Watch your mouth

I noticed recently that Sera had been using the term "What the" all the time. So I asked her where she learned this from. She said, "I don't know."
After thinking about where she possibly could have gotten this term from, I realized something...
I am always editing myself!
History lesson. In 6th grade I made a pack with myself to not swear ever again, and I did pretty good for the most part, until I had children.
Let me correct myself, I started swearing in my head once I started having children. That is different to me.
There is something that is evoked in me that goes to this place of foul language when it comes to helping my children do what they are suppose to do.
So I found myself saying a lot of "what the .....pause ... are you doing?"(hence where Sera got the term), "Get your .... pause... shoes on!" You get the point.
My husband says "Pam you might as well say it there is no difference."
I am sure he is right.
Nonetheless I can not bring myself to saying the "obscenities" out loud.

I would say about a month ago, I decided that I needed to say something to help ease the dramatic pauses in my sentences to my children. So I determined that "doggone" was an appropriate alternate to the pauses. "Get you doggone shoes on", "How many doggone times..!" "What the doggone are you doing?"
I have found that the swearing in my head has been subdued in a way.

For me this is as good as it gets,(at least for now) and I am sticking to it! I feel I have found a very happy medium! I mean really, have you ever tried this parenting thing out? It is not easy!

Unfortunately for me, Sera has not stopped using the term mentioned previously completely. I am sure eventually it will wear off, and when it does you will start hearing her use the term "doggone.....!"

How easy we really have it!

Yesterday when I was changing a very fragrant diaper courtesy of the little one, I had an overwhelming feeling of gratitude of all those Mothers who came before us. I am pretty sure that I would probably only have one child if I had to clean poop and pee from cloth diapers all day, and do laundry by hand. I tell ya what, those mothers and women are my hero's. I know, I know, that that is all they knew, but if that is all I knew you can bet your bottom dollar(no pun intended) I would have been the genius who invented the disposable stuff. This got me thinking of how easy we really have it. I am grateful for fast running moto vehicles with heaters and A/C. We don't need to stop on the side of the road and fill some kind of component with water to cool the car off. We just go to the gas station fill 'er up and go. Grocery stores! How blessed we are to have grocery stores with shelves filled with food and paper products, baby products, bandaids, shampoo, women products (heaven be praised), medicines and ice cream. These are just a few things that make me think "How easy we really have it!"
What makes your life easier?

As the fourth child, we don't have much video of Kady growing up, so we were excited when we were able to capture some video of Kady taking some of her first steps. Enjoy the funness!

Tree Jumping Follow-up

Last Thursday, Emma wanted to show her dad her jumping-out-of-tree skills I mentioned in a previous post.

Her dad videotaped her jump this time. Although she doesn't land as gracefully as she did the first time, I think this video sums up the oldest two girls really well.

(It's about 15 minutes edited into 2 to give you a taste of how blessed we are to have these girls in our lives.)

schizophrenic

So have any of you ever felt like you were two different people when it comes to being a parent? I do all the time.

I used to call her in my earlier Mommy Journal "The Incredible Hulk On Estrogen." I think she first arrived when Emma (our oldest) turned 2 and started having her own opinion, wanting to do things her own way. And I am not kidding you, it really happened over night, and I was like, "Wait a minute, no one warned me of the suddenness of this. I have no more control!!!!!!"

And thus began my split personality.

Let me tell you a little bit more about this beast. She only comes out when the kind nice person we all know as "Pam" has very gently and patiently asked her children too many times to admit to do their responsibilities, but they have, for one reason or another, decided to be entertained, because that is when "TIHOE" (The Incredible Hulk on Estrogen) comes out. It is almost like it says, "Move over, you are to calm. Let me take care of this for you."

Initially, the kids think it is funny, but then they realize they are not dealing with their Mommy. "Oh no, it isn't?!? It is....TIHOE!"

So TIHOE is an odd thing, really. Most of the time it sings opera and then other times it forgets to sing opera and freaks out. I have often pondered the affects of this personality disorder, and at present, think that it is most important for children to see how their parents deal with stressful situations. I think being calm all the time would stunt the children's emotional growth. Having more than one emotion helps children understand that, as humans, we have emotions, and if we channel them properly, at least most of the time, we will have healthy productive lives.

Being angry is a real scary emotion, but not knowing how to deal with it would be even scarier. Once in a while, I like asking our girls to role play situations we go through as a family. "Okay, Emma, you be Mom. Sera, you be Emma and role play what happend last night at bed time."

