A Cup of Tea

A tea cup from My Grandmother's Wedding Shower passed on to me.

I have been what I would call a “tea granny” since my teens.  Growing up I hated the taste of coffee.  I realized later that I just hated my parent’s coffee, still do. (Seriously, I'd say it tastes like dishwater only dishwater probably tastes better.)

So tea was my other warm beverage alternative, you know when you get to that age where hot cocao just wasn’t quite so cool. 

Besides there was always something special about the ritual of tea.  After all, my mother had a dozen dainty flowered porcelain tea cups in her china cabinet and a pretty porcelain teapot to go with it.  Whenever there was a special occasion like a wedding or baby shower my mother would set out those pretty little cups and steep a pot of tea.  This despite the fact that 90% of our family drank coffee. I guess it stemmed back to her own family traditions.  I would look enviously on while she poured out tea in the precious cups for her guests.   I can remember coveting a certain purple rose cup in my mother’s china cabinet and whenever I would get an afternoon to myself with no one at home, I take it out and have my own little elegant tea party.  Looking back I realize I was darn lucky I didn’t break anything.

Tea was always our go to comfort drink.  I can remember my mother making me a cup of tea when I was in pain from those dreaded menstrual cramps or staying up late sharing confidences and feeling so grown up.  I find myself offering my own little girls a cup of sweet tea to console them over a disappointment in their day.

The language of tea is international. When I was sixteen, I spent the year in Holland and enjoyed drinking tea with my host family.  Despite the fact that they thought milk in tea was disgusting and Jannie would get annoyed because I’d always steam up her special sugar spoon so it’d clump up and our tea was always in glass mugs. We still shared many a wonderful chat in both English and Dutch while drinking hot  tea out of those glass mugs.

In later years, I like to say that my husband and I fell in love over tea.  We started out as friends and would spend countless hours just sitting in my apartment drinking tea.  In those days we never even would turn on the television.  To this day, we still end our day with a cup of tea and find that if we don’t we actually miss that little part of our routine.

These days I drink my tea out of mugs but it has to be just the right mug. It can’t be too small:  not enough tea, or too big: too much tea and the mug has to have the right feel on my bottom lip.  And while I do like herbal tea, I’d rather have a good old comforting cup of black tea (Tetley is our current favourite) with a splash of milk and two sugars any day.

My china cabinet also boasts over a dozen pretty little cups collected over the years.  The most precious being the ones from my grandmother.  Before she passed on she presented me with cups that had been used at her wedding reception over 60 years ago.  She told me that she knew that I would be the one to take proper care of them.  My grandmother was a crusty old thing but now and then she'd pop out with a little something that made you realize that underneath she really was fond of you.

So when it came to my own little girl's 6th birthday, what else could I do but throw a lovely little tea party.

Of course I didn't use the 60 year old cups but still there were enough pretty cups to go around.

Zeemaid

This week I am participating in


and chose the writing prompt "How did your love affair with Coffee begin? (Or Diet Coke or Tea or whatever your beverage of choice might be.) (inspired by Buried With Children)"
If you'd like to join in simply click on the above button to see this week's list of writing prompts and drop by Mama Kat's to link up.  Try it, it's a lot of fun!

Don’t Have a Cow Dude!

My son is obsessed with cows.   That’s right, you heard me.  I said COWS. His current favourite knock knock joke (and oh how we love those) goes something like this:

O:   “Knock knock”

Me: “Who’s there?”

O:  “Bannahead”  (wait for it)

Me:  “Bannahead who?”

O:  “Bannahead has a cow on it” 

….and there it is once again, Cow. 

Almost every sentence he utters has to mention the word cow at least once followed by giggles. 


Do you like your supper, O?   Yeah, it has a cow in it.  (snicker snicker)


Would you like to watch a show, O?   I wanna watch mad  movers with a cow on it.  (snicker snicker)


Are you buckled?  Yeah with a cow.  (snicker snicker)


To his sisters:  You have a cow on your head.  (snicker snicker)


Why did you throw that on the floor?  I didn't, the cow did it. 


At least he cracks himself up.   It could be worse.  I asked another mother at preschool if her son was doing the cow craze.  Apparently not .  The catch phrase in their house tends to lean towards the poop word.  So like I said.. it could be worse.


And then it occurred to me… I better write this down.  Who knows how long this phase will last and after all, I am going to need good material on his wedding day.  In fact, I might be able to screen out the weak and not so worthy girlfriends by trotting out this old post and asking the prospective bride… 


“So…. how do you feel about cows.” 

My son will cry in embarrassment… “Moooomm”

and I will reply, elegantly of course,

“Don’t have a cow dude!”

Zeemaid

Question & Answers

I’ve been meaning to take part in one of Mama Kat’s Writing Workshops and while I’ve been scouring the writing prompts weekly, have yet to dive in.  This week; however, one of her prompts was so easy that even my 8 year old could breeze through it.

The challenge, should I choose to accept, is

Ask your child where babies come from and share their answers.

Oh boy. This could be a good one.  Or so I thought.  Their answers were surprisingly boring.  I guess that’s what I get for being too practical.  Although it did spark quite a few giggles.

So here it goes... Kids, where do babies come from?

O: (age 4)  "Tummys.  People have eggs in their body and there is babies in the eggs."

J: (age 6) "Mommy’s tummy from an egg.  J+J=J"  (uh okay, short attention span?)

