parenting

Loving Motherhood

Jan 11 2012

It is so easy to complain about being a mother; not enough sleep, whiny kids and no time to yourself. But today I am not going to do that. Inspired by Mama Kat’s Writers Workshop this week, here are the things that make me love being a mother.

Snuggle time – The time right after my kids wake up from either the night or nap and are warm and snuggly. It just melts my heart to hold them until they wake up and wiggle away.
Comfort me – When my child looks at me with tears in their eyes with a look that says you are the only one in the world that can make their hurt go away.
Look of wonder – I love to watch their faces when they see something new for the first time; that look of wonder at the unknown and then the joy of the discovery.
I understand – There is something amazing about watching my children connect the dots in their mind and figure something out. I can see it in their eyes.
Reaching for a hand – Even Jack will still reach out to hold my hand as we are walking along. It reminds me that even though he is getting older he still needs me.
Look at what I found – I have been shown so many surprises. Worms, robots built from Legos, sticks or leaves. These are life’s real treasures.
Family movie night – We have so many things that pull us in different directions so we make it a point to have regular quiet family time. The boys love movie night, complete with special popcorn.

What are the things you love about being a parent?

10 Must Haves for New Moms

Oct 24 2011

As a new mom it is so helpful to hear from seasoned moms on their favorite items. Here is my list of must haves.

1. Ergo – This is one of my favorite things and I only wish I would have had it for Jack. It is a front- or back-pack that has a waist strap to take the pressure off of your shoulders. I still haul Will, all 33 pounds of him, around in it.

2. Good umbrella stroller – We bit the bullet after Jack was born and invested in a good quality umbrella stroller and almost seven years later it is still going strong. They can be a bit pricey for the good ones, but this will be your most used stroller. Ours has been on and off many airplanes and miles at the mall, and around town. If you do buy a good one and plan to travel with it, also get a travel bag, then the bag gets bet up and not the stroller.

3. Good jogging stroller – While we are talking about strollers, a good jogging stroller is a must too. This is the one I use around the house going on walks and to the bus stop in the rain and snow. There are all different kinds, so be sure and go try them out.

4. Swing – When my boys were little they wouldn’t nap in their cribs. They would nap in the fancy-pants swing that goes side to side and front and back. We discovered this on our first overnight stay at Children’s Hospital. The nurse brought it in and Jack went right to sleep. Jim had one for Jack before we got back home.

5. Fisher Price Booster – There are all sorts of portable booster seats, but there is only one worth buying, the Fisher Price Healthy Care Booster seat. We have tested other ones and this is the only one that really grows with the kids. We have had one for over six years and are still using it. My sister uses one instead of having a big high chair at home.

6. Good backpack for a diaper bag – With Jack, I struggled with traditional diaper bags and backpacks trying to make them work for me. Eventually we ended up using an old backpack and it worked much better than all the other ones. Before Will was born I went and picked out a regular backpack from REI that had all the features I wanted. However the one thing that is really useful out of a typical diaper bag is the changing pad.

7. Bungee Baby Bouncer – When it comes to baby jumpers this is the one to get. It uses a bungee cord instead of a spring, so it is easier for the child to make it go. Both boys jumped to their hearts content. Will even jumped so much that he often fell asleep in it.

8. Books – Get yourself a stash of books, board books, picture books, paperback ones. I have books everywhere, in the car, diaper bag, playroom, their bedrooms, you get the idea. They like to have a variety, ones with real photos and others with drawings.

9. Bumbo – I wasn’t sure about this seat at first, but it is really helpful for the few months between when they can hold their head up and when they can sit up. Will needed to sit up as much as he could, because he was getting a flat spot on his head. This way he could sit up in the formed seat and be at the table with everyone.

10. Portable DVD player – This one is for when they are older, but if you plan on taking road trips or plane rides a DVD player is a must. It has also helped in meetings or at dinners after the kids have eaten. Then Jim and I get to sit and actually enjoy our meal.

What are your top items that new moms need?

I am linking up with Monday Listicles at Northwest Mommy today. Check out other people’s new mom tips.

