the OTHER mother

Poem for Mommy

Over on the WITS blog, the poem of the day is a love poem from a child to her mom.

PLAY Power

Carrie has had pneumonia (again!) all week, and she refuses to take her antibiotics.  She is improving, according to Dr. Alex, but it's been a long week. We've watched too much television in Grrrlville.
Nevertheless I've been exciting to hear and read these great news stories about the power of creative play. 

Details from the Retreat

Marcia and I enjoyed our time away from home, routine, and responsibility very much.  We did phone the brave grandparents twice a day, but we didn't fret or cry or anything too excessive.  Here are a few of the details that I thought I'd like to capture while I'm still able to remember them.

• We left our watches at home.
• We wrote in our journals. This is a good habit from the past that we'd both lost completely in recent years.
• We did some check-in art/writing exercises to catch up with one another.  Here's one of them.  Another one was a bit like this, only our group was just the two of us.  We used to do this kind of retreat frequently before our children were born.  Now that we have a lot less time to talk and plan, we need these conversations even more.  And yet we have had them a lot less often.
• We talked. We listened.
• We cast runes to help us contemplate the future.
• We took long walks on the beach.  On Thursday we saw hundreds of sailboats  huddled around the coast.  On Friday we saw hundreds of butterflies skirting around the border where land meets sea.  Was there any relationship between these two sightings?
• You may be ready to launch into season 5 of The L Word, but as usual we are way behind.  We had fun watching the first 3 episodes of season 4.  More on this topic will follow later this week, including a poll or survey. Maybe.
• Marcia found six amazing seashells.  The cat likes batting them across the hardwood floors.
• We were happy and relieved be a family back together when we got home.

Baby Loves Disco

Does your tyke live to do the hustle?

Baby Loves Disco might be coming to your area soon.

Okay, it's absurd, but the proceeds go to charity. 

Who's game?  (You know you want to try it, right?)

Question of the Day: Brand/New

What are your favorite brands of children's clothing?  Do you buy new, used, both?

Question of the Day: Nonfiction for Kids

Today I am fishing for book recommendations.  We have a nice collection of fictional picture books for Pearl and Carrie. Our collection leans toward imaginary adventures and talking animals.  We'd like to add some books for the summer that are either nonfiction or simply more realistic stories.  But they should be beautiful and well written, of course!

Pearl (age 3) likes dinosaurs, cars, trains, storytelling, and nature.  Carrie (age 1.5)  likes babies, animals, and life-skills such as cooking, cleaning, getting dressed, and gardening.

Three books that we already own that illustrate what I have in mind might be Flotsam by David Wiesner or Planting a Rainbow by Lois Ehlert or The Paperboy by Dav Pilkey.  If you have suggestions for our summer reading list, please let us know.

Pursuit of Happiness

It may seem to you via this blog that I am an upbeat person, and I usually am, but the truth is that I have a life-long relationship with depression.  I am not always depressed, but I perceive my life as a constant struggle with it.  Depression never seems very far away.  For me, happiness has been one of those fairly elusive things.  I often ask myself, what makes happy people happy?  I have also wondered if happy people can understand depression, and conversely, if those people who have "been there" can conceive of true happiness. 

As I parent, I find still more to fret over. Will my tendency toward depression affect my children?  What have I learned (if anything) about creating happiness?  Are there ways that I might help Pearl and Carrie become happier, both in the present and in the future?

Recently I discovered "The Childhood Roots of Adult Happiness" by Christine Carter on the website of The Greater Good Science Center at Berkeley.  They publish extremely readable articles based on scientific research.  From Carter's article, I take away a number of ideas that I want to remember and practice in our family.

• "Happiness certainly comes to some people more easily than it does others, but nature does not trump nurture when it comes to well-being. Only about half of a child’s overall level of happiness is determined by her genetic make-up."
• "The primary components of a happy life—positive feelings, flow and fulfillment, emotional intelligence and strong social bonds—are deeply intertwined. Experiencing and expressing positive emotion is at the heart of almost all love and friendship."
• an "important skill [that] parents teach children is how to deal with free-time and solitude in a way that promotes fulfillment and flow rather than loneliness and depression
• "Emotional intelligence and social competence are rooted in the parent-child bond. Studies show that when parents and caregivers pay close attention and respond to the emotional cues expressed by their children, children learn to regulate their emotions better."
• Parents can perceive "emotional expressions in their children—even anger and frustration—as opportunities to connect with and teach their children."

