When Brains Don't Work

When a baby is born, they are a perfect extension of the parents, particularly the mother. I personally felt such a connection with each of my children in their first year, even sharing my thoughts and interests with them. A perfect little buddy because they don't have anything to disagree about--they are not their own person quite yet. They are a satellite of yourself, an extension of your own wavelength, blissfully adorable.

 

Then some time passes and they become toddlers. Suddenly they are completely independent, and they want to make sure you know about it! So they make a point to disagree with most things you say, whether or not they truly feel that way (if you're up to it, you can be a great time trying to beguile them in this paradox).

 

Elisabeth has had a few royal tantrums when I know exactly what she wants but she continues to deny it, screaming "I Do Not!" but having nothing to answer when I say, "then what do you want?"  So you see these aren't the type of tantrums when she is trying to get something he can't have; it's just a wholly illogical and pointless interaction with her crying and shouting to no purpose, except that she does not want whatever is being asked of her.

 

When it comes to tantrums, distraction is a mother's most valuable tool. If you continue to focus on the fascimile of a "conversation" (particularly with pre-verbal children like my own) you will drive the stubborn thing and yourself further and further into upset frustration. Distraction is most effective when put to use early on in the game, when you see the tantrum on the horizon but haven't quite reached that destination. Rather, take a scenic route and find a round-a-bout way to achieve your intention. Moms have to be tricky -- this is the real test, "Are you smarter than a two-year-old?"

 

The other tools are things other moms are much better at than myself...making sure your children are napped and snacked at all opportunities, so as to not leave them vulnerable to low blood sugar or lapses in brain activity. In our family we have a saying, "Your brain is not working." That means "I love you but you're being completely irrational, and you need sleep a.s.a.p. I know you need sleep and you can't be held accountable for this, so we are going to pretend it never happened and get you in bed pronto!"

 

The best thing is, it works for parents too. Because we all know what going hungry or staying up too late can do to us, as well. Don't be afraid to say, "I'm sorry sweetheart, my brain wasn't working. Let's start over and talk this through."  Because dealing with a huge temper tantrum is very energy-depriving, and then you'll need twice as much make-up sleep!

A Peek into Rychen's Running

This weekend Rychen will be running his 6th full marathon, his 2nd time running the Seattle Rock & Roll course. I thought I'd share a bit about his goal setting and stuff...

Rychen has been called The Sun God by a friend in our ward, who sees him run past her house a lot. She says he has perfect form and looks like a warrior. (You'd have to know her!)

This is our wall in the garage, with numbers from every race he's done (he started running two years ago). The frames are the full marathons. The metals are fulls and halves. On each bib, he's written the event and his time so he can keep track and see progress.

Now, this is the inside of his closet door which he sees every day, to stay motivated. It has his running miles schedule, maps of various marathon courses, and inspirational quotes.
Here's a really interesting quote which is probably offensive to several of you (myself included), but worth the read.
Rychen pretty much signs up for every marathon he can get his hands on, without doing Sunday races or traveling impractically. Sometimes those marathons land within weeks of each other, but that doesn't stop him. People have asked why he wants to do so much, and I think he asks himself that as well. He still says he doesn't know exactly why he runs! But to him, it's a regular, ongoing goal in his life, not just once a year. So that's why he is continually striving to run one at each opportunity--learning new things, seeing new courses, giving it yet another shot.

I am very impressed with his accomplishments as well as his family and my family. It's been nice to see the support. One day we might join him but in the meantime we are in awe.

Next week he will run his 3rd marathon within these 30 days (on his birthday--his first time running two marathons 9 days apart, we'll see how that goes!!), and after that is St. George on October 1st.

Homemade Headbands

We got crafty this morning and made some headbands for Elisabeth. For a while I've been wanting to try my die-cutter on something other than paper, so when I saw this foam fabric at Dollar Tree, I got the idea to cut flowers and decorate a headband. We did that design in two different color schemes:








Then for this one we just wrapped and glued pony beads on with plastic lacing.



What these pictures don't show is how excited Rychen P. was to do this. He loves die cutting and stringing beads, so this was mostly a fun project for him to do!

I also have some assorted leathers and metal fabrics I am looking for a die-cutting craft to try!

Elisabeth

Elisabeth will be 3 in just a couple months! I can't believe the time flew by. She is still my adorable princess but has recently began the "No, I will not!" stage. My biggest fear is Rychen P. corrupting her, as he is already teaching her potty talk, and of course she loves to do anything he does to get a laugh.

Doe a Deer

Rychen here checking in. I try to do so every so often.

This is our cherry tree I planted two years ago. It's coming along nicely. It's very leafy and has a handful of cherries on it this year.

This is what the bottom branches look like today: This used to be a thriving strawberry patch:These used to be my blossoming blueberry bushes:
These used to be rows of beautiful romaine, red leaf and other assorted heads of lettuce:This is unaffectionately referred to as Satan around my house this week:

This is my deer fencing that Rychen and I put in today (hard to see, it's wrapped around the green poles):

Goin' to the Zoo Zoo Zoo!

We had a fun day at the zoo with our friends the Curzons and Lowes. It's exciting now that Elisabeth is old enough to get excited and ask some questions. You never know what animals are going to be MIA or who is going to be active and playful. But who would expect to find the polar bear mid-play, bouncing up and down on a huge barrel? It was a barrel of fun!

Another great surprise was the hippos out of water, which I've never seen. Wow. These fat things look like a gigantic daschund with their stubby legs.

I love zebras! This is an interesting species with a brown "shadow" stripe in between each black stripe.

Another special thing with this visit is that we got to ride the train, which we've never done before. The kids were scared of the Choo Choo noise, so they covered their ears for the first bit.

It was the best 35 minutes of my day, with Rychen P. quiet and calm, keeping mostly to himself.

And lastly here are some pictures from the shuttle ride back to our car (in the satellite parking lot! Dang discount day)

(Guess who always copies her brother?)

Toothless!

I am so happy that Rychen P. is finally cavity-free. No, we didn't go to the dentist. We waited it out... for FOUR YEARS... and the tooth finally came out!! He had this characteristic brown streak across the top of his front tooth.

Now he's lost 4 teeth and he's not even six yet. How funny that it turned out to be exactly as my mom said, that teeth fall out 5 years after they come in. That was true for each of these 4 teeth, within a couple months time!

This last tooth came out with a funny story. Yesterday after dinner he was talking to us and we noticed his tooth was out. We asked if he had pulled it, but he didn't know what we were talking about! We said "YOUR TOOTH IS GONE!!!!!" and he ran to the mirror in shock. It was an absolutely surprise. Nobody knows when his tooth came out, but we have a sneaking suspicion it might turn up in the toilet soon...

One less pasta dinner for Rychen this week

I actually cooked something that Rychen dug into with gusto last night. (This is a significant event around here; Many a night I have felt like Debra Barone. Sometimes he eats my cooking to be a good sport but most of the time he makes his own food. He NEVER eats it with gusto.) So I made the same thing again today! Veggie enchiladas with pinto beans, green bell peppers, onions, mixed up in homemade sauce. So a point for the domestic goddess, and one fewer meal he would have cooked for himself (invariably pasta).

This pan shows "his and hers" :)