Please Leave My Daughter Alone!

I think I have a pretty good idea about how five year old kindergartners act. I know that they like to be silly and say funny words. I also know they can be really sweet and show many signs of altruism. My children are not perfect, but they are very kind and compassionate to those around them. Why are they like this? They are like this because their father and I model this behavior for them. So when a child is mean to one of my own children, I have a hard time wrapping my brain around it. I do not like to run to the teacher and tell on another child and I generally tell my children to ignore “mean words” of other children. Recently my daughter has been coming home complaining that a little boy is calling her names in her classroom. This evening she even cried about it. I have talked to her about staying away from him, but this is not always possible in a classroom situation. Now I have to decide if I should write the teacher a note or not. Some mothers would not even hesitate to pick up the phone and call the teacher. I am not like that though. I tend to let situations work themselves out on their own. My daughter's tears got to me tonight. I do believe in this case I should write a little note to the teacher. After all, it is my responsibility to keep my children safe from all harm. Even the harm of “mean words”.

No Txting at the Dinner Table

When I was a little girl, we always ate dinner at the dining room table as a family. At dinner time, I would properly set the table with the dinner and salad fork on the left side of the plate and the knife and spoon set on the right side of the plate.  We would turn the television off and then all of us would sit down together and say the blessing. The meal itself wasn't fancy, but it was a time where we all came together.

Presently, in this very fast-paced technological world that we live in, getting everyone to sit down at the table together is no small task. Since it was such an important part of my childhood, I have tried to have the same sit down meals with my own family. Don't get me wrong, it doesn't happen every night of the week. Four out of seven days of the week, one of us has some kind of extracurricular activity. But on the nights that we all are home, we do manage to sit down at the table for a family meal.

The family dinner table is a place where we can come together to share the day's events and talk about our plans for the week. After a long day at school or work, the dinner table is a place where we can unwind and tell each other about how we are feeling. Somehow, this simple act of breaking bread together brings us all closer and keeps us in touch with one another.

There are two things that I ask of my children and husband when we are sitting down for a meal. The first one is that we turn off the television and the second one is no texting at the dinner table. My oldest son has a hard time letting go of his phone for dinner so we have asked him to leave it in his bedroom. Otherwise, the temptation is just too much when his phone vibrates.

If you are experiencing a disconnect from your family and you want to bring everyone closer together, then why not try sitting down at the dinner table and sharing some dialogue. Unplug from all the electronics that we have grown reliant on and engage in some family time. You have to eat anyway, so why not share a meal. It is a good habit to get into and promotes a strong family bond. Trust me when I say, the family dinner table won't solve all the problems of the world, but together as a family, you sure as heck can try.

Mr.Pants

Sometimes a seemingly innocent act can turn a situation into a fiasco. Last night, while cleaning up the kitchen after dinner, my oldest son ran in and "pantsed" his little brother. For those of you that aren't familiar with the term, it means to pull someone's pants down. This is all just horseplay between two brothers and everyone was enjoying the evening until in an instant the mood changed. In a retaliatory move, my younger son decided to attempt the same move on his older brother and when he went for the pants, his cell phone fell on the tile floor and cracked the screen. This is when all hell broke lose! Casey went into a teenage rage that put the fear of God into his little brother. Kyle immediately went into the ugly cry and ran to me for coverage. I of course, explained to Casey that it was all just an accident which meant absolutely nothing to him because  he was now without a phone.
In the end, they both went to bed angry at each other. The old adage about never going to bed angry doesn't apply at our house. Sometimes when kids are angry, it's just better for everyone to cool off--especially kids. This morning it was as if it never had happened. They were back to their old usual, playful selves.

Snaggle Puss

 

 

There are times in your children's lives that one must use a little force to get them to do what is necessary. To take a case in point, my five-year-old daughter had an extremely loose tooth this week. It was so loose that you could see the very large permanent tooth peaking though the gum line. When she spoke the tooth--which was on the top--would wiggle and cause her to speak with a sort of lisp in her voice. It was driving me nuts and I decided to take some action to extract the tooth. I knew that if I could just get her to sit still, then I could get the little pearl out of her mouth. This would not be an easy task and would require some deviousness on my part.

Granted, I know that it may seem somewhat scary to a little girl that her mother wants to hold her down and pull her tooth. After all , I was a little girl once too and I remember well being told that I needed to tie a string around my tooth and then attach the string to the door handle and give it a hard slam. Wasn't every kid told that when they had a very loose tooth? I wanted to avoid traumatizing my daughter though, so I enlisted the help of her big brother. He has already lost all of his baby teeth and knows the ways of the force. I felt pretty assured that Kyle could talk his little sister into to sitting still long enough so that he could get his grubby boy hands into her mouth and pull that tooth out.

I gathered them into Katie's bedroom at bedtime for our usual bedtime stories and asked for Katie to show us her wiggly tooth. She pushed it forward with her tongue and I could see specks of blood. It was ready to come out! I asked her if she would let me pull it and she emphatically replied, "No!" Naturally, I backed off and then suggested that she let her brother take a look at the tooth. I told her that since he had lost all of his baby teeth, he was now a pro at pulling teeth. Somehow, this sounded comforting to her and she laid down and opened her mouth wide for her brother to see the tooth. First, Kyle twisted the so that it hung crooked in her mouth. It was a funny sight for sure! We were laughing so hard that Katie completely lost all of her fear. Since the tooth was now twisted out of position, it absolutely had to come out. I told Katie to lie back down so that Kyle could pull the tooth. He reached right into her mouth and pulled that little tooth out. Both of the children jumped up in the excitement of it all, ready for the tooth fairy to visit. My plan was a success!

Pukey McPuker

My five-year old daughter woke up last night moaning at our bedroom door. By the time I got up out of bed to get to her, I heard the horrible splat noise. I new what that sound was. I had heard it before. I opened the door and turned on the light to see my little girl standing in a puddle of pink puke.

So I decided to share with you some tips for how I handle tummy viruses at my house. First of all, get an old bucket that can stay by the side of the patient. Seriously, this will save you from having to clean up puke messes that are displaced all over the house. Next, make a bed on the bathroom floor. When children are under the age of 5, it is very hard for them to make to the bathroom when they are sick. Grab some old blankets and pillows and that's right--sleep in the bathroom. Somehow, the coolness of the bathroom floor is soothing to the little patient and it eliminates having to get up and down all night.

Once my child is feeling better and the vomiting has stopped, I introduce the B.R.A.T. diet. The B.R.A.T. diet consists of bananas, rice, applesauce and toast. These are foods that are gentle on the stomach and are not greasy.

Stop the Cough!

Today, a mom friend of mine said that she was exhausted because her sick daughter had kept her up all night. She explained that all she did was "cough all night" and it was hard for anyone in the house to get a good night's rest.

This reminded me of a home remedy that truly works wonders when a mother--or anyone for that matter--needs to quiet a nighttime cough. This is going to sound as silly as the mayonnaise on the head lice, but trust me, it really does work. All you need is a bottle of Vick's Vapor Rub and an old pair of socks. Rub a thick coating of Vick's on the soles of the feet of the sick person and then cover the feet with socks. You will be amazed by how almost instantly the coughing ceases. It usually gives the person several hours of cough free sleep and then another application is needed. I know that it sounds completely wacko! I didn't believe it myself until I was so desperate that I tried it. And I am here to tell you that it really does work!  I don't know how or why it works--and when you are sick you won't care anyway. Just remember, the next time you are sick and you need some relief to try the Vick's on the soles of your feet!

Shrove Tuesday

Today is Shrove Tuesday. And by Shrove Tuesday, I mean the day before Ash Wednesday, the day when Lent officially begins. Some of you may know it as the Mardis Gras celebration that is also called Fat Tuesday.  Traditionally, my family either goes to church to have a feast of pancakes or we stay home and I make a mile-high stack of flapjacks for the entire family. This feast of butter, milk and flour is a symbolic way of clearing out one’s cupboards for the upcoming Lenten fast which is in preparation for Easter.

