2007 Archive | MamaSite

Forward, Not Back

Fri, 07 Dec 2007 18:40:48 -0500

Three and a half months since I updated this blog. About time I wrote about some of the non-school things in my life.

Hard stuff first. A little over a month ago, I decided to determinedly google for Debbie to see if I could find out what had happened. I found her obituary; she died last April. No cause of death was listed, but the family requested donations to Dana Farber's brain cancer research. She left her parents, three brothers, a sister, and her siblings' families. At least her kids and her husband will have them. It's not enough, of course; but they are not alone.

I have lost grandparents. A few kids I went to school with. Nobody I was this close to, who was so close to my own age. I had wished for it to go differently for Debbie, and I'm sure I'm way down a long list of people on that one. She gave me my whole life, and I never had a chance to thank her. We donated to Dana Farber this year; that's as close as I'll get.

Onward to happier, Mommier stuff. Em is changing so much every day. I've decided I'm going to write her a letter every year, telling her what I remember of what she's done. Amazing she potty trained this year. She still has the occasional accident overnight; but she's done amazingly well. Her sleep patterns are starting to settle as well; although I'm conscious I've made that declaration before! She generally gets up around 5:30 or 6:00. At this point she comes into our room to get me. "Mommy," she will say in a loud stage whisper, "I want you to come lie down." Or sometimes "I want to go downstairs." One morning she was quite funny - instead of coming into our room, she stood in the hallway in front of her room and whispered "Mommy!" as loudly as she could. She didn't want any arguments about going downstairs, I guess!

I have also managed to completely spoil her. We went to Barnes and Noble last weekend, and I got her a book. She kept saying she wanted a present; I told her the present was the book. She said "No, I want a toy." Argh. I told her books were better, but she sulked. She was so awful about it in the car that I took it away - for a while. Long enough to make the point! I am making a trial run to Target tomorrow, where I will not buy her a toy for the first time...ever, maybe. I am going to talk to her about it ahead of time, which will hopefully head off any tantrums. It's going to be hard - I love getting her something, even just stickers; but last weekend convinced me I need to teach her not to assume. It's not fair to her, or to anybody who has to deal with her.

It's just that I want to buy her everything. All the cute toys, all the cute clothes. Everything she could ever want. I know things are not love. I just love her so, and sometimes it's overwhelming. Apparently overflowing love drives me to purchase My Little Pony paraphernalia.

She kisses and hugs now. She does something Steve and I are calling "chicken kisses": when she says goodbye in the morning, she'll bob her head and make kissing noises toward the floor - just like a chicken pecking! She thinks it's hysterical, probably because she gets such a good reaction from us.

She counts to twenty, only skipping a few numbers. She knows "her" letter - capital E - and can recognize her written name, even if she can't spell it herself. She can sing the alphabet, and most of "This Is Halloween" from "The Nightmare Before Christmas." She can say "pterodactyl." She cannot do a somersault - she always ends up rolling sideways - but physically she is fearless, and has amazingly good balance for a child her age. One of her friends had a birthday party at a gymnasium, and she had a wonderful time. We are going to look for a weekend program for her - something geared toward fun, not toward competition. I'm guessing she'll pick up somersaults pretty fast.

School

Wed, 22 Aug 2007 09:50:20 -0400

It's been a week now.

I love it.

Randomness

Thu, 19 Jul 2007 20:45:49 -0400

Sometimes, when I catch a glimpse of her out of the corner of my eye, Rosie looks like Sabella.

As proud as I am of Emily, not a single day goes by when Something doesn't happen that makes me second-guess every bit of parenting I've ever done.

Sometimes I wish I'd started having babies when I was 21, so I could have had a dozen or so. And sometimes I realize that I'd just be obsessing over twelve kids instead of just one.

It's hard to find a way to apologize for something that happened a long time ago, especially when you don't really want to remind the person to whom you did it about the incident. (Or incidents.)

Friendships are worth working on.

How the heck am I ending up with double dates in this thing?

It's easy to say "It's just a job," but it's really impossible not to be affected by the atmosphere of a place you're in 40 hours a week.