E (age 8) "A mother’s stomache.  God creates a little child in the mother’s tummy and it grows and grows and grows and grows until it gets big and then becomes a full grown child and then it comes out as a baby.  Is that right?"

Then I lost my interviewees because dessert ran out.  Except for my 8 year old who seemed disappointed that I only wanted to ask one question.  So in the spirit of Saint Patrick’s Day coming up I figured I’d ask her a few more questions.

What are Leprechauns?

“Oh it’s related to the cat family and has spots. It’s yellow with black spots and runs real fast and catches its prey with its teeth.”

Okay then maybe I should have started with:


What is Saint Patrick’s Day?

“A day where you dress in green and you celebrate with four leaf clovers and it’s not really a holiday” Somehow I think the Irish would argue with you.

What would you do with a pot of gold?

“Really want to kn0w?  The truth?  I would save it and save it and save it and then I’d buy a cage and stuff and then a hamster.”

What do you do if you find a four leaf clover?

“I would have lots of good luck and maybe if I have enough good luck I would buy a hamster.” Gee I wonder who has hamsters on the brain.


And there you have it.  The answers to life's most pressing questions.

Zeemaid

Storm of the Century

Okay so I exaggerate.  It wasn’t the storm of the century but it certainly was the worst storm I have ever seen on our small west coast Island.  It was the first time school has ever been cancelled due to extreme weather conditions and we’re not talking snow.  In fact the wind was blowing so hard it actually scared my six year old and so we ended up listening to the storm (cause we certainly couldn’t ignore the noise) with the blinds closed for most of the day. 

Then bizarrest of all things is that it tried to snow late last evening.  Huge enormous snowflakes came floating down from nowhere only to disappear ten minutes later.

Today the sun is shining but the aftermath of destruction is severe. Highways are closed, trees are down and power is out for thousands of people.  Luckily not us.  We not only managed to keep our power but our satellite signal.  Who says satellites are so weather finicky. We’ve never had a problem with ours ever. 

We did; however, lose two fence panels.  One of them surprisingly was a panel that had been repaired only last year and yet it was the first to go.  The good news is that the fence belongs to the neighbours and not us and being retired older people with money they can well fork out the several hundred dollars needed to fix it that we couldn’t.

    O inspecting the damage

Now I just have to make sure the kids stay out of the neighbour’s yard. 

Zeemaid

Infertility

Take a quick tour around the blogosphere and you will come across an amazing number of women who have either struggled or are struggling with infertility.  It’s a painful topic and intensely personal which we often bear in silence.  After all, infertility isn’t exactly something our friends and family can help with and really who wants to share those sorts of intimate details with just anyone.

I know I’ve talked about my own personal struggle with infertility before but after having read a couple of more blogs I feel the need to share it again.

Why?  Because everyone seems to dismiss what I have to say as “oh that worked for you but won’t for me” or “my doctor would have told me about it”.

When it comes to a wide variety of subjects most of us seem to accept that sometimes natural medical choices are better for us than what we have been offered traditionally by the medical profession.   Why isn’t that the case with infertility?  Sure we’ll cut down our caffeine intake but try progesterone cream.. that’s just crazy.

To recap my own story, we went two years without being able to conceive.  Finally we did fertility tests.  I went through the most excruciating test of having ink shot up my tubes to see if they were scarred, I had an arthroscopy to rule out endometriosis (although I had no symptoms of it) and three months of fertility drugs. 

I did a ton of research on everything from PCOS to ovulation. I learned more about a woman’s monthly cycle than I ever wanted to.  I tracked my Basil Body Temperature religiously every morning and kept charts.  What emerged was a pattern of delayed ovulation and a slight.. very slight possibility of a luteal phase defect.

A luteal phase is the time in a woman’s cycle between ovulation and menstruation. In a pregnant woman, during the luteal phase the fertilized egg will travel from the fallopian tube and into the uterus for implantation. The luteal phase is normally 14 days long and on an average it can be anywhere from 10 to 17 days long. If your luteal phase lasts anything under 10 days it is considered a luteal phase defect. But some doctors believe that if the luteal phase falls under 12 days, then it is a problem. If you conceive and you have a luteal phase defect, you will have an early miscarriage.

A luteal phase defect cannot sustain a pregnancy because the uterine lining in these women begins to break down, bringing on the menstrual bleeding and causing an early miscarriage. There could be more than one reason for the luteal phase defect which can be found out after medical analysis. Going by statistics, the number one reason for a luteal phase defect is low progesterone levels. Your doctor can do a progesterone test on you 7 days past ovulation to determine exactly how deficient you are. Once you know that there are several ways of correcting this defect.

Causes of Luteal Phase Defect

The three main causes of luteal phase defect include poor follicle production, premature demise of the corpus luteum, and failure of the uterine lining to respond to normal levels of progesterone. These problems occur at different times during the cycle but can also be found in conjunction with each other.

Correction of Luteal Phase Defect

Fertility charting is an easy way of detecting whether you have luteal phase defect. If you do, don’t worry because luteal phase defect can be easily corrected. Immediately seek the advice of your physician first before starting any treatments to correct it. In most case, luteal phase defect can be corrected through over-the-counter remedies and/or with prescription drugs.

1. Over the counter remedies for luteal phase defect:
The two main over the counter remedies for luteal phase defect are vitamin B6 and progesterone cream. Vitamin B6 is generally regarded as safe and can be taken daily in dosages from 50 mg to 100mg. Taking vitamin B6 every day during the entire month will help to lengthen the luteal phase.   Please note that taking mega doses  of vitamin B6 can lead to serious medical issues.  Be sure to check with your doctor before using vitamin B-6 to increase the length of your luteal phase  to make sure it is the best option for you.