These passages are not meant as a summary but rather as ideas that struck me based on my personal experience.  I was surprised at how important Csikszentmihalyi's ideas about "flow" are to Carter's article.  I had read some of his work with great interest, but I don't think I had related it to parenting.  As always, your thoughts are welcome.

Question(s) of the Day

For obvious reasons, Marcia and I have been talking a lot about birthday parties.  A while back Marcia shared this website and our main goal has been to keep things simple and child-centered. Here are some questions for you.

1)  Did you (will you) have a big party celebrating your child's first birthday?

We had small family-only parties for Pearl and Carrie's first birthdays because the birthday is really more for the family.  Our one-year-olds didn't know what birthdays were yet.  We did have a cake and we did sing happy birthday.  We had a few gifts.  But that was it.  I've read poll results, though, that indicate that many  families do bigger celebrations for the first birthday than the second or third. I know that some cultures emphasize birthday #1. 

2)  Have you ever been to a birthday party that you considered over-the-top?

I haven't.  Not yet, anyway.  Can't wait to read your answers though.

3)  Have you ever requested "no gifts" for a child's birthday party?

Marcia really wanted to add this phrase to our invitations, but I was not so sure. I would be interested in your ideas about birthdays.  Please sound off.

Be Mine

For some reason, I'm a believer in Valentines that are home made. It seems we all have these certain key issues on which we are purists.  I don't do much home made cooking, and I take shortcuts left and right just like everyone, but so far I haven't sent Pearl to school with store-bought valentine cards. Maybe if Pixar paid us rather than the reverse then I would reconsider?

This year we made potato prints.  It doesn't take too much craftiness.  You cut a potato in half and carve a heart into each half.  Here are some clearer instructions.

Pearl got tired of stamping the papers after a while.  Marcia and I did more stamping than she did, truth be told.  But Pearl did select which card to give to each of her 25 classmates.  I thought that was cool.

Mini Kvetches

There are lots of annoying things that don't warrant a rant but definitely deserve an airing in public.  I will start that list.  Your mission, if you choose to accept it, is to add your own kvetch (complaint) in the comment section below.

1. Over-the-counter medicines that are labeled INFANT, but have warnings on them saying: do not give to children under 2 without consulting your doctor.
2. At our pharmacy, the label on a prescription drug reads like this:  Give one teaspoon to "Pearl" twice daily.  Why are there quotation marks around my daughter's name?
3. It irritates me that children's toys are wired into their packages so tightly that I can't remove them without tools. In a Consumer Reports study, they found that some packages required up to 15 minutes for an adult to undo.
4. Do car seats really have to be so complicated?
5. Your turn....

Question of the Day

Does your family read your blog? 

Show and Tell

We did the Hanukkah presentation at Pearl's school without any obvious disasters.  Potato latkes are not very delicious cold, but either the children are very polite or the addition of powdered sugar and apple sauce made up for shortcomings of the soggy pancakes. 

Preparing for the presentation, it occurred to me numerous times how the Hanukkah story is quite dull and obscure compared to the tales of Santa Claus, Rudolph the red-nose, or baby Jesus.  Oh well, right?

We got to the classroom ten minutes before our program was due to begin, and Pearl didn't see us.  It was interesting to watch her without her knowledge.  Marcia says that when she has come in to help, Pearl acts "babyish," whining and asking to sit in her lap.  Granted, she is the youngest in a large multi-age classroom, but the teachers have assured her that this is not her behavior, usually.  That, apparently, is true.  She seemed pretty self-sufficient working on a puzzle and returning it to its place on the shelf when she'd finished.

When she did finally notice us, she beamed at us!  I wasn't expecting that and it was very touching.  After the presentation ended, and everyone had eaten their snack, they did show and tell.  In this photo, Pearl is showing everyone her favorite menorah. 

Time Out

I thought that spanking was "history," something from the dark ages that got left behind in the old one room school house.  Last week I read an article about spanking claiming that although there is not a single parenting authority in the U.S. who condones spanking as a disciplinary measure, almost 30% of parents say they do it regularly.  When I read this statistic,  I was very surprised.  We are a non-spanking family.

Many years ago I taught preschool, and the key phrase that I learned then and invoke every day now is: Use your words.

Toddlers want to communicate with us, but they don't know very many words yet, and it's often more expedient for them to grab a toy out of another kid's hands than to formulate a question and then ask, Can I play with that truck after you're finished with it?  And really, they can only come up with the sentences they need, if you model them. 

