My Sunshine

tinkering

I seem to remember when my sisters were little that they made all sorts of interesting little sculptures in preschool with bits of wood and nails. Real nails – so there must have been hammers. I can’t imagine that happening in preschool these days. And that’s a shame, really, because there isn’t much more fun (or creatively stimulating) than tinkering around a bit. I think perhaps we all need more of that in our lives.

just to remind myself

I am not a Tiger Mother. And honestly, I don’t want to be one. I need to remind myself of that every now and then. So though I have posted this before, I am posting it again. Some things bear repeating:

Manifesto of the Idle Parent:

• We reject the idea that parenting requires hard work
• We pledge to leave our children alone
• That should mean that they leave us alone, too
• We reject the rampant consumerism that invades children from the moment they are born
• We read them poetry and fantastic stories without morals
• We drink alcohol without guilt
• We reject the inner Puritan
• We fill the house with music and laughter
• We don’t waste money on family days out and holidays
• We lie in bed for as long as possible
• We try not to interfere
• We push them into the garden and shut the door so that we can clean the house
• We both work as little as possible, particularly when the kids are small
• Time is more important than money
• Happy mess is better than miserable tidiness
• Down with school
• We fill the house with music and merriment

circus time!

Turning 7

All the planning paid off. The Harry Potter party was a huge success! Crazy, yes. Chaotic, yes. But what else would you expect from a 7 year old’s birthday party?? I didn’t take nearly as many photos as I would have liked, caught up as I was in the flow of the moment. But again, that is as it should be.

The kids had a ball. They were sorted into houses (and very few complaints about the sorting – which concerned me going in) and were thrilled with their house scarves. Several kept asking me if they had to give them back or if they got to keep them.

The Potions Lesson was a huge hit despite the fact that a few of the older kids tried very hard to give away the secret, having just done similar experiments in science class. Raymond told the kids not to drink the potions or they would turn into chickens, then pointed to the hens roaming the backyard as proof. Hysterical how many of them thought twice about that one!

Then, despite the fact that we had snow flurries (for the 3rd time this year!!) we all headed down the street to the park for our Care of Magical Creatures class. The magical creatures had escaped, and a fabulous scavenger hunt ensued . . .

Back to the house to warm in front of the fire and enjoy the rest of the whirlwind of activities. It was 2 jam packed hours, and could easily have gone on for longer! The Bertie Botts tasting was a big hit – though I should have thought to have a “spit jar” at the ready since it seemed most of the beans were of the nasty variety and most of them came back out of mouths much faster than they went in! It was hysterical.

As you can see from the photos, this was a “no parents allowed” party to cut down on the number of people in the house – we ended up with 20 kids in attendance and that was crowd enough! Fortunately, with 2 families involved we had 5 adults to keep things under control since my mother was able to join for the weekend. Control might not be exactly the word here, but it wasn’t total chaos. Several of the kids said this was the best birthday party they had attended – and my mother even heard one say he wished he could do this every day! I’d say that is pretty high praise from a group of 6 and 7 year olds. The big question now: how will we ever top this??

Party planning: Harry Potter style

Today, my amazing little boy turns 7 years old! Funny, isn’t it, how seven years can seem simultaneously like a lifetime and like it has passed in the blink of an eye? I can’t believe he is growing up so fast. . . . and I can hardly remember my life before him. Everything is better with this happy, funny, exuberant kid around.

We are in full party planning mode this week! In just a few days, our house will be transformed into Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry for a 7th birthday extravaganza for our sweet Fletcher and his buddy Will. It is such a fun party to plan, and I am so happy to be doing it with my dear friend (and Will’s mom) Jessica!

Jessica designed these incredible invitations to set the tone for the party guests. Each is a personalized letter from Hogwarts, inviting them to board the Hogwarts Express for Fletcher & Will’s birthday party  – parents not allowed. We also included a card explaining that in lieu of gifts, we are encouraging guests to make donations to Backpack Buddies. Backpack Buddies is a national initiative
(practiced locally) which provides nutritional meals and snacks to youth whose primary source of food is the school cafeteria. Each Friday, local churches and clubs deliver backpacks to our regional schools containing 6 meals to cover the weekend. The food donations we collect will help students at Fletcher and Will’s school, and will have a far greater impact than a handful of new toys for two boys who have everything they need. Fletcher, for his part, wasn’t entirely sure about this gifting direction – he knows there are people who need things more than he does  . . . but what kid doesn’t love getting gifts, right? In the end, I think this party is going to be so fabulous he won’t even think about gifts.