A progesterone cream is usually targeted for menopausal women; however this cream is also useful in lengthening the luteal phase. A cream with natural progesterone works best. Use about 1/4 to 1/2 a teaspoon of progesterone cream spread on the inner arm, inner thigh, neck, and chest – alternating places – twice a day from ovulation to menstruation or until the 10th week of pregnancy.

article information from http://www.babyhopes.com/articles/luteal-phase-defect.html

Ten years ago this information wasn’t that easy to find even on the internet and when I brought it to my fertility doctor’s attention he said maybe there was one…. but didn’t really think so.  I started reading information from Dr. John Lee, a well known medical expert on treating menopausal women and in fact it was in one of his lectures where he relates sharing an experience he had with an infertile patient of his.

He prescribed progesterone and recommended that the patient use it for the entire month for several months to help bring up her body hormonal levels etc.  After that the recommendation was to wait until ovulation has occurred and then use progesterone cream on a daily basis until the end of the the cycle.  Once you’ve established you are not pregnant by taking a home pregnancy test then you discontinue using the progesterone cream so you will have a normal period.  

Well.. I tell you I provided this information to my family doctor and while he was skeptical he agreed to prescribe for me since it wouldn’t harm me either.

Impatient I couldn’t wait the month of and using one of those Clearplan Fertility monitors I tracked my cycle until I knew I was ovulating and started using the cream as prescribed.  Sure enough I ovulated on Day 18 not day 14 like they say and considering you need 10 + days for an egg to fertilize and implant etc. obviously I was ovulating too late in my cycle to get pregnant.  The progesterone cream helped my body produce enough progesterone in time to promote the right conditions for implantation.  After two plus years of waiting I got pregnant the very first month I was on the cream.

My mom said maybe it was a fluke.  I knew better but I wasn’t going to argue with the skeptics.  So when I was unable to get pregnant with my second child, I went off to my doctor for a prescription again.  His only comment was… “didn’t you get pregnant on this the last time”  You bet I did.  And sure enough, one month of cream and I was pregnant again.

Since then I have shared what I have learned with fellow friends who are struggling with unexplained infertility.  Not one of them will consider the progesterone cream even though it worked for me.  Why? I really don’t know. 

This isn’t some crazy off the cuff made up therapy.  Luteal Phase Defect is a real condition which is under diagnosed by the medical profession. Hormone imbalances itself are difficult to diagnose because at every stage of our cycle we need different levels of estrogen and progesterone.  If you get screened early in the month you might have the right levels and so the diagnosticians state your hormones are in line.  However, had you had it taken nearer the end of the month it’s just possible those levels might not have been in line. 

Not only that every one’s body is different.  While my levels were low they were considered to be within the range.  Obviously for my body within range wasn’t good enough.

I realize that progesterone cream may not be the answer for everyone but if you have unexplained infertility, I would seriously consider it or at least look into the possibility of a luteal phase defect.  Pop that term into google and you will be surprised by plethora of information there is out there.

That’s my story. 

Zeemaid

Teacher Strike

In our neck of the woods the teachers are all on strike.  Well not really, apparently it’s more of a protest and they’re not teaching at the moment and they aren’t allowed to wear signs around their necks but are allowed to hold them on a stick as they lounge around outside our public schools.  They call it a protest, you might call it a strike.

It’s always a hot topic whenever you talk about someone’s wages.  It seems these days no one thinks they get paid enough and think they are worth more. Especially when the general public is being inconvenienced by disrupted service and picket lines.  We who have non union jobs think union people get paid a ton of money and are resentful because our non-union jobs only pay a fraction of the cost.  Not always entirely true but there it is none the less.

While I don’t know whether or not the teachers should get more money or not, I do know that this is an age old issue.  Government says they have no more money, teachers say they need more.  On the one hand in this economy you can’t squeeze money from a rock on the other hand, I am sure money is being wasted by the Government as we speak on useless projects. 

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against paying teachers more money or smaller class sizes.  What I do object to is the fact that the entire system is falling apart and no one knows how to fix it.  That this can go on and on for  five months without any resolution. Good teachers or bad teachers, there are too many kids and not enough money to go around.   When I hear reports of how the kids are suffering right now and have been since last September when this whole job action started, I can only be thankful that we put our own kids in private school.  A very hard financial sacrifice it has been but I have to say worth it.
 
Where would E have been this past year?  Not only was she significantly behind her peers, she was getting assisted learning and was on some “watch” list for the pysch assessment of which we had no knowledge.  Within two days at the private school not only did we have a meeting with the teachers, but had our eyes opened to what sorts of problems E had been having.  It’s been a rough school year but it would have been rougher had we not been pointed in direction of getting help.

It makes me angry to think that there are more kids like E out there in the public system that don’t fit into the normal curriculum and aren’t getting the time or help needed.   Where are all these kids in the last year?  Suffering and getting further and further behind because of the job action.

