Can it be this easy?

One small thing that my Julia and I have been butting heads on for years is brushing her hair.  She has some very sensitive areas on her scalp, and she hates having those tugged.  Even my gentlest brushing is not gentle enough.  But if I asked her to brush, she did a very superficial swipe and ran away.  Each morning she would wake up with a mat in her hair in the same spot, and each day we would bicker on this point.

"Julia, you have to brush your hair.  At least 5 times a week."
"Mom - ugh!  I don't care what my hair looks like!"

Then a couple of weeks ago, she and Paul went to a 2 night young-youth retreat.  I still haven't divined what all they learned on the spiritual side of things, but Julia had a hair revelation.  She bonded really well with some of the other girls there.  One of them put her hair in a fish-tail braid overnight.  Her hair didn't tangle.  It was wonderful.

Since then, I have been practicing doing a fishtail braid, and she has been letting me put her hair in a regular braid each night before bed.  We have gone from battling to bonding over her hair.

So now, here is my prayer -
Lord, thank you for this change.
Lord, please help me understand and accept that I am often not going to be the one who finds the solutions to prickly problems with my children.
Help me to be on the lookout for changing conflict into connection.

PJ English Project

PJ got an English project done early.  

Because we misunderstood the due date.  

Maybe this will help make-up for some of his other late, late, late projects.  

Last night he worked with Julia to make a video showing an interview with the main character from a book he just finished in class.  They used Legos, and Julia voiced the girl.  I was trying to decide whether to check on them to make sure the Chinese girl from the story was presented in a culturally sensitive way. While I haven’t seen the whole video, Paul did show me lego mini-figs he used.  The interviewer was male and was the standard lego-yellow mini-fig person.  For the Chinese girl, he picked a mini-fig with black (curly) hair and peach “skin” because, in his words, “that looked more Chinese.” I was assuaged that he was at least not doing something overly stereotypical or offensive.  I hope. 

I’m sure they steered clear from using pidgin English.  The bigger hurdle was helping Julia to avoid calling Chairman Mao, “Chairman Mayo.”  I’m afraid I can’t speak to the cultural sensitivity of the green alien that invaded the interview at the end of the video.  The book is called, “Red Scarf Girl,” and I’m looking forward to reading it when PJ is done with it.  It’s the memoir of a woman growing up during the cultural revolution in China.  Paul was really sad about some of the choices the girl had to make.

Conversations that should never happen #302

Sarah: Oh, I can't believe it! Kate Winslet did a duet with Weird Al Yankovic on this children's CD.  She's a glamorous super star actress, and he's just funny.
Paul: So he should be my role model?
Sarah: Umm... Uh... maybe?  You would have to learn the accordion.
Paul: Ooooo!  That sounds good!

Notes from home

Julia gets to sing as Tina Turner in her little 5^th grade musical.  She is so excited. 

The high point for my day last Tuesday was when I recognized that there was an error in a table of material properties in one of my textbooks.  The low point was cleaning a 6 foot long stretch of living room rug because Nathan was sick to his stomach again.  After ~2weeks of being ill every other day, I think he is finally, finally better.  

Grandpa has forgotten twice now to pick Nathan up from pre-school.  We’re going to have to put some alarm bells in place for him as reminders – it’s just not part of his usual routine.  Fortunately, I have a small bank of good will built up with the elementary school office because I didn’t freak out over them losing the first set of registration forms I sent in to enroll Nathan in pre-school.

Petra is keeping me endlessly engaged with the vicissitudes of first grade.  “The other girls wouldn’t let me play with them, because I’m not 7 yet.”  “I’m the table leader, but Evan wouldn’t listen to me when I told him it was time to put our heads down.”  “I got to play with some other girls today.  We had a girls' base.”

Paul’s schooling continues to be a roller coaster ride.  This boy, whom I love, would leave his head at school were it not attached to his shoulders.  

We forgot to have Paul dress nicely for picture day at school.  He wore a long sleeve t-shirt with a picture of a gingerbread man with broken legs, saying, "Oh, Snap!" I'm not sure what this says about me, but I think we might keep those pictures, because his smile is nice.  There may be some picture cropping or creative matting jobs this year.

15 Years

As of yesterday, Steve and I have been married for 15 years. 

We marked the occasion with Steve surprising me with lunch, and I picked up some cake from the bakery that made our wedding cake.  We're going out on a date on Sunday.

I think the best thing I can say about our marriage is that I like Steve better and love him more deeply than I did on our wedding day.

Hang on there, honey, and let's go for another 15.