Filed Under: parenting Tagged With: bumbo, bungee baby bouncer, Ergo, Fisher Price Booster Seat, mom tools, Monday Listicles, portable DVD player 6 Comments

Finding the Time …

Oct 19 2011

I am having trouble finding the time. There just isn’t enough time in one day or one week to get it all done. How can I fit it all in?

I am having trouble finding the time to make Jim’s and my Halloween costumes. I just broke it to Jack that if we dressed up we will not match him and Will. His sweet response was “Then what will you be?” I said “I am not sure bud, it depends on the time.”

I need to make decorations, lists, reports, brownies and costumes (maybe more, but I can’t remember) for the Haunted Maze for this year’s elementary school fundraiser. I have a list so long that I haven’t even found the time to make the actual list, and I am not sure how it will all get done in the time we have left.

Where did the time go to take some fall photos of the boys? I wanted to participate in a fall photo link-up, but so far I don’t have the photos to match each week’s themes.

I am having trouble finding the time to make and return phone calls. I am sorry if you are on that list; I promise I will get to you and I am thinking of you.

Ditto with emails. You would think that I would be better with a smart phone, but I am not. I read the emails and if the reply is more than a couple sentences I decide to wait to do it from my computer and then they get lost. Molly, the book list is coming. I promise.

How do I find the time to watermark and migrate all of my old blog photos to Flickr and then link the photos on the site? This one is so overwhelming that I don’t even know where to start.

I am having trouble finding the time to fit in a family fun night for the October Badges of Fun project for FamilyFun magazine. Friday night soccer and Saturday night football are really getting in the way. Maybe we will end up with a Sunday night movie or something else.

When can I fit in researching the new storage server for our growing library of digital media? Our other one is getting full and I am afraid every time I add files that I am going to get an error saying that we have reach its capacity. It is time to upgrade and I think I know what I want, but since it is such a big purchase I need to be sure.

These are only some of the things floating around in my mind that I can’t find the time to do. And we haven’t even reached the holidays yet.

How do you find the time? How do you prioritize your to-do list?

Filed Under: Mom, parenting Tagged With: Badges of Fun, Disney FamilyFun Magazine, Flickr, Halloween, time management, to-do list 1 Comment

Little Sports Fans

Sep 28 2011

When the calendar turns to September that means Husky season is here and most Saturdays are filled with football watching either at Husky Stadium or on TV. We have been lucky enough to be in a group of season ticket-holders with our good friends Dana and Alan for the last nine years.

The boys have been going to games since they were months old, although I have my rules — no night games and no rainy games (because we have our fair share of those in Seattle.) Jim has proudly taught the boys the phrases “go Dawgs! Woof! Woof! Woof!” and “go Huskies!” and get them revved up for games with YouTube videos and GoBlawgs.com posts.

As infants, the boys just slept through most of the games or were happy being held. Once they could move around it became more difficult to keep them entertained for four quarters. And two-year-olds are a whole different story — wiggly, opinionated and right where Will is now.

It takes a backpack full of toys, books, food, and a row of empty seats to keep Will happy at the game. Luckily Husky stadium hasn’t been completely full and the bottom five rows of our section are usually unoccupied. Right now, our strategy is to head down to the open rows where we have more room and everyone has a better time. Unfortunately this is at the expense of spending time with the rest of our group but necessary right now, knowing that it won’t always be this way as the boys grow. Will plays cars and action figures for a while, and then trades them in for a snack and some books.

At halftime we usually try to head out to the Zone, a great tailgating area right behind the stadium. The boys can move around some more and Jim and I can get a beer. During the second half, both boys get to watch/play iPods. This way Jim and I actually get to enjoy the rest of the game.

If it happens to be an afternoon game and Will decides he wants to take a nap, I put him in the Ergo and walk back to the car or just around to get him some shut eye.

This is our sophisticated and time-tested strategy for how we make football games work with a six year old and a two year old. We work hard at it because he boys love going to games and it is good quality family time. Do you take your kids to sporting events?

Filed Under: Jackson, parenting, Sports, William Tagged With: football, GoBlawgs, Huskies, iPod, The Zone Leave a Comment

Badges of Fun – September

Sep 14 2011

We are continuing with the year-long Badges of Fun series from Disney’s FamilyFun Magazine, where each month has a theme for fun family activities. September’s badge is about learning something new to help get families back into school mode.