I don’t know how to fix the system.  It almost seems like we are always our own worst enemies because as long as someone benefits from how things currently stand, there is no motivation to make the effort of change.   After all, unions often end up protecting the lazy and incompetent even though that wasn’t why they were formed in the first place.  Flame me if you will, but both my parents have worked for unions throughout the years and I have heard more than one horror story of how difficult it can be to rid yourself of bad employee because of union protection.  
Else why is the teacher that was demeaning to my child still employed?  Not a teacher in that building can stand to work with her for very long so every year she’s being shifted about the school into different grade levels and job sharing with different teachers.   Why does she get to stay?  Because she has a contract.  Parents have no real power.  We can complain to the principal but then we’re labeled as “difficult” and ignored from then on. 

Would that happen in a private school?  Not on your life.

Perhaps the Government should be taking a look at the private schools as to why they are so successful.  Smaller class sizes might help for a start.  In both our daughter’s class there are only 15 children.  The first day of school E commented on how quiet her class was and how she could actually eat her lunch in peace.  She said it with a big sigh like it was such a relief to her.   Maybe kids wouldn’t be so hyper if there wasn’t always so much chaos going on around them. 

Apparently sensory overload is a real and valid thing that affects our children more than we realize. 

 I’d like to go on strike too but I don’t think anybody would pay any attention except maybe my family when they ran out of clean socks or got hungry.

Little Product Testers

In an attempt to provide us with a calmer and less noisy environment we recently purchased an area rug from Home Depot.  The theory being that if we were to use area rugs we’d somehow be able to muffle the noise that three active kids can make on laminate floors.  I don’t know if you’ve experienced this yourself but with the whole first level being nothing but laminate, we find that the sounds just bounce of the walls and back again.  Not to mention the irritating noise of hot wheels on wood.  

Naturally our children wanted to know why we needed the carpet.  In the old days, my parents would have merely said “because” and left it at that.  In the good ol “new way of parenting” we explain everything.  So we told them how we were hoping that it would make things less noisy downstairs and how we hope to help mommy’s headaches etc.

When the new carpet arrived we deemed it best to lay it out after the kids were in bed.  I know, I know, what mean parents we are wanting to enjoy the luxury of opening a package without six little hands diving in to help.  We only had to shoo them back to bed like three times. 

The next morning; however, we were woken by the shouts and laughter of our three children followed by earth shaking crashes as they jumped off the t.v. stand doing “cannon balls” onto the new carpet.  They landed so hard it shook our bed upstairs.  Breathless, the three of them came running upstairs…

“Mommy, mommy, the carpet doesn’t work….  it’s still noisy.”

Who knew that a new area rug would cause such excitement in the house.  My children have continued to test the noise reducing capabilities of the new rug on a daily basis.  Although I have managed to instill in them the need to refrain from “cannon balling” off the t.v. stand. 

I think we would have been smarter to have purchased ear plugs. 

Zeemaid

lacking inspiration

I’ve been finding it very hard to post lately.  Partly due to lack of time.  I have no idea how people who work full-time can blog when I find it difficult working part-time.  Not only am I away from home three days a week but when I am home, then I’m back to playing catch up with dishes, laundry, vacuuming etc.  Not to mention getting meals on the table for the family after a hectic day at work. 

The other fact of it is that we’re all in a bit of  down turn at the moment.  We are struggling financially like so many others and that puts a lot of strain on our day to day living.  Plus we are still trying to come to terms with E’s diagnosis and were disappointed to learn that she’s recommending more assessments specifically in regards to Autism and Aspergers. If that’s ruled out then she’s leaning to Organic Brain Dysfunction.  Sounds lovely,right?

Reality is, we are coming to realize more and more just how difficult E can be and how much harder it is getting for us to cope with some of her behaviour.  We can no longer deceive ourselves and think that she’s just a normal child doing normal child things.  Most of the time she is… but it’s all the other stuff that’s driving us crazy.

It’s harder for family because they don’t live with her even though they do consider some of her behaviour as odd and they are prone to dismiss some of the psychologist’s more serious claims such as E is suffering from depression most likely.  What 8 year old suffers from depression? 

So posting has gotten a little difficult these days.  I have discovered that I’d rather not be a whiner after all so many others are going through much worse than we are.  Yet our focus is rather narrow at the moment and has left little room for inspiration on any other topics. 

I would be interested to know how other’s cope with these sorts of diagnosis….

Did you go through a grieving process or were you just so relieved you had a diagnosis?

Zeemaid

Technorati Tags: children,family,posting,blogging,aspergers

Valentine Bust

You would think that since I pretty much spent the weekend cutting out dozens of hearts so that my girls can make adorable Valentines for there friends that I'd be more aware of the fact that today is Valentine's Day.

I have to confess that I have absolutely diddly squat for my husband.  Zip Nada Zilch Nothing.  In fact, if I hadn't reminded Hubs about picking something up for the kiddo's last week, I wouldn't even have had the cheesy little heart shaped boxes filled with kinder egg surprises  to give the kids.

It occurred to me at precisely 4:15 pm on  February 14th while I was driving two of the kids home after dropping off E at her extra learning classes that I hadn't even thought about getting something for my darling husband.  I briefly contemplated stopping somewhere on the way home to grab something only to dismiss the idea as I remembered that one child was sick with a racking cough and was wrapped up in her blankie and the other declined to wear a jacket and was equally snotty trying to get over a cold.

Add to that a trip to the emergency room on the weekend and the business year end to be struggled through where it seems that every opportunity I have to work on the bookkeeping immediately gets derailed by (a) a sick kid and/or (b) a school holiday and there you have it folks romance in a nutshell.  Nonexistent.

