The Dish Canary (or Joan is a Crappy Mom)

Tonight after dinner, Brian was dealing with a client crisis on the phone, Thomas was starting trouble with his sisters, I was trying to clean up the dishes while keeping the kids quiet for Brian and stopping the fight.  Solomon came in to me very seriously and said:

Solomon:  Mom, I need your help, I'm starting a Dish Canary.

Joan (not really paying attention)...I told you to leave them alone, Thomas!  Get up to your room and practice your clarinet and don't make me tell you again!

Solomon:  Mom, Mom!  I need you right now!  I'm starting a Dish Canary!

Joan (increasingly annoyed and only slightly paying attention):  What is a Dish Canary?

Solomon (with huge eyes and great shock in his voice):  YOU don't know what a Dish Canary is?  You're a TEACHER!

Joan (finally paying attention but completely blowing a gasket):  Solomon Martin, I am tired of all this ridiculous attention-seeking behavior!  I do not have time for whatever nonsense you have going on right now and if I said 'what is a Dish Canary?' then I obviously do not know what a Dish Canary is!  Now if you really want my help then tell me what you need and stop wasting my time! 

Solomon (quietly and with regret):  Well, a Dish Canary is a book that tells you all the words and what they mean.  I saw it at school and thought I could write one.

Joan:  A dictionary?!?  You mean a dictionary???  You want to write a dictionary?

Solomon:  Well, yeah.  I said I needed some help.
 

What kind of a horrible mother yells at her kid who wants to write a dictionary?!  I laughed out loud, got down on my knees in the kitchen and hugged him and said, "I'm so sorry I yelled at you.  Where should we start?"  and Solomon grinned and said, "How about 'absolutely'?  I don't think I spelled it right."

First Day of School

Six weeks ago was the first day of school.  Here's what everybody looked like on that exciting day!

Thomas started sixth grade and is now in the middle school.  Notice the dark porch?  He catches the bus at 6:50am.  He is loving having his own schedule, more freedom and independence, the challenge of multiple teachers and more homework.  He is playing clarinet in the band and he is AMAZING (that is his critical self-analysis).  He intends to switch to saxophone later this year and follow in his Aunt Mandy's sax footsteps.  He is following in his dad's footsteps by running cross country and he's doing pretty well with that also.  He struggled at first remembering gym clothes, instrument, homework, lunch, running shoes and everything else every day, but he seems to be getting the hang of things now and seems very happy overall.

 

Tinsaye started fourth grade.  She skipped third to catch up with same-age peers.  She is doing much better emotionally this year.  She has gone from crying about something at least once a day (usually more) to maybe tears twice a week.  She has just settled in and leveled out emotionally.  I think her growth is settling down too... she grew 5 1/2 inches and gained 25 lbs in her first year here.  Hopefully that will slow because we can't keep her in clothes.  

  So far she is doing fine in fourth grade in spite of some pretty big gaps in her learning.  On her last math unit she started out with a 30% on her pretest.  At the end, her final test was 90%.  She is just a really hard worker.  She adores her teacher and is developing a whole new set of fourth grade friends.  Her vision is 20/20 in her good eye but she is legally blind in her bad eye.  It doesn't seem to affect her, though.  In another year or so we may get her a contact for her bad eye because it is correctable to about 20/150, but the ophthalmologist isn't sure her brain will use that eye even if it works.  

 

 

 Meredith started third grade this fall and I think she's having her best year yet.  She does not love school like the other kids do and her usual answer to "how was your day?" is "fine" or "okay".  This year I'm getting "GREAT!"  She likes her teacher and her class and I think she's catching up academically to some of the other kids her age.  She is still taking piano lessons and doesn't love to practice, but she loves her teacher and she loves to be able to play the pieces she finishes.  Her class will go on an overnight trip to Mackinac Island in the spring and she is very excited about doing that all by herself (no sisters or brothers or parents dragging along!).  Mere is taking gymnastics with Tinsaye on Saturday mornings and she really likes that (and it's not too taxing on our overloaded schedule).

Solomon  is in second grade this year.  He was disappointed that none of his best first-grade buddies were in his class and he was nervous about getting glasses in August and starting school with his new glasses.  All his fears were unfounded however, when everyone loved his glasses and he made lots of new friends right away (plus he still sits with his old friends at lunch).  

His vision continues to improve.  He had surgery to correct his wandering eye in May and now he has improved depth perception.  The eye drops continue to lower the pressures in his eyes and now his vision is correctable to 20/40 and 20/60.  Solomon started karate this fall and he is going to be a Ninja for halloween.  He's all about kicking, punching, jumping, spinning, and any other smashing that he thinks counts as "martial arts".  He loves to read and is the kid we never have to remind to do his daily reading minutes.  He also does math worksheets for fun.  It relaxes him.  Seriously.  He's the child of my heart, but clearly not my genetic material.

We could not be more proud of these terrific kids that God has given us!

Catching Up

Catching up.  It's what I do.  It's how I roll.  It's what this blog should be called.  I never seem to be able to stay on top of everything in my life, so I'm always "catching up" with something or someone. Since my last post in July (!!) many things, of course, have happened.  Nothing monumental, just life.  We spent lots of time at the cabin, worked our tails off on the house and yard, got everybody ready to start school, started school, started fall activities.  Also started going crazy, losing perspective, working too hard, and forgetting to laugh.  Started developing a short temper, unrealistic expectations, irritability, and impatience.

So now I'm catching up.  With this blog, with the people in my life, with my priorities.  Will it ever be thus?

Here's my new motto:

Find the joy.  If you can't find the joy, find the grace.

God put this in my head a few weeks ago while I was developing my crappy habits of irritability and impatience.  It seemed lovely.  When it came to me, I was like, "YES!  That's what I need to do!  My life is full of joy and grace.  This will be easy and will totally keep my perspective!"  

I was wrong.  Finding the joy is really, REALLY hard at 9:10pm when I am exhausted and Tinsaye is whining and Meredith STILL hasn't brushed her teeth and Thomas just remembered a math test tomorrow and Brian is yelling at Solomon that he CANNOT buy "crazy cheesy bread" for lunch tomorrow because it is garbage and he'd better get in there and make his lunch RIGHT NOW and all the kids should have been in bed 45 minutes ago and my whole body aches and I just want to crawl under the covers and never come out.  

Finding the joy is also really hard when it's 4:15pm and I have foolishly used up all my energy on my 225 students and am now late to pick up Thomas from cross country practice on my way home to get the other three off the bus and get someone to the dentist, the doctor, the therapist, church, a friends' house, Target, a piano lesson, or the library to return late books (see previous post) before figuring out what to make for dinner that is not a) expensive, b) fattening, c) more complicated than 3 ingredients, and d) going to take longer to prepare than 15 minutes.  

Finding the joy would also be considered difficult at 11:30am, when I have already seen 150 adolescents, have 30 minutes for lunch and am starving, but have to answer the 15 emails and 2 voice mails that have appeared since 8:20 when I last checked, have a stack of makeup quizzes to grade, have a blown speaker that needs repair and three mp3s that need to be burned to disc, have to call the counselor about one student, call a parent about another two, and write one up for behavior, have a concert next week that needs parents called to help out, two fundraisers that need attention, a trip that is not getting planned because other things need to happen first.

But this is my life.  And there IS joy.  And lots of grace.  When I am completely blowing my stack, Brian will say in a quiet (and definitely snarky) voice, "How about that joy, Joan?  Did you find it yet?"  (See what I live with?).  But when I stop and take a breath and pull back from the minute, I can almost always find the joy.  

Working with kids at school definitely brings me joy.  The paperwork and deadlines are bad, but the kids are wonderful.  I love what I do, I love that I am good at it and that the kids leave my room happy.  

Spending 5 minutes alone in the car with Thomas on the way home to the insanity is joyful and precious.  He is changing into a teenager before our very eyes and I love the quiet minutes alone with my oldest baby as I listen to his latest negotiating strategy to get a cell phone.  

There is grace at 9:15pm when God gives me the patience that I no longer possess on my own to remain calm and move each kid steadily toward bed.  And then there is joy at 9:30pm when I have a clean face, clean pjs, a warm bed, and my Nook for 30 minutes of quiet.  Plus a couple Tylenol PMs.

See, it's always there.  You just have to look for it.  I think it's getting easier for me to find.  

Blogging helps me find the joy and grace in my life so even though it's another thing to do, I'm going to keep at it.  I will backtrack a bit to catch up on the last three months.  Thank you to everyone who gently said to me, "I miss your blog posts!"  I haven't even posted on Facebook for a month, it's been that crazy.  So thanks for your patience, support, and prayers.  We are still alive, even though we've been media dark.  We've just been finding the joy.