No matter how tired I am in the morning, I never manage to go to sleep earlier at night. I do this OCD thing with puzzles - lately I've been doing two Anagram Magic Squares, and then two Places Please. I cannot make myself turn off the light until I've finished.

Wi-Max Internet beats satellite. But not by much.

Humidity saps absolutely all the energy out of me. Small tasks that are usually easy leave me feeling drained, achy, and a little nauseous. And yeah, I know it's not all that humid around here.

Apropos of high humidity - I must admit, a huge chunk of the fun of going to DisneyWorld is buying all the cool guidebooks ahead of time.

Emily has an awful lot of toys, especially considering how strongly we felt about not spoiling her.

I do not understand people who expend so much energy resenting the possibility that the guy next door might have more money than they do. You either have enough, or you don't. And everybody has to make tradeoffs.

Speaking of enough money - if I had so much money I really didn't have to think about what I spent, I wouldn't start with a new car. I'd get a MacPro and a 30-inch Apple monitor and every piece of software Adobe has ever shipped. And then I'd buy a Prius.

Getting old is unfair.

Part of me still wants to be a redhead, and I'm worried I'm getting too old for that sort of thing. If I could do a dark strawberry blonde thing, that'd be fun; of course, the reddish hair colors don't hold all that well. Still, it's coming in largely gray now - what do I care if I abuse it a little?

I really like that my hair got curlier after Em was born.

I have loved Emily all her life, and then some; but the older she gets, the more specific my affection becomes. She's sweet and mischievous and stubborn and unreasonable and strong and self-possessed. She is a constant fascination, and a constant mystery.

She's also beautiful. It's not important, not in the grand scheme of things; but she is. Right now it's wonderful. When she gets older, it'll probably dredge up some emotional rubbish for me to deal with. And it's also a little bit terrifying - being beautiful generally means that some people will want things from you just because of how you look.

I think I'm a pretty good mommy. I also think I won the kid lottery. I don't know how much is nature and how much nurture. Wouldn't it be funny if Emily's wit and charm was a result of a third trimester full of Burger King Big Fish sandwiches?

Marriage is cool. Wish I'd tried that earlier in life, too - I think I'd have grown up more quickly. Of course, I'd have had to have been married to someone else, which completely defeats the purpose of the wish.

I used to think I wanted to live forever. Now I know I only want to live forever if everybody can live forever with me.

I'm enjoying my extra-curricular computer studies, but sometimes even geeks need a night off.

Grumble.

Wed, 13 Jun 2007 20:19:19 -0400

So I just downloaded Sandvox 1.2.1, and it's rife with bugs. But sometimes a girl's gotta write anyway.

I mentioned I'm shopping for new education. Well, I progressed rather rapidly to the formal stage - I found an on-line place that offers a bachelor's degree in interactive media design - basically, web design and graphics. Way cool! Also way expensive - it's a real university, and is priced as such. Also, since it's a bachelor's degree, they require some unrelated courses like composition (which hopefully I could place out of) and art history.

I talked to my manager, and she's going to see if the company will pay for it. I figure it's kind of a long shot - the place is an art school, and the early classes are heavy on design and light on geeky stuff. If they won't pay for it...it's probably too expensive for us to swing. Or more accurately, while we could probably do it, there is a certificate program that costs 1/10th as much (no joke) that, while not as rigorous, is probably better than 1/10th as rigorous.

Honestly, I don't really know what I want. The degree would look better on my resumé, and would be a far more thorough graphic design education. But it's FOUR YEARS. The courses are semi-self-paced - they're scheduled, but assignments are week-to-week. The certificate program, on the other hand, is fully self-paced: you can download two courses at once, and you have three months to complete them. Realistically I could complete the certificate program in less than two years.

So it's hardly a no-brainer, choosing between the two - although it pretty much will be if the company says no. Except THEN I have to talk to the really nice admissions lady - who is also, I suspect, an extremely well-trained salesperson - and say well, no, this isn't going to happen. She'll whip out the contingency plans, and offers to evaluate me for financial aid (laughable, really, given our income; but we're trying to SAVE most of it, and this program would significantly eat into that, not that folks who want your money will take that as an excuse), and subtle guilt trips. I do not cope well with such things; but fortunately I have my husband to back me up, and I'm not going to promise OUR money just because I'm uncomfortable disappointing a total stranger.

