Today I Choose...

...

I choose to remember what was given, rather than what was taken. 

http://www.bensmom.blogspot.com/2006/06/neither-death-nor-life.html

Summer School

We just finished our academic year. The kids did well; Kyrie suddenly decided she wants to be in 1st grade next year and spent more time on her kindergarten work in the last month than the rest of the year combined. I need to finish the year by doing a little record-keeping and re-organizing the school closet/supplies.

The buzz in homeschooling circles is year-round schooling. "We keep going through the summer," one mom told me. "We will take a couple weeks off in August before we start up for fall."

I've spent a lot of time thinking about this. In one sense, a 3-month break is not realistic; they certainly won't be handed that in the vocations they choose. (Unless they go in to teaching.) On the other hand, we aren't teaching them how to take meaningful vacations and rest very well either.

Ultimately, I come down on the side that we teach different things in our summer school. Little bodies, little minds need sunshine, fresh air, and a chance to gain a new perspective. We also need to learn a few life skills that are hard to teach year-round. So, I pulled up the Life Skills chart and printed them out and worked out a summer schedule where Ben and Kyrie will each help me plan and prepare one meal one night a week and also spend 30 min twice a week working one-on-one with me to learn a new chore. Everleigh will get 30 minutes a week.

One thing I feel I'm not doing well is helping them develop a special skill. I'm fine at encouraging academics....But I'm lost with sports, music, etc.... They all have artistic interests but this summer I want to help Ben and Kyrie choose something (i.e. an instrument, sport, etc...) to pursue. Swimming lessons was a must this summer and Ben has already started his class.

We will continue to play learning games, Ben wants to continue Latin so he doesn't forget anything and I will work one day a week with Kyrie on keeping up her reading.

But there is so little time to be a child. These are the days of playing in the sandbox, swinging on swings, going to the park, playing with the neighbors and growing healthy little minds and bodies.

Fall will be upon us soon enough.

Speaking of Birth Order....

Note how one child knows they are being filmed and confidently does their thing while the other child steals the show.

Birth Order Matters

Back in high school, I stumbled across a book on birth order by Dr. Kevin Leman. I was absolutely fascinated. I so identified with the descriptors attached to first-born children and this helped me feel better about the ways I was so distinctly different from the rest of my family. I was quite determined for a while to make a good birth order match (which would have made my mate a baby in his family, ideally, or a middle child). That didn't happen (gratefully) and now my firstborn husband and I sometimes struggle to understand the non-firstborns in our families.

Last week, I read Why Birth Order Matters and watched elements of it play out.

On Friday, I heard Ben carefully describing how one was supposed to accomplish a certain task to Kyrie. He laid it out diligently. She promptly started with "You don't have to do it that way."

"Yes, you do, Kyrie." And the tension began to escalate.

I took the opportunity to explain to her that her brother and her parents love rules, love black and white. She looked at me like I was from another planet.

This description could not be more perfect for the three firstborns in our family:

Reliable and conscientious, they tend to be list makers and black-and-white thinkers. They have a keen sense of right and wrong and believe there is a right way to do things. They are natural leaders and achievement-oriented.

My middleborn completely fits this descriptor with the exception of the last phrase. Negotiator, yes. Peace, not so much.

They're the hardest to pin down of all the birth orders, but they'll be the opposite of the child above them in the family. If the firstborn is very conventional, the second will be unconventional. Middle children walk to the beat of a different drummer. They are competitive, loyal and big on friendships. The middle child of the family is often the negotiator who tries to keep the peace.

 And then our baby:

These social, outgoing creatures have never met a stranger. They are uncomplicated, spontaneous, humorous and high on people skills. To them, life's a party. They're the child in the family who is most likely to get away with murder and the least likely to be punished. They often retain their pet name.

This is the child who ran up to her uncle last weekend, jumped in his arms, and declared, "I'm your honey."

I know my kids aren't tied to these things and that there are always exceptions. (Kevin Leman is always mindful to point this out.) But this article gave renewed focus to my parenting and relieved a little of the guilt I have in always seeing the perspective of one of my children better than the others. I have to work a little harder. I particularly am focused on remembering that sometimes Kyrie is right; there is more than one way to skin a cat. And I have to be more diligent to make sure our little charmer grows up learning to pull her weight.

Lastly, Mike and I were both raised by a middle-born and last-born parent. Remembering that helps us understand why we are both more conventional than our parents and sometimes wish they were more interested in "following the rules." Hopefully, because we were raised by parents not of our birth order, we are more flexible and accommodating. Ben, however, may be a lost cause. (Smile.)

Testing the Mettle

This morning I overheard a conversation between my two oldest:

"Ben, they took my blood, just like they did yours."

"Oh, wow! Did it hurt?"

"Yeah, I hated it."

"Me too."

And they bonded over needle sticks.

Kyrie started having abdominal pain Sunday morning. She is never sick and when she told me her stomach hurt I didn't think much of it. But she was crying shortly after noon and doubled up. She watched TV on the couch and then drifted in and out of sleep. I was forcing liquids down her, including an herbal tea with a laxative effect. I thought she might have gas or constipation but by the time I came back from grocery shopping late in the afternoon, I wasn't so sure. She was crying in pain in her sleep and wincing if you so much as brushed her abdomen. She couldn't eat, could barely drink. I used my diagnostic resources and decided it was: 1) a urinary tract infection, 2) an intestinal blockage/constipation or 3) appendicitis. She had a fever but no other symptoms. My dad agreed. But he was a little worried too.

I finally called an on call doctor around 5:30pm. He was really concerned she couldn't walk upright and hadn't moved off the couch. He said to take her to ER. Ugh. I called friends who told us to bring Ben and Evie over.

And to ER we went. They tested her urine. Took blood. Took X-Rays. An ultrasound. Two different doctors came in and tried different things. Could she jump? Yes. Meanwhile, she was feeling a little better and her fever had come down. But still in pain. Mike went and took the other two kids home.

One doctor came in and suggested that she should stay overnight. I asked the purpose. "Just in case, so we can monitor her. We can't rule it is appendicitis but we can't rule it out either." I asked him to give me more reason to stay. He couldn't. "You can take her home and monitor her yourself too."  I asked for a few minutes to think it over and talked to Mike on the phone. I really didn't know. I was tired and she had gone from wanting to stay to wanting to leave. So we finally decided to leave, which the second doctor seemed to come in and affirm as a good decision. They dosed her on antibiotics in case she had an urinary tract infection.

We came home. She wanted to eat but I was still nervous about the appendix. I needn't have worried because she couldn't get down more than a third of a coconut water bar. We collapsed into bed and within forty minutes she was at my bedside in excruciating pain again. I took her to the guest bed so I could monitor her. I was so tired and her fever seemed gone, leaving me confused. But I second-guessed my decision to leave the hospital over and over. Mike came in and I went back to bed. We both had fitful sleeps.

Until 7am when Kyrie came into my room, I was nearly certain we were going back to the hospital for an appendectomy.  I had read all the symptoms over and over and the factor that troubled me was that her pain had never moved to the right. It was dead-center. But everything else fit. And then she went to the bathroom. And I remembered the intestinal blockage I had researched originally. And the ER had never considered. She felt better. She looked better.

I called her pediatrician's office and the nurse was unconvinced it was appendicitis as well. She scheduled a visit for 11am. I found Kyrie on the toilet again. And then 10 minutes later, there she was again.

By the time she saw the doctor I had renewed hope. The number of prayers we had prayed for wisdom, guidance, and yes, healing were huge. The doctor confirmed intestinal blockage with a few more important questions and the statement that "appendicitis does not just come and go." We have seen steady progress throughout the day and her strength has come back.

In this process, I could not fail to see her dad in her. She is tough. She does things for herself. She is a stalwart and undramatic patient. She wept during the blood-draw. She didn't scream or cry out or try to stop it. She thanked me continually during the process. At least four different times, she thanked me for being her mom, for being with her.

It made me explode with gratitude. At times, I was so tested. I didn't catch on as quickly as I should have. I was so weary. And yet, she thanked me.

I have always told her she is a tough girl, a strong girl, made for a special purpose. I reminded her again last night in the ER that she was so very strong.

And she is generous. When she had her xrays, the tech gave her two stickers: "Dora" and "Angry Birds." Evie will like Dora and Ben will like Angry Birds. And she brought home these things for them.

Tonight life has settled back into normal. We are tired but feeling well. But I know my daughter a little better, I know myself a little better. We are a little stronger for walking this road, and a lot more empathetic. And grateful. Ever so grateful.

School Zones, Road Kill and Snow

Today I ventured out to the library as schools were being let out. And I was struck by this new world I live in. I came from a part of the country, where every student, right up through high school is viewed as Helen Keller, utterly incapable of hearing or sight. School zones are taken very seriously and you'll get a ticket if you go 21 mph as you pass through one.

Today, I was nearly pushed off the road and was passed as I slowed down to obey the flashing posted 25 mph sign. I never got below 30.

Our public library closed for Good Friday. Mike had the day off from work. Western Washington is a place where the atheists sued to have their own holiday display at Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanzaa.

Most Sundays we drive 88 miles one way to church. Crazy, I know. But we do it in 1 hr 20 minutes. I just mapped that distance. It is the same distance as it was from our Olympia, WA house to my aunt's house in Everett. We never made it there in less than 1 hr, 50 minutes. Sadly, the population has diminished in my new state; the upside is that there are 3 and 4 lane freeways with very little traffic. Our local freeway that goes through our town just raised the speed limit to 70. And there are minimum speed signs posted too.

It snowed this week. And last week. And it is April. This, I'm told is unusual. But it does snow here. Lots. I love it.

I don't love the roadkill. Apparently, this is where Michigan attempts to make cuts from its diminishing population and lost revenue. I have lived a lot of places where roadkill is prevalent; but eventually it gets removed off the side of the road. Not here. Deer decomposing in the corn fields raises all sorts of questions for me. Not fun.

There is a lot I loved about western Washington. And there is a lot I love about Michigan. I really love that I don't have to go 20 mph in school zones.

The Wonder that is Everleigh

Everleigh entered the world in an unusual fashion. I had two days of promodral labor where I was certain she was coming, but she wasn't. After two days, I went in to the birthing center, certain this was it. And my midwife repositioned her, and sent me home with two Tylenol P.M. and a pool donut to sleep in so she would stay in the right position. Labor continued through early the next afternoon but I finally slept. Around 2 or 3pm the next afternoon, labor stopped. I had a nice long heavy sleep, woke up feeling good, and went down to start making dinner. A few minutes before 6pm, the mother of all labor pains hit. I KNEW there was no turning back. But they stayed a nice 8 or 9 minutes apart as they moved lower and lower. Mike, having excellent training, reminded me that we didn't need to worry until they were 5 minutes apart. About 9pm, I told him that we did need to worry, because I could tell where she was and she was low. At 9:45pm we arrived at the birthing center. The midwife told me I was almost done. My mom, Mike, and I laughed. HA! I knew labor was long and it was fast and furious at the end. I was in a hot tub nearly two hours later when I told her I did really need to push, even though I knew it wasn't time. She responded with, "You were fully dilated when you arrived. You go for it!" And about 10 minutes, Ev shot into the world like a cannonball. (Her sister named a doll "Cannonball" in her honor.)

Lately, I've noticed that this seems to be Ev's pattern.

