Educating Them For Real Life: What Do They Need To Succeed?

So we've decided to educate our children ourselves. At home. Without formal tutoring (except for pursuing interests such as music, gymnastics, martial arts, foreign languages, etc.). We're still deciding on whether to adhere to and purchase a ready-made curriculum, or conceptualize and design our own, or use a combination of both. After pouring through reading materials, researching available products and studying education theory by those who have been there and done that, there is a broad idea already forming of how we're going to go about it. Like most projects in the early planning stages, I've only just begun to collect and sort through the myriad of information out there. The end goal here is to identify (and agree upon) our teaching/learning philosophy, choose which method (or methods) we're going to incorporate into our lesson plans (if we go that route), and which materials we'll need to aid and assist us along our journey.

During our talks, my husband and I have found ourselves often referring back to our own formal educations, discussing what we liked, what we hated, what we learned, what we didn't - and comparatively have sorted through what we think we'd like to change about how our children are taught.

One recurring theme of our talks have revolved around how little formal schooling prepares you for real-life situations. It taught us little to nothing about establishing credit, budgeting a household, caring for living things such as plants or pets, how to prepare meals, how to survive if stranded or lost, how to climb out of debt from racking up student loans.... And then we think about the things we learned (often by trial, error and humiliation) from our peers, such as independently forming opinions, how to socialize, how to treat other human beings, modesty, humility, the value of making other people laugh  ... the list goes on and on. There seemed to be a pretty stark line drawn between what we learned (or was supposed to learn) at school and what we learned (or was supposed to learn) at home. There were wide gaps in both, and sometimes what was best taught at home was picked up at school by mimicking our classmate's behaviors, and what was best learned at school was independently self-taught, often by necessity, on an as-needed, emergency basis when we were young adults.

While we obviously coasted through to adulthood relatively unscathed, reminiscing on these trials, tribulations and errors helped give us a broader perspective of how we wanted to teach our kids. The term "well-rounded" is so vague and open to interpretation, but we were pretty sure that we wanted our kids to be more informed, more acutely prepared for real life, and more eager to learn via natural curiosity and practical application versus obedient memorization and regurgitation of (mostly useless) facts. A lot of the real-life skills we learned as adults (accounting, carpentry, etc.) was picked up as a hands-on, ongoing training and vocation through jobs we had as young adults.

My husband and I started making babies at a very late age (40 and 45, respectively). It was beyond obvious that what we learned back then would hardly be practical for our kid's generation. We didn't have the internet, with virtually every piece of information available at the click of a mouse. We didn't have the luxury of speaking with people from foreign cultures. We didn't have the technology to have a map, a set of encyclopedias, a telephone, a camera, a video recorder, fingertip shopping, game-playing, social-driven "apps" (the term wasn't even invented yet) on one device that could be tucked into our pocket. Our kids are lucky to be alive at a time when so much technology is readily available. We're going to have to chart the course of their learning based on these conveniences, and take into account that there are certain learned "skills" that are still being formally taught in classrooms that are both seriously outdated, and a waste of time. A couple of examples:

• Cursive writing. Do we really want to spend a huge block of our "school" year on this? Writing print and learning to navigate a keyboard at a young age would suffice, in our opinion. While writing formal written letters may be a lost art, I believe this art could be done on an elective basis, if my children are interested in learning.
  
• Long division (with or without decimals), memorizing the multiplication tables, algebra, calculus: Is this really necessary in a world where calculators are practically built into every piece of electronics we own? Being able to work out two sets of six-digit numbers multiplied can be done using technology. Same applies to division. Anything beyond the basic elementary mathematical schooling isn't going to be important until the later high school years when they've started getting their own ideas about where their career choices will lead them. This is not to say that the basic fundamentals of math shouldn't be rigorously taught and applied on an elementary level -  I just don't think it should be pounded systematically into their heads until either practical application or their own natural curiosity dictates that they need to learn it.
  

Of course I will prepare them academically if they plan to apply to a college. But I view their high school years as a time when they will have started to develop a good idea of what path they want to take, and we'll need to adjust their studies accordingly. My hope is that by the time they have reached the typical high school age, they will already have much practice at independently learning and researching on their own and they'll be telling ME how THEY are going to design their curriculum. I hope to have cultivated by then enough self-discipline, independence and dogged determination in my kids to be very, very comfortable with the choices they make for themselves. I hope to trust them explicitly with the responsibility of paving their own way long before they reach adulthood. And I hope that they trust me enough to confide in me their choices, even if they decide to pursue something that may seem risky, over-ambitious, or just plain lackadaisical. 

Suppose one of my daughters decides to enroll in a top-tier University and rack up $240k in student loans to make a modest $50k a year teaching Philosophy. Do I encourage her to follow her passion even though she will be saddled in debt for most of her young adult life? What if my son decides, despite having a natural penchant for mathematics and engineering to take his love of his garage band guitar-playing abilities on a cross-country bar tour with the hope of getting signed as a *serious* musician? Do I dash his dreams and point out the odds of him ever making it big as a musician? What if my other twin daughter decides to take the money she's saved up working as a teenager and invest it, along with borrowed dollars, into her own start-up company that has a 50/50 chance of succeeding or failing? To encourage her would send the message: I Believe In You. To discourage it would communicate to her that I don't think she has the moxie to pull it off.

While I'm definitely projecting too far ahead with absurd scenarios that may or may not happen, it seems like it's never too early to start considering how their elementary and primary education, coupled with their love-of-learning and passion for following their dreams will affect the way they form the strategic and complicated task of planning for their own futures. I believe it's a fine line between saddling them with our own expectations and letting them freely discover what will best suit them as far as career choices go. 

While I think about these things, in the back of my mind I'm planning for more immediate, present-day goals and ventures, such as potty-training them and teaching them to wipe their own butts and wash their own hands. Truth be told, I'm not sure which is more terrifying!

Raising Freethinkers: The Education Conundrum

One of the things troubling me as a parent of 3 children who are just a few short years shy of becoming school-aged is how to begin preparing their little minds for the pliability it requires to soak up knowledge. I think a huge part of it is massaging their already established curiosities, taking every opportunity to satisfy the whats, hows & whys that will soon be brewing at their intellectual surface. I'm certain of a few things already:

• I must give them consistent, varied, and unique opportunities to establish their interests. I want them to have a broad range of stimuli available to them so they can explore whatever piques their curiosities. While we'll be limited in some ways (geographically and financially speaking), it will be important to introduce new things, new places, and new people to them. Kids may thrive on routine, but variety will give them the chance to think outside of their little boxes and appreciate things that are unfamiliar. The hope is that this will foster a love of learning and becoming explorers by their own rite.
• I must give them space to grow. I want to raise them to be independent, rebellious, intellectual thinkers. I want them to question authority - even if it's my own. I don't want them to be systematically programmed to just mindlessly follow the rules and float through life on auto-pilot. I want them to cultivate their own self-discipline and have the guts and audacity to initiate change when they feel it's needed. I'd like them to be innovative, unique and constantly questioning their predicaments, looking for ways to improve themselves and their world.
• I want them to be unafraid and accepting towards those who are different than them. I don't want to raise them in a bubble, surrounded only by Mommy & Daddy's kind. I want them to be steeped in diversity, interested in other cultures, and eager to discover new ways of life alien to their own. I want them to be tolerant of practices they don't necessarily partake in, and I want them to establish early on a sense of compassion, empathy and altruism that will extend not only to their immediate peers, but to the rest of the whole, wide world outside of their zip code. I want them to dream of faraway lands and it's residents. I want them to aspire to travel and see the world when they're grown.

