Surviving Election Year (and Still Having a Babysitter!)

I try and turn a blind eye to the smear campaigns rolling around during election year. I don’t support them. I don’t support the people hosting them. I SERIOUSLY don’t support the candidates that endorse them.

Sometimes, however, you’ll come across a smear campaign so widely propagated that you have to say something about it. Because not only does it make you look unfavorably on the candidate and their campaign managers, it makes you lose all respect for the person posting. 

Yep, I said posting. Because for me, that breaking point was seeing post after post of smear campaign propaganda posted on Facebook by someone I like. Someone I’ve known a very long time. Someone I used to have a great deal of respect for. And someone I will never again be comfortable leaving in charge of my children.

As a parent, I encourage my kids to express their views. I also encourage them to use their manners, think before they speak, show respect for their elders and authority figures, stick to the facts and not try and win an argument by throwing their opponent under the bus.And I expect the adults I entrust with the responsibility of their care to do the same.

“But it’s just a Facebook post!” Your Facebook page is a representation of your personal brand. What you put on your page, you are personally endorsing. Being an azzhat on Facebook makes you an azzhat in real life. Not only because you’re repeating it, but because by repeating it you’re stating that this is both right and a reflection of your personal beliefs.

THINK before you speak. Be careful what you post. And for the love of God, can election year be over already?

Can Open House Cause PTSD?

Tonight’s feature event was Open House, take two, in which elementary school parents turned out in droves to meet the teacher(s). It was absolutely amazing, the difference between Open House for the Middle Schoolers and Open House for their younger siblings. If there was a square foot of space that didn’t have a person in it tonight, I didn’t see it. 

Ironically, we found all the peace and quiet we could handle down the middle school hallway. Go figure.

I think my hubby said it best. By the time the kids start middle school, parents are like, “You have 8 teachers. Forget this. I’ll be a bad parent, I’m fine with that.” In elementary school, it’s all about the discovery of where your little one is spending their day. What projects they’re working on. Who their friends are.

Where you can sign up to bring in cupcakes for the class Halloween party. (Cough, Cough.)

Two parent-teacher conferences, ten classroom tours and $50 in book fair finds later (don’t get me started), I got to take the kids to their first soccer game, where the screaming and pounding of dozens of fans in the bleachers was welcome relief for my buzzing head.

No, I’m not being melodramatic. As nice as it always is to get to walk around, visit with friends and peek at the kids’ projects, I left Open House this year feeling like I got hit by a truck. Not to mention feeling more than a little bit of sympathy for those parents who DON’T make it in for parent-teacher conferences, parties and special events.

I barely got to do more than say hi and bye to the kids’ teachers tonight. I get that Open House isn’t exactly where you plan to have a heart to heart with your kids’ instructors, but it would have been nice to get a LITTLE more information in there!

Anyway. Long story short, it was a crazy night. It didn’t help that my six year old was bouncing off the walls, I’m sure. They’re all upstairs enjoying the night before their four day weekend. I have one more day to work before my weekend rolls around, and I’ll be able to enjoy a little peace and quiet!

Well. Except for Homecoming and Fall Foliage and bonfires and Hotel Transylvania, of course…

Things are Getting Wild and Woolly…

I was starting to think it was never going to get here. September. The first day of school. The advent of being able to ship the kids off to school for a nice, steady six hours out of the day. 

Mr. A is on his second year of Middle School. Princess C is in fourth, and G-Money is now a second grader. We’ve been doing this whole “school” thang for a while now. This year, however, we’re shaking things up a bit. We’ve tossed the joy of afterschool daycare into the mix.

For the last six years, I’ve worked from home as a marketing copywriter. While the convenience of working from home has made working and raising kids much, much easier, there are a couple of bumps I didn’t expect when I first started out.

Quite frankly, that industry is wearing. Me. Out.

So. Starting next week, I’ll be working a 40 hour week at the nursing home down the street. Neither the job nor the pay are particularly glamorous, but I’m looking forward to it.Being around people all day. Doing a job that doesn't focus on increasing the bottom line. Don't get me wrong, I've loved working in marketing, but it’ll be a change of pace that I am quite desperately in need of.