Our oldest child was knocked down at church on Sunday and managed to hit the floor so hard that she went a little loopy for a while.  We actually were concerned enough to take her to emergency and turns out she has a concussion.  What a scare.  While she seems fine now apart from the enormous bruise along her jawline, it can't help but concern us since this is the child that they are telling us may be brain damaged.  It may be silly for us to worry, we're not medical doctors so have no idea if our fears are rational or not.  We are supposed to keep her relatively quite for a few days and if I let myself stop to think... I can see myself getting absolutely paranoid that she's going to fall and hit her head again.

I keep thinking we were supposed to go away this weekend.  If we had, it never would have happened.

So it's no wonder that I'm all Valentined out this year.

The Look

We needed to pop into Home Depot tonight to check out area rugs.  We had found a really nice one online that was on sale and was hoping that they'd have it in store so we could actually see it in person.  Of course, we had to do this errand with three kids in tow.  Normally, I'd rather have a root canal than take three rambuctious kids into a store loaded with power tools and sharp pointy objects.  But you gotta do what you gotta do.

Naturally the kids are bored and choose to entertain themselves by giggling like crazy, running around and hiding in between all the display racks of the hanging area rugs. So they're being a little loud and a little crazy but they were entertaining themselves and hubs and I were actually able to look at the rugs.  The kids weren't climbing on anything, hurting anybody or anything.  Then I turned and saw this young couple staring at my kids and that's when I saw the look. 

You know the look, the one that says... "Look at these kids, I can't believe their parents" and then the couple turns and share the look with each other and walk away.  

I don't know why but it really bothered me.  I went and grabbed my kids and decided it was time to leave. As we were walking away I asked hubs if he had seen the look that woman was giving our kids and he said "yeah" and added "they don't have kids".  

Obviously, they don't have kids or they wouldn't have been so judgmental about mine.  Realizing that didn't help though because you know it would be really nice if we could just go to the store without having to constantly get after our kids for acting up.  Then we wouldn't get those looks and we'd be a lot less stressed shopping for what we need.  The only store our kids truly love going to is Cost-co... for the samples.  Yup.  Free Food makes Cost-co just about the best store on the planet for our kids.  If we say.. "hey kids, do you want to go to Cost-co?"  They start to cheer.  "yeah, the sample store"   I actually don't eat the samples at Cost-co because I feel bad because we almost never buy what they sample.  

In the end kids will be kids. Give them a bit of space and they will run, give them boring surroundings and they will make their own entertainment.  Come to think of it, it would have been oodles of fun playing hide and seek inside those hanging rugs.  It's too bad that couple couldn't appreciate the good, clean fun my kids were having and it's too bad I let it bother me.  

So when's the last time you got the look?

Zeemaid

Minds out of the Gutter



Cause it's dirty.. heh heh

The conversation started innocently enough. Hubs had made chili the night before and we were forcing the kids were eagerly scarfing it up when I threw out the encouraging remark about how the chilis is good for you because you know ... it makes you poop.  Cause you know when you want to get down to their level, you gotta mention body functions.  Even hubs raised an eyebrow inquiringly.  Well duh... cause of all the fibre. Beans = Fibre. So yes, it's healthy for you and makes everything work properly to which my daughter jumps into the conversation with..

"My teacher has a ginormous ball"     Uh pardon?
"yeah", pipes up daughter #2, "and it's black"   *snicker* 

"Really so your teacher has a giant black ball?" Hubs and I make eye contact and snicker some more. 

To which my eldest daughter tries to convince us that no, they are not joking, they are telling the truth.

That's nice sweetie, we believe you.

And we prove that both hubs and I have our minds in the gutter... completely. 

Zeemaid

You Still Need Your Mom when You're 40

One of the truths that you realize as you get older is that no matter what you always need your mom.  At least if you had a good relationship with her and even if you didn't, I think there's still a part of you that longs for your parents love, support and advice.  I just hope I remember that bit of comfort when my own children grow up and leave the nest.  That while not expressed, there's still that deep need of your parents.

So when we were dealing with the whole bad news from the psychologist, I naturally turned to my mom.  Like you'd expect she listened, she sympathized and helped me try to puzzle the whole thing out.  While there isn't a whole lot she can do it's nice being able to talk to someone about it.  Because it feels like a big burden on my heart right now. 

So it shouldn't have surprised but it did when I received a call from her mid week asking what our plans were for the weekend.  Turns out she wanted us to come up for the weekend.  Now my parents live about an hour's drive away so we generally make the drive once a week. Only this time she offered to put us up at a hotel so we could stay the weekend and have a bit of a break.  At first I'm thinking how's that a break.  It's us and the kids and a hotel.  But then I realized, no housework, no preparing meals etc for the whole weekend.  Add to that we'd be on their property which is a veritable playground of exploration for my children with their aunt, uncle, cousins and grandparents all to shoulder some of the burden of entertaining them. 

While a stay in a hotel with two kids (the third stayed at Nana's) is not my idea of a good time, the kids were excited to go and explore a different room, watch a movie and snuggle in bed.  In fact, I even  managed to get a stellar sleep because in trying to get the kids to settle down and sleep, I fell asleep at 9:00 pm.  Earliest bed time, I've had in ages.

So I guess moms really do know best even what their 40 year old daughters need.  I just hope I can be that insightful with my own kids.

Zeemaid

Can you catch a cold over the internet?

Serves me right. I'd been just a tad smug lately.  You know, because my family managed to make it through the holidays etc without succumbing to the flu. It seemed like everyone around me in person or on blogs was coughing or sneezing or throwing up but my family's been just fine thank you very much.

