Changes

In my neverending search for self-discipline, I’ve decided to make some changes in the next few weeks.

First, I want to stick to my housekeeping schedule a little more closely.  When I was creating and thus following the schedule, it was almost as if I had a little housekeeping fairy who paved the way for me.  Cleaning house once a week is so much easier than waiting until I’m going crazy to do it.  So, I’m back to my plan of cleaning, sweeping and mopping the kitchen on Thursday evenings, then cleaning the rest of the house on Friday and planning weekly meals while doing every last stitch of laundry in the house on Mondays.

Second, in order to have time for things like cleaning the house and tending to my gaggle of children and in the interest of being more disciplined with my time and finances, I’m self-imposing a Facebook and iPhone detox.  I’m not quite to the point of deleting my Facebook account but knowing who Facebook shares my information with has made me pretty sure that I want to spend a lot less time on the site.  Add to that the fact that I feel like I spend what’s left of my time staring at my iPhone and I’m actually paying for the privilege and I came to the realization that the iPhone must go.  I started by deleting the Facebook app and disallowing e-mail notifications from Facebook.  Sometime this week La Roca and I will make a visit to the AT&T store and make the break with our iPhones (okay, well, he already did, only he hasn’t told AT&T about it and therefore we are still paying for the darned thing).

Third, since I will no longer be staring at my iPhone or Facebook screen all day, I’ll have more time.  I want to fill that time with things that are valuable and enriching.  Blogging has proven, for me, to be one of those things, so there will be a return to it.  I’m going to aim at three times a week.  And maybe I’ll start a midwifery blog, too.  But blogging isn’t valuable and enriching for my children, so I’ve got some goals there as well.  During the summer, which starts in an ever-shortening time *cue Jaws theme song*, I have planned a pool trip once weekly and a weekly craft for the big kids.  But since that is still three short weeks away, starting last night, I’m reading Tales From the Arabian Nights to them after putting Pebble to bed with a more age-appropriate story.  After Arabian Nights, I plan to move to Lamb’s Tales from Shakespeare and then onto something else that will allow me to mold their little brains to my purposes. (I’m open to suggestions)

 

Book Review: Mom, Jason's Breathing On Me!

I’ve been reading Mom, Jason’s Breathing on Me: The Solution to Sibling Bickering.  Since I have a newborn, it’s taking me a while.  A very long while.  Actually, I think by now I may have bought it from the library.  I can say already it’s worth the read.  I have learned much about sibling relationships from the first few chapters.

Some of you may know I’m an only child.  And you may know that I now have four children (ohmygosh…FOUR!?).  Here are some things a lot of you probably don’t know: I prayed (begged would be a more accurate description) for my fourth child–only 17.5 months younger than my third child–to be a daughter because I am overwhelmed by the relationship my first two sons have (they are 28 months apart) and because my husband and his brother were 16 months apart and I just CANNOT imagine being the mother of two boys like them.  Some of the stories they tell on each other make me want to run away with my hands over my ears screaming “LaLaLaLa I’m not LISTENING!”  And I’m NOT their mother.  I prayed for a daughter, hoping the dynamic between two closely spaced siblings of the opposite sex would be a little more tolerable.  I did get a sweet little girl, but as she’s only six weeks old, the jury’s still out on my theory.

Over the years I’ve asked my friends who have siblings what a normal sibling relationship is like in childhood (because, please God, my husband’s relationship with his brother CANNOT actually be the norm, right?).  I’ve asked mothers whose kids seem to love each other how they manage to make that happen.  I’ve read every book about sibling rivalry that comes across my path.  Nothing has really helped me understand what in the world my sons are doing to each other.  Until now.

Things I’ve learned in the painfully slow process of reading this book:

1. Unfortunately, my husband’s relationship with his brother as a child seems to be the universal standard.
2. Stay out of it.  Unless they are going to HARM each other, keep my mouth shut, don’t listen, and butt out.
3. How siblings interact as children has very, VERY little bearing on what their adult relationships will be like. (thank you, Jesus).
4. Sibling relationships {mostly} exist outside the realm of self-esteem.  Therefore being called a jerk by your brother is not the same as being called a jerk by the kid down the street.
5. Along the same lines as #4, siblings have a back and forth, push and pull that only they are allowed to participate in.

Okay, I kinda knew numbers 4 and 5.  I remember stepping in it in high school once because a friend was berating her two years younger sister–who I also happened to know and work with–behind her back.  I had the audacity to agree with her on some minor point.  I swear the entire lunch room went silent as she gave me a look that could kill and said “Don’t talk about MY sister like THAT!”  Um…excuse me what just happened here?  You were saying much worse about her just a moment ago?  Clearly I had stepped over some imaginary line that only people with siblings know exists.  I guess I’m lucky she was a relatively non-combative friend.

For me as a mother this means a few things:

First, the pressure is off of me to make my children into each other’s best friends.  They may never be like that as kids.  Actually, they probably won’t even appear to get along until they no longer feel the need to compete for my attention and affection as their parent.

I can hasten the day when they don’t feel the need to compete for my affection by not ever getting involved.  Never, EVER, take sides, unless one appears to be ready to harm (or is harming) the other.  Thus, if I were parenting my husband and his brother through the famous BB-gun-shot-to-the-butt-lead-to-breaking-down-the-door incident, I would get involved. (I think they were at home alone at the time, but you get the point)

And finally, I can make my life easier by not ever listening to the tattles.  The author gives all sorts of creative ways to blow your kids off and not offend either of them when they come to you saying, “Mama, so-n-so did XYZ.”  I’ve been using his some of his techniques for the subtle and caring blow-off and they are wonderful.  The boys have already started coming to me less often with their perfectly rehearsed tattles in their perfect little whiny voices.  Imagine this: permission to and instructions for blowing your children off is the most useful thing I’ve ever gleaned from a parenting book.