Surprise Present

I came home today to find a present for me from my husband.   Should I have laughed, cried or been insulted?   I’m not sure how you would have responded, but I couldn’t stop laughing.    The real question is: do they work?

The Big Boy Update:  I was a substitute in my son’s class today.   I got to see how his focus issues worked in the classroom.   He did pretty well today and didn’t need much help from me.   Or rather he didn’t need more help from me than any of the other students—and I had some that wanted to monopolize my time all day.   It was a nice day with my son and his classmates, all first and second graders.   The students were very helpful to the other substitute and me as we were truly guests in their classroom.   The third years were off on their end of year trip to Washington, D.C. with their teachers.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  I hate when this happens:  my daughter rounds the corner in the kitchen when I’ve turned away and slams her legs into the open dishwasher.   She crumpled to the floor, crying, saying, “you didn’t tell me it was there!”   She had been on the deck eating her popsicle or I would have told her I had opened the dishwasher—we always tell her when it’s open.   But I missed my window.   She refused an ice pack and told me to just let her go so she could go and play.    She processed the anger and hurt in another way though, getting very upset at something small only a few minutes later.    This is when as a parent I do a very big internal sigh because I can only help her so much.

Open It To See It

My daughter wanted to get a present for her Braillest at school.   She told me Mrs. Aagaard had two cats.   My daughter likes cats.   I think she would love to have a cat that would sit on her lap and let her pet it.   We have friends with cats and she knows cats like cat toys.

I pulled out my iPad and described to her what the different sorts of cat toys were that we could get for Mrs. Aagaard.   They came yesterday.    These toys are a stick with some feathers, some flexible straw mesh and tiny pompoms on the end.   If you saw the picture you’d understand what I’m trying to describe—and that’s the key point to my post here.   You’d “see” what I’m talking about.

When we get a gift for someone we typically leave it in the wrapping/container it comes in.   The person being given the gift gets to open the package as part of the gifting process.   The cat toy came in clear, crinkly plastic.  I could see it clearly, but if I closed my eyes and felt it, I could tell virtually nothing other than there was a hard stick at one end and some less-hard stuff at the other.

My daughter sees through feeling.   She sees with her hands.   So we opened Mrs. Aagaard’s cat toy, my daughter felt it all over and then she put it back in the wrapping.   She was excited about giving Mrs. Aagaard the toys for her cats this morning.

The Big Boy Tiny Girl Thank You’s In Progress:  My children got a surprise gift in the mail from their Aunt A yesterday.   They opened up the package to find a bag for each of them with lots of fun things inside.   Among the collection was slime which has had many experiments performed on it so far.   They want to write Aunt A thank you notes.   My son was about to get started when the doorbell rang and he decided writing a story book with his friend, Rayan, was going to have to take top priority for the afternoon.   My daughter was very interested though and must have called out fifteen or more words for me to spell for her as she wrote her letter.   She’s finished with the letter but I’m going to have to get some translation help to write it in print for Aunt A.   Next she’s going to work on a drawing on the paper.   My son may get back on task tomorrow, we’ll see how it goes.    Thanks for the summer surprise package, Aunt A!

Thumb

My right thumb is a mess.   About a year ago something happened in the joint closest to my wrist.   It was’t injury, it was wear over time that finally gave.   I don’t know if it’s something torn or strained but it jeeps getting worse over time.

I’ve been wearing a brace on and off and I don’t know that it helps but I’m getting good at typing with my thumb and index finger on my phone.   I was hopeful it would get better but I may have to have it looked at because it only deteriorating and hurting worse.

I’d really like to snap my fingers again.

The Big Boy Update:  My son went to school with a roller bottle with some essential oils in it today.   He was interested in making a bottle up that he could roll on his hands or wrists and smell tomorrow as a way to try and focus more during work cycle at school.   I told him the sense of smell is a powerful thing.   He and I looked up which oils are recommended to help with focus and calmness.   We put in Frankensense, Vetiver, Lemon, Spruce Leaf, Ho Wood Leaf, Blue Tansy Flower, Blue Chamomile Flower, and Osmanthus Flower.   When he came home today he said worked better when he came home today.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  There were some balloons left over from and open house my husband held this weekend.   My daughter took the now, partially deflated balloons and placed them on the dresser. She told me, “I want to leave them here because I don’t want them defeated”.   She didn’t want them stepped on and popped.

