Stress

It's been a challenge here in the last week - the children are shrieking and fighting when they're not making huge messes (I'm looking at the mop water all over my kitchen floor right now) and refusing to sleep or eat.  "It's a stage, it's a stage, it's a stage" is my constant mental refrain.  When I feel angry and overwhelmed, as I do a lot right now, I have a tendency to micro-manage, which I am doing my utmost to control.  I like to channel this desire into massive cleaning and purging sprees, as though by organizing my outside environment I will somehow also organize my interior environment and wake to a blissful, peaceful, FUNCTIONAL reality.

This likely explains why I just rearranged the livingroom furniture.

But this is also the time when I download, or brain dump, onto a piece of unlucky paper and begin another Big List.  You'll remember the last one, which was only a few months ago I think.  Let me check...ah, here it is.  Actually, it was two months ago; that sounds about right.  When I mentioned the last Big List, it was because I had fallen behind on Things That Needed Doing.  Lots of little chores, and some big ones, and lots of multi-step (have to call this person before that person and simultaneously do this thing and THEN I can do that thing...) tasks.  This is one way in which I utilize the Big List.  The other way is what I tend to refer to as a Family Re-Evaluation, which is what I'm doing right now.

A Family Re-Evaluation isn't always accompanied by a list, although pretty much everything in my life has a list attached to it in some way so likely if I'm in charge, there's going to be categorizing going on somewhere.  No, the Re-Evaluation is generally when everything is Not Working.  In this case bedrooms are not working, bedtimes are not working, meals are not working, the car seat situation (again with the little car chairs, Lord) is still, STILL not working, the car in general is not working, life isn't working.  It isn't working.

Sigh.  ANYway, it's a stage, it's a stage, it's a stage.  And I don't live in a bubble.  Although like the main character in Mom's Night Out I think I would also find a white bare room to be relaxing.  But that is not going to happen so onward and upward.

Thinking About Previously Important Things

I became a mother 5 years ago, and about 6 months after that I started this blog where I have journaled (more or less) what life has been like for us.  Since I started I've had two more children, moved twice, once across provinces, and my husband has realized his dream of becoming a minister.  It's not surprising, then, that my interests have changed.  I used to blog a lot about the topics that most interested or affected me in early parenthood - there's a post on my indignation at the public health nurse who was upset that my one year old didn't like solids, there are a whole series of posts on my opinion on the trend of treating cloth diapers as precious, delicate items.  I have posts on how to be frugal and books to read on keeping house that I found helpful and so on.

My life has changed a lot in four and a half years.  I was thinking about this the other day when I was doing diaper laundry.  It used to be that when I saw a friend discuss their diaper wash routine I felt compelled to jump in, and that feeling isn't there anymore.  I don't really care about someone's laundry detergent choices!  Or if you use plastic or glass storage in the kitchen, or even, to some extent, if you breast or bottle feed your baby.  In some cases, like with breastfeeding, I'm confident with my choice and don't really have any desire to talk to you about your choice, and in some cases, like cloth diapers, I just don't feel the passion anymore.  I use them, but I don't have any attachment to my choice.

I'm not sure, actually, that I have any mothering or domestic passions now in the same way that I had then.  A part of me is sad about this - when I felt really strongly about something I think it gave me an anchor, and now I'm just living.  Sure, there are topics that come up from time to time that spark my interest; I'm thinking meal planning, homeschool curriculum choices, crochet, making preserves in the kitchen, decluttering and organizing....but it's rare that I feel passion and deep deep interest in any of these topics.  They're just a part of life and spice in the routine.

Is this normal, I ask myself?  And I think it is.  I'm a big fan of the concept of 'seasons' in life (right along with the Bible) and this is a season.  It's a less exciting season in some ways, but it's also just as wonderful in other ways.  I'm not obsessed with eco-friendly cleaners at the moment, but I'm also present with my children and my life and I'm living through these days in the best way I can and that's also worthy and important.  I think, actually, that this is life, and what it should look like - a gentle interest in those around us and the topics that affect our lives.

Reading to the children and on my own.

So I recently mentioned that we had started Gooseberry Park by Cynthia Rylant after the success of The Adventures of Bob White and the (relative) consecutive failure of both Ramona the Pest and Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm.  Well, Gooseberry park was another winner for sure, and we followed it up with My Father's Dragon, which we finished in two nights and NOW we're a little stuck because ohmygoodness I have nothing else lined up.  So we're going to finish The House At Pooh Corner as our read-aloud and I am going to return Gooseberry Park to the library on Tuesday and pick a new read-aloud at the same time.  We haven't had a lot of luck with the recent library picks, especially after I got a collection of Beatrix Potter stories and it turns out they were all abridged and also combined together by the looks of it.  Very strange and not to my liking at all.  If I really don't find anything at the library though I have several more Thornton Burgess on the shelf at home, so we'll simply make our way through those.