The good side of all of this is that whichever program I end up in, I get to buy cool software. Both of them require Photoshop, Dreamweaver, Illustrator, and Flash (one of the electives in the certificate program would also get me into InDesign or QuarkXPress). I went to an Apple Store today and twiddled with Dreamweaver a little - quite a sophisticated tool, no surprise given its reputation (not to mention the price tag). And it sure looked nice on that 24" iMac - only $1999. $200 more than Adobe Creative Suite 3 Design Premium, which would include all the bits of software I would need. If I were a REAL graphic designer, splurging would mean that $160 set of 132 Prismacolor colored pencils, not two grand on software! But one must move with the times.

I don't know what I hope will happen. The company says yes, I get free everything, but I have to take ethics and art history. The company says no, I get the cheaper, self-paced program; but we'd be footing the bill. Would've been nice if the company covered certificates, but they don't; and I guess I can understand that.

Of course, ultimately I'm terrified of a) failure; and b) exhaustion. And oh, yeah: c) total lack of aptitude, which is a corollary of a). But I have to try. My whole life I've been afraid to screw up. Time to jump, for once.

What do I write about again?

Wed, 06 Jun 2007 20:42:09 -0400

It's been AGES. Things have been massively stressful, mostly due to things outside of my control. For now...all is well at Dragonfly Farm.

Somewhere in the gap Miss Em turned three. Her Royal Threeness. Suddenly she knows how old she is - before her birthday, if you asked how old she was, she'd look at you blankly and then say "I'm Emily!" Now she tells everybody who will listen how old she is. AND she's willful, and opinionated, and often hypersensitive. She's also starting to make jokes, and to goof on us, which is lovely beyond my ability to describe.

She's still in diapers at night. She's occasionally dry in the morning; but what's more interesting to me than those spotty successes is that her diaper is slowly becoming less wet overnight. (Tonight will be different. Tonight she REFUSED to go before bedtime - I think she was cold, and wanted to get under the covers.) Slowly but surely she's reaching that physiological stage. She's still a bit cranky when I put her diaper on at night - but sometimes I think that's just because she knows it means "bedtime," and at this time of year she's trying to sell me on the idea that if it's light outside it can't POSSIBLY be bedtime. Con artist. What am I going to do when she's 14 and so much better at it?

In other news, I've decided to shift my career focus a bit. Just as I once grudgingly caved in to the fact that I enjoyed computer programming and had an aptitude for it, I am now grudgingly admitting that I enjoy user interface and web design. So I'm working on finding some formal education to that effect - not a bachelor's program, but something I could put on my resumé to mitigate as much as possible the miniscule amount of experience I have in this area. The trouble is, the most promising place I've found - they offer online certificate programs in both web design and graphic design - doesn't offer college credit classes, and my employer will only pay for college credit classes (even if you're not working toward a degree). So that means we'd have to foot the bill. You can do it month-to-month; but still, I feel like I have to be Absolutely Certain before I commit my family to something like that.

But it sure does look like fun.

And here's my thinking about all of that: the more I work with (and on) graphical applications, the more I'm becoming convinced that everything is eventually going to live in a web browser - probably pretty damn soon, too. (Yes, I know I'm not the first person to have made that observation.) I've been studying Swing (a Java GUI toolkit) for about a week, and I'm amazed at how much of it I could do with HTML and CSS (which I know a lot better than I know Swing, but still don't know in depth). I think rich clients will become more and more boutique or niche applications, and will eventually suffer the fate of the dinosaur. Maybe not in my career lifetime; but it wouldn't surprise me.

Right now web designers don't get paid much - at least the storefront/shopping cart-type web designers. And I suspect it'll never pay what software engineering did in its heyday. But I think this area of programming has a longer shelf-life, and I have to think my experience with applications - even non-GUI applications - and programming languages will lend me some credibility.

