Tag Archives: parenting

Sharing a Room

Last night was the first night Calvin and Victor shared their room. I had no clue how it would go, but past experience told me Calvin wouldn’t do too poorly. When Victor first came onto the scene and was crying at night, it only woke Calvin up for the first two or three days. For the last four nights, I had been putting Victor down for the night in the guest room. It is between our room and the boys’ room, so I thought it would be a nice little transition for Calvin, with the crying noise a little closer, but not right beside him. It only woke Calvin up on the first night.

Last night, Victor woke up twice between 8:00 and 11:00 (once because he was apparently hungry, and the second time because his tummy was gurgly). Neither time Calvin woke up. Yes!

And then Victor went on to sleep for 5 more hours! Lately he has been doing 3 at the most at a time, so that was wonderful! And Calvin didn’t wake up that time either.

I know it has been only one night, so I can’t really call it a complete success yet, but I am pleased with the results so far. I feel like one reason Victor may have slept longer is that I got a prescription cream for his skin yesterday, so maybe he wasn’t waking up from itchiness? I don’t know if that was the reason he used to wake up, but it’s hard to know. He always went back to sleep really easily.

But anyways, hooray for them sharing so nicely, and hooray for us having a room to ourselves!

Currently the boys are napping peacefully.

I love that Calvin still sleeps like this.

Zzzz…

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The O-Word

Yesterday I read a comment somewhere on the the internet and it left me feeling a little off. It took me a while to figure out what this feeling was, but after a moment, I had it.

I felt offended.

For some this feeling comes easily. But for me, a girl with a small emotional spectrum, offense is one of the extremes I rarely experience.

In the world of parenting especially, you see it all the time. One person does something a certain way, and others chime in with their opinions. I think this is all fine and good because it is good to hear from other experienced people, but when you start having these interactions in text rather than in speech, some of the intention and tone gets lost and feelings get hurt. For those of you who have strangers express their opinions to you in person, I am sorry that I cannot empathize with you on that. I have never had this happen to me. Or maybe I have, but it doesn’t get under my skin, so I forget about it.

I feel blessed to have the natural ability to let things like this roll off my shoulders, and have not once, in my 1.5 years of parenting have I been made to feel like I was an inferior parent for doing things my way. Until yesterday. And it caught me off guard. I didn’t know what to do with this new feeling. I talked things through with Tim and he made me feel better. It made me wish that I could teach others how to not take offense to things because it sucks to feel that way. But how do you teach a natural ability? I find it hard to give advice in any kind of situation for the mere fact that I just do things that make sense. You won’t find any parenting literature on my shelves (except “Bringing Up Boys” because I thought I might need help with that and I have only heard wonderful things about it), and the only reason I read articles online about parenting is to read the comments and see the opinions, because I really enjoy hearing what others have to say and sometimes they make me laugh. I can’t think of a single time where I have implemented a strategy I learned about in literature into my parenting repertoire. You can’t teach common sense, and for that I am sad.

I have discovered a downside to not being easily offended. It’s often hard for me to know what might offend somebody else. Often times I have to reread comments I make in different voices and perspectives to see how others would see it coming off. Many times I rewrite it, and sometimes I just delete it all together. Sometimes I leave it because it is somebody I know and I think they can take it.

Parenting is just one example of where this is applicable in my life.

But anyways. I think I have rambled enough. I don’t know where I wanted this to go, but I just knew that I had these thoughts I wanted to share, even though it is is hard to get my feelings into text.

In other news, Calvin can now say “no”, so depending on the question I ask, his response sometimes offends me.

Just kidding.

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Motherhood – Part 2

Read Part 1 with more on my strengths as a mom.

I wasn’t planning on writing more on motherhood so soon, but today brought more thoughts to mind.

I have known for many years what one of my big weaknesses as a parent would be: playing and having fun.

I don’t remember being big into playing as a kid, much to my little sister’s disappointment. One of my favourite babysitting memories was when the mom payed me extra to tidy up their very messy playroom. And I had so much fun this one time I visited my cousin out of town and was in charge of getting their two very young children ready for church and out the door while they were at worship practice. I am looking forward to when my own kids are school aged and I have to make sure they are ready in time in the mornings and organize their schedules and stuff.

But this whole toddler stage is out of my comfort zone.

Since Calvin started crawling up until today, I kept the living room as a sort of cage for him with the couches pushed together and other small furniture between them and the walls. That way I didn’t have to keep a constant eye on him and I knew he wouldn’t get into trouble. But I guess overnight he grew that extra millimetre he needed to be able to climb onto the furniture and get over the barricade.

So instead of trying to keep him contained, because I knew I wouldn’t be able to do it forever, I removed all the obstacles and have been letting him have free reign. Of course this means I have had to be much more attentive. I have had to get rid of little “staircases” to keep him out of trouble, like this:

Him pulling all the diapers off the drying rack I am okay with. Him messing around by the computer I am not as much okay with. So now I am at a point where I need to keep him occupied enough so he doesn’t get bored and hurt himself or wreck something. And I have no clue how to do it. So, all you fun parents and child care workers, tell me your secrets! And (I was going to write an entire post on this, but then I had all these thoughts to share and it’s pretty related) those of you who spend the entire day outside, what do you do all day outside?

I don’t have money to spend on swimming pools and zoo visits and tons of craft supplies. I like to use what I have but don’t have imagination to put anything into execution.

And that is where motherhood is difficult for me.

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Motherhood – Part 1

I don’t often talk about my experience with motherhood. This is because I feel a little bit like an anomaly and being an anomaly in the world of mothers doesn’t always go over very well.

When I think of how I see motherhood portrayed by peers and media, I think of the words “exhausted”, “surviving”, “needing caffeine”, “yoga pants”, and “no me time”. Part of me has to wonder how much moms express themselves this way because it’s completely true, and how much some moms express themselves this way because they have to in order to fit in.

I have to honestly say that after 13 months of being a mom, I cannot empathize with these kinds of statements (sympathize, yes; empathize, no). I count myself blessed to not need much more than 6 hours of sleep to have a normal amount of energy through the day. I count myself blessed to not need caffeine before doing anything in the morning. I count myself blessed to not have ever spent money on yoga pants so I don’t have them to wear. I count myself blessed that I have never felt the need to be pampered with alone time, pedicures and a glass of wine.

But in no way do I think this makes me a better parent than you. I still rarely feed Calvin vegetables. I don’t play with him one on one as much as maybe I should. I don’t bring him outside as much as he wishes I would. I get annoyed with his crankiness and new realization of will.

But he has been a joy to me in his first year of life. He is a happy, silly goof who loves to smile and he makes me smile so much as well.

And that is how motherhood is for me.

Read Part 2 with more on my weaknesses as a mom.

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