I have been reading The Dead Sea Cipher by Elizabeth Peters and Cat People by Michael and Margaret Korda, both light and fluffy and escapist.

This week...

It's been a housekeeping sort of week.  Yesterday I caught up on the laundry, and today I tackled cleaning out Lillian's dresser drawer.  I realize that doesn't sound like a big job, but it really is for me, and I was talking to a friend today and trying to figure out why that is.  Here's what I've decided:

I can't throw things away.

Revolutionary, I know.  :-)

Why is this?  I think it's a combination of the old 'it still has use in it and I can't *waste* something that is still in the category of perfectly good' and 'I have an emotional attachment to this item because my child wore it'.  Whatever it is, I have trouble getting rid of clothes.  So today I worked on L's clothes and passing along the ones that were too small, disposing of the clothes that were too stained, and packing up the rest.  Now, on to the rest of the clothes....

This afternoon I made ginger rhubarb jam, which is just one of my absolute favourite preserves.  And again, I think I make jam because I can't bear to waste all the rhubarb!  Clearly this frugality thing is deep in my bones.

Soap, foggy days, book rethinking

So I made soap yesterday and I didn't die or horrifically burn myself or anything.  It all went smoothly and I am the proud possessor of about a dozen bars of oatmeal bath soap that I can start using in about 4 weeks.  It was fun!  Alright, it was a little stressful but overall it was fun, and informative, and my arm is sore from whisking and whisking to get the mixture to 'trace'.  See, I'm already using the lingo - sure sign of a professional there.

Today was supposed to be sunny and unseasonably warm, but instead it was foggy and cool from yesterday evening all the way until noon today, which kind of ruined our plans - I had big thoughts of putting on the sprinkler and breaking out the popsicles - instead we have been stuck inside all day, tired, crabby, chilly.  Now that the sun is out maybe we can go outside and play.

I gave Ramona the Pest a good shot, but the children aren't feeling it.  I'm not sure if it's just a bit too far out of their realm of experience for them to enjoy it, or if it's simply not their cup of tea right now, but we've had no luck getting any interest in the book.  So I closed it up and tried Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm (which I know is so much older) but the language wasn't doing it for them.  It's a challenge.  I've taken Gooseberry Park by Cynthia Rylant out of the library and I think it might have just the right mix of gentle adventure, short, simple story and nothing too old or too young.  We read two chapters aloud today while sitting under the lilac bushes outside.

While David is working, we're puttering around.  I managed to get two good sized mason jars of homemade chicken broth in the fridge, and the small stock pot is on a back burner and full of beef bones and a little lemon juice.  I have no idea if this works, but I always add a little acid to my broth as it cooks to help leach out the calcium.

I'm grateful that yesterday I had the foresight to make a double batch of spaghetti sauce, which we will eat with garlic bread and a lot of cheese before we all hit the hay early.  This spring cold has worn out its welcome.

Crochet and soap

There is something so fantastically retro about the look of all those little crochet stitches appearing on my afghan.  I love the word afghan.  I love this whole blanket, really, but I'm angsty over the introduction of a stripe of bright yellow in an otherwise muted palette - I wonder if we're progressing from 'scrap blanket' to 'garish striped blanket' rather faster than I had anticipated.  Also, if you have enough of a scrap of yarn to do multiple stripes, then as everyone knows you can't 'pool' all of that colour at one end, so you STILL have little balls of scrap yarn hanging about your life as you wait to progress to a decent distance away from the first stripe, and this means the acquisition of more yarn which initially makes you seem to be moving backwards in your progress.  The only way out is through, and whatever you do, don't stop!

I'm off in a few minutes to a friend's house; she's going to teach me how to overcome my fear of lye and make soap.  I will not be blinded and burned, I'm assuring myself, since she has done this many times and makes all of her own soaps.  Deep breath.

Birthday and gardens

Two days ago it was Clara's birthday - she's three now, which seems so impossible to me.  In celebration we all got into the car and drove to a waterfall and climbed up it and watched all the little people fly fishing at the bottom and took pictures.  It was exhilarating!  Then we drove to the city and ate a lot of chicken and came home and had more food - sausages and sweet potato fries and salad and a large strawberry shortcake.  Gifts were given and loved, a balloon made an appearance, and finally everyone was off to bed.

I thought things would slow down a bit after that, but since we still had guests up until this morning they didn't, really.  There was stitching group and Bible club and Bible study and so on, but on top of that I'm working on a new comforter for our bed, crocheted out of the ends of yarn that multiply around here like weeds, and done in triple crochet so it is moving quickly, and then yesterday I planted out two of the raised garden beds.  One of them is garlic (already up from last fall) and dill, spinach, kale, lettuce and zucchini, and the other is all flowers.  I debated for a while whether to give myself the luxury of an entire bed devoted to flowers when I could be practical and grow more vegetables, but then I thought beauty isn't luxury, and planted what I wanted.  In this case lupins, black eyed susans, sweet peas and more dill.  The third bed, once I get topsoil and manure on it, will be mostly tomatoes I think.  Although I dearly want to try and grow some luffa this year and since I have the seeds I might try them.

