December 31, 2018

It's new year's eve. I am sitting in my front dining room just listening to the fireworks outside for the last hour, with a few more hours to go until midnight.  I just got done re-reading all of my posts from 2018. I like to revisit what happened this year to help me gather my thoughts and reflect. I did notice the downward trend in number of posts since starting this blog, with this year being the least. Certainly not from lack of wanting to.


One thing I wanted to do was at least mention my son's birthday from back in October! He turned 4. We had a very small get together like usual and it really is just all we need. He's not really into big events and lots of presents, so I like that they are both happy to just be at home.
My son is such a sweet, sweet boy. He is a natural care-taker. He is always offering up his food, or treat, or toys to share. Just earlier this evening I sat down on the couch and he popped up off the floor and came and put a blanket on me.  For a four year old it's amazing how much he thinks of others. It makes you want to scoop him up and squeeze him! Now, of course at 4 he's testing boundaries, etc..and doesn't always behave...but overall, he really is a loving kid. I still hear 'I love you' at least 5 times a day. Heart melt. He still runs to the door when I come home and flings himself into my legs. His giggle/laugh is infectious and so is his smile.  Considering the fact that the kid hasn't slept well most of this year, he makes up for it in charm. We have finally gotten over the hump of the: to nap or not to nap....and he's finally made the transition to rest time, instead of nap. It was just causing him to stay up way too late and not sleep well. I also got him a toddler clock for christmas with colors, where it is blue during bed/sleep time and it turns yellow when he can get up. Can I just tell you he has stayed in his bed all night since December 26th and is SO excited to come out when it's yellow?! I started with 6:00am yellow because I wanted to be sure he woke up to see it, but my goal is to slowly move it to 6:30am. If he can stay in his bed all night and sleep until 6:30am.....I think we will all be better rested for it. So far so good and I really really hope he continues to love it.

Awwwww, my sweet boy.

Such a big boy now ;)

My girl......
I think by process of elimination we figured out that what was probably causing her persistent fatigue for many months into this year: growing!!  When we had her in for her 6 year old physical the Dr. noted that she grew 3 inches in one year....she said that normally kids grow around 2, so that definitely could have been the underlying reason for how tired she was all the time. During the summer she did get better, but now she is back to being pretty tired....so I am hoping it is growing again, combined with all day school for first grade.  That, and the fact that she and my son have been on/off sick w/ respiratory virus/colds/pink eye, etc.. since October.
As I've mentioned in earlier posts, it's been tough with her these past several months. I am feeling much like I did when she was three in that weekends are when she 'let's it out' and it can be exhausting. It really seems like every Saturday I can plan for a few meltdowns, arguments, she yells at her brother, resistance to most everything.  I did look into parent therapy for me in figuring out how to best parent her when emotions run high and I think I'll try it.
She is definitely becoming more of a 'big kid' and less like a little girl. She is only 6 but I think that's what is so challenging, she is very intelligent, and thinks of herself not as a little kid.
She's lost two teeth on the bottom and another one is about ready to come out on the top. She really is growing taller....her legs have really stretched this year! She calls herself a nature girl and loves everything science and nature. I did submit the checklist of the talented and gifted program so we will see if she gets testing early next year. She learned just a few weeks ago how to ride her bike with NO training wheels.
During her parent teacher conference this first half of 1st grade,  Mrs. Mcdonald said that she is a delight and such a joy to have in class....she is such a good student and very thoughtful to others. She also does really well in her schoolwork. She's such a rule follower at school and its funny, because of course not all kids are....she comes home and will tell me how Ashton doesn't do his work and can I believe that!! In her mind it's just crazy that someone wouldn't do it. I love that about her. