I have one of those little flip calenders sitting in my kitchen, called "365 Best-Kept Parenting Secrets". I have actually remembered to flip the page each day since January 1st. I love reading it in the morning just before breakfast. The contents are everything from parenting tips, safety ideas, scripture passages, words of wisdom, and much, much more. I've learned some great things. I also love that little feeling of satisfaction when I flip over the page and see a tip that I'm already practicing (reinforces my mothering emotions).
I was excited to see what was written on today's page. Today I celebrate my 28th birthday, and I wanted to see what sage advice would be imparted on this special day. You never know - it could be brilliant, old hat, or common sense. It could be exactly what I wanted or needed to read, or it could be very boring.
Well, this is what is written on August 8th:
(drum roll please)
"Share your passions with your children. Let them know they can make a difference in the world around them."
My heart filled with joy and a smile filled my face. These two sentences sum up one of my deepest wishes for my children. All that I hope I can teach them, all that I pray they will learn and know, all that I wish they will grow to become. It is my greatest desire for my children that they become passionate and a great mover in the world. One of the saddest outcomes would be complacency, boredom, and being a bystander.
One of my favourite songs (you can find the full lyrics if you look under "music" under my post labels) is called "In the Meantime". And one of my favourite lines is "Deep inside she's still the girl who's always felt the fire to make a difference in the world." This is me. And I hope one day it will be my children also.
Friday, 8 August 2008
Thursday, 7 August 2008
Oh sleep, where art thou?
I think I can now be classed as an expert on sleep. Although there is very little of it happening at our house, at least I can tell you the cycles of sleep, how and why we do it, patterns of good sleep habits, and a hundred different ways to get your child to sleep. And yet I still can't get Caleb to sleep.
A friend of ours is a sleep trainer. People pay her big money to come their homes and stay overnight and train their babies to sleep well. She has witnessed Caleb fussing and crying week after week in church, and reached out to us in sympathy. We've had numerous conversations and I filled out a sleep log for Caleb, recording his sleep time, awake time, and when he feeds. There were 5 simple symbols to record on an hourly basis. I laughed when I gave her the log, because the thing looked like hieroglyphics! In each little box I had sometimes scribbled 10 or 12 symbols, as Caleb would go down, get up, go down, get up, cry, sleep and eat like a madman.
She mulled over our conversations and the log and concluded: this was like nothing she'd ever encountered yet. She said this will be excellent experience for her. Even if we weren't friends, she would have taken the case pro bono! She is currently doing some research to see if she can find something to help Caleb. But her initial "diagnosis" was that most likely Caleb is extremely intelligent. He is processing everything around him and unable to turn it off.
I've read nearly every sleep book out there. We've tried all the methods. I've studied all the case studies. I am a little frustrated, however, because all the books simply assume that their method will work, just like that. There is no "but if this fails, try..." But I also haven't found any examples of Caleb's behaviour.
His problem is that he just doesn't want to sleep. Even with me in the room, he cries and cries when we try to put him down to sleep. Every sleep book out there talks about how a baby is conditioned to need you to help get to sleep. The problem is that not even I can help him sleep. Even bringing him in bed with me doesn't get him to sleep. He has never slept anywhere but in his crib. He has never gone to sleep without crying and fussing first. He has never worn himself out crying. He has never fallen asleep in my arms (which I really miss!). He never just lies in bed crying - he throws himself around the crib, thrashing about, or stands himself up. Even when his poor eyes are red and half closed, he struggles to his feet and hangs on for dear life to the crib rail. Yesterday I hoped if I just sat in the room with him he would calm down at my presence. No such luck.
Once he's asleep he's fine. He has slept several 4 hour stretches. He does normally take two naps a day. He does go to sleep around 7am. Some of the things I've read certainly have helped in certain ways. The funny thing is that all these sleep books tend to be about getting your baby to sleep through the night. I'm not concerned about that at all. I just want to get him to be able to fall asleep without an hour of coaxing. I don't mind getting up at 11pm and 2am and 5am if I can get him back to sleep in a few minutes and crawl back into bed. But being up for hours in the middle of the night is really trying!