We have sooooo much planned!We will probably pull out some of the Halloween decorations to help set the tone. I am also working on a collection of magical ingredient and specimen jars that are looking really great so far! I found the inspiration (and some great printable labels) here.

When the guests arrive they will be sorted into the 4 Hogwarts houses (with the help of a sorting hat borrowed from my sister) and each will receive a fleece scarf in their house colors.I made the scarves using scrap fleece on sale at Hancocks – the lot of 24 cost less than $20 to make, which isn’t a bad price for a party favor. Plus, it has been crazy cold around here so the scarves could come in handy as I’m pretty sure we will not want to keep 20 boys (and a few sisters) cooped up in the house if we don’t have to!

Then, let the games begin! We will have a potions lesson (a baking soda and vinegar concoction like the experiment we did here), explore our knowledge of magical ingredients with a “What’s in the box?” game Jessica has cooked up, and an if-you-dare tasting of Bertie Bott’s Every Flavor Beans. Actually, it is nearly impossible to find Bertie Botts anymore. At one time Jelly Belly was selling the off-flavor beans under the Bertie Botts name, but now they are selling a version called Bean Boozled. The Bean Boozled jelly beans come in regular tasty jelly belly flavors like chocolate and berry blue, but for every normal flavor there is a matching  . . . . ummmmmm . . . not so ordinary flavor to match. Flavors like canned dog food and pencil shavings. The trick is that the nasty beans look exactly like the regular ones, so you never know what you are going to get! The box comes with a spinner, so we plan to have each child spin, pick and taste – if they dare!

If the weather holds out we have a great scavenger hunt planned in the park down the block. We have a collection of plastic rats, frogs, snakes and the like that we will hide in the park. The kids will hunt as part of their house team and will earn points for each item they found – the more “rare” the find the more points they earn.

And then, of course, there is the food! We are sticking with pizza for lunch – can’t get a much easier crowd-pleaser than pizza.  And with the pizza, butterbeer of course! There are loads of recipes out there, some of which sound incredibly complicated. The one I found here sounded like the easiest, and with everything else going on I think easy is key. We gave it a test run over the weekend, with mixed reviews. Fletcher loved it exactly as prepared. Lola Gray, however, did not like all the foam. And I had to agree with her. The stuff is sweet – think cream soda topped with whipped cream and you’ll get an idea. I started out with gobs of cream and have been gradually testing it out with less and less. Honestly, I think I could just serve cream soda, call it butterbeer, and be done with it. But Fletcher likes the cream, so we will compromise . . . with a tiny, tiny, tiny bit of cream on top of the soda.

We’re going to split the feasting up a bit – first pizza, then some more games, then cake and ice cream. And to go along with the cake, magic color change sodas. I found the idea here and absolutely can not wait to give it a try for the party!

 

 

And then of course there will be chocolate frogs and licorice wands, a wizard hat pinata, Quidditch broomstick party favors . . . photos of all to follow soon!!

Oh! And I can’t forget the cupcakes! Will’s dad is tackling the extravagant Hogwarts castle cake for the party, but for Fletcher’s school buddies today, snowy owl cupcakes in honor of Harry’s owl Hedwig. How cute are they??

In case you can’t tell, we are having a ball planning this party! Such a fun theme – with so many possibilities!!

first words

At dinner tonight, the kids wanted to know what their first words had been. If I was one of those good mothers who religiously kept a baby book, I would be able to answer them. But honestly, I can’t remember. Isn’t that awful?

I do, however, remember both of their first sentences.

Fletcher’s first sentence was “I want apple juice.” We were in the parking lot of Home Depot, and Raymond & I were so shocked that he used a full sentence rather than just saying “juice” that we drove straight to the grocery store and bought the boy some apple juice!