These things I know for certain, and while it gives us a good foundation as to how we hope our kids will turn out, it does nothing at all to help me establish how I want them to be formally educated, or if we want them to be formally educated at all! The current conundrum we're facing now is which direction to go as far as how our kids are taught. We've got a good idea of how we'd like them to operate as Good People, but then there's the ABC's, 123's, History, Science, Geography, Algebra ... 

The hard questions here are: 

• How much do they need to know to be prepared for life? Will they aspire to become academically at the top of their chosen field and pursue college accreditation? Or will they hone in on the arts, or a skilled trade? Perhaps their vision will lead them to want to join the Peace Corps, travel to remote corners of the globe and help others. Maybe the (gulp) traditional 8-5 corporate lifestyle will be their preference. However it turns out, we want to make sure even their early childhood education gives them the proper tools and mindset to be able to both discover and pursue their goals. The onus is on us, the parents, to make sure they're given everything they need to succeed.
• Which learning style will suit them best? We've learned an incredible amount about their personalities that have recently formed to know that our boy is a hands-on kinda guy who gets bored sitting still for too long. Will this change as he gets older? Our twin daughters may look alike, but their personalities are as different as night and day. One is introverted, one is extroverted. Do I lean towards these innate traits of theirs and model their education around it, or do I challenge them to go outside of their comfort zone? The fact is, they're going to change as they get older. We need to be prepared to grow with them and be willing to change with them. I'm pretty sure the public school system isn't going to conform to our kid's changing needs or redirect their curriculum to what suits their current interests. They're going to teach them to be autonomous, obedient, and structured to the point of monotony. And we're 100% positive that is not what we want for them. 

All that established, we've made our minds up that home schooling will best fit our family. I'm fortunate enough to have a husband who both shares my vision and is willing to work hard to provide for our family while I stay home and see to it that our children are well taken care of, beyond their basic needs, and flourish as they grow up. I support public schools, as they provide an education, and meals, and the attention that some kids probably do not have the good fortune of getting at home. It's just not for us.

I've been reading and researching and soaking in every bit of information available on the internet as to which method of homeschooling will suit us. In the posts that follow, I'll be hammering out the pros and cons of each.

Everyone admonishes me for wishing the years away too fast and suggest that I cherish this time while my kids are babies and toddlers. I think it's easier said than done. I look forward to my kids relishing in more concrete activities and interests! As I type this, my two year-old son is celebrating the ability to take off all his clothing and strip down naked as he triumphantly tosses his diaper over the child gate while my twin daughters are practicing the highest decibels of their war cries as they take turns yanking at each other's hair. Sigh. 

Backtracking and Bouncing Forward

After a long hiatus, I had originally planned to pick up my blogging pace by catching up on the fun and festivities we enjoyed over the holiday season. I managed to finish a long overdue draft I'd started on Planning and (Almost) Executing the Perfect Twin 1st Birthday, but after that, I found myself revising and revisiting the same old drafts I'd started without having anything resembling a good flow. Seems like the long break dried up my creative juice reserves, and I was seriously lacking the enthusiasm to retell our adventures with the same passion and eagerness that I had before.

I took that *in a rut* moment to indulge in a little self-reflection while I reviewed old blog posts. Mostly because I'm nostalgic, partially because I was seeking motivation to continue writing, but also because I realize that our life here changes drastically in intervals of just a few months, and it's interesting to look back and see how much we've grown, both parents and children alike. What surprised me most was noticing how what seemed like a lifetime ago happened in just under a 2-year time span.

I relived my pregnancy woes and delivery mishaps in How To Completely Foil Your Birth Plan.  It reminded me of how lucky my husband and I are that we didn't have to experience the worst-case-scenarios some parents are faced with in the delivery room. It made me take pause and look down at the sleeping two-year old curled up beside me with his foot propped up on the corner of my laptop and - BAM! Supernovas exploded in my chest, an atomic collision of the exquisite love, attachment and unyielding devotion we have for our children. It truly is so powerful, it makes you suck your breath in and put your hand to your chest, all Fred Sanford-style. Best. High. EVER.

I revisited our first bouts with sick infants in When Viruses Strike: Welcome to the S.U.C.K. (Sick Unruly Crying Kids), where I used adjectives such as "grisly," and descriptives like "full-blown crisis situation". HA! Three sick kids can rock your boat, for sure - but my *newbness* rendered me as dramatic as a teenage girl when it came to recanting it. Several snot-nosed, congested chests later and I barely flinch when they take on a cold. I am now Master of the Saline Bulb and rectal temperature readings no longer make me grimace. Since then we had a major toddler accident that involved a split lip, enough blood to soak a super tampon, and a scar that is still slightly visible on my son's precious face. Did I cry? Of course. A mother can't help but feel anguish at the sight of her child in pain.  But it didn't throw me into full-fledged alarmist mode where I ripped out or cushioned every sharp right angle in our home. I've learned that crisis hurdles like that are best dealt with swiftly, patched up accordingly, and then you move on with the quickness so that you don't turn into the Smother Mother who constantly coddles and overprotects her children. Germs and viruses are a part of life. Accidents are going to happen. That said, the influenza strain this season has left 41 50 people in my state dead - so I've avoided taking the kids to shopping malls or grocery stores until this mild epidemic passes. There is indeed a fine line between exercising caution and becoming totally agoraphobic during flu season. I like to think we have erred on the smart, cautious side.

It's been six months since I wrote Co-Sleeping, A Year in Review:, and my stance hasn't changed, even though the size of my son's feet and the downright hog-like behavior he partakes in when sleeping horizontally between my husband and I has changed dramatically. We still talk about transitioning him to his toddler bed, but it's mostly just a bunch of hot air we blow off when we wake up in the morning with bruised ribs, having been robbed of both our pillows and our covers. We feel like we'll know when the time is right when it's convenient for him, not for us. A year and a half of co-sleeping, despite the myths, hasn't 1) ruined our sex life, 2) made our son any less independent, or 3) posed any sort of psychological issues with any of us. I know for a fact that I'm going to miss him when he decides on his own that he wants to sleep in his own bed - with a little cajoling from me and dad, of course. We definitely don't want a five or six year-old between us, and pretty soon our twin daughters are going to insist that our oversized King bed looks more comfy and inviting than the confines of their cribs. We'll cross that bridge when we get to it.

I blogged about organizing kid clutter, when I had no idea how much worse it would get after getting a couple of Christmas's and birthdays behind us. We still take every opportunity to be silly, mostly because we're dorks, partially because it helps keep us sane. I still have moments of self-loathing when I look down and see that my abdomen is quartered into horizontal rolls, as opposed to quadrants of flat muscle.