Hence my desire not to pick some fly-by-night certificate program. (I can't find much about these guys out there; but they did win an award back in 2001.) There just isn't much out there available as on-line self-paced courses; and realistically that's all I'm going to be able to do until Em is quite a bit older. (Well, okay, I probably could manage - I've got a colleague whose son is about a year older, and she's almost done with her masters in computer science - but y'all know me, and you know I'd blow it off too much.) If it was less money - even half the price - I might chance it. I might chance it anyway. I mean, really, what I NEED to do is stop dithering.

It would be awfully nice to have fun at work again.

Potty Training, Day 5

Mon, 07 May 2007 20:19:12 -0400

Back to school today. One accident, but otherwise fine.

I'm beginning to think, though, that she's working at holding it more than she's working at using the potty. She didn't use it once tonight before bed. She used it this morning, and almost didn't make it. Maybe I'll see if they can tell me how many times she goes.

I am wondering if diapers at night is just giving her an excuse to wait. After all, I know from Thursday's episode that she has a Mighty Bladder. I wonder if the diapers just disappeared how long it'd be before she made it through the night, or got to the point where she'd use the potty before bed, or get up in the middle of the night...

Pushing it too much at this point, maybe. In general, she's doing brilliantly, and handling the change rather well. I think the thing to do is pick a timeframe, and stick to it. Two weeks? Or maybe a little longer - her birthday, perhaps. See how everything is going on her birthday, and reevaluate the overnight strategy then.

It's funny; I'm learning that books don't really help much. They're comforting to me, in that they give me a perspective on what's normal - the kid who goes from diapers straight to underwear with no mishaps at all is somewhat unusual - but I don't know how much I learn that I actually use. My potty training book suggests reminding the child, and making her sit on the potty at regular intervals. This worked for one day with Em - now if you poke her, she'll dig her heels in. With this kid, the best thing to do is leave her be, let her listen to her own body, and hope that the discomfort of having accidents will teach her to go before it becomes urgent. Common sense, I suppose.

Potty Training, Day 3

Sat, 05 May 2007 19:52:20 -0400

I shouldn't have skipped a day, because today was so dramatically better than Thursday it's going to seem a disjointed tale.

Today: No accidents. The only reason she wore two different pairs of panties today is because we had a little overflow while sitting on the toilet, and her pink kitty panties got wet. This caused brief hysteria, until I produced the Meow Meow Meow panties, which are almost as popular.

She even used the toilet without being asked once. Just turned in the middle of playing and said "I need to use the potty" as she trundled down the stairs to the bathroom.

This is a big deal; yesterday she didn't go even once without some form of coercion. Some times were easy - it was easy to tell her that everybody had to go before we went out, and have all of us take turns so she didn't feel singled out. Other times bribery was required. Once I bribed her with Raisinettes, and immediately felt like a bad Mommy - but then I discovered she liked changing panties, and when I wanted her to go I just pulled out a few new pairs and asked her which ones she wanted to change into. Telling her she needed to use the potty to get new panties worked like a charm.

Today even that wasn't necessary. We didn't push it as much - we pushed first thing in the morning, and about an hour after she got up, because she's always been pretty regular about those times - and otherwise just played the "everybody goes before we leave" game. I took her shopping and she stayed dry. We walked for an hour (she was in the stroller, which is a good workout for Daddy on the hills, but probably ought to end soon), and she stayed dry. She made it through the whole day and back into diapers (the diapers-at-nighttime thing seems to be working beautifully for now) without so much as a drop out of place.

I'm thinking now of going back to work on Monday instead of taking the vacation day, and sending her back to day care in undies. I asked her tonight if she wanted to wear her kitty panties to school on Monday, and she lit up like a Christmas tree.

Tomorrow will mock my optimism, I'm sure. Tomorrow will likely be a disaster. But today - today she did just beautifully, and I'm so proud of her.

Potty Training, Day 1

Thu, 03 May 2007 21:29:01 -0400

Did not go as I had hoped, although I did discover that she can hold her bladder for five and a half hours.

