Random conversations

I seriously do not think people get how weird my kids are.  I suppose all kids are weird, but mine appear to be thinking about some very strange things all the time.  In the last 24 hours here are the beginnings of three conversations I participated in (along with some Easter egg party photos):

Thomas: Hey mom, imagine you were driving a car that was incredibly aerodynamic, almost like a knife, and you were going about 400 miles an hour and you hit a deer.  What do you think would happen to the deer?  Would you slice it in half?  Would it fly up over the car?  Would it destroy the car?  Would you get killed?

Solomon:  Hey mom, if this car had two more wheels and another antenna, it would be an insect.  It even has an exoskeleton!












Meredith:  Hey mom, I'm so thankful I have lips.  If I didn't have lips, the food would fall out of my mouth all the time.  Plus I couldn't smile.














Tinsaye is significantly less weird that the other three.  She mostly just rolls her eyes. 












It is the funny, sweet weirdness that makes all the chaos worth it.  They are just so fun.

Underpants Guy

Since I had a filthy van full of kids and 20 extra minutes (don't ask how, I really don't know that happened), I pulled into my favorite car wash with FREE VACUUMS and put everyone to work.  I keep packages of Windex wipes and Armor-all wipes under the seat for just such an occasion.  Thomas was vacuuming, the girls were cleaning windows/leather, and Solomon was digging out petrified Cheez-Its, old crayons, and random ponytail elastics from under the seats (it sucks to be the youngest). 

We were almost done when a teenaged boy in a Jeep pulled up to the vacuum in front of us and started cleaning out his car while (of course) talking on his cell phone.  Solomon looked up at him and yells over the vacuum, "MOM, LOOK AT THAT GUY!  HIS PANTS IS OFF HIS BUTT!"  and sure enough, this poor kid (who at some point in his adult life will bitterly regret the fashion choices of his youth) was wearing jeans that were sitting a good inch or two south of his butt.  I'm sure he thought they were sagging, but they were not even close to his butt.  In fact, they defied the laws of gravity.  So as I stared transfixed, Solomon grabbed his sisters to show them, and they screamed this conversation over the vacuum, "MOM, HIS UNDERPANTS HAVE PINK ELEPHANTS ON THEM!  NO, THEY'RE NOT ELEPHANTS, I THINK THEY'RE PIGS!  NO, THEY'RE ELEPHANTS!  WHY IS HE WEARING HIS PANTS OFF HIS BUTT?  DOES HE WANT US TO LOOK AT HIS UNDERPANTS! HOW DO HIS PANTS STAY UP?"

All this screaming finally caught Thomas's attention.  He looked even more closely at the kid and screamed, "THAT GUY HAS A GIRL IN HIS CAR!  WHAT KIND OF GIRL IS GOING TO GO OUT WITH A GUY WHO WEARS UNDERPANTS WITH PINK ELEPHANTS ON THEM AND SAGS HIS PANTS COMPLETELY OFF HIS BUTT?!?!"

Finally, I was able to form words and said, "You guys are all screaming and staring!  Let's get out of here before he notices us!" and we took off.  The underpants guy was completely oblivious, but I think his girlfriend caught us laughing as we drove past them, four faces pressed up against the freshly cleaned windows, cracking up.

Finding peace and love

Being away from the kids gave us time and space to get a little perspective on what we've been doing, what's working and not working, and where we'd like to be.  Our new motto is:

Peace and love are more important than clean and on time.

Sounds great, right?  Hard to remember when we should have left the house 10 minutes ago and Solomon can't find his coat and Meredith forgot to brush her hair and Tinsaye is crying because her favorite pants are dirty and I told her to go change and Thomas suddenly realized he forgot to do his math homework and is now having a panic attack.  It's also hard to remember when I walk into my formerly neat living room after having been outside for 15 minutes and find video game controllers, blankets, playing cards, yarn, Cheetos, action figures, markers, and random dirty socks everywhere, all the lights on, Justin Bieber blaring from the speakers, but no children because they've all run off to play somewhere else.  You would think it had been pillaged by a horde of 9-yr-old suburban Vikings. 