Graduation Season

It’s graduation season.   We’ve got friends and family members graduating this year and we’re going to multiple parties.   And who doesn’t love a celebration party?   We went to one this afternoon, getting the children out of camp an hour early so we could make the festivities.

The party was at for the third child, and third sitter, who are friends of ours in the neighborhood.   I remember when they had just moved in to the neighborhood.  Kate, the mother, came over with her daughter to introduce themselves and to say that Morgan was interested in sitting if we had a need.   And we definitely had a need.

Hannah, their oldest, is finished with college now but we were very happy to see her, up for her brother’s graduation weekend.   Morgan, our children’s favorite sitter for multiple years, is finishing her second year in college and now their son, Tristan, has graduated from high school and is off to college in the fall.

Tristan loves video games and my son clearly thinks he’s about the coolest sitter in the world as a result.    We got to the party late, but we also left late after finally finding my children in the attic playing Disney Infinity on the Xbox, hiding away from the adults.   My children were trying to monopolize as much of Morgan’s time as they could because she’s not here for the first time this summer, having taken an internship out of state.

Tristan will be around this summer, but it may be some of the last times we’ll get to have him sit for us before he goes to college in the fall.

The Big Boy Update:   My son went to rock climbing day camp for the holiday day today.   His sister went too and is a veteran of camp there as she’s done track-out full week camp as well as some single day camps.   I was a little worried he would be unhappy about his skill level versus hers.   When I left them this morning he looked a little anxious.   When we picked them up this afternoon he told us all about the day and how he liked climbing.  He didn’t have any troubles getting to the top of the various easy and hard routes and had an overall positive experience.   He wanted to know if we could sign him up for a week class like his sister.   He wants to get a t-shirt like his sister, which she told him he would get if he went to camp after he commented about it.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  At the graduation party this afternoon my daughter wanted to do crafts at the house the party was held at.   All three children (who have all sat for our children) and their parents have great ideas and have done lots of crafts with the children before.   It was hard to get her to understand that it wasn’t the best time to do crafts because there was a celebration going on.    They all spent some time with her and at the end lots of pipe cleaner creations had been made.

Secret Rooms

We have a secret room in our basement.   Two actually.   These are areas only accessible through small doors which go into unfinished spaces of the basement.   We have children who are inquisitive, but who also are respectful when we say a place if off limits.

The “hidden” room in the basement I’m surprised the children haven’t investigated yet is beyond the closet under the stairs going down to the basement area.   The, “closet under the stairs” ala Harry Potter, has always been filled with toys for the children.   It’s a big space with lots of shelves.    Over time the shelves have been filled with different toys, games, cards, outdoor toys and things that include lots of small pieces.   The closet is almost always a wreck.

A few times each year I go through the contents to organize, clean and remove toys they’ve outgrown.    When they were younger, the toys on the lower shelves were ones they could play with while the upper shelves contained things we would bring down to use together.    Now that they’re older they can get to anything they want—which sometimes means dumping things from lower shelves so they can get to what’s on the upper ones.  

When my son was very young we had a baby pen we’d prop up against the closet.   We’d put my son into the space and watch him from our office desks, also in the basement, so we could watch him and get work done at the same time.   That’s when we named it, “The Closet Under the Stairs” because he was literally pinned into the space and couldn’t escape.  He never minded as he was in a toy-filled area in sight of us.   He would pull himself up and hold on to the pen and babble at us while he dropped toys over the edge to get our attention.

Right now the closet is definitely due for a cleaning.   I don’t think you could walk on the floor if you tried due to the colossal mess of toy pieces everywhere.    This mess doesn’t seem to bother the children.   It only bothers me if I look inside.   One of the things they’ve never really noticed is the flat door at the lowest point in the back of the closet.   When they were younger I blocked the door with a stool so they wouldn’t discover it by accident.   Today it’s partially covered with a box of toys.  