Lola Gray’s first sentence was even more of a shocker. It’s hard to imagine now, but she was not as verbal a baby as her big brother the non-stop talker, and because I worry about everything I was just the tiniest bit worried about her vocabulary, which I think consisted pretty much of “Mommy”, “Daddy” and maybe “juice.” (Mind you, she was still very young and her vocab was actually perfectly normal.) One day we stayed for a church lunch after the Sunday service. We were in the line to get lunch and I was holding Lola on my hip when she pointed up at one of the lights and said “I see the moon!” I was so surprised I just looked at her for a second and then said “What did you say?” And she said it again!

For the record, neither of them has stopped talking since!

My life with chickens: cold chicken

It must be hard to be a chicken in the cold. Egg production is way down, which breaks my heart. I think we only have 4 or 5 of the beauties left in the fridge, and after Sunday morning pancakes we may be out entirely. After our stretch of getting 4 and sometimes 5 eggs a day, that is hard to take. But honestly, if I was a chicken in this weather we’ve had lately, I wouldn’t bother to lay any eggs either.

I do love how fat and feathery the girls are these days. Mike, in particular, has that wonderful fluffy down on her tush – just kills me watching her run around the yard. Warmer weather is coming, girls! Hang in there!

temporary pet

Ellis, the pre-K class bunny, is spending the long holiday weekend with us. The kids are thrilled. Poor Ellis isn’t quite sure.

Coming clean

They’re baa-aack! Ugh.

It’s time I share a dirty little secret with you. One I hoped never to have to share with anyone, until I realized that it is precisely that attitude that makes this such a tough situation. So here it goes.

My children have head lice. You heard me – lice. And this is not the first time it has happened. And, most importantly, none of us did anything wrong to cause this to happen, so get that out of your head right now. (After you finish saying ICK! and scratching your head, because you know just the thought of lice makes your head itch.)

When it happened the first time, just before Halloween, I was horrified. Disgusted. And hugely embarrassed. I mean, lice??? Panic kicked in. I had a babysitter scheduled for the next night (you know we almost never go out, so this was a big deal) and I had to call and cancel. . . . which meant I had to tell her parents, my friends, what was going on. We had a party scheduled for the next week . . . if people found out about this would they still come to the party? Would everyone have to know???

It was late on a Friday evening, Raymond was out of town, the kids were about to get in bed, and I had NO idea what to do. I called my mother and my mother-in-law, both of whom said go to the drugstore and buy “that stuff” but BE CAREFUL because it is horrible and toxic. (Gulp)
They said a lot of other things, too.

“This happened because Fletcher’s hair is too long.”

“You know, chickens have lice so I bet they caught them from the chickens.”

And while they may or may not have actually said “This wouldn’t have happened if you bathed them more often.” I know they were thinking it.

Or at least, I was thinking it and projecting that onto them . . . I was convinced I was the world’s worst mother and under no circumstances could I let anyone know about this.

It turns out it was a good thing it was late and I was alone with the kids. I couldn’t run out and solve the problem right away. We had no choice but to sleep on the matter, so to speak, which slowed me down, made me think things through a little more than my initial panic may have allowed. Once everyone was in bed, I did a little research – some of which made me feel a lot better, and some a little worse. Just in case anyone else out there is in the same boat, I thought I would save you a little time, come clean and share what I learned.

• Lice like clean hair! I was convinced this happened because we had skipped bath here and there, but in fact it was just the opposite. Lice thrive in clean, straight, fine hair – exactly the type of hair my sweet children are blessed to have.
• Bathing and shampooing doesn’t kill lice. In fact, lice go into a state of suspended animation in water and can live that way, totally submerged, for several hours – all the while clinging to strands of hair and not letting go.
• Lice generally spread by head-to-head contact or by sharing hats, hair brushes, etc. They do not live for long without a human host (only about 24 hours) and they can not jump or fly.
• You can not contract lice from birds or animals, only from other humans.
• Girls are more likely to get lice not because their hair is longer but because they are traditionally more likely to put their heads together while working on an activity. I say traditionally, because anyone who has a 1st grade boy interested in Pokemon cards has likely witnessed a scene common around our house – a group of boys huddled on a sidewalk comparing and trading cards with their heads touching! (Not to mention the Lego building sessions! And the wrestling matches!)
• Lice do not transmit diseases – or really cause any problems at all other than itching. And, you know, the gross out factor of having bugs living in your hair.
• Chemical treatment of head lice may not be the best way to go. Let’s take out of the equation for just a moment the fact that RID, NIX and other commercially available products are pesticides – and that you would be applying that pesticide to your child’s head. Instead, let’s address the fact that lice resistance to the permethrin pesticide has been growing for years and in an increasing number of cases it just isn’t working any more.