Until Saturday.  What do you do with a 4 year old little boy who won't nap and feels fairly fine all day long as long as we have plenty of tissues and Advil but wakes up repeatedly throughout the night asking for medicine? A little boy who should be kept quiet because his racking chest cough gets pretty scary if he doesn't.

Add to that I'm supposed to be working at our store, I had an entire month of bookkeeping to do on a sleep deprived brain and a multitude of laundry because of puke boy and a pee girl. Sigh.

Now I have to beg my MIL to babysit a sick kid because we have no one to work the store tomorrow and as i sit here feeling tired and nauseous... I wonder if it's because of puke boy or possibly because a diabetic woman without a gall bladder has no business eating fish and chips for dinner.

I need some tea.

Zeemaid

If…. You are a Better Mom Than Me

If you proudly wear your child’s painted macaroni necklace for longer than five minutes… you’re a better mom than me.


If you happily wipe your four year old’s bum when he poos to make sure he doesn’t leave any “track”s… you’re a better mom than me.


If you cherish and store each and every art work created by your little darlings, never tossing even the barest and strangest of scribbles… you’re a better mom than me.


If your child has a bath/shower more frequently than once a week every other day… you’re a better mom than me.


If you enjoy chauffeuring kids to after school activities… you’re a better mom than me.


If one of your children wants to add in another after school activity and you say no problem… you’re a better mom than me.


If you remember a head of time to pack the appropriate snacks for those after school drives… you’re definitely a better mom than me.


If your child has their own small pet like a hamster or a mouse, snack or lizard or anything in the reptile family…. you are a better mom than me.


If your house is tidy, homework’s done and dinner is on the table by the time your husband walks through the door… you are a better mom than me.


If you laugh at all 100 and 99 of your child’s original knock knock jokes.. “Knock, knock, who’s there?  Banana, Banana Who?  Cause it’s an orange.”.. you’re a better mom than me.


Want to play along?  Just leave your “you’re a better mom than me” quote in the comments.


Zeemaid

I feel Angry

This is a hard post to write and yet I need to get it out because I know there are many of you out there who have been in the same place as me and can perhaps emphasize with our situation.


You see, my beautiful daughter, of whom I had just been boasting about last week, may be brain damaged.  At least that's what the psychologist has told us.  In fact, there isn't really any "may" about it. She will be referring us to the Child Development Centre where we'll get a "team" to work with her.  In fact, she won't be surprised to find that E falls on the Autism spectrum.


Are you kidding me?  We go from a few learning difficulties to brain damage and possibly autism.  I am told to prepare myself for the fact that E might not leave the home until later in life and that she may never learn to do those things that she can't currently do now.  Again, are you freaking kidding me? At worst, I thought she had Central Auditory Processing Disorder.  I've always thought she didn't hear things quite right but right from the get go all initial assessments dismissed autism.  No, she's just quirky they said.  Now I'm told that as she's my first born I've just gotten used to her and consider this to be normal.  Now I'm told to watch Temple Grandin because thanks to her we know so much more about animal behaviour.  That's supposed to make me feel better?  How about a little time to adjust first before you start throwing out successful autistic people at me to make me feel better.


Right now I'm either racking my brain trying to figure out if I had done something to cause this to happen or grieving because I know how hard it's going to be for my child to walk this path.  Add to the fact that I know she is getting tired of all the extra tutoring and just know how hard it's going to be to have to take her to a whole bunch more appointments.


Her last tutoring lesson didn't go well.  Apparently she told her teacher she wanted to die.  Now I am pretty certain she didn't mean it and was just trying to express her frustration at not being able to have play time. She doesn't see all the time she does get to play just when she doesn't get to play.  This was on the same day when we got the news from the psychologist so as you can imagine I was pretty much an emotional basket case.


The worst is that I continue to run over all the times I've been impatient or angry with E when it was most likely not that she won't do something but that she can't do it and here I've been berating her.  Can you imagine how bad we feel?


Sure it could be worse and there are dozen of situations or conditions that would be much more difficult to live with.  It doesn't take away from the fact that we need to have time to come to acceptance of the situation and when we do, we will be able to put off the tears and take up the cause that is our child.


When I read about how people say it was a relief to get a diagnosis, I can't relate to that.  I can honestly say I don't feel relieved.


I feel angry

*Please, if anything I've said in this post offends you do not flame me.  I'm being real here and am expressing my feelings.  Good or bad it's how I feel at the moment as I work through this new curve that life has thrown us. Through it all she's my child and I love her dearly no matter what.*

I’m Proud of My Girl

I’m really proud of my girl. 


She has had a tough go of it ever since we had her assessed last summer and learned just how far behind she was in school.  A fact which was only made more glaringly aware once she started at her new school.  To say that our girl had thrown her teachers for a complete loop is a mild understatement.  From venting her extreme frustrating with change by getting in their face and yelling to downright tears and shut downs. 


Once we had a firm diagnosis of ADD and began a low dose of medication we saw big changes in her.  While she still gets frustrated and teary when she’s tired, she has become much more easier to manage.  Even the school has noticed a big improvement.  Finally Emma can focus on learning.  While I don’t necessarily agree that Emma completely falls into the ADD category, I do think she may be on the low end of the scale. 