The flip side, of course, is that I need someone to run herd on the kids when they get home from school. Their dad works from home, so he’ll be here in case of emergencies or sick days, but his hands are pretty full during the day. Three kids rampaging through the house is a little past his productivity quota.

So. G-Money is staying with a friend of ours who has an in-home daycare. He’s there every day until five. The first couple of days were rough, but he’s slowly settling in. Our friend’s son is usually quite devastated when it’s time for him to leave, so that’s made things a little sticky.

Princess C is doing the afterschool program at the school until 5:30 each night. They keep her hopping-dance and karate and arts and crafts and swimming and outdoor time, on top of that whole homework thing. She’s coming home tired and a little cranky, but I figure that’s not awful. Just means they’re keeping her running. She’ll get used to the longer days soon enough. 

Both of the younger two have had mixed emotions about their new afterschool arrangements. On one hand, they’re enjoying themselves. On the other, they miss those afterschool hours with mom.

Not so much so with my oldest. Mr. A is flexing his wings (and his independence) by coming home after school. He gets his own snack, is responsible for his own homework, and gets to decide what to do with his time after that. We had a little trouble getting him to settle in and actually DO the work the first day or two, making me very glad we started this routine before I went back to work. That way, I could actually be here to help him through it.

The flip side to all of this daycare happiness? Our evenings are a lot more rushed. The kids have afterschool activities, which means I often pick up the younger two and have a half an hour (or less) to get them where they need to go. Late dinners and skipped baths aren’t the end of the world, but with dance on Monday and Wednesday and Tae Kwon Do on Thursday, we’re going to be doing some serious running. Last week was a bit of a fail in the efficiency/finding our groove thing. I’m hoping this week will be better.

Cheers!

How Much Time Do Your Kids Spend Playing Video Games?

Last week, as part of an article I’m working on for a parenting website, I asked the friends and family on my social media sites whether they limited their kids’ video game time. Given the huge controversy surrounding video games these days, I wasn’t at all surprised to see responses ranging from “My kids aren’t allowed to play video games at all” to “They can play as long as they want as long they’re still speaking proper English”.

What did surprise me was how many parents were eager to set their OWN limits instead of quoting the American Academy of Pediatrics and calling it a day.

With a child with ADHD, video games are a hot topic at my house. I can tell when Mr. A’s been spending too much time glued to the computer. Not only does he start bouncing off the walls, his social manner begins to be…well…shall we say lacking in manners?

On school days, I usually cut the kids an hour or two of electronics time. That translates to a TV show or two before bed. Weekends and vacations, they get on the television and computer pretty much as soon as they get up. I let them hang out until 10 or 11, then kick them off until bedtime. At which point I usually allow another hour or so before I send them to bed.

Occasionally I’ll let them stay up watching television until all hours of the night. Well, okay, midnight, which is the point at which they go to bed or my head goes “POP”.

Work days during vacations are always a little tricky. I’ve discovered that the pool about an hour and a half down the road has a perfect pre-made work space; the tables are set high enough above the pool that I can see what’s going on without having to worry about my laptop getting soaked. Since I now have three-count them, three-kids that can swim comfortably without the aid of a flotation device, that makes a good way to keep them occupied for 3-4 hours while I blog/research/work on the day’s articles/whatever. Well worth the drive.

Winter time, however, I have been known to lift video and television restrictions completely if it will keep them occupied and out of trouble for 4-6 hours. Same with sick days-mine or theirs. (My kids LOVE mom’s sick days, let me tell you what.) Since that usually ends with the kids bouncing off the walls by bedtime, I try not to let that one happen too often.

I’ve heard a number of people tell me that their kids will, if given the choice, self-police themselves when it comes to video games. Two thumbs way up to those kids, let me tell you what. My kids aren’t there yet.

What are the video game rules in your house?  

School Clothes Shopping

I thought I was going to get lucky this year. I really did. Mr. A needs new pants, but otherwise he’s pretty good on clothes. Princess C started the summer wearing the same size range as she did last year, and G-Money was the recipient of so many hand-me-downsI’m not going to have to shop for him for years.