Notes on Nathan

I got my hair cut.  Nathan was a little stunned, but has discovered that he can still smoochie my nice hair if I bend down.

He has trying to see if crying in the morning will persuade us to let him stay home from preschool.  So far, no luck.  He enjoys himself while is actually at preschool.

Nathan's class built a class pet.  I guess they used paper or something and made a cat, which they all helped to decorate.  The next day the children collaborated to name the cat Tiana Banana Pants. 

I will let you guess which part of that name my son contributed.

I'm not sure whether to be proud or mortified.

Flip-flop mercy

I took the all four kids grocery shopping with me this morning.  We didn't have to make any trips to the bathroom while we were there (yay!), but the trip still took a little longer than normal because first I had to run into the the store with the younger three in order to buy flipflops for the oldest.  The flipflop trip ended up being a blessing in disguise.

Earlier in the morning Paul and Julia had really been butting heads.  I was up to my neck in frustration with them for their behavior toward each other, and I told them so.  Julia, especially, seemed to be in some sort of vortex of hurt and bad attitude.  As we drove the the store, I talked to them about how God made them, and gave them to each other as siblings.  "How does God want you to treat this person He gave you for family?"

Julia was a little humbled and asked if she could change the subject.

As we got to the store Paul said, "Mom, I forgot to wear any shoes!"

Now, I had seen that he was barefoot in the car, but I had assumed that he had just slipped his sandals off while we were driving. No such luck.  After banging my head against the steering wheel a few times, I rolled the windows way down (it was about 87°F out) and scurried into the store with the younger children, hoping that the seasonal aisle still included cheap footwear.  We were in luck.  Julia helped pick out some camo-colored flip flops, and to my delight, they rang up at half-off.  We asked one of the store clerks to help cut off the ties, and hurried back to the car.  Julia carried the flip-flops and was very cheerful about bringing them to Paul.  Once he got them on his feet, we returned to the store to actually buy groceries.

I don't know if Julia was just pleased to be in a position to offer aid, or if she was glad that she wasn't the one to make the mistake of forgetting shoes, but something about the whole affair diffused her unhappy little energy ball.  Thank you, Lord!

Girls and horses

Last weekend I got to take my girls to Marmon Valley Farm for a mother-daughter overnight.  My mom joined up with us and we stayed in bunks in the old farmhouse.  Despite bad weather predictions, the rain held off, so we got to have a chuck wagon breakfast, go horseback riding, and square dance.  We got to try out a climbing wall - I've always wanted to give that a whirl.

I was really proud of how my girls handled themselves with their horses.  Before riding, we all groomed our horses.  Okay, I groomed Petra's and one of the wranglers took care of my horse.  All four of us had horses whose shoulder were higher than our heads.

The horses wanted to nibble grass on the trail, and the wranglers were adamant that they shouldn't.  "It's like potato chips for them.  They are not hungry.  They just want some junk food."  After a while I figured out which little white flowers were especially tempting for my horse and started preempting it.  I think Petra's horse knew it had a lightweight on back, and kept stopping to eat.  After the first ride, Petra leaned over to me and whispered, "Mommy, my horse, Rosy, is a bit of a stubborn mule."  On the second ride, she and Julia were both given light whips to tap the horses with when then bent down to eat.

It worked out really well because Grandma, who is the more experienced rider was behind the girls for both rides.  She was able to coach  and encourage them.

Me and my posse on the ride out to breakfast

Proof grandma was on a horse.

Petra on Rosy, Julia on Kasy, and Mom on Jasmine.
I got to lead the line.

Saturday afternoon we all went on a hay ride.  Later Julia said, "We looked over and saw that one of the other little girls had fallen asleep in her mom's lap.  We all thought that was a really good idea!"  So they lay down in the straw and closed their eyes.

Princess in Black

Petra is the mild mannered (ahem) alter ego of the monster fighting heroine...

The Princess in Black

New Grape Arbor

After many delays, Dad & I finally finished the grape arbor last weekend! And it turned out mighty fine, if I do say so myself.

Now I need to get a couple more grape vines to populate the last couple spots....

Springtime Sights Around the Farm

Two perspectives on Nathan

Petra says, "Nathan loves unicorns.  Nathan loves to climb on the big shiny step stool.  I love Nathan.  He is the best little kid I've ever seen. " 

Mommy says, "Sometimes being the youngest, means borrowing your sister's unicorn bike helmet."

Petra learns about publishing

I am Petra. I am six years old. I love butterflies. I got these clothes for Christmas.