Waiting for a knock on the door...

I've been worried lately what the neighbors think about all of Ian's little tantrums. Any given day at any given time, there are blood curdling screams coming from our house. Add to that Owen the escape artist and I'm sure that DCFS will be knocking on the door any day now.

Monday Ian and Owen were playing in the backyard. I had made sure all the gates were locked and I had the back door open so I could see them and hear them. I was busy in the kitchen when I noticed Ian hit Owen across the face. I marched him inside and up to his room to "time-out". I held the door closed for about five minutes until the door bell ring. I answered the door to see a stranger holding Owen. He had climbed the fence and was playing in the very busy road. To top it off, he was covered in marker and Ian was SCREAMING upstairs. I'm sure I looked like a fabulous mom.

Wednesday I am sitting in my front room busy working on FHE kits for the service auction. The kids were downstairs watching Igor. I look out the window and I watch as a neighbor slowly drives by my house, flips around and drives by again and then finally pulls into my driveway. "I'm being a nosy neighbor" she says, "but Owen is in the road" WHAT??? The doors were all locked but apparently he can escape from that too.

Thursday, I'm in my room folding clothes and Ian and Owen are HAPPILY playing in their room next door. I emphasize happily because Ian was laughing and playing instead of screaming and crying which has become his norm. I was thinking to myself how wonderful it felt to hear laughter coming from him. I went in to get them in their jammies when I notice Ian's hair is bright red. Crap! I think... Ian found the koolaid powder! I look around for the mess I'm sure I have to clean up when I notice bloody hand prints on the wall...Ian is bleeding. I look over his head for the wound but can't find it because there is so much blood. Long story short, I end up taking Ian to the same after hours office that I took Owen to in January. The receptions asks "weren't you just in here for this same thing not too long ago?" And imagin their surprise when I said "I have no idea how or when it happened". Ian did not cry. Not a single peep. I don't have a clue although there was a patch of blood on the edge of the door about his height up. But still...did he fall, did Owen slam the door, how the crap did it happen? No staples this time. Although he needed them, he put up a fight and the doctor decided he'd be ok without them.

So, yes, crown me bad mother of the year already! Just be sure to vouch for me when someone calls the state on me!

My smarty pants kids (A shameless brag)

Last week was our semi-anual SEP's. Matthais's teacher shared with us his recent Iowa test scores. I was completely shocked and stunned to see that percentile was 99%. Do you know what that means??? He tested higher than 99% of the nations 5th graders. I knew he was smart but I would never put him in that range.WOW! He gets that from his dad. Although I was pretty bright when I was younger, having four children has wiped me of nearly every brain cell I have. Millie's teacher also had fabulous news for us. She has gone up 12 levels in reading and that was as high as they could test her.She has already met every second grade goal. Her teacher always has glowing things to say about Millie and told us how kind she is to everyone. We talked about the "friend" issues she's been experiencing and hopefully that won't be as much of a problem any more. Ian's report wasn't so fabulous but that is for a different post! On the down side, both teachers told us our children lack in confidence. That was kinda hard to hear since I hope to raise confident, strong children but, look at their mom. I have always stuggled with self esteem and confindence issues. Not a trait I'd hoped to have passed on...

MTC

I had an interesting conversation once with a good friend of mine who has four little girls. At the time she was pregnant with her 5th and didn't know the gender. I asked her if she was anxious to have a boy and she replied that at one time, early in her married years she wanted a whole house full of boys; she wanted her own little Missionary Training Center. Well, as fate would have it, she had four girls. One day it occurred to her that even with a house full of girls she did have a MTC; she had a Mommy Training Center. I was very impressed with this. It feels exciting to know I am raising a future mother. At the same time, I feel as though this is one of my hardest responsibilities. How can I teach Millie to be a good mom when I feel like such a failure at it??? But,I am the best one to teach her.

Lately Millie has been very interested in everything I do. I've been crocheting around burp cloths and she watches intently and asks how it's done. Anytime I'm cooking she is right there asking to help. I get frustrated easily and prefer to do things myself because it's so much easier. It's been very hard but I've been letting her help.



She was so happy to help and even asked Matthais which pizza he liked better, hers
or mine.

I know that I need to teach her the basic skills to be a mother. I also need to teach her to be a nurturer, a leader, a teacher. I'm just worried I'm not cut out for it! I am not the most patient teacher and I tend to give up very easily. But, from now on I am going to think of my home as a MTC. Not only am I lucky to have 3 missionaries in training, I am also training a mother.

Matthais's rebuttal

When I picked up all the wrappers and diet coke cans off of Matthais's floor yesterday I left him a little note telling him he owed me $5.00. I felt that was fair considering that is how much I would need to replace the items used. He came home from school yesterday and I didn't say anything to him. I wanted him to find it on his own so I could see how he'd react. He went to his room to put his backpack away and didn't even notice the pile of garbage on his bed. I finally pointed it out to him. After a while he started moping around the house with a sad puppy look. I asked him what was up and he said he felt bad. He apologized several times and offered to babysit and clean the house. Wow! I thought...What a great kid! Then I found these on my bed...


My original note with Matthais's rebuttal...

In case I didn't get the point, he wrote me another one...

I thought about responding with a note of my own...

But hey, I am his mom! I guess I should be the bigger person right? I just hope he understands that maybe next time he should ask permission before he devours a weeks worth of snacks in one day!

Tweenager

Matthais has recently been giving me glimpses into the teenage years. Last week at a sleepover he decided to stay up all night. Literally. He know this is against our rules but he did it anyway. The next day (Saturday) he was so tired but we made him stay up. Finally around6:00 he crashed. The next morning I went down to wake him up for church at 10:00. At 10:45 as we were walking out the door we called him up for prayer and he never came. I went down to see what he was doing and found him just getting dressed. He had gone back to sleep. We left and told him he had 20 min to get dressed and walk to church. He has started talking back and arguing and challenging our authority. And then today, there was this...


I went downstairs to get Owen out of Matthais's room and I found this. Only, it wasn't neatly piled on his bed. I did that and wrote him a little note informing him that he owes me $5. Seriously, I bought those granola bars YESTERDAY! And they were for our 72 hour kits that I'm switching the food out of. There were 20 wrappers. And the diet coke!!!! I'm pretty possessive about that!!! No wonder I had only one left today. I couldn't believe I went through that case so fast. Now it makes more sense. So, what do I do now? I mean, if he's hungry I want to feed him but I can't afford this kind of nonsense! I've heard people talk about how their teenage boys eat them out of house and home. I don't think I'm ready for this!