My Hero is . . .

Joel wrote the following at school about a month ago . . .

"My Hero is really nice. The're my parents. Not stupid at all. Not half an inch. Always help me."

Took Cara to the doctor today because she's had a high fever since the wee am hours Sunday. Poor thing has strep throat. Neither Kelly nor I have ever knowingly had strep throat. It's supposed to be super contagious. Got her some antibiotics after the doctor and she's doing a lot better tonight. Yea! It's always scary when your baby has a high fever cause you don't know when it will break or how serious the condition is that's causing it. Such a huge sigh of relief when they start to do better. She's been such a good girl about taking her medicine and complying with the doctor's/nurses requests. I'm proud of her.

Trying to decide whether or not to send Eli to kindergarten next year. The child wears me out. For that reason alone I'd like to send him. Yet he also loves structure and organized activities, I know he would enjoy it. However he would be one of the youngest if not the very youngest in the class. I don't want him to be behind socially, academically, physically. I know kids in the ward that have fall 2004 birthdays that will be entering kindergarten in September who seem leaps and bounds beyond my Eli. Of course they are almost a year older. Eli is very sensitive (to say the least) and I'm afraid it will affect him emotionally if he feels less than in any way. Of course we all have times when we feel inferior but I don't want to add insult to injury in his case.

LOVE my precious kids.

Kids say the Funniest Things

A couple of days ago I was in the bathroom and Cara knocks on the door and peeks her head in, "Doin' your bizness mama?"

Eli and Kelly were in Target yesterday. Eli points to a tampon box and says, "Daddy I think we need to get some of these because we're running low."


Joel has taken to "spider" climbing up the hallway walls and then walking forward in said stance. He's very proud of himself.

Beautiful spring day today. All the cherry blossoms on are block are in bloom as well as the other flowering trees around. When the wind blows the perfumed air fills your nostrils. Ummmmm!

Kelly took the afternoon off after much begging from his wife and we took the kids to Burke Lake Park. Train, carousel, et al. aren't open yet. But it was nice to be able to enjoy the beautiful afternoon together as a family. It's spring break. I was hoping Kelly could take it off this year, but he was too busy with the migration.

Trying to save money because I really want to buy a real house. Really really.

Deep Thoughts from Eli . . .

"Mommy, dinosaurs don't have penises, they just do dribbly poo poos."

Joel's Facebook Poem

Joel emailed me the following excerpt a couple of weeks ago. One of his current missions in life is to obtain my facebook password.

a poem:
it was a beautiful day for your facebook
but you did'nt learn your lesson
give me the password
i am so mad
give it to me now
love,joel


He cracks me up and I LOVE him to PIECES.

Eli-isms

Eli today, "Mommy sometimes you don't know the way to go. That's why Jesus gave us a Tom-Tom.

Eli yesterday, "Mommy I wanna be the Little Mermaid for Halloween, then we can have three girls and two boys in our family."

The Winter of my Discontent

Snow. Snow. More snow. Joel and Eli only went to school Tuesday and Thursday last week. School was cancelled today (Monday), and is tomorrow and Wednesday as well. Kelly and the kids left the house today for the first time since the storm hit us. Three feet, way too much.

Unexpected breaks are hard for me. I feed off of the structure of regular days. The structure of the school rhythm is good for Joel too. He can't spend too much time in his own head obsessing about the five seasons of contestants' scores on Fetch with Ruff Ruffman -- one of his recent obsessions. I feel guilty that I can't spend a lot of one on one time with him keeping him from his all too frequent perseveration. Eli and Cara too. All my kids watch way TOO MUCH TV. And I do use it as a babysitter so I can get stuff done.

I would rather they just play with toys so they can be creative and let their brains expand and learn. But that doesn't happen nearly as often as I'd like. For Joel with his limited ability to play symbolically toys have never held much magic. Even the stuff he got for Christmas this past year, he tells me "I don't want to play with it. I just want to love it." And Eli is a difficult child to play with. He wants it his way all the time and he yells and screams a lot which is nerve racking. Of course Cara is young and two and her favorite words are "mine" and "no." So those are my justifications for keeping the TV on way too much of the time.

Some days I do concentrate a lot of my time orchestrating art/cooking/reading activities for them and then my house is a total wreck and the laundry piles up like crazy and I feel like a loser in my role as a homemaker. Of course I also feel like a failure when I spend most of my time doing housework and my kids are mostly entertained by the TV. It really is a rock and a hard place.

Guilt, guilt, guilt. The mother's constant companion.

That's why all these days out of school are so difficult for me. I lose the balance that the school schedule affords me. Kelly is always good about taking the kids off my hands for a bit, but I'm still out of whack. The snow makes it harder too because it's been impossible to get outta here.

The Pinewood Derby et al

Now that Joel is the big 8 he is eligible for the cub scout program at church which includes the legendary PINEWOOD DERBY. Last Tuesday they made their cars and Friday was the derby. I tried to tell Kelly that people use all kind of trickery to make their cars as speedy as possible. I encouraged him to look on the internet for these family secrets that have been passed down from father to son since Adam used sandpaper to round the wheels of Cain and Abel's cars.

But Kelly felt that all these alterations were a bit deceptive and dishonest. He foolishly thought that Joel should do most of the work himself and that it should all be about the kids. An ostrich burying his head in the sand for sure! Doesn't he know that the Pinewood Derby is a place for the dads to prove their manhood? To see whose car is really the most powerful and explosive of all? A place where men can make up for the shortcomings they felt in childhood. If you were a wimpy kid who got beat up a lot you can reassert your missing macho by turning that humble pine rectangle into a real speeding bullet.

In the final standings Joel was ranked number 83. Out of 84. Told ya Kelly!

He did win one race, and he was so HAPPY! Jumping up and down and grinning from ear to ear. I love seeing hime like that. (Hence the reason I wanted Kelly to help him cheat:o)

They added a new twist tho since my older brother was a pinewood derby participant. The Bishop's car. Anyone who wants can race the B's car at the end, and said car is designed to go very s-l-o-w-l-y. So all the cubs can at least beat the Bish thereby leaving their ids, egos and superegos fully undisturbed and intact.

Unscarred, maybe the next generation of pinewood derby dads can actually let their kids take the lead and leave themselves at the starting line. We'll see.