Everything toddlers learn is through copying and imitation.  If a 2-year-old roars NOOOOOO, she might really want to say: "please move away" or "I want that carrot stick."  But she has to be taught the right phrases before she uses them, and her only way to learn is through imitation. So in our house Marcia and I often have coversations with each other that are solely to for provide Pearl the phrases that will help her express her needs, feelings, and ideas.

I think probably the people who perpetuate the spanking also remember being spanked as children, and they do it without really questioning it.  The problem with spanking is that you are modeling a behavior that you would actually punish if your child imitated it.  In other words, if Pearl couldn't get Carrie to hand over her cookie and she hit her, that would be inappropriate.  We would prefer that she use her words.  Instead of hiting, we use words, and in more serious cases, consequences such as denial of a toy or brief isolation, to teach her safe and respectful ways to work and play with others.

Time Outs were not around when Marcia and I were kids, and we've had to do our fair share of research.  We read several books and watched a video on the topic.  Marcia is the expert, really, and I often defer to her in planning our response to issues as they come up.  Whining has been one of the issues.  It's not dangerous--not directly, anyway--but we wanted to respond to Pearl's whining as a team, consistently. 

So far Time Outs have worked with Pearl. At first (we started them the day Carrie came home from the hospital) we gave several of them a day, but we now can go for a week or two without them.  Our time outs consist of 10 minutes in a room away from the family. 

In a more pre-emptive mode, we have also used the "time in" approach with her.  This is the opposite of the "time out."  Instead of isolating the child after they have made a mistake, you snuggle, cuddle, and hug them for a few minutes before things get out-of-hand.  Pearl can be stubborn and willful.  Sometimes, though, she will actually request a "time in."  This seems ideal--to teach her to identify her need for attention and get it in a positive way, using her words.

One Wish

If you could grant someone (not yourself) one wish, who and what would it be?

{Source: from The Big Question blog}

(Love to) Hate List

I was "tagged" by my friends at Green Parenting (via Izzy Mom, It Feels Kinda Good) while I was away on vacation and so I missed it completely. Now that I have noticed the tag, I feel like I want to participate.  Here's the meme: make a list of 20 things you hate. 

I must confess up front that this idea makes me a little uncomfortable. I grew up in one of those homes where, if you didn't have something nice to say, you weren't supposed to say it.  Repression was my friend. So the thought of posting 20 complaints seems extravagant. 

At the same time, perhaps I am a little worried about "opening the floodgates."  I like to think of this blog as a positive touchstone for people in similar circumstances to ours.  I also like to think that other lesbian parents or parents-to-be would find this blog reassuring. What if The Other Mother quickly morphed into a RANT blog?  Enough of my silliness though.  Let's begin.

1. I hate it when people stand in front of the refrigerator with the door open for a very long time.
2. I hate it when people give me advice when I never asked for any.
3. I hate spam.
4. I hate to trip or stumble, even if I don't fall and even if nobody sees me do it.
5. I hate being fat, and at the same time I also hate watching what I eat.
6. I hate worrying and wish that I didn't worry so much.  What a waste of time!
7. I hate tapioca.
8. I hate having to assemble baby gear--exersaucers, bouncy seats, cribs, bassinets, etc.  You name it; I hate it.  Even the boxes that say NO ASSEMBLY REQUIRED are a pain!
9. I hate how difficult it is to extract the toys from their packages.
10. I hate missing my dog Jake.  Loss stays hard for a long, long time.
11. I hate it when my children suffer, and there's nothing I can do to help.
12. I hate the way people claim to be religious and godly in order to justify their hateful, bigoted behavior.
13. I hate war.  It's hard for me to understand why it still exists.  Isn't there a better way to solve problems?
14. I hate the way the news shows on television only tell about disasters, murders, and crimes.
15. I hate business jargon.  Not my own of course, just other people's.  Phrases such as buy in, 360 evaluation, hacks and networking.  Just shoot me.
16. I hate ice cream.  Joke!  Joke! A magenta herring to make sure you're still paying attention.
17. I hate it when people say: I hate blogs.  How can you categorically hate all blogs?  What Scrooges.
18. I hate it when I lose things.
19. I hate ice and freezing cold weather.  Guess that's why I live in Houston.
20. I hate it when I don't get comments on my blog!

Your turn.  Let her rip!

Are You Ready for Children?

This is one of those emails that goes around and around and around.  Maybe I've hit a low point or something, but it really made me laugh.