But I must say, out of all the topics I'd covered on our experiences as parents, the Litmus Test of Parenting and Momma Said There'd Be Days Like This had to be the two biggest instances I opined about that today's perspective completely squashes. They don't grow out of driving you crazy. You just grow used to that brand of crazy and it no longer phases you to be in that state.

Revisiting the words of your past (and not so recent past!) can give you a fresh perspective on the days to come. For me, it makes me feel wiser, more seasoned, and affords me the opportunity to take jabs at myself for the Epic Parenting Fails I now consider to be innocent rookie mistakes.

We're excited about the year ahead of us, as we've got huge plans ahead of us which involves (another) massive remodel of our home, a crash course in early education methods, and plenty of time to stress about the two until we get to that point.

Till then ... enjoy our Halloween and Christmas photos (that are so overdue and outdated due to gross neglect of blog posting that it's no longer relevant, but rather a shameless plug on how freakin' adorable our youngsters are)

BEST.COSTUME.EVER.

THIS Princess wasn't impressed with the Halloween Carnival. At all. She grouched the whole time.

Is he excited, or infuriated? We don't know, either.

This is going to be a great Throwback Thursday photo to haunt their (insert future media site) with.

It was 90 degrees at the carnival. Can you imagine how that suit must have felt?

The weight of the bow on her head finally collapsed her.

He is smiling, but his limbs are expertly fighting us off as we try to make him wear a Santa hat for a photo. 

This is her "I left your Christmas present in my diaper" face.

18-24 Months: The Litmus Test of Parenting

The quixotic, well-intentioned ambitions of an inexperienced new mother knows absolutely no bounds. The preparation, the planning, the laying out of what you think is going to be a solid foundation to start from - it consumes you while your child is in utero. You worry about how difficult it's going to be, this mothering business. You fret over whether or not you'll always be up to the task, and how good you'll be at not just meeting your child's every need, but helping him thrive from infanthood to adulthood in a manner that would make him look back on his own childhood and think: My mom had it going ON! You unknowingly mistake your naïve aspirations towards perfection as a sign of being a responsible parent-to-be, even though you have no way of knowing how up-to-the-task you already are from an evolutionary standpoint. Being a child-bearing female equips you with more know-how, intuition and mothering capabilities than you ever thought you possessed. It just doesn't ever prepare you for how difficult it gets when your precious little darling turns into a hot-headed little firecracker during the toddler years.

When I was pregnant with my son, I did a lot of future planning and had many projections for how we were going to spend his early formative years together. Drunk with love, high on hormones, intoxicated by the intuitive mothering pull towards my unborn baby - it was easy to convince myself that I had my whole new-parent plan already mapped out and set in stone ... even though I'd only had two ultrasounds and hadn't quite crossed that third trimester mark yet. I was absolutely terrified of other people's newborns, yet strangely had such overwhelming feelings of familiarity with the life growing inside me, I was confident and certain that I wouldn't run scared as soon as he was born and put into my care. I spent a great deal of time sitting in his unfinished nursery, carefully calibrating and fine-tuning how I was going to react and respond to just about every single need that my infant could possibly manifest. I knew how I wanted to nurture him, how I wanted to shower my love onto him, and how I'd do everything in my power to make sure his environment was happy, safe and secure. I had no idea how easy and natural that part was going to be, especially the first year. But until you've had to pry off a sweaty, screaming toddler mid-tantrum from your pants leg, you have no idea how challenging your role will be going into that second year. You get tested, and retested, and then when you think you know what to expect out of them, they throw you for a loop and redefine the art of being bad.

It's worth looking back at my misconceptions and laughing now, especially since I got the pleasure of three babies in under two years. Clearly, I focused too much on how to take care of an infant, and didn't invest enough time strategizing how I'd have to learn to compromise with a toddler. Granted, the newborn stage isn't a complete cakewalk. There's several weeks of sleepless nights due to their incessant every-two-hour feeding marathons, coupled with the urge to check in on them when they finally do sleep for a decent stretch to make sure their breathing is normal. But seriously - aside from making sure they have full bellies, dry diapers and adequate sleep (often at the expense of your own zzzzz's) ... newborns are relatively easy. My son was a new mother's dream: Never cried unless he was hungry, smiled at you just for meeting his gaze, sat still in his little bouncer seat and charmed anyone who had the good fortune of walking in the room and becoming acquainted with him. The twins have proved to be a little more high-maintenance (they're girls, what did you expect?), but all in all, they aren't much trouble right now, either. You'll notice the subtlety in which I don't project any farther into the future with them. Let's just say my lessons have been learned ever since my toddler son put his doting mother through a grueling six-month course I affectionately refer to as Handle It School.

What I'd like to know now, is ... Where did my sweet, docile baby boy GO? Once the 18th month hit, he morphed into an opinionated little rebel-rouser with the short temper of a rattlesnake and a set of lungs that, turned up full volume, could rival the shrill pitch of a police siren. I toss around the phrase "opinionated" as if the little fella can actually speak in cohesive sentences and express himself outside of the toddler vernacular of "mo" (more), "no" (his answer to every question) and "mine" (which applies to his things, things that aren't his yet, but are about to be, and every other thing in his immediate radius), but I assure you - the little boy is quick to elaborate on how entitled he is to his opinion, and he's not afraid to act it out for us, lest we be unaware. Sometimes these opinions are expressed through body language, such as the arched back/head thrown towards floor sentiment that really means HELL NO, I WON'T GO. Then there's the more complex theatrics that illustrates his aversion towards taking medicine, which is his rendition of a lockjaw-patient-shape-shifting-into-a-snapping-turtle. There's also the wordless miming of raising one eyebrow (how does he do that? I'm envious) that clearly communicates to whoever is trying to get him to eat that one more bite of food that they're going to be wearing that spoonful if he has his way about it. Naptime really brings out the thespian in him, and he has about fourteen different soldiering personas for fighting sleep. Those range from the noiseless, sneaky belly-crawl out of bed to the incessant chattering that he belts out at the most ridiculously loudest decibel imaginable, all because he's realized that the one thing I can't put an absolute stop to is the range of noise he can emit from his vocal chords.

I think back to the newborn to first year period with him: The joy of seeing him hold his bottle for the first time. The clumsy little bowlegged, tippy-toed walk he first attempted. The glee we'd all share in when he'd patty-cake his little hands, or how we'd all laugh and think it was cute when he unceremoniously tossed his sippy cup to the side when he finished his drink. Then it abruptly ended, and although the cuteness lingered and the smiles and joy never dissipated, a new level of disobedience gave rise in that boy, and so help me - there's days when I wonder if someone came into our home and reprogrammed him with a bunch of insolence software. I realize that most boys are rambunctious, and perhaps some of the fire that kid has comes from the bullheadedness he inherited from his 'rents, but some days I'm certain that the fabled "Terrible Twos" is just a diversionary tactic used to blindside mommies and daddies when they're feeling comfortable with the fact that there's still a good six months or so before that kind of behavior is due. It sneaks up on vulnerable newbie parents and we're left stunned, unable to render any kind of authoritarian role over them because we still consider them our sweet, cuddly little angels of innocence. All it really takes to snap you back into reality is having a nearly-full sippy cup hurled at you from a distance of about six feet. It's the knowledge that sinks in when you realize that they meant to do it, when out of the corner of your eye, you see them triumphantly grinning because they know their cup connected with your face. Sure, you correct them for the offense. You forgive them easily, because that's what good, loving mothers do. You go on about your day, trying to act like it didn't rattle you much, even though your left cheekbone hurts like hell.

