limiting the meetings he’s gone to, but now it is okay for him to get out more. The girls are older and while 3 is still young, I know that Luna will come around.
This is a monumental trip, however. This is the longest trip (7 days) that he will have been gone and I am the single parent. We’ve always had a grandparent or pair come and stay for at least part of his long trips. This is the first long one without help.
Day 1 went well. The bedtime on day 0 went great, but I still didn’t sleep well. I never sleep well at first. And then I don’t sleep well when he returns. Go figure. We have friends visit in the morning, we played in the snow and made a snow fort with a styrofoam cooler. (yes, we have THAT much snow). The cooler made our blocks. The fort is currently 3 levels high. (we did 2 levels on Sunday). Then we ran out to get our pottery that Soleil and I painted last week. Soleil decided to paint a piggy bank for Luna because Luna didn’t have one. It came out great!
We had an early dinner and then printed out coloring sheets from the Internet and we took them to Friendly’s for ice cream. The wait at our Friendly’s is terrible, so I figured the coloring sheets would help. It did!
So day one ends, and we survive!
A plea! February 29, 2008
Posted by spacemom in : Parenting 101 , 3 commentsHave you found THIS in a store near you? I can’t find it anywhere.
Anyone? Anyone?
The long dark tea-time of the soul* February 7, 2008
Posted by spacemom in : Life...otherwise, Depression, Parenting 101 , 5 commentsYesterday Soleil had her 6 month checkup at the dentist. She LOVES the dentist. This visit was good and bad and left me feeling inadequate as a parent.
Hence, the title of this post. Shall we investigate my soul right now? Oh joy! Sit back and join me!
THE GOOD:
Soleil went right into the dentist chair, after taking her shoes off because we don’t put our shoes on furniture, and I spoke to the hygienist. "She’s been having pain down here, with this tooth in particular. It is at a bad angle and I swear it was not like that 2 weeks ago. I think her adult tooth is pushing it, but it isn’t loose." The hygienist looked and agreed with me that the adult tooth is pushing up. It is only a matter of time. In the meanwhile, a little Tylenol will help her with the pain. Then Soleil looked up and said "Mom, Please go to the waiting room. I can do this alone. I am in Kindergarten you know."
This is not the first time my sweet little one has asserted her independence. However, this one floored me. I felt so…unneeded. Mom is not needed. Not Mommy, Mom was not needed. I sat down with a copy of Real Simple and watched from the waiting room as my child went on to talk to the hygienist. To be honest, I wasn’t sure how I felt. It was bittersweet. She didn’t need me there. She wasn’t rejecting me, she was just trying to show that she could do this on her own. She is very independent this way. I expect to buy a set of walky-talkies this year to let them play in the yard more and we will communicate via the walky-talkies. She heads to the restroom herself in restaurants. She insists that she can do things that I worry about. I try to let go…within reason. She is a strong, confident human being. I respect that and I feel it is our job as parents to foster these emotions. But it doesn’t mean that I don’t feel the sting when she walks away.
THE BAD
2 cavities. Yes, 2! Horrible horrible news in my opinion. This is all my fault. You see, she was always a terrible sleeper. She needed her bottle to fall asleep. We didn’t make her give up her bottle until she was (gasp, hang my head in shame…) three. Her sister was born when she was 2, so we had already moved to sippies then. But for nighttime, she needed her milk. She needed the primal comfort of sucking. So we let her keep the bottle. To take it away and then let her baby sister have a bottle, that would have been cruel. So we waited. And waited. After our first trip to Hawai’i with the girls, she traded it in for a magnifying glass. Instead of a bottle of milk, she took a sippy of milk to bed. This tradition continued until last night. I finally said ENOUGH! I am terrified that because I am soft hearted I let the milk sit on her teeth all night and this is why she has 2 cavities. Sigh.
So, am I a good parent? Or a bad parent? Should I let my 5.5 year old foster her independence, but take away the milk sippy at night? (it’s now a water sippy, a change she took in stride, Luna did not handle the change very well)
In Dire Straits… November 18, 2007
Posted by spacemom in : Parenting 101 , 4 commentsWhoops, I was playing some Dire Straits… And playing "Money for Nothing"….. And then the line came on about "the Little Faggot"… Um, Should I let my kids listen this? And when they ask, How do I explain "faggot" and how these sorts of taunts are not ok…? Sigh, Parenting sucks sometimes…
Help November 12, 2007
Posted by spacemom in : Parenting 101 , 3 commentsI am trapped with two small children who think that "Barbie as the Island Princess" is da bomb.
I can’t handle the music any more..They can’t hold a tune (comes from their father)
Must get starbucks
What’s your style? November 6, 2007
Posted by spacemom in : Parenting 101 , 4 commentsChicagoMama had a great post about her parenting style. I liked this post and I promised to appropriate it. It is funny how CM and I differ!
- I push politeness. I do my best, but I forget sometimes. I use Please and Thank you with my husband and children. I do my best to explain that we need manners. As far as I can tell, we have done pretty well on this front. I still have the "climbing on the furniture" issue… Sigh
- we encourage television. I know, we are horrible modern parents, right? But…but…both Jay and I learned a great deal from TV. We both watched shows that are now on discovery channel. We both retained factoids from shows like this. We would watch these and go to the library and learn more. The girls will watch a show and then play act it. I like to see this kind of imagination. Take an idea and expand on it. We discuss what we watch on TV. My most often repeated phrase during TV is "nope, we aren’t buying that". Sure, they get exposure to toys that they would otherwise not see, but I can’t prevent them from seeing the world forever. So let them see it now, with the explanations of what manipulation is.
- We sadly encourage free thought. I say sadly because it means that we get into minor power struggles. Teaching respect while teaching independence and standing for what you mean is a tough line to toe. But we are doing it. I want my girls to have the balls to stand up and say "This is wrong. I will not allow this to happen" while doing it with respect. This is so hard. Some days I just want them to listen and do what I ask….
- Lack of cleaning gene. I failed to get the cleaning gene. I failed to pass this on to my children. Last night, Soleil lost it when I pulled back her sheets… Why? Because she had made her bed! And she didn’t want to have to make it again (as in EVER) sigh… Luna’s room is just as bad
- toys? Ha! I try to eliminate some, but I don’t go as crazy as I could. We have 2 leap pad books and will have 2 leapsters in the house. The girls love these toys, as much as they love books. We don’t go crazy with educational toys, but we also don’t discourage them. I originally thought I would do without plastic toys, but I found that you can have a healthy mix.
- I was surprised to discover we don’t punish much. The two biggest things that we use are removal of TV privileges and quiet time. We will ask the offender to go to their room and calm down so we can talk. Not letting TV be watched is a huge issue for the girls. We don’t use time outs (we limit what we do use), we encourage discussion, we don’t hit.
- In the same vein, I encourage the girls to work it out. A common phrase in my house is "So? Why are you telling me what she did? Go tell her how you feel!" I make them discuss their feelings with each other. I refuse to be a referee. If I wanted to be a ref, I would sharpen my skates and apply to the local league.
- I believe strongly in the "try out and find the answer" parenting. As long as it isn’t going to hurt anyone, I allow for experimentation. So far, so good. We have the most interesting dinner discussions. And we have a great deal of "..and if this breaks, who’s fault is it?"
- Everything is fair game for discussion. Imagine the day that Jay went to Elie Wiesel’s talk. They now know that Wiesel spent time in a "camp" for Jews that was created by a man who was not nice. A man who wanted to run the world his way. A man who hated Jews just because they were Jewish. I am not going to explain Auschwitz with them today. But they have a right to learn about the evils of the world.
I think that sums up the space parenting…