These are the moments when Brian and I are terrible parents.  We like to have the world perceive us as "having it all together" and when we (and by extension, our kids) are late, unprepared, and messy we get very stressed and react badly.  I yell ('are you KIDDING ME?????  how can you POSSIBLY make this much mess!  when are you EVER going to learn?'), we make sweeping threats, Brian often issues completely unrealistic edicts ('we must now all be in the car 15 minutes before we actually need to leave', 'no one may ever again use markers').  At these moments, we feel out of control and neither of us is comfortable with that.  Of course, it is absolutely ridiculous to think that we can expect the kids to get it right all the time, but we are also really concerned about setting expectations and standards for them.  We are unwilling to accept the living room of the Vikings and snarly haired kids with no homework.

But we have decided to try to break out of our frustration by changing our reaction to these situations.  This morning I told Meredith, "I am leaving for work in 5 minutes.  If you don't get your hair brushed I can't do it for you."  And she stood in front of the mirror with her hairbrush making faces and singing songs and didn't brush it.  So I left without screaming.  And she looked pretty crappy. But no one died, and any shame she felt was of her own making, not because I yelled at her and made her feel like a failure.  I am trying to de-escalate my response to the messes by letting it go until the kids are back around and then making them pick stuff up before they do anything fun or eat (whichever appears more motivating).  Last week, Solomon missed the bus and Brian did not yell or threaten or drive him to school while yelling and threatening, he just said, "You'd better run hard and try to catch it on the next street."  Sol was a bit shocked, but he took off running and he managed to catch it, much to the delight of his brother and sisters who found it hilarious to see him waving his arms and hollering "Wait Bus Driver!!!"

The trick is to CHOOSE a peaceful, loving response with natural consequences instead of allowing ourselves to be triggered into anger.  Not easy, but totally worth it for everyone's sake.   It has really made a difference for me and it seems to be getting easier to do.  But I have to actually say out loud to myself, "peace and love are more important than clean and on time" in order to do it.  As with most things in life, hard work pays off and I am feeling more loving toward my little Vikings and peaceful about our chronic chaos.

A Few Of My Favorite Things

Several weeks ago, when Brian and I were on the brink of a murder-suicide attempt, we called his parents and begged them to stay with the kids for a few days so we could go away.  Anywhere.  Even the Econolodge on 8 Mile sounded great to us as long as we had some alone time.  Sensing our extreme desperation, they agreed.  Have I ever mentioned how much I love my in-laws?  That is another post entirely.  Anyway, we booked flights and 4 days at a resort in Ft. Lauderdale.  We are there right now and it is just perfect.  We aren't doing much, lots of eating, sleeping, and laying in the sun.  It might storm tomorrow which actually sounds just fine.  It is such a treat to just lay around and not have to do anything or be anywhere or be responsible for anything or anyone.  Plus, our room is loaded with my favorite things, which include:

-giant fluffy snow white towels that you can just throw on the floor and someone else washes
-a bed so huge you can't even tell there's another person in there with you
-400 thread count white cotton sheets
-orange scented hotel shampoo in cute little bottles
-endless hot water showers that don't get ruined when someone flushes the toilet
-TV that is not Nickeodeon or Disney Channel

Wow, did we need this break.  I am feeling human again, instead of a kid-taxi-driving mom-bot who constantly shrieks "pick up your stuff and put it away and keep your hands off your siblings".

That's enough blogging for now... I'm going to take another shower just because I can.

Perspective

Tomorrow is the beginning of Lent.  For the next 40 days I will be praying for God to give me clearer perspective on my life and my struggles.  I am very tired of feeling bogged down by the stuff I can't escape.  Like right now I have birthday parties to plan and rsvp to, soccer cleats to buy, prescriptions to refill, papers to file, lessons to plan, emails to return, checks to write, meals to prepare... the list is endless, insurmountable, and it will be there for the next decade.  I need to accept the fact that my desk will never be clear, my kitchen will always be a disaster, I will lose things and forget appointments and miss deadlines for the rest of my life as a mom.  And none of it matters in the long run. 

What does matter is that my family is a miracle, created by the grace of God and for His glory.  I get to live in the middle of it and witness four beautiful children grow up together.  I get a first row seat for hilarious scenes like last night's dinner when Thomas said, "Hey guys, look!  There's a cat!" and we saw a weird yellow cat limp up toward our deck.  Tinsaye yelled, "His leg is broken!"  Meredith yelled, "He's pregnant!" and Solomon yelled, "His name is Cindy!"  Then we cracked up for 10 minutes over the gimpy, pregnant, transgendered cat named Cindy until Brian yelled, "Hey, I hope he didn't go under the deck and die!" and then they all ran out to see if Cindy had expired (he/she appears to have limped off elsewhere to deliver and/or croak). 