Things started well. We'd been prepping her for a few days, mentioning casually that the diapers were going to go away, so she knew what was happening when I took her diaper off in the morning. She obligingly stopped in the bathroom on the way downstairs, and did a smashing job. She cheerfully pulled on a pair of pink panties and went about her business.

Which, oops, not much later included elimination in her undies, liquid and solid. Oh, well. No biggie. I took them off, emptied them into the toilet, let her flush and clean up, and got her a new pair.

About an hour later, a flood. Oh well again; I knew there would be accidents, and now I've had a chance to scrub the floor in two separate spots. I figured that would be my day.

And then a bit later, after lunch (cashew nuts and animal crackers; she ate like a bird today, maybe on purpose), she got up, announced she needed to use the potty, went into the bathroom, and went through the whole process like a professional. Lovely, I thought. Maybe this is it. Maybe this is the end of the accidents.

Naive? Oh, yeah. But I hoped.

She napped today, of all things. She almost never naps at home anymore, and has started skipping it occasionally at day care. Fortunately I had a rubber sheet on the couch, and I tucked her blanket around her bottom just in case. She woke up dry around 3:00.

"Do you need to use the potty?" I asked her.

She shook her head. "No, not yet."

I asked her periodically over and over again. Once she said she wanted different panties; I let her pick a striped pair and change. Still didn't want to use the potty. I was making dinner when she said she wanted to change again. I asked her again, and got the same answer: "Not yet."

Things got very quiet when I was in the kitchen. Never a good sign. Sure enough, moments later she called to me: another flood. An impressive one, too; she must've been hanging on to that for quite a while.

I cleaned it up cheerfully. She wanted to help; but she's not really equipped to, so I had to distract her a bit. I told her next time she should let me know so we could get to the potty first. She nodded sagely; she's always doing that.

So: How many things did I do wrong? In retrospect, I think two:

1) I shouldn't have chastised her, however gently, about her last accident.

2) More importantly, I should not have ASKED if she wanted to use the potty. I should have told her it was time, and if she sat and did nothing that was fine; but that it was potty time and we were going to go sit for a minute.

Not easy. #2 is going to be rough for her; she has her routine, and she gets upset if it's interrupted. I will need to be gentle, but insistent. I don't want it to turn into a bad experience, but it CANNOT turn into a power struggle. That's what happened to my work friend who had the five-year-old in diapers. No, thank you.

Am I doing this too soon? I don't know. I asked her at bedtime if she wanted a diaper or panties; she thought about it for a moment, then decided on a diaper. While I was putting her to bed, she reiterated that she didn't want panties. I told her that was fine - that diapers could be for nighttime, and panties for daytime. She got a huge smile on her face and said "Yeah."

Maybe that was the wrong thing, too. Maybe it sends a mixed message.

She has ALL the pieces. I'm reasonably sure that her marathon non-peeing session this afternoon was more about control than not understanding when she needed to go. When she DOES go, she gets all of it right. She just needs to get to the point where it's the default, and not just some novel game that she's getting bored with.

I promised myself I'd stick with it at least through the weekend; but right now it sure would be easier just to pull the Pampers back out of the closet.

Enough is Enough

Mon, 16 Apr 2007 13:48:31 -0400

It's April 16, 2007, nearly a solid month into spring.

Yesterday, it snowed. Heavy, wet stuff, coming down at quite an impressive clip. At one point the individual flakes joined forces, dropping from the sky in flat clumps the size of my palm. Every time I looked at the weather report - in those little moments when we actually had Internet - AccuWeather claimed it was raining.

Of course, it did change to rain later. Drenching rain. Which came down ALL NIGHT, and managed to wash out our driveway in three places. Thank God we've got a tractor, and more dirt and rocks on our property than we're likely to need. (I hope.)

We're only 1200 feet above sea level. This is insanity. Or, more likely, global warming. Either way, the Patriot's Day that was going to be just me and Em and maybe some errands turned into all three of us, hanging out in our cozy little house. Which...is actually really nice, so I can't be too bothered by it, even if my husband would've rather not burned a vacation day today.