Please excuse the rant. A writer's prerogative, I guess. I always find it helps to get everything out "on paper". I know these days won't last forever and a beautiful dreamy sleep will find my again one day. And please feel free to call for any sleep advice for your own little bambino. I'm a regular sleep encyclopedia these days!
A friend of ours is a sleep trainer. People pay her big money to come their homes and stay overnight and train their babies to sleep well. She has witnessed Caleb fussing and crying week after week in church, and reached out to us in sympathy. We've had numerous conversations and I filled out a sleep log for Caleb, recording his sleep time, awake time, and when he feeds. There were 5 simple symbols to record on an hourly basis. I laughed when I gave her the log, because the thing looked like hieroglyphics! In each little box I had sometimes scribbled 10 or 12 symbols, as Caleb would go down, get up, go down, get up, cry, sleep and eat like a madman.
She mulled over our conversations and the log and concluded: this was like nothing she'd ever encountered yet. She said this will be excellent experience for her. Even if we weren't friends, she would have taken the case pro bono! She is currently doing some research to see if she can find something to help Caleb. But her initial "diagnosis" was that most likely Caleb is extremely intelligent. He is processing everything around him and unable to turn it off.
I've read nearly every sleep book out there. We've tried all the methods. I've studied all the case studies. I am a little frustrated, however, because all the books simply assume that their method will work, just like that. There is no "but if this fails, try..." But I also haven't found any examples of Caleb's behaviour.
His problem is that he just doesn't want to sleep. Even with me in the room, he cries and cries when we try to put him down to sleep. Every sleep book out there talks about how a baby is conditioned to need you to help get to sleep. The problem is that not even I can help him sleep. Even bringing him in bed with me doesn't get him to sleep. He has never slept anywhere but in his crib. He has never gone to sleep without crying and fussing first. He has never worn himself out crying. He has never fallen asleep in my arms (which I really miss!). He never just lies in bed crying - he throws himself around the crib, thrashing about, or stands himself up. Even when his poor eyes are red and half closed, he struggles to his feet and hangs on for dear life to the crib rail. Yesterday I hoped if I just sat in the room with him he would calm down at my presence. No such luck.
Once he's asleep he's fine. He has slept several 4 hour stretches. He does normally take two naps a day. He does go to sleep around 7am. Some of the things I've read certainly have helped in certain ways. The funny thing is that all these sleep books tend to be about getting your baby to sleep through the night. I'm not concerned about that at all. I just want to get him to be able to fall asleep without an hour of coaxing. I don't mind getting up at 11pm and 2am and 5am if I can get him back to sleep in a few minutes and crawl back into bed. But being up for hours in the middle of the night is really trying!
Please excuse the rant. A writer's prerogative, I guess. I always find it helps to get everything out "on paper". I know these days won't last forever and a beautiful dreamy sleep will find my again one day. And please feel free to call for any sleep advice for your own little bambino. I'm a regular sleep encyclopedia these days!
Tuesday, 5 August 2008
Working hard
My dear neighbour, Mary (an elderly widow of 30 years) tells me I work too hard. She also tells me they should pay me double. Unfortunately, double of nothing is still nothing!
I will admit I have had my nose to the grindstone a lot lately. And I have been reveling in it. I have discovered that good hard work is good for the body, mind and spirit. In addition to constant work on my fence (sawing, sanding, staining, nailing, measuring), last week I also had to haul a tree. Yes, you read that right. While we were away for the weekend, a huge maple tree came crashing down on our back yard. While this may seem like a disaster, there were numerous blessings associated with its demise. It was an old tree leaning at a 30 degree angle. It was growing right where my fence needed to go. It was leaning over a hydro wire. It was hiding a much more beautiful maple tree that had much better shade potential. then two weeks ago it was struck by lightening, gashing the truck down the middle near the bottom. Five days later it was leaning at 45 degrees. A few days after that the split in the trunk was wide enough to walk through. Hydro was called, and instead of taking the tree down as we hoped, they simply disconnected the wire and swung it over top of the tree. Tree removal companies were desperately called. Only one returned my messages and he was hired on the spot. He came the next day, but the tree had already come crashing down in our absence. Additional blessing - it fell diagonally across the yard, missing the fence, deck, swing and our neighbour's newly built two-story garage. The tree-removal man hauled away the branches and left the trunk cut up as firewood on our back lawn.