I never got the humor behind the incredibly popular ReasonsMySonIsCrying website, and used to think to myself: Why on earth do people find it funny that their children are feeling anguish? I also never understood why they'd take photos of their kid's throwing fits, until mine started doing it. They happen so spontaneously that it becomes dangerously entertaining, kind of like watching a funnel cloud turn into a tornado. You know the shit is about to hit the fan, you'd be well-advised to hunker down, 'cause it's about to be Get Your MommyPants On time where you have to deal maturely with the situation. It's just that they happen so randomly, and so often, that you know how to discern actual anguish from just a routine meltdown that can be quickly tuned down by a simple distraction like whistling, or holding them in a bear hug and covering them with kisses (ooooh, but he hates that when he's mad!). Sometimes you've just got to enjoy the fireworks - even though you know it's about to set the yard ablaze. I believe in letting my son express his frustrations, and I never want him to feel like he has to hold anything inside, as I believe that can pave the way for some communication barriers in the future. I fully realize that there will be a time when he can express his feelings without falling on the floor and venting red-faced rage, but right now, this is the best he can do.

I don't believe it's healthy to laugh at your children for any reason, because you certainly don't want them left feeling taunted, or belittled in any way. But after going through the whole "mommy understands you are mad" routine, let them know how silly they looked while  throwing a tantrum. It gets my son EVERY time. I urge you to try it! After the situation has been diffused and your child has calmed down, throw yourself on the floor and start spazzing out like they did, complete with the noise and the flapping of hands/kicking of feet. This cracks my son up, and the laughter is contagious, and before you know it, we're both acting ridiculous. He forgets that he thought the world was ending five minutes ago when I wouldn't let him bludgeon the T.V. with the pointy end of his stick horse, and I forget that my precious little boy looked upon me with a homicidal glare when I took away the stick horse his Poppa gave him.

I'm learning lots of valuable lessons with my son that I hope I will be able to apply when his twin sisters hit their Mean Toddler phase, knowing full well that it's going to be a whole other ballgame due to the fact that 1) there's TWO of them, and 2) girls are, by design - more difficult than boys. However, I think it's important that I've nearly completed this first "test" as a new parent and still have (most of) my marbles intact. I have concluded that if you get through the sometimes scary, sometimes maddening, oftentimes nerve-fraying 18-24 month period, the rest of it is just a long string of happy discoveries, new accomplishments, artsy little macaroni plates, and other such whimsy. If you manage to make it through without tearing your hair out (most of it will fall out anyway), your parenting skills will have reached a critical mass that will render you capable to deal with anything parenthood has to throw at you, and most importantly - you'll do it effectively, efficiently, and with a honed sense of humor that will keep you from crumbling.

Mirror, Mirror On The Wall - What Happened?!

Preface:
This post sat drafted and unrevised in the fashion that I'm sure fellow bloggers are familiar with: You become inspired to opine about a particular subject, hammer out a ridiculous amount of keystrokes building your narrative, and as the text flows, you begin to lose confidence and/or interest in both the content and the subject matter. In my case, I got so long-winded in my composition that my original point got lost in a rambling sea of musings. To add to the post's demise, the life happening around me demanded that I stop halfway through my missive, and the truth is, I never really intended to revisit it. I've learned from past journaling that when that happens, my mind isn't always at the same fervent pitch it was when I started, so my original idea will just trail off into Draft Neverland. Thus was the case with this post, until I came upon another post by Jill Raffiani that was very much along the same thread as my cobwebby draft.

The Letting Yourself Go Debate inspired me to rethink my position, reopen the post-in-the-making, and elaborate on my own position for this very hairy (no pun) subject matter that we're all a bit sensitive to - our appearances. I thank her for the great article, plus the spark and motivation it gave me to not only finish what I'd previously started, but to revise it in a way that would encourage me to KEEP IT REAL, and to dive headfirst into a self-improvement mission that was seriously long overdue.

******

I'm no stranger to self-reflection. There's always a steady stream of it playing in the background of my subconscious at any given point in my busy day. It's pretty crowded in there, with the proverbial foot of hindsight kicking me in the back of my head, scolding me for not making better use of my time and brainstorming about how I can expand every nanosecond of the next day to trump the prior day's productivity. Sometimes it's the endless chatter of the merciless, fault-finding heckler that relentlessly points it's gnarled, accusatory finger in my face, nagging me about unfinished projects and giving me a good lashing for being a procrastinating underachiever, even if I managed to get (what I consider) a great deal done before noon. I'm fairly certain that my inner voice is a cross between a mild-mannered philosophical problem solver and a brutal, highly critical Jewish mother figure. These two are constantly at odds with one another at the intersection of Praise Lane and Bash Boulevard, and deciding which one of these counterparts I want to side with kind of drains me sometimes.

Lately, my chief inner grievance has been my failure to reconnect with my femininity after wearing the SAHM hat for almost two years. I've noticed changes in myself on both a physical and emotional level, and it's been troublesome, to say the least. I have a dogged determination not to let anything resembling depression put a damper on what I consider to be a wonderful home life, and I'd rather take a sharp stick in the eye than expose my husband and kids to the extreme funks I can get myself into. Sometimes, I crack. Not often, but I do. I had to come to grips with finding out that I had the tendency to be a sniveling whiny-baby during my meltdowns. I don't let the kids see me in that state, so it usually spills out into my husband's lap complete with tears, sobs and a great deal of snot. And mannnnn, does it feel good to let it out! What I most love about my husband (besides him being good looking, smart and funny) is that he listens to me. He also knows when to sympathize, and has been schooled on knowing when to reel me in when I get too far out there at my pity parties. We both have a huge arsenal at our disposal to fight off my occasional crazies with, and I'd have to say that humor is our tactical weapon of choice. If it weren't for our wisecracking banter and general buffoonery warding off full-blown breakdowns, I'd probably be committed to a padded room and administered several antipsychotic prescriptions.

Since the bane of my existence here recently has been my personal upkeep, I know that it's time to stop kidding myself about it and adopt a new, improved self-betterment ritual that would restore the confidence towards my womanhood. I was never a vainglorious, selfie-posting, smug-kinda-gal prior to becoming a wife, mother and a SAHM, but having a career and the free time to hang out with female friends (who we know and count on to critique us into submission when we get lazy) pretty much mandates that hair, nails, clothing and accessories be tended to on a daily basis. Having that part of my life replaced with being a mommy to three very demanding little babies somehow gave me a license to become lax in the broader areas of maintaining my personal appearance. Some of it is due to finances, and the budget cuts we took in order for me to be able to stay home with the kids. The typical six-week cut, color and blowout I'd treat my coiffure to happens about every six months now, with a few *box* treatments sprinkled in here and there. Spa pedicures and manicures went by the wayside when we started spending $240 a month on diapers and formula. I've always been anti-chick (and not very fashion-forward) in that I hate shopping for and trying on clothes. Luckily for me, I now have a valid reason to never step foot in a mall again. Our clothing budget was cut way back, and since my husband is an office jockey who works with upper management and VP's in his line of work, it only makes sense to make sure that his attire needs are updated and funded before mine are. As you've already figured out, these are nothing short than excuses. These excuses have been holding me back from my quest of self-improvement, and I've been leaning on them as a crutch for far too long.

