Baptism by complete submersion

We have the opportunity to send PJ to a brand new Mandarin Chinese Immersion program next year for kindergarten. When Adam brought this up to me I was completely against it. You know, you are suppose to go to school with your siblings, in the same building, ride the bus together and have your parents be able to help you with your homework.

I thought I would let him follow up on this new found “opportunity” and then secretly just hoped it would die out by itself. But that’s not what happened.

What has happened is that we started asking questions, reading more about it and realizing it really is a great opportunity.

And for me, I’ve had to ask myself “why”. Why I had such an immediate negative response to the idea and what’s behind that.

I realized it’s simply fear of the unknown, fear of not being able to help because I don’t know the language, fear because she will be alone and not in the same school as her brother or riding the bus with her brother or being in class with the friends she already has, fear that she will feel different or isolated, fear because it’s such a drastic change from what my perception of what her kindergarten experience was going to be like, fear because I don’t want to make the wrong decision for her.

At the end of pulling apart my thoughts and moving through my fears, I think my friend Jen said it best, “you will be giving her an amazing gift.”

I’ll let you know later if we give her that gift or not.

Lenten penance

I’ve just started a new knitting project. A friend of mine let me page through her favorite knitting book and I fell in love with this little crown. A project that I think is adorable and would love to see Miss PJ wear on her birthday…even though she has made it clear she doesn’t want it.

Not listening to her may be mistake number one.

So I bought the supplies, which include 3 rolls of pink crepe paper. Yes, I know…crepe paper. I am KNITTING a crepe paper crown.

God certainly did not dole out any patience to me as I got shot down from heaven on my birthday, knitting with this type of material may be mistake number two.

PJ’s big day is not until May so I thought this would give me ample time to try and make it. At the rate it is taking me to gently, gingerly and oh so cautiously not rip this stuff to bits while knitting it I may not be done until Christmas.

Hmmm, maybe I should have bought it in red. Mistake number three?

circa 88

And I still remember kissing those adorable lips and having butterflies in my stomach while running my fingers through that awesome “party in the back”.

I never said I was a doctor

To know me well is to know that I typically only bring my kids into the doctor’s office if they are REALLY sick. I’m not one to bring them in for a cold or a cough or a low grade fever. In fact, unless they are truly miserable, I just kind of ignore it and hope it will clear itself up.

For the past four days CT’s cheeks have been really red. I, of course, assumed that he just had chapped cheeks from the sub zero temperatures and have been coating them with Aquaphor. Not once thinking there could be anything else wrong.

Tuesday, mid-morning, I got a call from the school. The school nurse starts telling me that CT has a lacy like rash all over his face and infact ALL OVER HIS BODY. She went on to say that she thinks he has Fifths Disease and that I need to come get him immediately and bring him to the doctor to have it confirmed or denied. And in parting, she was wondering if I had noticed it at all before he stepped foot out the door that morning.

So, I bring all of them into the doctor’s office, where they are sure to catch something else, and sure enough he had it and quit a good case of it. The good news is that he is no longer contagious now that he is sporting this amazing body rash that can last up to four weeks and works its way down the extremities.

Honestly, I was just pleased that I was trying to do my part and take care of his chapped cheeks.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

This afternoon as my dad and I were hanging out in the kitchen drinking a cup of tea, I saw some animal scrounging around the back door. I had recently gone to Costco and left several empty boxes outside the door along with one extremely rancid poop infested diaper.

I went to the window to find the mangiest looking opossum I have ever seen. That little critter came right up to the back door, moved the boxes around and then stuck the nasty balled up diaper onto its snout and walked off with it as proud as can be.

I’m left wondering if that diaper is her Valentine’s gift for her opossum lover, her twelve children or for us and if we’ll find it somewhere in the yard during our Easter egg hunt.

20 degrees is the new 70

I’m not one to like the cold. My body type, the type that is perpetually cold, should not have been born here (ok, I was born in Michigan but whatever). I’m constantly cold. And the deep freeze of the past two weeks has put me on edge. One can’t even go out without your nose hairs freezing together.

Did you know that happens to be my barometer for coldness…nose hair freeze simply means…IT IS TOO FUCKING COLD.

That said, yesterday the sun was out and the temperature topped out at a whopping 21 degrees. I put my running gear on, ran around the lakes with my nano and could have sworn that I was in Miami beach livin’ la vita loca.

Oh what perspective can do.

Most useful cooking tip of the day

2 cups = 1 pound.

Yes, my day is that exciting.

Tales of a Preschool fibster

I’ve been hearing quite the stories from Miss PJ after school over the past few weeks. She tells tails of kids getting in trouble for not including others in their play, kids getting time outs for not being nice and still others being spoken to for just plain old ill behavior.

As we were talking I started to inquire if any of these kids just so happened to be her. “OH NO” she said and went to list four or five classmates that clearly were misbehaving in school, each with their own story.

Seeing that “we” happened to have a few problems with including others in the past, it was not too off the mark for me to think that she was projecting. So last week I told the teacher of PJ’s exciting tales, what she was saying and that I was wondering if it happened to be her and not her classmates at all.

That sweet teacher looked at me, shook her head and said, “Yeah, she’s been having some problems with that.” And then proceed to give us some new reading materials:

Share and Take Turns
Join In and Play
Talk and Work It Out

I decided to add Be Polite and Kind and the one on manners while I was at it.

Can’t hurt, right?

This afternoon’s game

I can’t talk long. I only have but an hour.

The game I’m going to partake in this afternoon: TOY RESTRUCTURING.

The parameters of the game:
#1. You need two bags: 1 bag for garbage and 1 bag for ARC.
#2. Bin and purge as much as you can, as quickly as possible.
#3. If it is questionable, get ride of it anyway. Less is more.
#4. I always have a hard time with this one. Never, ever be sentimental.

My partners in crime this afternoon will be…a diet coke and Justin Timberlake.

Please excuse me, I must be off.

Imaginative play

KP and PJ like to pretend they are Diego (Dora’s cousin) and Alicia (Diego’s side kick). They run through the house rescuing all sorts of wild animals and helping them get back to their mommies and daddies.

Yesterday after a morning of saving baby chinchillas we hopped in the car to go to Nana’s house. From the drivers seat I overheard the following exchange.

PJ: Hey Diego.

KP: Yah Alicia?

PJ: I love you Diego.

KP: (in raspy voice) I wuv you too Alicia.