Still, life hasn’t been easy.  What with starting at a new school, taking extra classes 3 times a week after school, attending learning support in school she’s been made to realize rather forcibly just how far she is behind her peers.  Add to that the fact everyone is throwing around the term “learning disability” and she pretty much feels like a freak no matter how much we tell her it’s normal and everyone learns different.


While I hurt for my baby and ache for the tough time she is going through, I can appreciate that she is learning some really good life lessons here.  After all, I don’t ever remember being in a situation where my mom has had to say to me “sweetie, this is just the way it’s going to be and there is no point in whining about it”.  Thank goodness she got it because really the last four months would have been hell if I had to have listened to her whine about going to tutoring after school 3 days a week.


With a lot of effort and hard work my girl has managed to go from reading at practically a kindergarden level to almost reading at her grade three level.  In fact, I think she’s reading even better than her own teachers realize.  By the time Christmas break had arrived my poor girl had had about enough schooling.  Give her two weeks Christmas break though and she’s back to her normal cheerful self and reading up a storm.


I’m so proud of her.  She has accomplished so much this year.  She still has a tough road because let’s face it, learning disabilities don’t disappear overnight and while the reading is coming along beautifully the writing isn’t. 


She will get it though because even though there are days that she feels like giving up, that it’s all just too much and that she can’t do it… underneath it all she is determined that she will get it, that she will do it. 


Enough to make a mama’s heart swell with pride. 

That’s my girl!

Is it Really My Job?

So you know you are tired when you're ready to lose it over a couple of missing school library books.  I end up lecturing and nagging and going on and on to the point that I frustrate myself even more because they don't care.

So I question, is it really my job to keep track of their stuff?  I wouldn't have thought so after all I'm supposed to be teaching them how to become self-reliant and independent little beings.  Teach them?  HAH that's a laugh.  I can organize, show them and "take time for training" till I'm blue in the face and they'll smile at me and the next thing I know they've left the washroom without flushing or washing their hands, they promptly drop their clothes beside their laundry baskets, ignore the napkins I've placed in front of them and wipe their faces across the back of their school uniform sleeves.  Ohhhhhh the list goes on.

So no wonder I begin to feel just a bit like a failure of a mother.  Especially when well meaning people (scream in-laws) make me feel like it's me cause I don't clean or organize.  Because, of course, they don't see it when it's all neat and tidy (after I've had to stand over them and finally pitch in myself) oh no, they just see it after the bomb has gone off and let's face it with three rambunctious kids the bomb goes off often at my house.

It's no great wonder that I'm ready to lose it today since I've been only asking J to find her library books since the last school library day last week.  But you know she's too busy to do anything like that and unless I stand over her and push her into looking, it doesn't get done.  So who ends up looking, I do. Then I go to the next child, where are your library books... "I don't know" to well the "computer says I have books out but I know I returned it".  Sure you did, the books you took out over Christmas vacation magically got returned to the school when?

The problem is we can designate a library book spot but no one seems to follow it, not even their dad.  Books get dropped wherever  they happened to be read and rarely even make it back to the bookshelf until we do a big clean up or I get tired of the sloppy mess of a bookshelf and clean it up myself.  The kids like to play with the books and drag them all over no matter how many times I ask them not to because you know nothing holds a fort together so well as a couple of good heavy books and playing library or bookstore without books is just plain old silly and why would we use a bookshelf to store the books when they look so much nicer on the floor.

Of course, I'm just griping about their library books.  I haven't even mentioned their homework, backpacks, lunch kits, school supplies, mittens, coats, hats, gloves, scarves, shoes, boots, hair do dads, water bottles, crafts, etc. Never mind the drama that occurs if I don't know where something is.  I will literally be greeted with tears and frustration if I can't tell them where they happened to sit their toy down on coming into the house.   WTH!  I know that I'm supposed to have eyes in the back of my head but really I draw the line at psychic abilities.

So what say you?  Do you feel like you have to be their personal assistant or are you trying to train your little beings to be self-reliant?  Are you making any headway or like me are you just one step away from banging your head on the wall?

Zeemaid

Things That Make Me Angry

1. People that have no clue how a four way stop works. Yes mam, you were first so you shouldn't be waving for me to go then looking at me like I'm the retarded one.

2. Go to load the breakfast dishes only to find hubby did a 3/4 load the night before. Damn it, I could have squeezed in the breakfast dishes. Now I have to empty the dishwasher before I can clean up from breakfast and get on to the rest of my day.

3. When I find out two out of my three kids have peed the bed on the same morning. Add to that the fact that one kid peed the day before but didn't tell us so we didn't find out until bedtime so i have three sets of bedding to wash on the day that we're volunteering at a bottle drive.

4. People who make snarky side comments about how "expensive" video stores are but not actually to you but to their friend so you can't respond. Um hello prices haven't gone up in over 10 years in the industry. We're still making the same 5.00 bucks a vid as we were doing in the 90s and yet, inflation has gone up, minimum wage keeps going up along with our lease, hydro etc and these people bitch about $5.00 and walk out if we don't give them the same special deal we offered two years ago.

5. Rude people. There's no need to be rude, especially to people in the service industry. The job is tough enough serving the public and they are human too, cut them some slack. A smile goes a long way.

6. On the other hand, I hate it when I'm being served by two teens or young adults who think it's appropriate to carry on conversations about how much they had to drink or how drunk they were at the party last night while they scan my groceries and bag them. My kid doesn't need to hear what your boyfriend thinks about your new tattoo. Seriously.