My husband and I have only been married for three years, but have never put on airs around one another, even from the first date. We just meshed together, au natural, in our base forms, and fell in love without a lot of flamboyant courting rituals closely akin to peacock plumage and mating calls. I had never felt pressure to look a particular way for my husband in order to be his love interest. That said, I was not beneath using the feminine wiles all women possess when it comes to seducing your mate. There's a great deal of pleasure knowing that you can make your partner's heart (and other blood-engorged organs) thump by making yourself alluring and beautiful in ways that you know will steep his attraction to you. Two back-to-back pregnancies and a hysterectomy seemed to put that particular pleasure on the backburner, and while I'm not dissing my husband for being loving enough to not bust my chops about it, I secretly wish he would tell me that he missed that part of my personality. I say this knowing full well that the insecurities I now harbor towards my appearance would cause me to take it as an insult or a jab, so as you can see -  the poor man just can't win for losing where this is concerned. Luckily he's tuned into me well enough to know that, so he chooses his answers carefully when I childishly sling the "Do you still think I'm pretty" interrogation his way. I don't believe he is lying to me when he answers in the affirmative, but I do know that on some level, he must miss the "old" me.

After my twin daughters were born, there was a long stretch where I had completely justifiable reasons for wearing my husband's pajama pants and loose T-shirts day in and day out. I'd had a difficult recovery with the C-section, and the trips I made to NICU each day was a bumpy 25-minute ride on the Arkansas interstates (pothole capital of the U.S.A) that required me wearing that ridiculous Velcro bellyband underneath my clothing. Then there was the newborn feeding schedule, multiplied by two, which kept me up all the time. I was practically napping on the fly whenever I could nod off and catch a few zzzzz's, so why bother changing clothes several times a day and night? Four months later after my C-section scar had healed, I was admitted back into the hospital for a complete, lifesaving hysterectomy (up yours, cervical cancer!). The recovery time from that was grueling, especially with 3 babies at home to tend to, and the only person who was around to help while my husband worked was my elderly father. I hardly felt the need to fix my hair and put on makeup in his presence, as he'd seen me at my absolute worst. There began the bad habit of wearing pajamas all day and tying my clean but unkempt hair up into a loose knot at the top of my head. I said I did it because it was "easier". I complained about not having the time to mess with it, knowing full well that I probably wouldn't have bothered even if I did. I was in a deep rut that I'd carved out myself and didn't have the wherewithal to climb out of.

I started having recurring dreams (nightmares!) of my husband being surrounded by beautiful, glamorous women who were all vying for his attention. Through no fault of his, he'd wake up already on my shit list and have to deal with my blatant insecurities and unnecessary bouts of jealousy. I started resenting the fact that he got up every morning, shower and shaved, dressed presentably, and got to mingle in the outside world with other attractive, kempt, polished people. That alone gave me the incentive to start climbing out of the despair pit I'd let myself slide into, and for awhile, I started applying makeup again, straightened and styled my hair, wore my favorite perfume ... It improved my self-esteem, adjusted my attitude, and my confidence came back. It wasn't long before the day-to-day redundancy of housework, chores, multiple diaper changes, and chasing kids tricked me into thinking that sprucing myself up every day was just pointless, and futile, because it didn't look like I was going to be able to leave the house for the next three years save for some trips to the grocery or drug stores. Back into the rut I spiraled. Not wanting to fall prey to the inevitable depression that ruts tend to envelop you in, I began using a fair amount of self-deprecating humor to just laugh away my appearance. Poking fun at one's self can be extremely useful in a lot of situations, and it's often a good exercise to help a person not take themselves too seriously. However, it's not always useful, and can even be more of a hindrance than a help. It allows you to embrace your inconsistencies, and you begin to champion them versus trying to change them. I was shouting from my soapbox about my contentment as a Plain Jane, and I used Mommyhood as the reasoning behind it. I made it sound as though the two went hand-in-hand, and loved roasting and ragging all the airbrushed floozies on the pages of Parenting magazine, looking as glamorous as Supermodels while they held up children that surely didn't come out of their own birth canals, because really ... you're in a size 0 two months after delivering a 10 pound baby boy? I call shenanigans!

So this is where I was, just days ago when I stumbled upon Jill's post in a Google+ parenting forum. When I first read her intro to the Letting Yourself Go Debate, it was the closing line that got me hook, line and sinker: "Who were you before you were a parent?" My first kneejerk reaction to her post was to jump to the defense of women who chose to toss vanity out the window after having kids. I was ready to roll up my sleeves and begin a catlike debate over it, but something inside me (perhaps the scathing Jewish mother who often puts me in check) had me read it again, and again and then another time, to be sure - and I finally admitted that it was, indeed, an incredibly sound wake-up call to women out there who were B.S.'ing themselves like I was. There's no excuse not to pull yourself together each day, she remarked in her missive. You owe it to your husband, your kids ... yourself!

Now, while I didn't jump in my Jeep and head to the first salon that would take me without an appointment, it did inspire me to go back and read my previous draft that pretty much defended my carelessness and resignation. It motivated me to be more honest with myself, and it influenced me to take a personal inventory of something I used to take a fair amount of pride in: Myself.

I get really fired up when I make resolutions. It's almost like the tenacity to do better is a viscous liquid coursing through my veins. I hope to be able to regale countless stories about how the New & Improved Me adopts a whole new livelihood that is filled with excitement, and GLAMOUR, and new adventures with the husband that would make a puritan blush ... but the truth is, I truly wouldn't change anything about the way our life is right now. Nothing makes me happier than all five of us romping around on the floor together playing, or curling up with my husband after the kids are asleep to watch a dozen or so back-to-back episodes of American Horror Story or Walking Dead, popcorn and Hershey kisses in our respective laps. There is nothing more glamorous than taking photos of our kids wearing silly hats, capturing smiles and seeing their funny faces light up with glee. It's not the environment I want to change - it's me. And I'm not changing to make my environment more enjoyable, because absolutely nothing trumps this wonderfully chaotic household, in my book. I'm resolving to change only to feel better about the woman I see staring back at me in family photos or when I look in the mirror. I'd like to be able to high-five her and give her an Atta Girl rather than wince at the dark circles under her eyes that she was too lazy to cover up with foundation. I want my kids to be proud of the way their mommy looks when they enroll in school in the next five years. I want my husband to drive home at breakneck speed after texting him a provocative photo that spells out without words what he has waiting for him when he arrives. In short, I want to be able to make my trifecta of roles balance with one another in harmony - The Wife, The Mommy & The Individual.