Our family chose to play with the alphabet and help Jack work on his word-building skills. At school they are working on filling in missing letters in the alphabet. We wanted to help him continue to hone these skills at home while exposing Will to more letters of the alphabet.

I started out my putting individual letters onto sticky notes and putting them on the wall, then mixing them up. Jack would then work on putting them in order. We had both upper and lower case letters in two different locations. But the sticky notes kept falling off the wall.

Version two included some wooden letters I recycled out of a letter puzzle, some sticky dots and a piece of poster board. The only problem with this one is that the dots are too sticky and make it harder for him to remove the letters. At least they weren’t falling on the floor – far from it.

For version three I want to make them magnetic or find something that is easier to stick and unstick. We are going to use them to help Jack spell small words and have Will learn to identify letters. Will likes to mimic what his brother is doing and will pretend to spell or sound words out.

These exercises have been a fun way to get everyone in back-to-school mode. Are you participating in Badges of Fun? What activities has your family been doing?

Filed Under: Jackson, parenting, William Tagged With: alphabet, Badges of Fun, Disney FamilyFun Magazine 7 Comments

Good Sports

Aug 10 2011

It is hard to teach our kids how to be a good sport when we are confronted every day with so many bad examples of sportsmanship. It is no longer exclusive to the NBA or the NFL, it even now permeates the most gentleman of sports, golf.

Over the weekend, Tiger Woods’ former caddie, Steve Williams, helped his new boss, golfer Adam Scott, win the Bridgestone Invitational. Williams has been an interesting subject for reporters over the years, and most recently after he was let go by Tiger. After the win over the weekend, Williams was interviewed on the 18^th green by CBS (it is unusual for caddies to speak at all but Williams is known to open his mouth from time to time). He told reporters this was the best win he has ever had. Keep in mind that he caddied Tiger to 13 majors wins and 16 world titles. Tiger paid him millions of dollars in salary of his tenure. Williams proceeded to show his obvious bitterness about his dismissal last month and we are all left to wonder why he would lash out in such an immature manner against someone who has made him a multi-millionaire for carrying a golf bag. Regardless of the circumstances of his firing, it was a classless act and Williams should be ashamed.

We work very hard at raising our boys to be balanced, well-rounded individuals, who are loving and kind as well as strong and confident. As they are starting to play sports we are already confronted with a shocking amount of competitiveness. In our second year of T-ball there is already a push for the boys to be hitting pitched balls, keeping score and making outs. The kids are six. What happened to learning fundamentals, rules, sportsmanship and having fun?

Jack — who isn’t overly competitive in daily life – already gets frustrated when he doesn’t win (including board games). Competition is engrained in most of his social settings with other friends. We keep hoping things will balance out so he and other kids can learn how to handle themselves with grace and dignity.

With all the bad examples of sportsmanship, we as a family try hard to find positive role models for our boys. Luckily we have had an ideal role model right in our backyard for the last four years — Jake Locker, the former quarterback of the University of Washington Huskies and current quarterback of the Tennessee Titans (and Jim’s man crush.) Jake is a local boy who decided to stay close to home to go to college even though the program was a shell of what it once was. He started for four years, including forgoing a chance to go out in the 2010 draft and make millions more than he did entering the draft a year later. He handled himself with professionalism and grace even when he was the quarterback of a 0-12 football team.

Every year the Huskies hold a photo day where the players mingle with the fans and take photos. For Jake’s final two seasons Jim wanted to make sure we were not only able to meet Jake, but be first in line. And we were. Given his popularity, the line wrapped around the field. Jake was very sweet with the boys and happily signed the photo of him and the boys from the previous photo day. ESPN even picked Jake to follow during the 2010 season and aired the coverage during the lead up to the draft. It showed what a good person he is on and off the field. Needless to say we are now Tennessee Titan fans in our house (I am sure Jim’s jersey will be arriving any day now.)