I did have to smile, though, at the headline on Boston.com this morning, proclaiming no reports of flooding after the storm. I suppose it's all in your perspective.

Being Nice

Mon, 19 Mar 2007 19:59:45 -0400

I've been told, many times in my life, that I'm a nice person.

It's not entirely true, of course. I am not always nice. I make snap judgments, I get annoyed, I climb up on my high horse and to heck with what anybody else says. I have raised stubbornness to an art form. I've been unkind - sometimes repeatedly - to people I've called my friends. I've lost friends - driven them away, or let them go.

But I know what people mean when they say it. They mean I'm cheerful, and I don't let day-to-day things rattle me all that much. I'm forgiving of the small stuff and the stuff that wasn't intended. I have my lines, and some of them don't do me much credit; but if the lines aren't crossed, I'm generally not bothered.

I realized today, as I was reading one of my bulletin boards, that I was looking for entertainment in the snarky posts of others. There's a lot of polarization on this particular set of message boards, and many of the people with whom I agree can write articulate, well-thought-out posts. They can also write biting sarcasm and vicious insults. And I enjoy reading them. Why shouldn't I, when the folks on the other side do the same?

What am I becoming?

Insults are insults. Nastiness is nastiness. In discussions as polarized as these are, nobody ever persuades anybody else. It's often impossible to get past semantic games to figure out exactly what the disagreement is. Everybody participates in this willingly and vociferously. And I've become the sort of person who enjoys watching other people get insulted.

"Enjoys" is overstating it, of course. It's like picking a scab - you can't resist, and it feels weirdly good when you do it; but then you're bleeding again and it's just as raw as it was before. Sometimes it even gets worse. It's one quick hit of nastiness and self-satisfaction, and then you're hammered with retaliatory nastiness from the other side.

I don't want to be that person. I don't want to condone ANYBODY'S nastiness, including my own. I don't want to pick that scab; I want it to heal, so the next time I get scratched I recognize that it's not good for me.

Enough with the analogies.

I've made a lot of mistakes in my life, and most of those mistakes don't involve being nice. I would really like to be a nice person - to live up to my husband's image of me, and to give my daughter a good role model. Of course, maybe what I'm saying is that i want to be kind, which is a little different. One can be kind without being nice; being nice sometimes means being a doormat. (I don't recommend that, by the way.) Being kind means you're forthright with people, but if you have to give them bad news you give it to them with an effort to cause them as little harm as possible. It does NOT mean concealing hurtful things, or forgiving someone you really can't forgive. It just means not adding insult to injury.

Kind is better. I think I'd rather be kind.

Second Impressions

Sun, 11 Mar 2007 20:35:08 -0400

Okay, okay, okay, I admit it: I was wrong about Em's preschool teacher.

I still suspect she's not the brightest creature on earth; but I'm rather ashamed of myself that I still tend to assume not-bright people aren't terribly perceptive. I know plenty of near-geniuses who are completely tone-deaf to non-verbal cues; why should I be surprised that someone who's maybe never going to be Einstein gets the more important things just fine?

One day last week she asked me to pronounce Em's last name (it's pretty easy to figure out if you've had any German, but an awful lot of people haven't). I pronounced it for her; she repeated it back a few times, making sure she had it right. The next day at drop-off she repeated it, just to verify she'd remembered properly (she had).

The following day we got there late - everyone was already lining up for breakfast. Em wanted to go to the cafeteria with them, but she wanted me to carry her. Her teacher had the other students wait, and when I couldn't easily detach Em, she said "Emily, do you want to lead the line with me?" And Em went to her right away.

So maybe she knows a thing or two about shy kids after all. And maybe, eventually, I'll learn not to judge so quickly.

One of the other teachers (I don't know which one - there are four altogether in the room all day, in overlapping shifts) sent her home in a pull-up. Oh, dear. She's not quite there; and of course when the thing got wet I had to throw it out. What an ogre that made me! But I did discover the amazing power of Princesses, and promptly ordered her some real Princess underwear on-line. We also picked her up one pair of Princess underwear and three pairs of Thomas the Tank Engine underwear at Target, so she could see them and have something to think about when considering whether or not to use the potty.

