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2008-09-03 - 12.07am previous entry next entry
More thoughts, and photos/videos of boys!
Thank you so incredibly much for all the wise advice and supportive comments last time I wrote! I want to do a proper follow-up to the stuff I was talking about then, but it's already so late (again!) and I came to post photos and stuff, so perhaps next time?
Although, just briefly (hahaha... ;) ), we have a new plan for the bed time crisis as a result of praying a lot, and talking about it a lot, and reading your comments (I read them out loud to Neil - we are both really grateful!). The down side is it involves completely decluttering the two bedrooms, and reducing the furniture in them to the bare minimum, which I can't FATHOM us ever achieving with no time, energy, or hands free, plus a child/baby sleeping in one or both rooms quite a lot of the day! But oh well!
The theoretical plan is that Neil moves back in with me (gasp! hehe!) and we clear out the boys' bedroom till there is just a big double chest of drawers for their clothes (which is there now), and Matthew's little toddler bed in the far corner, and Arthur's MATTRESS next to it in the other far corner. That's it! We'll take Arthur's bed down and have him go back to just a mattress on the floor for his bed, without a bed guard. Then they're at a similar height, and there is not nearly so much danger with kids jumping on high-up beds if we end up leaving them to go to sleep. NOT that we are planning to let them jump on beds all evening, but yeah. Minimalist effect - I feel good about it! :)
Our room will be decluttered in a similar way to the bare minimum, so that there is room to store a cotbed sized mattress under the end of our bed, and it can pull out onto the appropriate-sized space on the floor between the wardrobe and the end of our bed, if it becomes desperate that we separate the boys at bedtime to go to sleep. Then we can carry the sleeping boy (whichever boy it might be) to his own bed after he goes to sleep in our room. I'm not sure how that would work given the fact that our room is Nathan's room as well and he would be asleep in the cot (or trying to go to sleep) only a few feet away. That might not work at all, in fact. But it's good to have a Plan B all the same! :) And it would be soooooooo much nicer for all of us to have cleared, decluttered bedrooms to sleep and rest and relax in. It might even help their little psyches or something, to be in a calm and uncluttered room for bed (poor loves!).
The schooling.... I'm not sure what I want to say about that tonight, because it's a big and waffly subject (as far as I'm concerned anyway!) and it's actually a work in progress, our thoughts on it and feelings about it. So it's not concrete, whatever I write about how I'm feeling. One thing I can say is that it isn't so much that I want to prioritise the boys having a Christian education, in fact that was a belatedly-realised bonus of homeschooling, for me! Nor is it so extreme that I don't want the boys out of my sight... It's that I want to completely oversee their upbringing in basically EVERY way, when they are very young anyway. I sort of view it like tomato staking (great analogy that I found online and which EXACTLY describes my heart for the boys). When they're young, they are not yet equipped for the world, purely because of their immaturity. They WILL become mature (all kids will, whichever approach their parents take to bring them up), but I don't want to mature them by putting them out into the world and letting the world's values shape who they become. I want to be the "stake" for my baby tomato plants! I want to personally tend to my seedlings until they are strong enough to withstand the elements without a stake. I want to feed and water them with the best nourishment (I'm talking spiritually), and I want to protect the soil they grow in, plucking weeds as soon as I see them sprouting. I want to be right there as they stretch out tender new shoots that are too little and delicate to support themselves without a carefully placed foundational structure. I want that foundational structure to be ME. Well, Neil and I - both of us.
It isn't that I want them tied to my apron-strings - though I know it sounds like I'm saying pretty much the same thing when I say I want to keep them very close during their "foundation" years. A foundation WILL be laid, and whatever they are exposed to will shape what that foundation is made of. I have a big thing about making sure that foundation is exactly what I believe to be the best thing for them. School has risks, to me, in that respect. Socialising with other kids is important (although, that is up for debate apparently, according to recent research). I know it will sound extreme (or crazy!) of me, but I do not want ANY peer influence in these formative years, for my kids. I don't want any leanings towards the "normal" exclusion of other kids because they are "not the same age as me", "girls/boys", "different", etc. Or the separation between friends and siblings. PLENTY of siblings remain great friends, but there is a mindset on the whole at school that siblings are not cool but FRIENDS are (as if your sibling cannot possibly be your best friend!). That is my experience in all the schools I attended (some working class, some quite the opposite) anyway. I also don't feel too thrilled about the beginnings of the mindset that it's We The Kids versus Them The Parents/Teachers, and the general disrespect that can arise from that, egged on by peer influence over the years.