Well, I hadn't planned on telling that whole story! The point of starting it was that the "firewood" was actually huge two by two by two foot slabs of tree trunk that threatened to kill my beautiful lawn if left for too many days. And so I (James was away for the week on business) had to haul all one billion pounds of tree pieces up to a hideaway spot in our yard! Anyone know what to do with an entire tree of stumps?
I've also been out weeding, pruning, mowing the lawn and running around playing soccer with Colin. Add that to our walks (1 1/2 - 3 hours daily), running up and down the stairs, carrying 20 lbs of Caleb, sewing summer swaddle blankets, building stairs for our deck, cleaning the garage...
Well, there's nothing like some good hard work. The television is being (thankfully) neglected, and even my books are begging to be read a little more. But I'm finding much satisfaction in my work. I had a beautiful image last week of our forefathers 150 years ago as they toiled to carve out lives in this wild and untamed country. I thought of the houses and fences they built, without the conveniences of power tools. I thought of the community efforts to help each family raise a home and clear the land and plant and harvest crops. What satisfying lives they must have lived! Without the distractions of today's gadgets and media and time-fillers and time-wasters. I'll keep the flush toilet, but I often yearn for the simplicity of yesteryear...
I will admit I have had my nose to the grindstone a lot lately. And I have been reveling in it. I have discovered that good hard work is good for the body, mind and spirit. In addition to constant work on my fence (sawing, sanding, staining, nailing, measuring), last week I also had to haul a tree. Yes, you read that right. While we were away for the weekend, a huge maple tree came crashing down on our back yard. While this may seem like a disaster, there were numerous blessings associated with its demise. It was an old tree leaning at a 30 degree angle. It was growing right where my fence needed to go. It was leaning over a hydro wire. It was hiding a much more beautiful maple tree that had much better shade potential. then two weeks ago it was struck by lightening, gashing the truck down the middle near the bottom. Five days later it was leaning at 45 degrees. A few days after that the split in the trunk was wide enough to walk through. Hydro was called, and instead of taking the tree down as we hoped, they simply disconnected the wire and swung it over top of the tree. Tree removal companies were desperately called. Only one returned my messages and he was hired on the spot. He came the next day, but the tree had already come crashing down in our absence. Additional blessing - it fell diagonally across the yard, missing the fence, deck, swing and our neighbour's newly built two-story garage. The tree-removal man hauled away the branches and left the trunk cut up as firewood on our back lawn.
Well, I hadn't planned on telling that whole story! The point of starting it was that the "firewood" was actually huge two by two by two foot slabs of tree trunk that threatened to kill my beautiful lawn if left for too many days. And so I (James was away for the week on business) had to haul all one billion pounds of tree pieces up to a hideaway spot in our yard! Anyone know what to do with an entire tree of stumps?
I've also been out weeding, pruning, mowing the lawn and running around playing soccer with Colin. Add that to our walks (1 1/2 - 3 hours daily), running up and down the stairs, carrying 20 lbs of Caleb, sewing summer swaddle blankets, building stairs for our deck, cleaning the garage...
Well, there's nothing like some good hard work. The television is being (thankfully) neglected, and even my books are begging to be read a little more. But I'm finding much satisfaction in my work. I had a beautiful image last week of our forefathers 150 years ago as they toiled to carve out lives in this wild and untamed country. I thought of the houses and fences they built, without the conveniences of power tools. I thought of the community efforts to help each family raise a home and clear the land and plant and harvest crops. What satisfying lives they must have lived! Without the distractions of today's gadgets and media and time-fillers and time-wasters. I'll keep the flush toilet, but I often yearn for the simplicity of yesteryear...