Admissions: The Futility of Regret, and the Practicality of Do-Overs

I've only been a mother for a little over 18 months. Some days I feel like I've got this whole parenting gig down pat, and other days it feels like I am watching myself slowly unravel in my own piloted sitcom that has just shifted into the Friday Night Death Slot. Taking lots of pictures, journaling our day-to-day vibe, and blogging about it has become a habitual release. At first, I couldn't understand while I felt the urge to chronicle these events, but it's all pretty clear now: One day in the not-too-distant-future when I'm a seasoned old veteran of a mother, I can look back on the parenting days of yore and write an entire book with "No Regrets" worked somewhere into the subtitle.

Problem is ... I've already got regrets aplenty, and a good deal of the damage done is irreversible. I figure that realizing, internalizing, and then vocalizing my deficits as a mother would be best applied while using the catharsis of humor and self-deprecation as a coping mechanism. If anything, it'll be a good reference point for when I'm grandparenting, since we all know that grandparents are a little sadistically twisted in that they enjoy watching new parents stumble around blindly in the dark making loads of the same mistakes they once did. The offspring will be too proud to ask us for advice, and we'll be too amused to offer any kernels of wisdom. I plan on breaking this vicious cycle by just handing over the cliff notes and wishing them good luck while Grandpa and I are off on that Silver Couples Cruise boozing it up and dancing till dawn. Stuck at home with a screaming newborn? Sucks to be you, sweetheart - we've done our time. Call us when they can use utensils, defecate in a toilet, and dress themselves. Don't forget to study the notes we so kindly handed down to you, as it's a luxury we never had back in the day.

So far, the list of regrets is only about as long as my forearm, given a 20pt font and a lot of double spacing. I'll spare you most of them, as there are some motherly malfeasances that aren't worth owning up to, like accidently getting poo on the couch during a diaper change and just flipping the cushion after a hurried, perfunctory scrubbing. A multi-colored earth-hued sofa pattern encourages that kind of negligence, so I'm hardly to blame. What I'm focusing on are the biggies, and the regrets I've indexed thus far are mistakes actually worthy of remorse and repentance on my part:

Circumcision

I ask myself now - was mutilating my son's genitals really necessary? Had I bothered to do actual research prior to consenting to have the foreskin sliced off my son's penis, I probably definitely wouldn't have gone through with it. It certainly wasn't to comply with any indoctrinated religious beliefs on our parts, as we consider ourselves to be in the non-theism camp. There has been a great deal of skepticism on whether the health benefits (if any) necessitates surgery, which pretty much renders it completely cosmetic, in my book. Shame on me for going with the mainstream norm and allowing a 15,000-year old antiquated ritual be performed on my son without his permission. Shame on me for not giving such a major decision more consideration, and shame on the unsteady hand of the doctor who had to use silver nitrate to patch his poor little pecker up afterwards.

Breastfeeding                                    

I gave up both times, with all three of my children. I'd start out all gung-ho and determined, and then when it wouldn't flow like a faucet and work out so that every feeding was just perfect, I'd get frustrated and beat myself (and my boobs) up. I went back-and-forth until exclusive breastfeeding turned into supplemental feeding, and then I'd pump like crazy and wonder why the stream downgraded to a slow trickle. With my son, I just wasn't producing as much as I thought I should have been. Had I persevered harder, I'd have surely gotten over the hump. We had a great lactation consultant in the hospital, too. Once we got home, it slowly went south. With my twin daughters, I convinced myself that I had several factors already working against me. First was their requirement for extra calories, as preemies. NICU instructed me that if I were going to breastfeed, I'd need to supplement every other feeding with Neosure formula at least until they hit about 8 pounds. Going back and forth from bottle to boob was going to confuse them, I told myself. I'd have to either master doing tandem breastfeeding (not an easy task, but doable), or spend twice as long at feedings by doing just one at a time. My C-section recovery was awful, and I had a needy 10-month old competing for Mommy time. Once again, I threw my hands up. While I know that formula-fed infants don't necessarily perish, I know in my heart that if I'd just had more confidence, more patience, and more willpower - I could have been more successful, and my children would have benefited greatly from it.                                                     

Mealtimes
My son has been off the bottle for 7 months now and I hope to have my daughters off by New Year's Day. The transition was an easy one for my son - he pretty much abandoned the idea of the "ba-ba" soon after receiving his first brightly-colored sippy cup, and had shown interest in table food at a very young age. My failing here is that I can't quite commit to letting him feed himself actual food. Finger foods are fine - it's the actual entrees that I struggle with. I see pictures of my friend's kids sitting in their highchairs with spaghetti-o's covering every square inch of their tray, torsos and faces ... and I just can't bring myself to relinquish the utensils and let him use his hands, which is how it almost always ends up, regardless of the fact that he makes a decent effort to use his spoon or fork before growing bored with it and flinging it at me. I know that it's extremely rare for a person to reach adulthood (or even kindergarten) and still be spoonfed by their mothers. If they're hungry enough, self-feeding will come about naturally. With a little coaching, they'll master it eventually - but I am really dragging my feet on this one. The few times I've let him have a go at it, he delighted in making an earnest attempt at feeding himself, even though his clumsy little hands and his sense of exploration towards colors and textures had him (and the high chair, and the floor, and occasionally the walls) covered in food. My husband has gently scolded me for not letting him "just have at it", but I feel inside like I'm encouraging a lifetime of playing with his food. It's not that I'm lazy and trying to avoid the clean-up, but a small part of me feels like I'm giving him a license to make intentional messes. I'm still working on it, but I realize that had I started a lot earlier, we'd already have this behind us and he'd probably be able to use chopsticks by now.

Demoting the cat                            
Before you roll your eyes, let me assure you that this one is both relevant and nocuous. It took a long  time to realize it, too. We have a beautiful marbled black and orange Bengal cat named Morrison. He is docile, friendly and very un-catlike in his demeanor. I've joked to people how he isn't really a feline, but rather a lapdog, working undercover. He isn't snobbish and standoffish like most cats. He loves water and is very vocal and playful. His front claws have been removed, so he's not a danger to the kids or the furnishings. Like all Bengals, he's hypoallergenic - which is great, because I had him before I met my husband, who happens to be fiercely allergic to cats. His only major quirk is that although he's been neutered since kittenhood, he's very amorous and gets all Pepé Le Pew on blankets, stuffed animals, or pillows. This particular behavior became worse when I was pregnant with my son, and we believe it was the excess hormones I was emitting. Regardless, he was our child before we had kids. Since the kids arrived, he's become a second-class citizen and pretty much spends all his time out in our enclosed garage. While we didn't force that on him, I know it's because he stopped receiving all of our extra attention. We just didn't have the time to play with him or have him sit on our laps and stroke his fur while watching television. As a result, he's become more like a houseguest than a loving family pet, venturing inside only to drink running water out of our faucet (another quirk of his) or to give us an obligatory leg-rubbing with his arched back when he feels the need to thank us for his shabby accommodations. It's very important to me to raise our kids to be kind, loving, and compassionate to animals. This new homesteading arrangement for him made him skittish around the kids, and understandably so. My son has all the finesse of a bull in a china shop, and "petting" the kitty who wanders in every now and then isn't something he does with a lot of grace and subtlety. My kids look upon him as more of a novelty visitor than a household fixture, and this is entirely my fault. Networking him back into the family is going to take some time, and this is another item I've been dragging my feet on.