Are You Ready for Children?

Do the following to prepare yourself or find out if
you're incompatible:

Mess Test: Smear peanut butter on the sofa and
curtains. Now rub your hands in the wet flowerbed and
rub on the walls. Cover the stains with crayons. Place
a fish stick behind the couch and leave it there all
summer.

Toy Test: Obtain a 55-gallon box of Legos. (If Legos
are not available, you may substitute roofing tacks or
broken bottles.) Have a friend spread them all over
the house. Put on a blindfold. Try to walk to the
bathroom or kitchen. Do not scream. (This could wake a child at night.)

Grocery Store Test: Borrow one or two small animals
(goats are best) and take them with you as you shop at
the grocery store. Always keep them in sight and pay
for anything they eat or damage.

Dressing Test: Obtain one large, unhappy, live
octopus. Stuff into a small net bag making sure that
all arms stay inside.

Feeding Test: Obtain a large plastic milk jug. Fill
halfway with water. Suspend from the ceiling with a
stout cord. Start the jug swinging. Try to insert
spoonfuls of soggy cereal (such as Fruit Loops or
Cheerios) into the mouth of the jug, while pretending
to be an airplane. Now dump the contents of the jug on
the floor.

Night Test: Prepare by obtaining a small cloth bag and
fill it with 8 - 12 pounds of sand. Soak it thoroughly
in water. At 8:00 PM begin to waltz and hum with the
bag until 9:00 PM. Lay down your bag and set your
alarm for 10:00 PM. Get up, pick up your bag, and sing
every song you have ever heard. Make up about a dozen
more and sing these too until 4:00 AM. Set alarm for
5:00 AM. Get up and make breakfast. Keep this up for 5
years. Look cheerful.

Physical Test: Obtain a large beanbag chair
and attach it to the front of your clothes. Leave it
there for 9 months. Now remove 10 of the beans.

Social Test: Have some important family members or
people from work come to your home to visit. When they
show up, turn the TV and stereo on full blast. Start a
self-propelled lawn mower in the front room and let it
careen around the house at random. Now try to
graciously entertain and converse with your guests.

Final Assignment: Find a couple who already has a
small child. Lecture them on how they can improve
their discipline, patience, tolerance, toilet
training, and child's table manners. Suggest many ways
they can improve. Emphasize to them that they should
never allow their children to run riot.

Enjoy this experience. It will be the last time you
will have all the answers

Details from our Weekend

• Yes, friends, crazy Jojo (Carrie) can sit and twist and shout.  She is a tiny, human tumbleweed, rolling across the prairie of our lives.  And oh, what a screamer!
• Pearl has learned the names of at least 60 of the trains from Thomas the Tank Engine from the toys, the books, and the videos.  Marcia has decided that as long as Pearl is--at this developmental moment--capable of memorizing so much stuff so fast that she's going to try teaching her something useful, such as the name of all the birds.  Or Spanish.  Go Mommy go Pearl go!
• We have the most wonderful social worker helping us with our adoption, and the home visit went well last Friday. The craziest moment of the morning was when Carrie had just gotten up from her nap.  Marcia had taken Pearl to go look for a panda bear (emergency!), and I was holding Carrie in my lap, and I sneezed.  The loud sound scared her so much that she began to sob.  And when the only face she could see was the social worker's (I held her facing out), she began to shed huge, marble-sized tears.  As soon as she saw Marcia return, however, all was well.  Just in the past week, Carrie has figured out that some people are strangers.
• We went to a pride party Saturday night.  It was fun, and we also saw what we thought to be a glimpse into the future.  Among new (to her) folks, Pearl usually sticks close to Mommy and Baba.  At this party, however, she met a 3 year old girl and the two of them played with dolls and a doll house for 2 hours.  Pearl didn't even stop to eat dinner.  The 8 year old girls were so great with the younger ones, even letting them dance to music with them.  At one point, Marcia interrupted the dancing to see if Pearl needed a potty break.  Pearl gave her an adamant NO and waved her out the room!
• Lately I have gotten addicted to a new (to me) computer game.  If you like word games such as Scrabble or Boggle, do NOT click on the link for Babble.  You have been warned.
  
• Inspired by Shannon, I have been trying to cook more lately.  As usual, my intentions are much more impressive than the reality, but I have been serving up whole grains, vegetables, and other good foods when possible.  All yummy too, I might.
• We started a modified cry-it-out routine with Carrie about 10 days ago, and to our great surprise she and we are all doing well with that.  She's slept until at least 4 a.m. most nights since then.  A light at end of the tunnel of sleeplessness?  We shall see.
• Happy Pride!  Have a great week.