Monday, 4 August 2008
Old Testament Study
I mentioned this challenge last week, and this week I embark on a journey through the Old Testament. My goal is to read five chapters a week. But more than that, I want to study what I find - look beyond just the words on the page and discover something more.
So I've set up a new blog and I want to invite you all to join in. You can find the blog at:
www.oldtestamentstudy.blogspot.com
The first entry is already up and talks about how you can write entries or comment on things already written. I will try to write once a week (Sundays, most likely), but I'm hoping many of you will come along on the journey also. Look for the first post on the first five chapters next Sunday.
Hope to see you there!
So I've set up a new blog and I want to invite you all to join in. You can find the blog at:
www.oldtestamentstudy.blogspot.com
The first entry is already up and talks about how you can write entries or comment on things already written. I will try to write once a week (Sundays, most likely), but I'm hoping many of you will come along on the journey also. Look for the first post on the first five chapters next Sunday.
Hope to see you there!
Friday, 1 August 2008
Five Years
Today James and I celebrate five years of marriage. It seems like forever and just yesterday all at once. Some days it's hard to believe that five short years past we were two filmmakers living in Toronto. Most days it feels like we were always a family, just waiting to happen.
I am so grateful to have the most wonderful husband in the world (sorry ladies! I win this one.) We were married not "until death do you part" but "for time and all eternity", as we believe that families are forever and will last beyond life here on earth. We were a family before we came to this life, and our family will endure in the next. What a blessing.
I don't talk too much about James on here, probably because the majority of my days are spent with my kids. But this seems like the perfect time to brag, just a little. Although there are too many to list, here are some of my favourite things about him:
- he is a fantastic father. He was always meant to be a dad. He doesn't have to find time to fit his kids in, or juggle other social commitments. His favourite place to be is here with us.
- he always leave me the last piece of any dessert leftover. Pie, ice cream, cookies (especially cookies!) - he'll always leave at least one so if I go looking I won't be disappointed!
- he is the most dedicated person I know. He gives his full attention to whatever task he is doing and does it to the best of his ability and beyond.
- he makes us all laugh. We always joke that the kids will find him hilarious until they are about eight, and then will perfect the eye roll by age ten. And we both can catch a good case of the gigles while spending time together. I can't tell you how many times the two of us end up with tears streaming down our faces and our stomachs aching from laughter.
- he tells great stories. And they're so great, he'll tell you again, and again, and again. And even if I remind him I've already heard this one, he'll tell me one more time. But he's a great storyteller, and quick with a punch line, so the redundancy is forgiven.
- he's thoughtful and attentive. He's away on business this week, but just before lunch a beautiful bouquet of yellow roses arrived for me. That's right, yellow. People always query: "Doesn't he know yellow is for friendship?" Well, he is my best friend, but it means even more than that. Yellow is my favourite colour, and way, way back when we were dating, he sent yellow flowers for that reason. He had no idea the different colours of roses meant different things. But he was paying attention one day when I noted my favourite colour was yellow. And so that has been our little thing. He does, however, add one red rose, out of romantic whimsy.
- speaking of romance, he's the one to light up the candles, put on some classical music, slip his hand in mine, take the second best to offer me the best, open a door, sneak a kiss, and a million other little things that make me feel as though I'm the only person in the world. And he reminds me daily just how much in love he is.
And I tell him likewise.
I am so grateful to have the most wonderful husband in the world (sorry ladies! I win this one.) We were married not "until death do you part" but "for time and all eternity", as we believe that families are forever and will last beyond life here on earth. We were a family before we came to this life, and our family will endure in the next. What a blessing.
I don't talk too much about James on here, probably because the majority of my days are spent with my kids. But this seems like the perfect time to brag, just a little. Although there are too many to list, here are some of my favourite things about him:
- he is a fantastic father. He was always meant to be a dad. He doesn't have to find time to fit his kids in, or juggle other social commitments. His favourite place to be is here with us.
- he always leave me the last piece of any dessert leftover. Pie, ice cream, cookies (especially cookies!) - he'll always leave at least one so if I go looking I won't be disappointed!