I WENT to school, several different ones. I know that school is a lot of fun, unless of course you are bullied to heck like I was, in which case it is MISERABLE, but somehow I also remember a lot of fun and have very fond memories of school in general. I don't have a problem with ANYONE sending their children to school! This is something extremely personal, about my own mindset, and my own personal brood of kiddies, and my desires for them, and how I am feeling led to raise them as I press into God and ask him to guide me. I think my little ones would probably love school and have fun, make lots of friends, and learn a lot. I think they have the potential to do very well academically. With those things popping into my head now and then, I get worried that I must therefore be doing something wrong in thinking NOT to send them down that road - it seems crazy not to sometimes! Maybe we still will? But right now (and since Arthur was about a year old, actually), I am thinking not.
It's a hard decision to make, and to follow through on. It's not so easy as saying, "Home-schooling sounds like The Thing for our kids! Right-ho, that's what we'll do then!" with cheerful confidence! My thoughts over the years have been more (nervously), "Oh my gosh... I think God is calling me to homeschool my children! What in the wide wiggly world am I going to do?!... (much frantic prayer...) Surely God doesn't MEAN me to isolate and seclude my children, or for that matter, teach them myself when I am currently tearing my hair out over being pregnant and having a baby and a toddler who are trying my patience severely?!?!" But then I also get, "Oh, I can't WAIT to homeschool! I'm so happy they will not be going to school - I could not be happier with my decision and I just know it's the right thing for them! Yayness!" Followed swiftly by, "Yaaargh, already my children are turning into pent-up and emotionally challenged little men because of my CRAZY decision to keep them from NORMAL mainstream education! What in the wide wiggly world have I done to my sweet loves?!?!" And then, "They so need my guidance in everything this early on.... I'm so thrilled to have the privilege of building a godly foundation for their lives, and protecting them from influences which would potentially go against that. There is NOTHING more important to me than their salvation, ultimately, nothing. Though they must choose for themselves, I want them to know Jesus. I know from personal experience - if I meet Neil and get to know him, I can't very well then say, "Oh, I don't believe Neil exists!" It's the very same thing with Jesus. So, I want them to know Jesus. What's to choose once you know him? I want to provide an environment where there is plenty of opportunity to get to KNOW Jesus, not just to learn about him and a ton of other "religious options", not while they're young." And so it goes on. I know some of that could be provided for in a Christian school, but *I* want to oversee their early years, me! I'm eager to! I don't want somebody else to tell me what they did or how they reacted to this or that, or how the learning process went for them over such-and-such. I want to be involved, so that I'm right there for them in everything. I will ease back as the years go by, as I see their foundation become stronger and their limbs more ready to run with the values I have helped them start off with.
I have a million and one ramblings about it, as you can see! Lots (if not all!) of it will rub at least some of my readers up the wrong way, and I just want to say again that by stating my own convictions I IN NO WAY intend to judge others or preach by them! They are just my own personal desires for my own children, and I don't mean to say that it's the way Christians should school their children either.
So anyway. I will continue to pray and wait on God, and he will continue to lead me, and hopefully I will not have too many freak-out-panicking episodes about what I'm doing to my children as a result, whatever the end decision! ;)
Well, Nathan has been awake and nursing since I started this. He's asleep (for now!) again, so I had better hurry up and post the pictures I wanted to post, and go to bed.
Today is Tuesday, and it was a GOOD day!!! I somehow randomly (!) transformed into No Nonsense Discipline Mama when I got out of bed this morning (and it WAS a random act, I assure you, lol!), and so today has been a reeeeally good day in terms of behaviour and nipping things in the bud. How I wish that was my default setting and I could naturally be that way every waking moment! Life would be a lot simpler if I were!
Arthur was put in the porch for 3 minutes today for not doing something I asked him to - something fairly small and petty on the scale of things, but disobedience nonetheless. He freaked right out in there, as he usually does (because he HATES going in the porch as a method of discipline!), and then said he needed a wee. So I put the potty in there and left him to it. When I came back, he had soaked ALL the wee up with his underwear, and was slapping said undergarments around the porch. The walls were running YELLOW and wee was spattered every which where. He looked mighty pleased with himself! Normally I would probably do my nut on discovering this kind of behaviour, because it would make me really cross! But thankfully (ohhh thankfully!) I was No Nonsense Discipline Mama today, and so I calmly administered several non-too-feeble smacks to his rear-end, and then handed him a towel and a pack of baby wipes and told him to clean the walls and door thoroughly, and left him to it! He looked most put out! I went back after a couple of minutes to make sure he was cleaning it up thoroughly enough - he wasn't, but he's only little so I did not hold that against him. I helped him clean up and then he had to stay in the porch for a further 3 minutes after it was all done. When I went back and asked him why he had been put in the porch, he instantly told me (sometimes he inexplicably loses his memory at this point) that he had disobeyed me, kicked up a fuss about going into the porch, dipped his pants in the wee and spread it around the porch, and that he understood he was never to do it again and he was very sorry!!! I am not 100% sure he won't do it again, but I was happy with his response to the way I handled it. *sigh* That boy is testing the boundaries like crazy these days! I'm constantly praying that I'm up to the challenge of reinforcing them.