We can only hope that our boys learn how to handle themselves like their role model Jake. I hope that we are able to instill the values of good sportsmanship in our boys, so they understand it is not about winning or losing, but about how you play the game.

How have you taught your kids sportsmanship? What tools have you used?

Filed Under: Jackson, parenting, Sports Tagged With: Adam Scott, competition, football, golf, Jake Locker, photo day, sportsmanship, Steve Williams, Tennessee Titans, Tiger Woods, University of Washington 4 Comments

Cars 2 Review

Jul 25 2011

While we were in California, I took the boys to see the movie, Cars 2. Jim and I wanted to take them before we left on our trip, but couldn’t find the time. So I picked a day when the workload wasn’t too much and surprised them with a trip to the movies.

They were so excited, jumping up and down and dancing. We planned to go to a morning movie and then meet Yaya for lunch. Popcorn and candy in hand we got settled into the theater only to be greeted with a 40 minute delay due to a projector problem. There was a 15 minute period of time where I thought I was going to have to drag two hysterical children out of the theater because they were going to cancel the showing. Somehow miraculously Will sat in his seat eating popcorn and reading books until they finally got it working.

Eventually the movie got going and I have to admit I was underwhelmed. I had heard that some of the reviews were negative, but I don’t always agree with the critics. This time I did.

First of all, Lightning McQueen was hardly in the movie; Mater and the new character Finn McMissile were definitely the stars. The story was a lot more complex and violent than it needed to be. The oil and alternative fuel message was too complex for children to understand and if Disney/Pixar put that in for the adults it wasn’t necessary. Interjecting humor throughout the movie for adults is enough. Due to the oil and secret agent storyline there were a lot of guns, shooting and violence. It was bordering on not appropriate for Will.

The best part of the movie, the races and the characters, Lightning McQueen and the race cars from around the world, were completely overshadowed by the oil and secret agent story. They didn’t even show the end of the last race in London. The story could have easily been the races around the world with the big question being who will win. That would have been enough for the kids and for me.

Although the kids will say they loved it, I can say that it is far from my favorite. With that said there were some good moments. My favorite had to be in the very beginning when Crabby, a character designed after the crab fishing boat the Northwestern from Deadliest Catch and voiced Captain Sig Hanson (both from Seattle) took Finn out to the secret oil rigs. I also felt that they did a good job paying tribute to Doc, voiced by the late Paul Newman.

Overall I was disappointed with this much anticipated sequel, because the first one is still one of my favorite cartoons. Maybe they will do better with the next one, if there is a next one. Based on how long it took to make this one, and given its bad reception, I won’t hold my breath.

Filed Under: parenting, reviews Tagged With: Cars 2, Disney, Finn McMissile, Lightning McQueen, Mater, movies, Northwestern, Pixar, Sig Hanson, violence Leave a Comment

Badges of Fun

Jul 07 2011

I recently was introduced to Family Fun magazine by a friend and neighbor. She always has great ideas for the kids, so I thought I would give it a try.

In the June/July issue they launched Badges of Fun to celebrate their 20^th birthday. During each month for the next year families can earn badges by participating in themed activities. Once the month’s activity is complete you are able to post photos on their website and be eligible for some prizes. You can also print out the badges you have completed and display them on the poster.

For June/July the badge is called backyard fun. Some of their suggestions were to camp in your backyard (hmm my bed is too comfortable to do that and the kids are too little to do it on their own), play twilight games (would love to, but it doesn’t get dark until 10 p.m. right now) and make garden art (ding, ding, we have a winner.)

One Friday night we made painted rocks for the flower beds. I found some outdoor paint in a few colors, had a handful of paint brushes and our yard has plenty of rocks. We all sat down on the garage floor and went to work. Will ended up with more paint on his clothes and hands than on the rocks (thank goodness I changed his clothes.)

We only had about six colors, so soon enough we started mixing colors to make new ones. It was a good lesson for Jack about what colors mix to make other ones; impromptu science lesson, who know that would happen.

Once the rocks were dry (a few hours later) and it had stopped raining (a few days later) we placed them out in our flowerbeds. Both boys thought it was fun to put them in groups near some of the flowers. It was a great project, the perfect balance of something Will could do and still challenging for Jack. We have our first badge complete and we checked something off our Summer Fun List.