• She was absolutely devoted to her pacifier and I feared she would never give it up, even lamenting it was going to take forever to get rid of it two days before she threw it in the garbage and never looked back. 
• She was napping nearly two hours most days right up until her 3rd birthday, when she quit napping cold turkey and no amount of cajoling or having her sit on her bed for more than an hour has convinced her to ever resume.
• She started occasionally choosing to wear underwear sometimes last year. But she was always very forthright about not wanting to be potty-trained and asking to wear diapers most of the time. I was patient. Two months ago, she was done with diapers. We had two diapers left and I showed her and asked her if she wanted to wear panties and give up diapers completely. She said, "yes." (I still have those two diapers.) She did not look back, becoming the first of my children to be night-trained the same day she was day-trained. She is also fiercely independent. We have to catch her going in order to help her. This sometimes makes for a mess when we miss that she has gone on her own. I will sometimes hear the toilet flush and run in to find her on a stool washing her hands. She tells us she doesn't need help with anything and I frequently have to hold her up so she can see her back end in a mirror (with evidence that she needs a little assist) before she will accept help.

This girl is an original!

I wonder sometimes what I should brace myself for. I've identified her as most likely to elope with a perfect stranger and I have no doubt that her independence will carry her far from me someday. I may not love that idea, but I do love this girl.

And When and How Do We Tell the Kids?

I jumped on the internet this afternoon to check work email and became aware of the tragic events happening in Boston. I didn't click on any news clips, just read a few online reports. I didn't turn on the TV. Little ears and eyes were about and instead I asked myself "how do you, when do you tell the kids?"

I may avoid talking about this for a little while longer, but not much longer. Ben found out about Newtown and he knows about September 11. The girls do not. Yet.

But evil is unavoidable, tragedy, a product of the Fall, and we can't hide from it.

About a month ago, Kyrie asked innocently, "What was the name of your friend who died?" I had no idea what she was talking about so I displayed genuine confusion. "It was something like 'Sharon,'" she pushed. My heart sank at what come next, but she didn't ask the questions I dread to answer. The questions about Shannon, my cousin whose murder when we were 25 forever altered the way I look at the world. I'm constantly formulating in my head how I will tell my children that awful story. How I will say "Do not be afraid" when I still will not walk through my neighborhood alone, when I still get up if I hear anything in the night.

I realized today how different 9/11 was for the mothers of young children, the parents who caught glimpses of coverage here and there, but who realized for a certain time and place, they needed to shelter their kids from those images, the fumbling of reporters, bystanders and pundits to make sense of the horror they were encountering.

I will not lie. Today is not an anomaly in the character of man; it is the norm. It is not surprising that these things happen, it is shocking that they aren't visible to us more often. The heart of man bears horrific darkness. The truth is finding the Light.

But I still don't know how to tell them.

A Live Lesson

The kids were back to science class today studying birds and migration at the Chippewa Nature Center. This has been an amazing experience for us, worth the small amount of money I pay for Ben and Kyrie to have 90 minutes of hands-on instruction in topics I know little about. Everleigh and I were wandering around checking out the rushing water in the river, watching a mama owl sitting with her new baby in a tree, and enjoying ourselves when I saw a little bird struggling outside a window. A woman was watching intently and I asked her if it had hit the window. She nodded yes and said he was a goner. He was on his back kicking, then stopped for a minute, chest still heaving. I decided to tell a staff person. It's a Nature Center! The receptionist calmly came with me and picked it up and held it. She did a brief check and said he would be fine but they would put him in a paper bag for awhile. The dark calms the bird and when he's relieved himself, they know he is ready to fly again. She spent some time educating us. I asked if the kids in classes could see him and she took him to Ben's class and let the children touch him gently. And then the same with Kyrie's class. 

We all learned what to do if a bird survives flying into a window; how to help and what to look for.

I 'm so grateful for the break the Science Center gives me and for the opportunity the kids have to learn from teachers enthusiastic about science and to have time with other kids their age.

A Few Weekend Photos

Belle Isle Conservatory, Detroit, MI, Ph: Ben Reitz

Detroit from Belle Isle

Evie picking up a nail for the cross at Good Friday service

Belle Isle Aquarium, Oldest Aquarium in N. America