But it’s only a matter of time before they discover it.   I’m not overly worried if they do at this age—it’s a small space with a carpet remnant on the poured concrete floor and is filled in part with the sub woofer for the surround sound system.  

I’m wondering when they’ll find it and if they’ll come to let me know when they do—or if they’ll use it as a hiding place for hide and seek games or other “treasures”.  

The other secret room isn’t something they can get to, but it’s my favorite secret space in the house.   In the small hallway going to the basement bedroom there is a wall with some decorative trim work.   We had our trim carpenter make the wall look like a giant door, sans door knob.   The top section of the pretend door can be reached with a small ladder.   If you grab the top section just so and pull, it comes off, revealing the entrance to the house’s encapsulated crawl space.  

I had Wayne, our trim carpenter, conceal the entrance for aesthetic sake.  Once open you can climb up the ladder, turn on the light bulb and enter the hidden space below the front half of the house.   It’s not that exciting as an adult what with duct work and one of the HVAC systems inside, but I wonder if it would be exciting to a child?  I know when I was little any space that was secret was a mystery to me.  

We have some other “secret” spaces on the second floor with small doors, as required by code, they haven’t figured out about yet as well.    They’re getting older, I’m guessing it’s only a matter of time until they do.

The Big Boy Tiny Girl Rock Climbing Schedule:  Tomorrow for Memorial Day we’re sending both my son and daughter to rock climbing camp.   My son has been before multiple times, including for a birthday party, but his sister has been for week-long camps since that time.   I’m hoping they both have a good time tomorrow, but I also hope he doesn’t gauge his success based on his sister’s additional experience.   He’s looking forward to the day tomorrow; I hope he’s still as enthusiastic when we pick him up.

Not Five Minutes

My children go through clothing quickly.  Part of the reason is they seem to keep growing and getting bigger.   Another reason is the turn of season, causing the current clothing in their drawers to be unideal to the weather conditions outside.   Then there is the wear and tear issue, but let me address that one last.

For the growing part, every year for the “warm weather clothes” and “cold weather clothes” seasons as I’ve nicknamed them, I go through the children’s drawers.   I have to do this because they are still in the “don’t care” age bracket where they are more than happy to put on whatever clothes are in their drawers—regardless of if they are appropriate to the weather for the day.   This is true even if they’ve been told the predicted temperature for the day by Alexa or a parent.   They will doggedly insist on wearing the overly hot or overly cold clothes, saying they’ll be just fine.

The only way to combat this is to remove the offending, out of season clothing in increments so the children can only go so wrong.   For instance, I removed fleece shirts and sweat pants a while back, but long sleeved shirts and long pants were still available.   With temperatures in the upper eighties now, those options need to be stored and not brought back until the more temperate days of fall.

I like to go to the children’s used clothing store to get new things for the children.   The prices are hard to beat, there is a large, well-organized selection and I can see how the clothes will hold up after washings since they’re pre-worn.   Yesterday, I went to get my son some more shorts as his selection was slim and I needed to pull the remaining long pants from his drawer.

I came home with eight pair of shorts and a shirt for him.   For my daughter I got six shirts (some with tactile elements), five pair of shorts and an exercise skort like the ones I wear.   And I got everything for $69, in and out in ten minutes.

My children get pretty excited about new clothes, which I like because I don’t think I cared much about clothes when I was young.   After I showed them their new things, I put things away in their drawers and removed any too-warm items remaining.   Clothing-wise, their drawers were now in full-on summer mode.  

This morning my daughter found the new exercise skort because she and I had talked about it last night.   It was white with a yellow stripe and yellow shorts underneath.    She came downstairs wearing the skort saying she wanted to wear that and the new polka-dot shirt to the trampoline place this afternoon with Blake, their sitter.  

