Intentional Parenting/homeschooling and some “family and me” updates

Another ramble:

Jumpin’ right in, yes we are. Still lacking most of our curriculum books (darn that snail mail!), we mainly spent the week going through books about oceans and ocean animals, doing projects and integrating learning lessons into our daily life. We were able to start the day with “spiritual time” only a three days this week, and twice with yoga (ya win some, ya lose some!). Here are the main prayers/reflections I have found for us to do throughout the day (they are beautiful and you’re welcome to use them).

The biggest thing that has been helping with Lil’ E’s “rhythm” is a chore and behavior chart. Yes, he gets stars — its a bribe, BUT: I feel that this is helpful for us at this age. I can tell that he is learning not only that doing his chores and being well-behaved are things that gets star stickers on his chart, but also that this “incentive” is helping him decipher between his choices, think through what he will ultimately do, and muster the skill of self-control that is so crucial for a 3 year old boy! It has also helped me remain CALM and COOL throughout the day, as I present the choices before him (e.g. at toy store: “I have told you it is time to leave, and you need to follow me to the door. If you go back to the train table for the ‘one last train’, you will have lost your listening star for today. It is your choice. I’ll be waiting at the cart. You can follow me and keep your star, or you can go back to the train table and lose your star.”)

It feels good to have a PLAN for behavior problems that are unique to this age (where as a year or two ago a stern look or clap of my hands might have deterred a precarious situation, he now will rationalize, argue and bargain! WHOA!). So, even when he is in tears because he realized his choice cost him a star, I can calmly check out and be the mom with the screaming boy without that feeling in my chest like I am in the most embarrassing position of my life, all because I am confident in the choices I gave him, carrying out the consequences, and empathizing with his emotional response without wavering on my decision, (and I do hope it gets easier with practice, cause I’m such a noob!) We’ve finally made a pact as a couple that there will be no physical aggression (spank, hit, pinch, grab, pull, drag, etc) to tame his behavior (here’s some reasons why), and there’s been a lot less tears and raising of voices too – which feels in my heart a million times better.

Some things he gets stars for each day, (or doesn’t), include brushing his teeth in the morning and at night, getting himself dressed (both times), making his bed (as best he can), putting toys away when finished, helping with laundry, helping with dishes (drying and stacking), helping with dinner, listening, doing his lessons, so on. He gets really excited to complete a task and watch his chart fill up with stars, so that by the end of the week he can obtain some special (very affordable) prize. This week, he wanted a rolling pin that was his size so he can help me with cookies. We found an unfinished wooden one for $1.20 from an online wood craft store – he was so excited when it arrived yesterday, just in time for him to turn in his star chart for his prize.

Some things he learned this week were ocean animals; lots about sharks, sea turtles, and alligators, the different types, their life cycle, so on. We made a craft this week of water colored sea animals and created an small underwater ocean scene (I drew several, he painted – though the fish he drew himself are pretty cool too!) and a counting project with crab legs (he did all the cutting and letters himself, but needed help with numbers. I LOVE that he drew the eyes and smile upside down- his “touch” ). He had to watch “Finding Nemo” once when I had to work, but I placed lots of paper and colors before him and we interacted with the movie by having him draw the types of fish and ocean life he saw (little blue and orange circles for Nemo and Dori, lol, and one big zig zaggy line for the shark’s teeth! He’s so cute!). Along with the ocean learning unit, we’ve incorporate basic academics, if you will. His spanish vocab has been “La Playa” and “Las Conchas” and then we added “La Estrella De Mar” when he got those down. He’s picking up on phonics, recognizing the sounds of letters/words in our exercises, as well as math (he’s counting to 20 in english, 10 in spanish, and can recognize number 0-9, which we’ll continue to do until he really has it “under his belt”.) Next week we are studying Florida ocean life and the Everglades, since we will be flying to the southern Gulf Coast on Thursday. We will integrate his lessons (again, that word “integrate”, as in holistic, organic, so on) with the turtles we spot treading across my dad’s lawn, the seagulls and shells at the beach, and a trip to the nature reserve to spot some native wildlife. We are also bringing along a fresh doodle pad and new colored pencils, which we will use to document his trip to Florida and draw what he is seeing. For the plane ride, we hope things like this come in very handy, along with his etch-a-sketch, which I have brought out with us this week to occupy him during outings and has been SUCH a success! I love getting to the bookstore, handing him a doodle pad, he lays down on his tummy and draws for 5 minutes giving me time to look around that section without worrying about him getting bored and misbehaving. I kept thinking, “WHY didn’t I do this more often?!”