Now I have the diapers out on the line and the blankets are about to join them.  The house is fairly quiet and I'm going to go do some running around and then possibly take everyone to the library.  Have a wonderful day.

Mother's Day

Mother's Day has come and gone for another year, thank goodness; I can't stand being made a fuss over.  It wasn't too bad this year, though - the children each bought me a peony plant (light and dark pink, so so pretty) and David bought me a movie to add to my Wes Anderson collection and a handmade corn broom that I wanted badly. At church the ladies were all given large amounts of decadent desserts and pansies for their gardens, both of which I got the leftovers from, and so the day passed.  David's parent's are visiting us right now and we bought his mother a little white rosebush that I think will look sweet in her garden.

In school news, we've finished reading aloud Thornton Burgess's The Adventures of Bob White, which the children seemed to enjoy, and are starting in on Ramona The Pest by Beverly Cleary.  I liked the Ramona books as a child, and she seems to get into the minds of little children so well, but then this book centres around the little girl attending kindergarten, which isn't a familiar concept for my children so we'll have to see if they like it.

I'm still determined to do nature journaling with the children this summer but somehow have been totally unable to get to the craft store to buy the notebooks I know I want.  As I said, we have guests, and they are likely here until Thursday, and we've been busy celebrating a certain little girl's third birthday and yesterday going to see a waterfall and take a lot of nerve-wracking photos from the top of it.  But come the end of the week our guests will continue on their way and we'll be able to shake down into normal life again - and I will, I'm certain I will, get a chance to buy these books and some little watercolour paints and other interesting supplies, and tear the children from their playdough, and show them the wonders of nature.

Home Schooling and Socialization

I have gotten asked a lot if I'm worried about my children's socialization since they're being home schooled, and my answer is...no.  I don't want to downplay another parent's fears or concerns for their children, but I have trouble even understanding the question.  To begin with, I'm not sure I agree with the whole idea of 'socialization' anyway; from what I can gather when people refer to it what they mean is 'aren't you worried that your children won't be able to relate to other people and function in society?' and no, I'm not, because my children are IN society.  Unless you aren't letting your children outside of the house and refusing to let them speak to others, they will become 'socialized'.  No one looks at a herd of zebra and asks if it's healthy for the baby zebra of one herd to not meet the baby zebra of another herd - the zebra learn to be zebra in their own herd.

What I think people really want to ask is if I'm afraid my children will be 'weird'.  If they won't dress and act like other children their age, or 'fit in'.  And I'm not sure that's necessarily dependent on where you go to school.  Nor do I think learning the latest fashions should be the driving force behind sending my children to public school.

I believe that my children are actually getting more of a 'real world' education in a lot of ways.  They see adults living at home and doing the things they need to do everyday and from that knowledge they will be able to function on their own one day.  My children will see me plan a meal, go shopping for ingredients, prepare the food and clean up.  They will see me care for infants-change diapers and so forth.  They watch me garden.  When they are grown, they will know how a house runs.  This sort of knowledge is really important to overall life happiness.

Still sick

It's been a long slog through this cold or flu or whatever it is.  And the 'rough nights'....ugh.  First the baby had hers and I sat in the chair all night until the wee hours holding her.  Then a day went by, a day when I began to think life might be worth living again, and then the girl had her rough night and again we sat all night up, rocking and rocking.  A few days passed (the children have literally gone through almost every symptom a cold can present at this point) and I thought 'surely the boy will want his turn up all night with mama' and lo!  It came to pass!  So, last night was pretty awful with complaints of an incredibly sore throat.

David's parents arrive tomorrow and I have nothing done.  Nothing.  Well, no, I have shampooed the sofa that desperately needed it, but other than that I need to pretty much do all of the things.  Mostly this involves dealing with the laundry and the floors, the only two areas of the house that are totally out of control at this point.  If you need me, I'll be folding.

Breathe

We're back home from a four day trip during which we drove 20 hours with three unhappy, sick children.  I'm not sure you could call it a vacation, per se, but it was an adventure, and no one can say the ministry doesn't take you places, since the point of this trip was a work-related meeting.  We arrived home yesterday evening and ate ramen noodles for supper and tried to decompress and simultaneously unpack and get back into the groove of home life.  It wasn't until both girls were down for their naps today and the boy was parked in front of a cartoon and I was finally eating my lunch in peace that I unwound enough to look around me.  The blankets are swinging on the line, the odds and ends from the fridge have been combined into a salad, the floors have been swept; I feel, if not at ease necessarily, at least as though I can put on the kettle and get a blanket and go curl up in the living room to watch kid's shows with my eldest.  I'll roast vegetables and serve them with rice and some fish baked in pastry with a dill mustard sauce for supper, I think.  Breathe.