Now don’t get me wrong, we don’t fast at our house.  I would never expect for my children to give up food for the forty days of Lent—they would never make it and neither would my husband and I. But what I do expect is for my family to have some kind of awareness as to why we aren’t having any gooey chocolate cake around the house for the next month. I want them to be aware that we are taking the decadence out of our lives in a somber preparation for Easter. Through simple acts of kindness and compassion, I believe that my children will learn that Lent can be a time of giving and it no longer has to be a time a misery and suffering.

So at dinner I told the kids that we were entering Lent and that we would either have to give something up or take some kind of good deed on.  At first glance, my teenager says, "yum, pancakes". But on a closer inspection he remembers that Shrove Tuesday means Lent. He then informs me that he is now an atheist; my 9 year old says that he doesn’t want to give up sweets but he was willing to do some extra chores and my little girl said that she would give up M&M’s. I think it’s going to be a very long Lenten season.

Parade Day

Today was a great day for a parade. The sun was shining and the air was warm. Parades are not my most favorite events of the year, but this year my son oldest son and husband were in the parade. So I loaded up the kids with lawn chairs and snacks and headed downtown for the annual Strawberry Festival Parade. This is a time in our town when you see people that you went to high school with and old neighbors that have moved across town.
We sat at the home of the newly awarded "Citizen of the Year". Everyone in town was there. And when my husband and son went by in the boy scout bus, the crowd cheered for them. My two younger children were so proud of their father and brother. These are the times that make memories that I will treasure forever.

Hellman's Mayonnnaise, It Ain't Just for Potato Salad

I can’t believe that I am going to share this with all of you. This is a topic that most moms shy away from in an attempt to spare themselves and their children from any shame. Of course, some will probably disagree with this assertion that head lice is an embarrassment, but then again, maybe that is because they never had to sit with a shower cap on their head in an attempt to kill a head full of lice. So for the sake of those of you that will ever have this experience in the future, I have decided to throw my kids under the bus and share my story after all.  

The other day when brushing my 5 year old daughter’s tangled hair, I decided to pull it back into a pony tail to fix it for the day. As I brushed the hair back, I noticed a black dot on her scalp. As I looked again--even closer this time--I saw another black dot.  This one however was moving! Could it be? Could it really be? I shuddered at the thought. I had heard the horror stories of nit picking and sheet bleaching. Right then, as I sat there scratching my own head, I decided it was war against the little critters. A war that I was determined to win.

I immediately text messaged my husband at work to tell him the exciting news of the day. He was completely appalled by the fact that his precious little girl had an infestation of bugs in her head. My first phone call was to our pediatrician’s office where Lauren, our all-knowing doctor’s assistant, got on the phone and listened to my story. She told me to get some mayonnaise and coat my daughter’s head in it and then cover it with a shower cap. I had heard of using mayonnaise in the hair as a conditioner, but now I was told it could also kill head lice? I asked Lauren, “How does mayonnaise kill head lice”? To which she replied, “It smothers them”.

That evening, after picking out all of the live bugs that I could get my fingers on, I took out a jar of Hellman’s Mayonnaise and proceeded to coat my daughter’s head with the greasy sludge. My daughter began to cry because the odor from the mayonnaise was too much for her to handle. I quickly put the plastic shower cap on her head and put her in her bed. It was awful!

Early the next morning I went into her room to find her without the shower cap on her head and mayonnaise dried and caked all over her pillow case. It was a smelly and disgusting sight. I quickly ushered her into the shower where I began to rinse out the stinky mess. I immediately noticed that the bugs had turned a reddish color. And to my relief, they all appeared to be dead! The mayonnaise had indeed worked in killing the head lice. Halleluiah! I am happy to report that we are now completely bug free at our home. So if you ever find yourself with a head full of lice, remember to get out the mayonnaise because it does work!