As always, he likes letters, spells them out where ever we go and every time I bring out his doodle pad for him to draw, he is practicing letters instead of anything creative, lol. I think he’s always had a strong “left brain” in that way – sorting, putting away, counting, letters, so on. He likes free play and loves to build, but gets frustrated with artwork when it doesn’t come out the way he wants it to in his head. I can relate to that, as I have always felt I am creative only in one sense. I can do stuff, but I follow a pattern, copy a picture, etc. The only place I have ever felt “freely creative” is perhaps in certain styles of writing (and I would say this is largely due to the year or so I spent POURING over Poemcrazy: Freeing Your Life with Words in middle school – a book I really recommend!). Otherwise, its more of a logical, methodical, perfectionist “creation” I can’t make it to my church’s group reading of it, but I plan to get through “An Artist’s Way: Spiritual Path to Creativity” in the next 3 months. Speaking of my creativity, check out the picture I painted at christmas, and last night my first knitted swatch (mostly knit, a few purl rows for practice)! I plan to make some baby hats during the long plane ride and while visiting in Florida. Fun!

One of the best parts about the last two weeks is that he no longer asks to watch cartoons. This used to be his morning “thing”, straight to PBS Kids while I started working. Now, I do my best to put off work until the afternoon and spend time with him on lessons and homemaking from roughly 9-1 each day (unless he is at playschool, two days per week, til the end of this month). In fact, once I asked him if he wanted to watch a movie while I made dinner, and he said, “No, I don’t want ANY movie or TV, just music and my lessons, please!” That really touched my heart. How much of his life have I missed that all he wanted was to curl up with me and learn stuff, and I put him in front of the tube? I know we all do the best we can, and life dealt me a pretty hard blow 7 months ago that took me some time to even BEGIN to recover from, but I am so glad we are starting to get back on track now.
Hubby and I continue to see him adjust to our new attempts to parent as “emotion coaches” and its the perfect encouragement to keep trying. So many less meltdowns, so many more compliant, loving behaviors.

Aside: I’m very proud of Hubby for the strides he is making, as a person, employee, christian, husband and father. He continues to work his recovery program, continues to spend lots of time reading and learning, putting in effort and quality time with me and Lil’ E. He is taking such better care of himself, not out of vanity but for his emotional, physical and spiritual health, such as yoga and a healthy, vegetarian diet. He is reading “A Generous Orthodoxy” by Brian McLaren (I never, not in a million years, thought Hubby and I would be able to discuss theology together! I could just cry!) I told my counselor this week that I actually love my husband now. He is becoming the partner, friend and lover that my heart as a woman desires – something I had given up all hope about a year ago. I still grieve, I still hurt, I still feel angry over the past and the 5 years of emptiness that came before, but I am beginning to see us, as a system, changing from the inside out, and it is a miraculous feeling.

As an individual, a mother and a woman, I am learning a lot too. Seeing the ways in which I interact with mother figures as opposed to female “peers”, I am recognizing how often my feelings and reactions come from a place of not knowing what it means to be a woman, uniquely female, confident and strong, but nurturing and soft too. Things that my other female friends make decisions on seem to come fairly naturally as they operate from the blueprint of their “woman manual” based on what they observed their mother’s do (or not do) well. For me, its just kinda blank, a big wormy mixture of female roll models but nothing really formative and substantial. It often takes concerted effort for me to not revert to a 13 year old mindset when being around older women, from doctors to people I have to interview for work, you name it. It’s like there’s a bit of me that is just way more stunted than the rest, and that bit acts like a kid that is needy for love and approval. At this point, I’m just in the phase of recognizing it, maybe every so often “giving it up” to God and asking for Him to fill up any empty spaces with a secure identity in Him and His love for me. I know it will be a life-long process, taking on many forms and faces over the years as I grow.

Books I’m reading/To Read before Verity arrives:
The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron (for me time)
Finding Our Way Again, Brian McLaren (for church “Theology Pub” starting this Monday!)
The Wounded Healer, Henri Nouwen (for book club, gotta read by the 25th, so this one is reserved for plane ride!)
Raising an Emotionally Intelligent Child , John Gottman (for Hubby & Me time)
The Creative Family, Amanda Soule (for me time)
Wild Fermentation: The Flavor, Nutrition, and Craft of Live-Culture Foods, Sandor Ellix Katz (me time!)

P.S. Rainy Day Tonic: this reminded me of how steamers can “hit the spot” when I don’t want more coffee but I do want a gentle, warm drink on a cold and rainy day. I’ve been making mine with raw local goat’s milk and raw local honey, a touch of fair trade vanilla extract and a sprinkle of cinnamon and allspice. Sometimes I add this to black tea if my goal is NOT to fall asleep

P.S.S. I luuuuv my kitty, Paz. I call him “squishy” and make up songs for him when I see him. However, he is older than we thought. We smelled something this week, could likely be male kitty spray, on Hubby’s newly painted media shelf. We are getting him nuetered this Wednesday, and time will tell if we caught the spraying behavior in time or not. If not, I have to say goodbye to my Squishy And yes, this is the face I make when I call him “squishy”, picture randomly taken courtesy of Hubby.