Personal Fitness                    

Prior to turning 40 and having three kids in under a two-year time span, I was one of those lucky women who could pretty much eat Cheetos and drink Coke for dinner, wash it down with some Skittles, and still fit into the same jeans I wore into high school with a very minimalist fitness regimen. After becoming pregnant with my son, I made more of a concerted effort to eat healthier foods and have more structured mealtimes. I gained quite a bit of weight while carrying him, but it just seemed to disappear as soon as I gave birth. The few pounds that refused to vanish troubled me, but my husband remarked that I "needed" it and that it made me look better. I went up one pant size for comfort, but was back in my regular jeans literally after the first month. I boasted about this, and I even admit to rubbing it in at every opportunity, to any woman who would listen. Karma came back around and bit me on that, and it bit me HARD. I had sashayed up to my OB/GYN six week postpartum check up in my tightest skinny jeans only to confirm that I was pregnant again. I was sure the stick test was lying, because 1) my boobs weren't tender, 2) I didn't cry at least six times before noon, and 3) my sex drive wasn't through the roof like it was when I first became pregnant with my son.  After giving birth to the twins just 8 months later, I had hanging around my midsection the phenomena known as Twin Skin. It just hung there like a deflated inner tube in all it's unsightliness as if to mock me for all the gloating I'd done before. Healing from a C-section scar renders your abdomen pretty useless for several weeks. Follow that up with a full hysterectomy just four months later, and you can imagine how intimidating the idea of a sit-up or a crunch must have been. I resolved to start working out vigorously as soon as my guts were healed up. 7 months later, and I've yet to do anything resembling an abdominal workout, unless you count bending over a crib or picking toys up and off the floor as a workout. Would you believe that the weight actually spread? To my ass? And thighs? And even my arms? It happened. The pre-pregnancy clothing that I fit into right after the birth of my son that I saved because I just KNEW I'd miraculously shrink again - let's just say it's made for a gross misuse of valuable real estate in my closet. I get depressed about it. I complain about it. And if I'd wipe the snack crumbs off my lap and put the Coke down, I might actually get around to working out. I already know this is going to be one of those things I'm going to have to start with a vengeance and commit to with all the willpower I have inside me. Right now, I'm too tired. The positive to be gleaned from this is that my husbands pajama pants and T-shirts are extremely comfortable.


While some of these regrets I've lamented on are absolutes that can never be rectified, I know that a little more self-discipline and resolve can fix the rest. I can get my body toned again, become a more attentive pet owner, and shrug off the messes that an 18-month old makes at the dinner table. Instead of complaining about there not being enough hours in the day, I can manage my time more effectively to be able to work in new routines and schedule new undertakings that would allow me to remove some of these items from the Regrets list to a crossed-off I Fixed This! list. Clearly, a whole new mindset is in order. But first, I must laugh at myself for being human, for being imperfect, and for failing at some endeavors. There is a fine line between harmful self-loathing and the ability to poke fun at one's own shortcomings. Some occasions in life mandate that you wreck yourself before you check yourself, and I believe that admitting my fallibilities is the first crucial step.

 

 

 

The Silliness Imperative

Three rules we hold steadfast to in our chaotic household is: stay busy, play together, and laugh often. While we appreciate the value of adhering to a routine and would probably all go collectively insane without one, we try our hardest to not let the routine suck the spontaneity out of our long days. Although my kids are too young at 18 and 10 months to follow a strict schedule outside of eating and napping, I've tried to keep some structure to our playtime so that the kids learn that some activities are a free-for-all, and others require cooperation and attentiveness on their parts. One thing I've noticed as my son hits toddlerhood is that kids are afflicted with uncontrollable bouts of silliness that they just can't - and shouldn't - hold in. I've also learned that a case of The Sillies are highly contagious, and I contract it often. I hope to never build up an immunity, as it breaks up the inevitable monotony and depression that a lot of SAHM's suffer from. It keeps me in a good, lighthearted mood that inevitably rubs off on Dad after a long, grueling day at the office.

My son is goofy by nature, a jester by trade, and delights in keeping us all in stitches with his daily antics. When I was pregnant with him, I fantasized about how we'd spend our day together: Reading classic children's stories by lamplight while he sat comfortably in my lap, mimicking each other with vocabulary exercises and singing sweet lullabies in a soothing tone while he played with my hair. I never visualized how it would actually turn out: Chasing him down the hallway when he gleefully and victoriously steals the book from my hands, making up new lyrics to classic lullabies that I sing in a ridiculously high falsetto while we dance around like lunatics, and how he enjoys not running his hands through my hair, but rather poking his little index finger into my corneas while showing off his anatomical prowess by saying "EYE!".

I fully realize that I'm cultivating future class clowns and armchair comedians, but I refuse to believe that this is a bad thing. There's plenty ... scratch that, there's too many opportunities in life to be serious, and I'm sure they'll be able to discern when they get older when acting silly and being funny is appropriate, and when it's not. For now, I just want their earliest childhood memories to be happy, fun and filled with laughter. Sometimes it's tricky to get them to calm down after an especially long afternoon of reckless folly, but my son seems to sleep better at night after exhausting his seemingly endless supply of energy by dancing around the living room acting a fool to an appreciative, familiar audience. He's actually quite shy around people he doesn't know, so I don't worry much about him going into spaz mode in public.

One thing my kids love is to look at photos of themselves, and I take at least a dozen pictures of them at play each day. They're so used to having the iPhone pointed at their faces that it doesn't seem to phase them, and that makes for some perfectly candid shots of them at their merriest. Even at my most disgruntled, in-a-funk moments, I can view these photos of the five of us having a jolly good time and it feels like the sun shines inside me. So while their happiness is my catharsis, I'm certain that Jovial Mommy is preferable to them than Serious Mommy, or Busy Mommy, or that dreaded old battle axe that no one can stand being in the same room with - Tired Mommy. Sometimes it's difficult to be "on" for your kids all the time. I find that mirroring their carefree, happy-go-lucky personas even when I'm moody and not particularly feeling it helps me be more of a kindred spirit to them, someone they can count on to not pull the wind out of their sails or pee on their parades. While conventional wisdom teaches us to be a parent first and a friend second, I don't see why the two can't be interchangeable, especially while they're toddlers. I know there will be a time when my silliness will be lost on them and probably embarrass them - as all kids inevitably grow up to be way too cool to enjoy hanging with the 'rents, so I'm going to suck every second of this up while I can.

My Facebook friends and family get kicks out of the photos I share of me, dad and the kids acting like morons, and it's a grand opportunity for me and the husband to let our hair down, forget that we're forty-somethings with our fair share of aches, pains and stress and abandon crummy adulthood by having fun with our kids. I think I take it farther than my husband does with the childish antics, as sometimes I forget to take my voice off of playful falsetto when we're swapping stories at the end of the day. Or we'll be in a serious discussion and I'll peekaboo him, just for the hell of it. Once we stole away to the farthest reaches of our boudoir for some of that fifteen-minutes-of-bliss parents of toddlers live for, and we both ended up getting the giggles over the ridiculous sing-song music still blaring from our television because we forgot to change the channel. It might have killed the moment for us as far as savage, wonton lovemaking went - but simultaneously being afflicted with a case of the uncontrollable giggles is right up there next to the big "O", in our opinion. Both leaves us sweaty, out of breath, and deeply fulfilled on an intimate level. Quality time, that!