Aaargh, it's so late! PHOTOS, stat!
I really wanted to post a whole bunch of photos of the boys that just keep not getting posted when I write diary entries! Some of them are nearly a month old. They are just random ones of two or three of the boys together (how my brain still boggles itself when confronted with that sentence, "two or three of the boys"! Hehe!). Arthur in particular loves to sit with Nathan - he still asks to hold Nathan, but Nathan's getting so big and squirmy and mobile now! They sit side by side more often, and it's always a photo opportunity. I always take photos, even if none of them end up coming out well. So here are some "brotherly" photos, starting with the oldest ones - of the boys loving their littlest brother (and the feeling being mutual!):
In this next one, Arthur kept on saying, "Cheese" and looking really unnatural! So I asked him to smile naturally, as though he was really happy about something. He did this, hahaha!
The next one was better :)
Here are quite a few of Arthur and Nathan that I took a few days ago - they sat fairly still long enough for me to take lots of photos! Arthur is so lovely with Nathan. He loves to be affectionate with him and put his arms around him and snuggle him :) Matthew is similarly affectionate (in fact he is a little more affectionate in general than Arthur, though there's not much in it given that Arthur is a very affectionate child anyway) and Nathan NEVER goes for a nap or to bed for the night without a kiss on his face or lips from Matthew, no matter what Matthew is doing at the time - he MUST stop and "give kiss, Ninny!" It's so adorable. *sigh*
The older boys have been a mixture of affectionate and, er, the opposite (!) with each other lately. That reminds me, thanks Jemma for mentioning the rough-and-tumble with Daddy thing! I remember somebody (you??) gave me that advice a while ago, before Nathan was born I think, and we initiated rough-and-tumble with Daddy every day after work, after that, for both boys. They loved it! It's only your message that made me realise that somehow that has slipped and they really haven't had that nearly so often for a while. Thanks so much for the reminder! I'll mention it to Neil and get it back on track!
Meanwhile the boys enjoy rough-and-tumble with each other during the day. They don't really get aggressive (mean) with each other, just play and enjoy it. I videoed them for FIVE MINUTES STRAIGHT just wrestling on the floor and giggling today! But I can't show you it because I maxed out my monthly upload thingy at One True Media, with a few other videos that I uploaded (to come soon!). But here are a few photos from yesterday's rough-and-tumble :) Note Nathan in the 4th photo, as yet totally innocent to such behaviour, haha! Not for much longer, my boy, not for much longer....
On the theme of brotherliness (word?! spelling?!), here are a couple of random short videos clips (less than a minute each because longer than that and I have to wait all YEAR for it to upload). There are three, but please OH PLEASE, if you don't have time to watch them, I beg you to squeeze in a viewing of the last one! It's of Nathan finding Arthur too funny doing a crazy little quick-step dancey thingy in the kitchen (which, sadly, I didn't get much footage of, since the camera was mostly pointed at Nathan or my own double chin). He laughed so much that he squealed and gasped, and I just love it so much that I want you people to see it too! Please dooo! :)
Thursday was my daddy's 60th birthday and because he is in France, we didn't see him in person. We had birthday cake though! I let the boys decorate it with chocolate icing and mini smarties (not the sour American kind!!! ;) ) and put candles in it (the boys loved blowing those out and singing happy birthday!). And we had a little party with balloons and games! I made 2 pass-the-parcels with a little toy car in the middle of each, and a chocolate finger biscuit in between each layer! They loved that. Here is a little clip of the boys sitting ready to play the first pass-the-parcel game. I put the CD player on for the music, and it happened to be my Chris Tomlin CD which the boys hear sometimes at "Bible Time" (around 10-10.30am every day). Instead of grabbing for the parcel or bugging me to start the game like they had been before I put the music on, they sat and did a funny little bop to the music for a bit (while Nathan coveted the little parcel in my lap!):
Here's the little video clip I made for my daddy, of the boys singing/saying Happy Birthday to him, sitting on the sofa. I have no idea why Arthur must pick his nose for the better part of each day.
And here's the video clip of sweet little Nathan laughing his head off at Arthur's antics. Please please avert your eyes from the hideous kitchen that you see flashing about the edges of the shot (I beg you). Pretend it's clean and shiny and uncluttered and real-honest-white. Okay? Also, never mind my double chin.
Isn't he so precious?! Ahhh I love him soooo! I love them all just so much. I feel so blessed to be A Mama. She who brings up littlies. What a privilege! :D
Recent entries.....
Moving time... - 2009-01-04
Christmas Eve! - 2008-12-24
Long-overdue update, a few Nathey pics and a video clip :) - 2008-12-01
Lots of news! - 2008-11-03
Nathan at 8 months... - 2008-10-12