She headed outside and came in not five minutes later.   As I watched her walk past I got up and followed her.   Five minutes, maybe ten and there was a dark rust-colored mark right in the center of the back of her skort.   A big brown mark—like she’d messed up her pants.    Only she hadn’t.    She’d been playing with chalk and the rust-colored one which use I’m guessing real red clay to color the chalk, she had sat on.

This is not a rust color that comes out.   It’s not a color that even bleaches out.   I tried for about twenty minutes with multiple cleaners and I couldn’t get the stain out all the way.   This is so typical of my children.   They’re messy.   But they have fun.    And we don’t yell at them for having safe fun outside.    I just hope that most of the messes I can get clean.    I will never mind having messy  children if they’re safely exploring their world and learning.  

The Big Boy Update:   My son’s hand goes to sleep at night.  He must sleep on it or something.   We haven’t been able to figure out what causes it.   He comes downstairs and has me rub it to help it wake up.   Last night he came downstairs and I was apparently very asleep.   Apparently he also plunked his hand down on the middle of my stomach which caused me to cry out, waking my husband.   I then dropped back onto the bed and was back out asleep, only not completely.   I vaguely remember my son correcting his father on how he wasn’t rubbing his fingers in the proper way.   It’s actually impossible to get the rubbing correct from what I’ve tried over time, so I just do lots of different things until my son's ready to go back upstairs.

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  I remember doing this when I was a child.   It felt so comfortable.   My daughter was working on a drawing and instead of sitting on a chair, she preferred to prop herself up like this:

Loose Sheets

I like a tight fitted sheet.   I want to get in bed and have a completely smooth surface underneath me.   Conversely, I hate when the fitted sheet is slightly too large for the mattress, resulting in almost a non-fitted, fitted sheet.

We had some sheets we got several years ago.   I liked them a lot the first day I put them on the bed but by the second day I would do that thing where you try to pull the sheet to the edge of the bed and stuff it under the mattress.   This lasts for maybe an hour, less if you toss about a lot.

I got a sewing machine from my mother-in-law a few years ago.   She taught my husband how to sew. which seemed like an extension of the sewing machine gift, now that it came with a resident sewer.   Wait, that’s not how that word should be spelled, is it?   I don’t think ’sewer’ is the word I meant. How about, ‘resident sew-person’ instead?

I asked my husband if he could sew in the corners of the fitted sheet by an inch on each corner.   He did this with ease one afternoon in about ten minutes (which is a sewing minor miracle for those of us who don’t know how to sew).   And it did the trick.   The sheet which perhaps was meant for a mattress three or so inches taller than ours, now fit tightly on the first day and remained that way until wash time.

My daughter had a similar situation with her sheets.   I don’t know what type of mattress these full-sized fitted sheets were made for, but they had to be at least five inches taller than my daughter’s mattress.   I could pull them tight but by morning it was like swimming in a sea of folds.

I decided to do the sewing myself.   I mean I knew words like bobbin, needle and thread.   Surely learning the rest wouldn’t take that much time.   Besides, the sewing machine was already plugged in with the little foot pedal set up under the desk.   I had this…I hoped.

Things did not go as easily as I had hoped.   There were snags in the thread, rethreading everything more than once and then the bobbin ran out of thread.   Getting the bobbin up and going again wasn’t as easy as I had hoped.   But I eventually conquered the bobbin.

Did I mention there were two fitted sheets needing corner reductions?   That’s eight straight lines I had to sew.   I know, it’s a lot.   But I did it.   And actually by the time I was done, I was sort of having fun.

The Big Boy Update:  My son was telling me about his plan the other day.   He didn’t specify what the plan was going to help him accomplish, but he told me the plan had three steps.   He explained, saying you just: “Tell yourself you can do this.   Try as hard as you can.   And stay positive.”

The Tiny Girl Chronicles:  Blake was over watching my daughter this afternoon.   She got a lot cards and toys out and then wanted to do something else.   Blake told her before they could do the next thing, they had to clean up.   My daughter apparently didn’t want to clean up because she told Blake (who was already starting to put things away), “I know you don’t know this, but in life, people help each other.”