7. Finding dirty socks everywhere but the laundry basket. Better yet with toys in the toes.

8. Asking your child to put socks on only to have them come back to you saying they don’t have any socks in their drawer because you didn’t do the laundry.

Those are a few things that make me angry.  What makes you angry?

Zeemaid

A New Year

Well we have officially reached that point where I am more than ready for my Christmas decorations to go away.  While I love my decorations and am absolutely delighted to see it come out of their boxes and be distributed throughout my house, I find that four weeks of delight is enough.  Put the crap er heirlooms away until next year when I’ll be happy to see them again.
Things have been just a little too hectic around here for me to actually stop and contemplate the transition from 2011 to 2012.  Frankly, it was a quick toast at midnight, hugs all around, a kiss for hubs and then I couldn’t wait for the family to get out.  Seriously.  I had the kitchen lights off and was literally clicking off the Christmas Tree lights while shooing family out the door.  I did for decency sake wait until they started their car before I flicked off the outside lights but barely.
A Year in Review
When I look back at 2011, it’s hard not to focus on the negative so I am going to sit here and try to come up with positives.

• We are all healthy. 
• E got to learn a dance routine and perform on a real stage in a real theatre.. finally.
• While we didn’t get to Disneyland or Alberta, we did manage to get in two camping trips which were a lot of fun.
• All three of my children learned to ride their bikes without training wheels. 
• I got a great new haircut.
• We had a great summer playing in the pool
• We won two gift certificate to really nice restaurants in our area
• We joined a new Church, which we are really enjoying;
• I learned how to throw my first pot and discovered a new passion
• The girls started a new school in September which has been amazingly supportive.
• I started selling on Amazon which gives me some spending money.
• I lost 20 pounds (So I gained a few back, I still lost 20)

As for what we’d like to to in 2012 well the list is rather long

• Go to Disneyland
• Go up the mountain and take the kids tobaggoning
• Paint our house
• Do some necessary renovations on our house
• Possibly sell and buy a new home
• Get our business in a better financial position
• Improve our own finances
• Love our kids more
• Play more with our kids
• Yell less
• Lose weight
• Improve our physical fitness, I d’ like to get on my treadmill on a regular basis and do some yoga and pilates to help our backs.
• Get our kids to either eat more iron rich foods or take a multivitamin consistently.
• I’d like to finish one of my stories and submit it for publishing.
• Write more., Blog More, read more blogs
• Knit more, crochet more, craft more
• Find more time for myself
• Watch less t.v. doing nothing.

What are your New Years Resolutions?

Having a Good christmas

What’s the secret to having a successful and happy Christmas? 
Well, it certainly isn’t the presents, the decorations or even the turkey dinner. 
It seems silly but it was  the message in a Christmas movie that the children were watching that actually got my attention. 

“Christmas doesn’t have to be perfect to have a perfect Christmas.” 

Trust me, we’ve had our share of less than perfect Christmases over the past few years from financial woes, bickering,  fighting depression to downright unrealistic expectations of ourselves and our children. 

This Christmas wouldn’t have fared any different.  I started off December with plans to host both a birthday party and a cookie decorating party which meant I had to have the house cleaned and the decorations up in record time, I had to bake several dozen sugar cookies for decorating and figure out when I was going  to make my signature chocolate truffles.   Throw in a tonsilectomy, a 40th Surprise Birthday Party, after school activities and a new extended work hours and Christmas shopping in there somewhere and well … I’m sure you’ve been there and understand what I mean.  It seemed like every time I turned around I would remember someone else who I needed to buy a gift for.

So how did I get through it?  Well, a supportive husband helps but most of all it took checking my expectations at the door.  Laying off some of the pressure on myself and on the kids.  So what if some things didn’t get done.  So what if a pillow has hit the Christmas tree for the umpteenth time and the ornaments keep falling off and the garland looks atrocious.  The kids love it anyway.  That’s why we don’t put glass ornaments on the tree anymore.  Oh well that the cats keep messing up the tree skirt.  If it’s not the cats it’s the kids anyways.

So I didn’t get all of my chocolates done but I got enough to give to my family as gifts and the rest are in the fridge waiting.  I did get sugar cookies baked for the party but no other Christmas baking.  Who cares.  My mother does enough for both of us and I don’t need the extra calories anyways.  The kids still got to decorate cookies and that’s all they care about. 

So we had to wait until the last weekend before Christmas to do all our shopping.  We still managed to find everything we wanted and got the kids some really cool presents and we supported the local economy by not buying online.

My biggest tip for success is to keep the kids busy instead of expecting them to entertain themselves.  They are all hepped up on excitement for the big day.  Of course they are going to be a little crazy. Staggering out the activities over  several days really helped.

Taking more than one drive around the neighbourhoods looking at lights.  It didn’t have to be all on one night.  Grab a cup of hot cocoa and a cookie and we’re good to go almost any night after dinner.
AND.. we stayed home.  This year we visited with my folks on Christmas eve day and then stayed home on Christmas Day and did our own dinner with his parents that afternoon.  I really thought I’d miss being with my family but it was just so nice not to have to rush out anywhere.  It was a lot of work putting the dinner together but again, instead of fussing too much I opted for simple prep vegetables instead of getting all fancy.  Turkey tasted amazing and the rest of the meal was familiar to my picky eaters.

I’m not saying I breezed through it all without a care.  I had my moments of shame but mostly when it began to become overwhelming again, I’d just tell myself.. It doesn’t have to be perfect. 

It’s so true.

Zeemaid