She did once, on Friday when my mom was with her. Just a little. Very exciting, of course! Although she wasn't in the slightest bit interested in discussing it afterward. It's SO hard not to push when she's got all the pieces in her hands...but I don't. I ask her every once in a while if she wants to use the potty. Sometimes she'll take her diaper off and sit for a minute, then wash her hands; but nothing has come of it since Friday. So I'll just keep asking, mentioning her underwear, and trying not to make it a Big Deal.

But HOW WONDERFUL WOULD IT BE DO HAVE HER OUT OF DIAPERS???

Feet

Mon, 26 Feb 2007 19:54:30 -0500

Her left foot is a shark. Her right foot is a little girl.

I learned this at bathtime a week or so ago. They apparently play together quite nicely, although the shark will sometimes growl at Mommy while it's in the tub.

Tonight at bedtime her left foot became a kitty. I'm not sure why; it seemed perfectly happy as a shark. Nevertheless. Perhaps at bedtime the little girl prefers curling up with something furry.

She's filled with these little bursts of imagination. It astonishes me, sometimes, how fertile her mind is. She slips in and out of character seamlessly, depending on us to be observant enough to recognize what's going on. If she can learn to do that in front of an audience, she'll be quite an actress. For now, though, she shares it with her nearest and dearest, always with the slightest of sly smiles.

We are almost recovered from the Very Scary Incident. That is to say, she is completely recovered, and was last Saturday night. I only occasionally feel that fist of fear around my stomach. I don't think I'll ever take her health quite as much for granted again. The web sites can scream HARMLESS HARMLESS HARMLESS all they want.

She's adjusting to preschool. Drop-offs are still hard; she's eager to see her friends until we actually get in the room, and then it's loud and strange and out of her control. One of the teachers - an older woman who should know better - seems to think trying to tickle Emily is a good way to get her to warm up. Good Lord, woman, she's not being stubborn, she's shy! You'd think she'd have run into a shy kid before.

I don't completely blame her, though. I think the main problem is she's just not too bright. I watched her deal with two slightly rowdy boys this morning (they weren't that bad, really; just a little wired, and probably looking for some attention). She didn't lose her temper, but she said the same set of phrases to each kid. I think she has a limited repertoire. Full points to her, though, if she doesn't lose her temper - it's HARD with kids this age, especially when they're competing for your time. But i don't think she's got anything in her playbook that is going to help Em learn how to deal with that burst of anxiety she feels when she first walks into that room. That's something we'll need to help her with ourselves.

Teasing

Wed, 14 Feb 2007 19:33:58 -0500

We were all home today for a snow day. Em was frolicking in her nightgown; I noticed her diaper was a bit laden.

I said "Let's change your diaper," and she ignored me.

(This in itself is not an unusual occurrence; but lately she's been getting better about telling me when she needs changing instead of just pretending nothing is going on.)

I gave her a few minutes, then said "Come on, Em, I need to give you a new diaper."

"No!" she shouted. "I don't need a new diaper! Stop teasing me!"

And with that i suddenly had a vision of what might happen to a kid who looks closer to 4 than 3 who is suddenly put in a room full of older kids, most of whom don't wear diapers anymore.

"Do the kids tease you because you wear a diaper?"

"Yeah," she said.

Now, I know that's not necessarily true. She's at an age where just asking her a question is leading. It's just as likely she was responding to the sympathy in my voice as anything else. But it's sure not out of the realm of possibilities.

I tried for the rest of the day to be normal; but really, I'm pretty much beside myself. I can't figure out what to do about it. Talk to day care? They'll tell me yes, sometimes this happens, and of course they can't watch every kid every minute. They'll tell me the kids get past it. They may even tell me it'll help her potty train - which they'd be wrong about, actually; she's far more likely to dig her heels in and keep on doing what she's doing, which is another (less important) reason this possibility distresses me.

They can't stop it. I know that. As a practical matter, there will always be kids who tease and kids who get teased. And Em, by virtue of her height, does look a lot older than she is - adults get it wrong, why shouldn't other children?