So what are we supposed to do??

I am incredibly lucky to have a pediatrician who is on the cautious side when it comes to use of chemicals – or any medications for that matter. I called his office the next morning, was put through to his NP almost immediately, and the first thing she said to me was “Take a deep breath, it’s going to be OK.” The next thing she said was “Don’t use NIX or anything you find at the drugstore.” and she confirmed the information I had already found about the dangers of putting these chemicals on tiny heads and the lice who are not in the least bothered by them. Then, she gave me a plan of attack:

1. Mayonnaise. Slather it on, massage it through the hair, then fit a shower cap over the mess and leave it there for as long as possible. Leave it on all day. Sleep like that, if you can stand it. It smells nasty, but it works. As a bonus, your hair will be shiny and silky once you get rid of the mayo!!
2. Fairy Tales Haircare for Children makes a line of all-natural, organic lice treatment products and repellents. (We bought our at a salon we found through the Fairy Tales website, but I understand that Ulta now also carries the line.) We used the Lice Good-Bye foaming mousse, which kills both lice and their nits, and the Rosemary Repel Shampoo. We also used the Rosemary Repel Shield & Spray for a while . . . and maybe if we hadn’t gotten lazy about using it we wouldn’t have gotten the little buggers a second time! They also sell a metal nit comb which we didn’t buy as the mousse came with a plastic comb – but if we wind up here again I am going to spring for the comb because . . .
3. Comb, comb and comb some more! Even if you don’t see any living lice, the odds are you will still have nits – eggs glued to the hair shaft an inch or so away from the scalp. And really the only way to get rid of them is to comb them out. One at a time. It’s kind of a pain in the butt, but once you get past the ick factor it can be nice to just sit and watch a movie and comb your child’s hair for an hour or so . . .
4. Blow dry your hair. Better yet, use a flat iron. Heat kills lice.
5. Wash everything. In hot water if possible. Anything you can’t wash, put it in the dryer on high for as long as possible. We were also told to put stuffed animals, etc. into plastic garbage bags , seal them up and leave them for a week – this is what they did in Lola’s Pre-K class with all the dress-up clothes. But this doesn’t seem to make sense to me. If lice can’t live for more than 24-36 hours without a human host then it seems that just staying away from those items for that length of time would be sufficient. Personally, we went the dryer route with most everything.
6. Vacuum everything. Your house will never have been so clean. Vacuum the mattresses. Vacuum the car seats and headrests. Take the vacuum bag out to the trash immediately.
7. Comb some more. Yes, that warrants it’s own number in the list even though I already said it once. You might think you have gotten rid of the little critters because the itching has stopped, but if there are nits left they will hatch in 10 days or so and start the process all over again. It’s a vicious cycle to break.

My last bit of advice I think might be the most important bit. Tell people!! I know, it is embarrassing. But why? Trust me this problem didn’t originate with you. You didn’t do anything to be embarrassed about and neither did your child. Your kid caught them from someone who caught them from someone who caught them from someone. Odds are good that everyone who has children or works with children or knows children will encounter lice at some point in time. And yes, there are snooty people out there who will turn up their noses and refuse playdates and act like you must be “dirty.” But really, do you want to be friends with those people? Frankly, those are the people who are making the problem worse – by not acknowledging that their child could have lice, by not treating it responsibly, by not letting their child’s school or friends know so that others can get a jump on the situation before it is out of control. Most people understand. Most people appreciate honesty. And the one person I told who acted snooty and standoffish . . . the next week I saw her child standing outside the nurse’s office before school waiting for a head check. Clearly she had no room to talk. (Isn’t that always the case??)