We get ourselves laughing so hard because Emma's face will be all crazy and stuff trying to get it to look as crazy as mine did the night before. I guess my whole point in this post is this: Look, it is okay to get upset with your kids. It really is normal. It is what you do after the fact is what I think will make the lasting effect. I do not know about my other siblings, but for me growing up, I remember often, after I had gotten disciplined, having my Mother or Father coming in and saying sorry and making sure I understood what just happend. For me this made a world of a difference.

I know very well that every child is sooooo very different. That is why I think it is even more important to have a relationship with Him who knows all, because He is the only one who knows that child better and knows how to help that child.

As for the split personality, I have a feeling that she helps get things done. All I know is that, despite how frustrating it can be as a parent, the joy and happiness of being a mom far outweighs the frustration (by about a bagillion times!). You gotta love the good, the bad, and the ugly when it comes to parenting!

SHOUT OUT!

So today the 3 younger ones and I went to the doctors. The office building we went to is new and the ceilings are high in the foyer area and a lot of empty space still. Well Sera, the child that makes me go "huh" the most t, immediately realized her opportunity to shine. She really liked the echo this building created, so she began to shout as she talked, "MOM, HOW ARE YOU. MOM THIS IS A NICE BUILDING, HEY WHO ARE YOU,(to a stranger), MOM WHAT BUTTON SHOULD I PRESS FOR THE ELEVATOR" etc. I thought whatever, this is totally expected of this child. I used to think it was rather odd, until I watched a bio on Carol Burnett and said, "oh my goodness that is totally how Sera acts." Well anyway, we got to the doctors office area and I thought surely Sera would stop shouting, since we were not in an echoey area anymore. I was wrong! When asked what her name was, she shouted rather loudly " MY NAME IS SERA PALMA AND I GO TO KINDERGARTEN AND THIS IS MY BABY SISTA KADY AND SHE REALLY IS THE CUTEST BABY EVA". The nurse was taken by surprise and then started to chuckle nervously. That's our Sera. Neva a dull moment with her.
Maybe one day I will be crazy enough to reply to people in a shout just cause I want to. "WHAT I CANNOT HEAR YOU, DID YOU JUST ASK IF ALL THESE CHILDREN ARE MINE, WHY YES THEY ARE, AREN'T THEY SO BEAUTIFUL, WHAT DID YOU SAY, YES WE ARE PLANNING ON HAVING MORE, WHAT OTHER PERSONAL QUESTIONS DID YOU WANT TO ASK?"

Grammatically challenged

So have you ever thought when you are talking with people, "did I just make sense" ? I think I have a serious mental problem because I ask myself that question all the time when conversing with others. :) I think it is quite funny personally. It might be early stages of dementia for all I know, or it is a thing I call "children induced insanity, causes me to be grammatically challenged". Now some might think that having this is a serious issue but for me I know that it is only a stage in life and that one day I will no longer have this challenge,and quite possibly forget about it! But until then you get to be apart of this fun journey with me.

So a funny story that happened today. As a preface we have 4 children 2 in school 2 not, and I watch the 3 brothers from next door after school . Anyway, after homework was done and snacks the kids went outside to play. We have this huge maple tree out back and we have 2 tire swings and 1 rope swing attached to it. For the last 3 weeks the kids have figured out how to climb the tree and swing down from the top. Really cool to watch them maneuver themselves up the tree and then Tarzan jump out of. Well Emma has been able to climb up the tree but has not mustered up the courage to be able to swing down yet, that is til today. Lets talk about some good bribery techniques. SO she was sitting up in the tree and I needed her to come in because it was dinner time and the boyz parents had gotten home from work. So I said Emma just swing down from the rope, of course she started to panic and was like heck no, so I said I'll give you $2 if you do it, uh no from her, so then I said what would make it worth it for you, she said, if you get me a horse, I said I can get you a plastic horse, she said, no thank you, so then I remembered she has been wanting her own room for a while now, so I said, if you swing down from that tree you can have your own room. Wow something snapped in that child and she suddenly became brave, held on tight to the rope jumped, she got so excited that she actually jumped that she let go of the rope in mid air, did this amazingly graceful fall to the ground where she proceeded to do 3 very fast rolls on the ground, got up from the ground just as fast and stated "I am Okay" and ran to the door where I was standing laughing so hard, and said I can have my own room now." So Emma is sleeping very peacefully, and happily in her new room tonight and is equally glad she did not have to listen to her 2 younger sisters chit chat when she wanted to go to sleep. So we have the oldest with her own room and youngest with her own room and the middles sharing. Life is good! That is all for today.