But all I can do is think back to my own experience in kindergarten 38 years ago. 38 years, and they still haven't figured out what to do about it. So what would be the purpose of talking to the teachers? Just to let them know? 38 years ago that sort of thing made you even more of a target, and good intentions notwithstanding I don't believe things have changed much.

I don't know what to tell her. I told her anyone who said that was being naughty, and that she could use a diaper or not as she wished. I told her she was a good girl and I loved her, and I tried to act normally for the rest of the day. Not so easy, and my kid is no fool; we got into kind of a feedback loop tonight, which I'm hoping is being broken by Daddy who is obligingly doing his bedtime shift.

I need to deal with this. I will never be able to help her deal unless I can deal myself.

A Few Short Notes

Sat, 13 Jan 2007 20:06:19 -0500

I wasn't going to write until I had the new web pages up, but that's taking longer than I thought it would. So I thought I'd post a few little things.

1) The woman I was ranting about in my last entry is scheduled for a c-section at 39 weeks. Shocker, huh?

2) My friend at work was induced on Wednesday. I got a note that her son was born and everybody was fine. No further details - but I was so glad to hear the news. I have a tendency to worry - even about very unlikely things - until I hear otherwise.

3) The light department says our pole is operational. Steve observes, however, that it doesn't seem to have an antenna mounted on top. We have the Internet kit, but I'll call them Tuesday to make sure the pole really and truly is supposed to look the way it does. If all is well, weather permitting we'll put the receiver up next weekend. And then...the migration toward telecommuting begins!

4) Em's been a bit off her game. Last week she skipped a nap at day care - which I think is a first. Not only did she skip her nap; she ran around the room shrieking and waking up the other kids. Oh, she must have been a staff favorite that day! There are a number of things going on: first, she's getting more molars, and has been complaining of tooth pain. Second, her best friend at day care has been moved to the preschool room. Third, SHE is due to head toward the preschool room by February 25th. That's a lot of change, all at once. Not to mention her cognitive development - she's grasping more and more abstract concepts every day. Plus, it takes a lot of energy being the World's Tallest Toddler.

(Actually, she's not the World's Tallest. She's about 38" tall, which puts her at about the 88th percentile - funny, since she's taller than ALL of her peers at day care - and she weighs 32 pounds, which is about the 76th percentile. All that puts her a wee bit over the 50th in weight-for-height - a beanpole, but still healthy. Yes, I am interested in statistics like this, and in a way I'm glad she's not off the charts anymore - I started wondering about giantism and growth problems. Good grief, I'm paranoid!)

She also regularly says "I love you, Mommy" now. Sometimes she may actually mean it; but most of the time she says it when she's got me in a headlock and is using aggressive cuddling as an excuse not to go to sleep. I have to say, it doesn't bother me that much, although eventually I have to curb things a bit or she'll be up half the night. Clearly, though, she's recognized it's something I like to hear. So in some ways, Mommy isn't so hard to manipulate.

Can I Just Say One Thing?

Wed, 03 Jan 2007 21:47:58 -0500

THERE IS NO REASON, IF YOU'RE HAVING A NORMAL PREGNANCY, TO HAVE AN INTERNAL EXAM JUST BECAUSE YOU'RE CREEPING UP TO YOUR DUE DATE. How dilated you are means pretty much nothing about when you'll go into labor, AND you run the risk of introducing infection.

There, I feel better now. Oh, wait: there's more!

PRODROMAL LABOR/BRAXTON-HICKS CONTRACTIONS ARE NOT CAUSED BY LARGE BABIES. Zillions of women have prodromal contractions for WEEKS before giving birth, and only a small percentage of them have large babies. And oh, while we're on the subject: did you know that if your doctor BELIEVES you are going to have a large baby you are twice as likely (maybe three times; I can't remember) to end up with medical interventions than if you actually DO have a large baby that nobody's anticipating? With no improvement of outcome?

One last thing: Co-sleeping is NOT the same as spoiling a child. If you think it is, you're probably better off not co-sleeping. But don't assume that folks who DO co-sleep don't know what the heck they're doing.

Happy 2007, everybody. I need a nap.