A couple of months ago we sat in the living room with the twins on our laps and our son zipping in and out between us, and an opportunity presented itself for us to make a game out of fashioning burp rags to our daughter's heads just for laughs. What started out as a silly game turned into what is now a standing tradition. We immediately uploaded it to Facebook with the title being:

Baby Thespians Theatre Presents: Mother Teresa, Aunt Jemima, Bad-Ass Biker Babe & The Surgeon

It was such fun, and our friends and family enjoyed it so much, that we constantly look for household props to adorn the kids with for silly photos. I know for a fact that these photos will land in their school yearbooks, their wedding videos, and will haunt them for the rest of their lives. This, we're counting on. At the very least, I know we will be able to wallpaper the walls of our retirement home with them when our kids disown us for making spectacles of them at such a tender young age.

 

If you were to stoop outside our windows with your ear pressed to the panes, you'd likely hear me singing ridiculous songs that I made up on the fly just because my kids love to hear me sing, and - dare I say - I'm rather good at it, as long as it's not a serious performance. I have many songs I remember from childhood, like the good old mainstays Itsy Bitsy Spider, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and The Wheels on the Bus - and my kids love these songs, don't get me wrong - but after about the 15th time you've belted it out with the accompanying hand motions - it gets really old. Have you ever noticed that a lot of the antiquated Nursery Rhymes are actually very sinister and macabre? London Bridge collapsing, the baby plummeting to it's demise from the treetops due to that breaking bough, kids voluntarily falling down into ashes with pockets full of ... what?! They're just not the feelgood vibe I'm shooting for, so I tend to avoid those like the plague, which ironically is what children in the dark ages kept pockets of posies to ward off. Instead, I've bastardized my own versions of childhood songs to either fit the moment, the activity, and sometimes just for the hell of it. Some of mom's twisted lyrics go as follows:

(Sung to the tune of Farmer in the Dell, this is a song my son has enjoyed at each diaper change ever since he was a newborn, to present day)

 

 

Powder on my nuts!

Powder on my nuts!

Momma's gonna put some .... powder-on-my-nuts!

 

 

(This next one was adapted from the nursery rhyme titled Peas Porridge Hot, and it is reserved for those inexplicably, eye-watering, nose-pinching dirty diaper changes that would otherwise be a miserable, much-loathed undertaking*)

 

 

Poo Diaper Hot!

Poo Diaper Cold!

Poo Diaper on your butt, nine days old!

Some like it hot!

Some like it cold!

Some like it on their butts, nine days old!

 

 

*can also be adapted to a pee diaper, but I've become such a pro at removing/wiping/changing those that we're barely afforded the time and luxury of a serenade.

 

I don't kid myself into thinking that I wouldn't be committed by court order if a sane person heard me belt out these ridiculous tunes, but ask me if I care! I most assuredly do not. The kids dig it, I dig it, and as long as we're all enjoying ourselves, I'll fight rehabilitation from my personal brand of crazy tooth and nail. Of course, I don't manipulate ALL lyrics to ALL the songs we sing. There's also all the theme songs and jingles from their favorite shows on BabyFirstTV, and those can't be modified or amended, else the kids will know. They have memorized those song lyrics, and they know if you try to cut it short, or forget the lyrics. You can bet that they'll call you out on it in one hot, quick minute if you dare try to alter it. Because they know. Be warned.

 

As a relatively new parent, I naively swan-dived into the rock-your-child-to-sleep trap that other parenting n00bs fall victim to before they realize it sets a very cumbersome ritual that is hell to break from. As a newborn, my son got that luxury. With the twins, we knew better than to ever go there. During our practice run with my son, I put many, many miles on that glider rocker while trying to lull him to sleep on the swell of my pregnant belly with my fat, water-retaining crankles propped up on the ottoman to help balance the weight, since my legs would usually fall asleep before my son would. I only knew a handful of nursery rhyme songs at the time, so after the first fifteen minutes, I'd run out of material. But I improvised, and my son's ears were christened with just about every genre of MY favorite music - from Ray Charles to Nirvana to Metallica and the Foo Fighters. My husband didn't think it was weird at all that I slowed down Master of Puppets a few dozen beats to accommodate a sleepy child. Nor did he think it was odd to hear me singing the sanguine or angst-filled lyrics by a dead rockstar who no longer topped the charts. For the longest time, the 5-disk CD changer in my Jeep held only one CD that was a medley of Elvis Christmas Tunes that my sweet husband burned for me one winter. If my son remembers one thing about me, I hope it's that his mother could impersonate Elvis like a pro. We spent nearly every one of those first car rides straight into the spring and summer with that CD on full blast, singing about Blue Christmases.

 

My husband and I made a promise to one another that we'd never pimp our kids out on YouTube, no matter how great the content, but for Facebook friends and family, we'd share in our daughter's favorite game of wearing bloomers on their head. My husband and I aren't above wearing them, either. Don't judge. They were inarguably enjoying themselves, and that is apparent by their big grins and sparkly eyes:

 

 

 

Our son is, always has been, and always will be a big giant ham, and he revels in dressing up in anything other than actual clothes, and it's ALWAYS better to ride around the house on your trike with a monkey hanging from the steering column:

 

 

 

There is absolutely nothing my kids enjoy more than when Dad gets down on the floor with them and serves as their personal climbing structure. My husband no doubt curses the decision to replace our soft, plush carpet with hardwood floors, but hey - you live, you learn. Don't be fooled, though - creaky knees be damned, I'm sure this activity ranks right up there for him with the Superbowl, E3, and riding the Harley Davidson he so selflessly sold to help supplement funds when we decided I was going to quit my job to be a stay-at-home Mom. In my book, there is nothing sexier than an ex-biker romping on the floor with his kids:

 

 

We hope that when our kids are older, they won't be too traumatized by the amount of photos we took of them in precarious positions, wearing silly outfits, with ridiculous looks on their faces that just SCREAMED to be captioned. Who can resist photographing your twin daughter's first bikinis? Not us. We hope they never struggle with weight issues and blame this photo on their predicament. It's just that chubby babies are awesome, the more rolls, the merrier, and so on and so forth:

 

 

 

I'm sure we're not in the minority when it comes to parents being silly with their kids. I would venture a guess that kids bring out the silliness in most everyone they influence, because after all - who can resist making a child laugh and seeing their eyes light up? My view is that at the end of the day, if the housework, laundry, mess-sweeping, spill-blotting, booger-picking, butt-wiping blues have been cancelled out by the great fun you had with your children, then I call it a win/win for all parties involved. I pity the children whose parents greedily dole out laughs on an occasional-only basis, and I weep for those parents who are so stingy with their time due to their own personal agendas that they miss out on the delightful gratification of entertaining their kids while the kids are still young enough to worship them as not only their main provider and benefactor, but also their bestest friends.