Question of the Day: Waste of Cash

Part of the having-a-baby process seems to inevitably involve a season of acquisition.  The parenting books recommend a vast array of STUFF, and in the absence of not knowing what to do, it is easy to buy things as a means of feeling prepared.  Many friends tell tales of being overwhelmed completely by their first visit to Babies-r-Us or similar retail merchants. Even if you're determined to limit the amount of plastic that enters your nursery, it can be a hard line to maintain.

Which baby gear or gizmo that you purchased turned out to be the greatest waste of your hard-earned moolah?

TV or NOT TV, That is the Question

I read (not watched) something about national turn off your television week.  The question of television for babies and toddlers is an interesting issue, one that I've thought about a lot, and now seemed a perfect time to get your ideas on the topic.

Many of our parenting friends take the anti-television point-of-view, and while I can see the sense in their reasoning, I tend to feel positive about the role of TV in Pearl's life thus far.  I think Marcia feels less positive about television.  Interestingly (at least to me), she watches TV and I don't.  Hmmmmm.

1,  Our approach has been to introduce tv almost exclusively through video.  Pearl's age group (she's 25 months old) learns through repetition, and the best way to achieve that is by showing videos.

2,  We limit the amount of TV to 1 hour a day.  Some days she doesn't watch anything on the television.

3,  We try to choose age-appropriate material that reinforces the things we're already working on with her. 

4.  We watch the show with her the first time so that we can help her make connections between the content of the stories and the events of our own world. 

5.  We've tried to model for Pearl creative ways to integrate books, TV shows, stuffed animals, etc. into her play.  Last week we played doctor's office.  The doctor was our pediatrician, Doctor Alex, and the patients were Pearl, Carrie, Curious George (he eats a puzzle piece in one book), and Wags the Dog (from the Wiggles).  Each patient came into the examination room, one at a time, and was treated.  (My favorite one was that Wags Dog ate something unusual that gave him a tummy ache.  It turned out to be CAT food!)

That's our strategy.  We started out with Baby Einstein and moved on to Sesame Street.  Usually at any given time she is especially interested in one show, but she moves on to something different every few weeks. 

Using this approach, I do think Pearl has gotten powerful reiteration in the areas of vocabulary, sentence building, and repetition-based learning, such as counting, ABC's, colors, for example. 

However, I must also agree that there are a number of the anti-TV arguments that are very compelling.  The commercialism of absolutely everything is truly disheartening.  The reality that bandaids cost $1 and bandaids with cartoon characters on them cost $2 and that your child may well throw a tantrum in the store in order to help you make the *right* decision.  We haven't had tantrums thus far, but I can understand why parents fear their children's response to the compelling power of the media imagery. 

Clearly we all know that the TV can not be a substitute for teacher, parent, or caretaker. Feel free to weigh in on this one.  Your turn.

Question of the Day: Togs

Tonight I've done a whole lot of laundry which is probably why I'm thinking about clothes. Do you have a philosophy behind the way you dress your children? What generalizations could you make about their wardrobes?  Are there certain types of clothing that are not okay for your kids to wear?

Friday Poetry Blogging

I know a good idea when I steal it. Jo(e) started posting a poem to her blog every Friday.  I think that's really cool.  Here's one from the "Oldie but Goodie" category.  I have enjoyed it for many years, but now that I am a parent, it emits new and ominous vibes.

This be the Verse

They fuck you up, your mum and dad. They may not mean to, but they do. They fill you with the faults they had And add some extra, just for you. But they were fucked up in their turn By fools in old-style hats and coats, Who half the time were soppy-stern And half at one another's throats. Man hands on misery to man. It deepens like a coastal shelf. Get out as early as you can, And don't have any kids yourself. Philip Larkin

The Toddler Rules of Possession

I found this while bopping around on the web....

1. If I like it, it's mine.

2. If it's in my hand, it's mine.

3. If I can take it from you, it's mine.

4. If I had it a little while ago, it's mine.

5. If it's mine, it must NEVER appear to be yours in any way.

6. If I'm doing or building something, all the pieces are mine.

7. If it looks just like mine, it is mine.

8. If I saw it first, it's mine.

9. If you are playing with something and you put it down, it automatically becomes mine.

10. If it's broken, it's yours.