Filed Under: Crafts, Jackson, parenting, photos, William Tagged With: Badges of Fun, Family Fun magazine, garden art, painting, summer activities 1 Comment

Parental Guidence Suggested

Jun 27 2011

Why are we in such a rush to have our children grow up? It seems like kids today are asked to be mini-adults basically from birth. There is a palpable and pervasive parenting style that appears to be more the norm than not in which children are pressured to be the best – the best athlete, the best musician, the best scholar. While it is not surprising, it is still shocking the extent to which some parents push their children at such an early age to be better at everything than their peers. Now, don’t get me wrong I think some competition is healthy. But when it comes at the expense of a childhood, what is the point?

What happened to the days when kids could just be kids? There was a time not long ago when they didn’t need to be reading in preschool, hitting pitches at age five, or watching Transformers or Iron Man at six. As a parent there is so much pressure to keep up with everyone else that you begin to consider things that you would have thought were completely inappropriate before. Even if you are confident in your morals, it is hard not to question them when the mob is forging ahead without questioning why and at what cost.

It is hard to sit back and let you kids enjoy life, pushing them just enough to keep them motivated, as others are repeatedly pushing their children to the point of burnout before the third grade.

If you choose to dig in on an issue that is important to you, such as movies, then you risk being labeled as the outcast of the group. I try to be pretty conservative about what movies the boys should watch. The pervasive violence in movies today is troubling to me, but I will save that for another post. A number of Jack’s friends have seen movies such as Transformers and Star Trek (a few of them have older brothers, so that changes the rules, ask me about Will and Star Wars sometime). As a result, he asks to watch them frequently because “so-in-so is allowed to watch it.” What am I to do?

I really want to mimic some other friends who are also conservative and wouldn’t let their ten year old watch Avatar, because it was rated PG-13. He was ten, not six. I just don’t know how I am going to hold out until I am ready for him to watch movies like that. I feel like the ratings are there for a reason and more often than not, are a good benchmark.

Kids are kids for such a short period of time – why are parents compelled to force their children to grow up so soon? Life isn’t a race. It’s a journey comprised of all the vivid memories you collect along the way at all stages. Don’t waste it looking beyond.

Filed Under: parenting, rants Tagged With: childhood, competition, movies 1 Comment

Explaining the news

May 04 2011

I hate watching the news. It is never anything good and in order to get viewers most stations have resorted to sensationalizing what is available. Especially having young children I don’t want them to be constantly bombarded with someone getting shot, news on the war or political bickering every evening. (I do read the paper everyday, so I know what is going on in the world.)

With all that said we do watch the Today show in the morning. When the alarm goes off the local news comes on to see what the weather forecast is (not sure why we bother, since they hardly ever get it right more than a few hours in advance) and how bad traffic is. That leads into the Today show, which is news for the first 20 minutes. Once the boys are awake they will come and get in bed with us and watch some of the morning’s headlines.

On Sunday night when news of Osama Bin Laden’s death broke, Jack was still awake. We had some friends over and he was getting ready for bed, but still downstairs, so he heard the news. I don’t remember what questions he asked that night, but the last two mornings he has had more.

Like this morning at breakfast he asked “Was he a bad guy.” I said yes he was. Then I realized that he didn’t live through 9/11 (I knew that but until now I hadn’t thought about the fact that we would have to explain to him what happened that day and why our world would never be the same.) His next question was “What did he do?” So I delicately explained that he told his people to take over airplanes and to fly them into buildings killing over 3000 people. Then he asked “how did they kill him?” I told him that the army found out where he was hiding and went to get him and he fought back.

These were all very good questions and I am glad he asked me. I don’t want to keep him in a complete bubble. If he has questions I want him to ask, but I don’t want him to be scared by things. Luckily we are able to keep our children sheltered from war. They don’t have to live in constant fear, like children in war torn countries around the world. I am counting my blessings today and am thankful for all that we have.

Filed Under: Jackson, parenting Tagged With: current events, news Leave a Comment

A Mompreneur’s Chronicle Of Life With Her Boys