New socks, a few new t-shirts for the boys and we’re ready to rock!

Then I took a good look at Princess C’s wardrobe and realized I wasn’t getting that lucky. You’d think it would be my boys who were hard on their clothes. Nope, not so much. Everything in her dresser right now has either stains, holes or both. The bottoms are falling off of her pants. Her shirts have shrunk in the dryer. Her skorts from last year aren’t too bad, but let’s be realistic. We live in New England. Global warming or not, it’ll be a miracle if it’s not snowing by Halloween.

So, this weekend, we get to go school clothes shopping. And because the boys would rather have their toenails plucked than go shopping when they don’t have to, it’s going to be ladies’ day out all the way around. Maybe we’ll make it to Red Lobster this time. Those shrimp are calling my name.

The Problem with Cartoons

Curling up with cartoons in the morning is a long-standing tradition that dates back to the year Mr. A was born. I was working nights, and being able to kick on the television and distract him for a few hours was my key to catching another hour or two of sleep.

Maybe not the best habits to foster, but hey. A mom’s gotta do what a mom’s gotta do.

Now, when Mr. A was born, good cartoons were a dime a dozen. We’d watch “Bear in the Big Blue House”, “Darkwing Duck” and “Dora the Explorer”. Things started taking a downturn when Princess C came along, but they weren’t bad. By the time G-Money was old enough to appreciate the wonders of animation, his options were pretty gosh-darned cruddy.

Fortunately, we were too cheap to pay for cable. All those Dora and Blues Clues DVDs came in handy.

Now that the kids are older and moving beyond Thomas the Tank Engine and Care Bears, I’m not impressed. We’ve pretty much banned Cartoon Network in my house for excessive violence and encouraging bad behavior. Even the Disney Channel is letting me down. I love Phineas and Ferb, but even Suite Life and Pair of Kings is a perfect launch pad for anarchy and terminal verbal diarrhea.

Short story, our kids are getting bombarded with messages about how it’s “cool” to talk back to their parents, play pranks on their supervisors and disrespect their friends. And it’s not cool.

What happened to the cartoons of our youth? I know I’m not romanticizing it. These days, if nobody gets their butt kicked, my kids don’t want to watch it. I did, however, find one show I really like.

Magi Nation

If you have older kids who are into Yu Gi Oh and Pokemon, you have to check this out. The show is essentially Pokemon, but in a dream world with dream creatures. The best part is, there are math and science lessons incorporated into each show. The kids get to see Gorram be captured and sent back to the dream land AND discover the lattice and pure minerals inside crystals. They track down the dream stones while discovering addition, subtraction and greater than/less than, which might not mean much for older kids but is solid gold when their six year old brother’s in the room too.

Most importantly, it teaches things like friendship and family values while still giving them enough action to keep them interested. I love it.

 

Yay Sick Days

Hello hello hello! Did you miss me?

It’s been a wild summer. Kids spent a month out of state with my in-laws while I finished some college classes. (More on that when I’ve put the trauma out of my mind.) I spent that whole month scouting out great things to do with the kids when they got back.

I planned camping trips. I planned amusement park days. I planned for picnics and pools and movies and all sorts of other stuff. So what’s the first thing they do when they get back?

Okay, the first thing they did was spend two days at Jellystone, which was AMAZING. The second thing they did was get sick.

Yup. Sick. For the last one…three…five days I’ve had at least one kid down with the plague at any point in time. Princess C had to come home early from a slumber party the other night. I left her home with Dad to take the boys to the state park for a day of fun, sun and swimming, only to have Mr. A drop on the way home with a fever, cough and general misery.

I was so aggravated with the amount of time they spent on the computer and watching TV while they were gone. I SWORE I was going to get them out and about when they got home. What happened? We’ve had a five day cartoon marathon while the kids lay around in bored misery and mom tries to work, catch up on two weeks’ of errands and housework, job hunt and play nurse, all at the same time.

No days at the park or Chuck E. Cheese with my laptop in one hand and a juice box in the other. No early morning work sessions so we can spend the afternoon at the pool. I love sick days. (sigh)