A mountain of snow in front of the house + 2 happy dogs + 2 happy kids = 1
happy Mom with a heart full of love!
Friday, January 29, 2010
Thursday, January 28, 2010
More Mom Time - a different spin...
I've been having some very special More Mom Time - Mum actually. My Mum has been visiting from England (leaving my Dad behind this time). We don't get to see her very often so her visits are like gold dust. She has been here for 2 weeks and unfortunately has to return to UK tomorrow. We will all miss her terribly. It seems that no matter how old I am, time with my Mum means as much as it did when I was young - actually it means more because I know now to cherish it. I hope my children feel this way about time with me when they are older. Hopefully they won't pack their life in a suitcase and move 3,500 miles away like I did 16 years ago today. Hopefully it won't be too many months before I am able to have some More Mum Time : )
Simple wands and fuzzy pictures
T2 was star of the day in her class earlier this week. One of her tasks that day was to bring in something that began with either a W or a Z. She chose a wand. She then decided that she wanted to make 20 wands for the kids in her class. She wanted to do it all herself so aside from pouring glue and writing the word 'wand' on each one - I let her work by herself. The pictures are poor quality because my regular camera was out of power.
She chose craft sticks and foam stars and wanted to match them by colour. She had to put pink sticks and red stars together as they were the closest match. After sticking a star on each stick, she smothered the stars with glue (there's no such thing as too much glue when you're 4!) and added glitter to "make them sparkle and have magic". When they were dry, she took them to school and passed them out to her classmates proudly.
She chose craft sticks and foam stars and wanted to match them by colour. She had to put pink sticks and red stars together as they were the closest match. After sticking a star on each stick, she smothered the stars with glue (there's no such thing as too much glue when you're 4!) and added glitter to "make them sparkle and have magic". When they were dry, she took them to school and passed them out to her classmates proudly.
Friday, January 22, 2010
Thinking out loud...
I'll admit I started blogging because I wanted to do more with my kids and by blogging about it, I would have something to reflect upon. Taking pictures of an activity in progress and the completed result was like memory keeping but lately I've realized that it was something completely different.
I've always thrived on praise. As a Nanny and early childhood educator, I put lots of thought into the craft and activities I did with the children but it was the compliments from parents that gave me the best feeling - rather than the shared enjoyment with the children. I wanted to impress. I know the interests of the children were very important to me but when a child might have been happy to randomly glue paper on paper or do a regular painting with paint and brushes - I wanted to achieve something bigger and better.
As a parent, there is of course no employer giving back pats and compliments. This is something I have found hard in my 10 years of parenting. I now see that by blogging crafts and activities, I was needing something to show me that I am a good Mom and that I do fun things with my kids. Does a 30 minute glue/paint extravaganza make me a better Mom than the little to no arts and craft Mom who snuggles and reads endlessly or includes her child in every day chores by her side? Absolutely not.
I see now that the moments I need to cherish are the moments in between the day to day activities. A trip to the zoo is awesome but a quiet stroll along the local trail enjoying the peace and chit chatting with no distractions is far more intimate. The crafting might give a cool result but the snuggle on the couch watching the snow fall outside shows a child you have no place you'd rather be at that minute.
Blogging is about sharing thoughts and ideas and sharing moments with people, not wanting the follower count to go up to feel successful or obsessing when the follower count goes down, wondering what I did to lose their interest.
I really want to get blogging again but I want my reasons to be more true. If we do an activity - it will be because the moment was there and not manufactured. I ceased blogging in part, because I was trying so hard to think of new ideas that I couldn't think of anything at all. T1 is in school full time and enjoys spending time alone when he comes home, or is doing homework.T2 is in school too and as an independent four and a half year old, wants to craft and create in her own way, not Mom's.
More Mom Time is going somewhere, which direction that is...... well let's leave that to those who earned me the title of Mom!!
I've always thrived on praise. As a Nanny and early childhood educator, I put lots of thought into the craft and activities I did with the children but it was the compliments from parents that gave me the best feeling - rather than the shared enjoyment with the children. I wanted to impress. I know the interests of the children were very important to me but when a child might have been happy to randomly glue paper on paper or do a regular painting with paint and brushes - I wanted to achieve something bigger and better.
As a parent, there is of course no employer giving back pats and compliments. This is something I have found hard in my 10 years of parenting. I now see that by blogging crafts and activities, I was needing something to show me that I am a good Mom and that I do fun things with my kids. Does a 30 minute glue/paint extravaganza make me a better Mom than the little to no arts and craft Mom who snuggles and reads endlessly or includes her child in every day chores by her side? Absolutely not.
I see now that the moments I need to cherish are the moments in between the day to day activities. A trip to the zoo is awesome but a quiet stroll along the local trail enjoying the peace and chit chatting with no distractions is far more intimate. The crafting might give a cool result but the snuggle on the couch watching the snow fall outside shows a child you have no place you'd rather be at that minute.
Blogging is about sharing thoughts and ideas and sharing moments with people, not wanting the follower count to go up to feel successful or obsessing when the follower count goes down, wondering what I did to lose their interest.
I really want to get blogging again but I want my reasons to be more true. If we do an activity - it will be because the moment was there and not manufactured. I ceased blogging in part, because I was trying so hard to think of new ideas that I couldn't think of anything at all. T1 is in school full time and enjoys spending time alone when he comes home, or is doing homework.T2 is in school too and as an independent four and a half year old, wants to craft and create in her own way, not Mom's.
More Mom Time is going somewhere, which direction that is...... well let's leave that to those who earned me the title of Mom!!
Friday, January 1, 2010
New Year improvements
I'm not necessarily resolving to do anything in 2010 but I am going to try to make improvements....
Procrastinate less
Mommy more (too often things get in the way of being the Mom I truly want to be)
Complain less
Appreciate more
Eat less
Exercise more
Talk less
Listen more
Buy less
make more
Judge less
blog more
2009 was a pretty awesome year around here. All of us are healthy and were for the most part, we moved to an awesome house in a great town with a nice school and a fabulous grade 4 teacher (and a great Junior Kindergarten teacher also). We spent some fun times with friends and family, we made good use of living by a beach. The year for me was still chaos but with an underlying sense of calm. 2008 was a tough year filled with anxiety and agoraphobia for me and that was behind me in 2009. I am looking forward to all that 2010 holds for us = mostly good things I hope : )
Procrastinate less
Mommy more (too often things get in the way of being the Mom I truly want to be)
Complain less
Appreciate more
Eat less
Exercise more
Talk less
Listen more
Buy less
make more
Judge less
blog more
2009 was a pretty awesome year around here. All of us are healthy and were for the most part, we moved to an awesome house in a great town with a nice school and a fabulous grade 4 teacher (and a great Junior Kindergarten teacher also). We spent some fun times with friends and family, we made good use of living by a beach. The year for me was still chaos but with an underlying sense of calm. 2008 was a tough year filled with anxiety and agoraphobia for me and that was behind me in 2009. I am looking forward to all that 2010 holds for us = mostly good things I hope : )
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