- he is the most dedicated person I know. He gives his full attention to whatever task he is doing and does it to the best of his ability and beyond.
- he makes us all laugh. We always joke that the kids will find him hilarious until they are about eight, and then will perfect the eye roll by age ten. And we both can catch a good case of the gigles while spending time together. I can't tell you how many times the two of us end up with tears streaming down our faces and our stomachs aching from laughter.
- he tells great stories. And they're so great, he'll tell you again, and again, and again. And even if I remind him I've already heard this one, he'll tell me one more time. But he's a great storyteller, and quick with a punch line, so the redundancy is forgiven.
- he's thoughtful and attentive. He's away on business this week, but just before lunch a beautiful bouquet of yellow roses arrived for me. That's right, yellow. People always query: "Doesn't he know yellow is for friendship?" Well, he is my best friend, but it means even more than that. Yellow is my favourite colour, and way, way back when we were dating, he sent yellow flowers for that reason. He had no idea the different colours of roses meant different things. But he was paying attention one day when I noted my favourite colour was yellow. And so that has been our little thing. He does, however, add one red rose, out of romantic whimsy.
- speaking of romance, he's the one to light up the candles, put on some classical music, slip his hand in mine, take the second best to offer me the best, open a door, sneak a kiss, and a million other little things that make me feel as though I'm the only person in the world. And he reminds me daily just how much in love he is.
And I tell him likewise.
Colin Says:
Colin: Glumph, aruga, ahanaba.
Mommy: Colin, don't talk with food in your mouth, honey.
Colin: (spits out a mouthful of strawberry into his hand) It's very yummy! (puts half chewed strawberry back in)
Well, you can't say he wasn't at least trying to do as I asked!
***
Colin: Mommy, I don't like your shirt.
Mommy: Which one do you like?
Colin: The one with the bubbles. Can you wear that one?
Mommy: Well, this one is the one with the buttons, for me to do yard work in.
Colin: Okay.
(9 hours later, after nap, he opened his eyes and the first words out of his mouth were:)
Colin: Mommy, you changed your shirt! Where is the one with the buttons?
Mommy: It was dirty so I put on this new yellow one.
Colin: (sizing it up) Okay. I like that one, too.
Mommy: Colin, don't talk with food in your mouth, honey.
Colin: (spits out a mouthful of strawberry into his hand) It's very yummy! (puts half chewed strawberry back in)
Well, you can't say he wasn't at least trying to do as I asked!
***
Colin: Mommy, I don't like your shirt.
Mommy: Which one do you like?
Colin: The one with the bubbles. Can you wear that one?
Mommy: Well, this one is the one with the buttons, for me to do yard work in.
Colin: Okay.
(9 hours later, after nap, he opened his eyes and the first words out of his mouth were:)
Colin: Mommy, you changed your shirt! Where is the one with the buttons?
Mommy: It was dirty so I put on this new yellow one.
Colin: (sizing it up) Okay. I like that one, too.
I sure could use a little good news today...
The following are the headlines of the most read news stories (online, Toronto Star) for today, August 1st, 2008:
- Owen Sound mob attacks Toronto man
- Horror as bus passenger beheaded
- Body found in Lake Ontario
This is what makes me want to move to the country and withdraw from the world around me. Not only is all this horror going on around me, but it's what the majority of people want to read about.
But I believe strongly in being the change I want to see in the world around me, and I don't think everyone withdrawing like hermits would be an improvement. And so I must figure out how to stay strong in my own beliefs, raise my children in this society, and do my best to change what little of the world I can.
- Owen Sound mob attacks Toronto man
- Horror as bus passenger beheaded
- Body found in Lake Ontario
This is what makes me want to move to the country and withdraw from the world around me. Not only is all this horror going on around me, but it's what the majority of people want to read about.
But I believe strongly in being the change I want to see in the world around me, and I don't think everyone withdrawing like hermits would be an improvement. And so I must figure out how to stay strong in my own beliefs, raise my children in this society, and do my best to change what little of the world I can.
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