What is important in the story of Cindy is that a) we laugh together a lot, b) no one has grief issues so severe that they don't want to go look for a dead cat, c) we often eat meals together and its all the same food and it's not avocados, and d) everyone speaks English.  These are big important things that I need to recognize and not just be grateful for, but truly see as miraculous gifts to be honored.  I need God's help to shift my perspective from the daily grind to His plan for all of us (which does not hinge on my remembering to reschedule my dentist appointment).

Whatever your Lenten observances are, consider praying along with me this psalm:

Hide Your face from my sin and cover my iniquities
Create in me a clean heart and renew a right spirit within me
Cast me not from Your presence, take not Your Spirit from me
Restore to me the joy of Your salvation
Restore to me the wonders of Your love

A Recent Conversation

Meredith, Solomon, and I were in the van on the way to my rheumatologist's office.  We were on an unfamiliar road early in the morning and the kids were reading in the back seat.

Solomon:  Where are we, Mom?

Joan:  We're half way to Brighton to see my doctor.

Solomon:  This place looks like hell!

Joan [puzzled, it is rather bleak, but the scene of eternal damnation?]:  Umm... what do you mean, Solomon?

Solomon:  The road, it is going up and down verrrrrry big.

Joan:   Ahhh, there is a big HILL!

Solomon:  Yes, a hell.

Meredith [mortified]:  Solomon, you said a bad word!

Solomon [panicking]:  No I did not!

Meredith [condescending]: Yes, you did.  You said H-E-L-L and that is a swear word.  It is where the devil lives and it is very very bad to say.

Solomon [confused and defensive]:  No!!  I am not talking about the devil I am talking about up and down!!

Joan:  It's okay, Sol, you meant HILL which is when the ground goes up and down but it came out like HELL which is only a bad word, Meredith, when you say something like "what the h*** are you doing".  It's not a bad word if you are talking about where the devil lives.  But lets just not say it at all, okay guys?

Mere/Sol:  Okay.

[a few seconds of silence]

Meredith:  You'll get in big trouble if you say it on the school bus.

Joan:  Meredith, leave him alone.

[a few more seconds of silence]

Solomon [resigned]:  English is hard.

Let the good times roll

We spent Sunday through Tuesday noon at Kalahari Resort and Indoor Waterpark in Sandusky, Ohio with the kids.  Some neighborhood friends also joined us.  This was a new experience, but I kind of forgot that it would be.  The kids are so adaptable and seem so "American" now that it is really easy to forget that things are still new.  Tinsaye does NOT like to not know everything, so she's a master at acting very blase'.  As we were packing up, she said really quietly to me, "I've never been on a vacation." and  Solomon asked, "Will we have to sleep in the car?". 

I was very surprised that we did not get many strange looks at our unusual family.  Maybe they were looking at us when my back was turned.  I anticipated more staring.  I guess there are more interesting people to stare at at a midwestern waterpark (think: obesity and tatoos).  Tinsaye acts mortified at the teeny swimsuits and piercings on teenage girls.  I think she's trying to gauge my reaction.  I am, of course, appropriately disparaging, but I can see her storing it all away for future reference. 

The kids had a great time.  Loved the waterslides, the body surfing thing, the hotel room, and most of all the giant wave pool.  Solomon stayed in the wave pool for so long the waves made him kind of nauseous.  It was at the end of the night and he was exhausted and cold and when he gets tired his wandering eye gets much worse.  and remember how I said he and Mere both had Fifth's Disease?  Its like a rash and it can reappear for weeks, especially with temperature changes.  So we were looking at poor Solomon at the end of the night, standing at the edge of the pool, shivering, covered in rash, his eyes going two different directions, and looking like he might hurl, and we said to each other, "I think he's done having fun."

It was good for all of us to just get out of the house for a few days.  Now we're back to the grind, but I feel more optimistic about being able to hang on for the next few weeks. 

PS.  It would be cool if there was a photo of this trip to post on the blog, but alas, no photos exist.  I was too busy keeping my eyes on all four at once.  No time for pics.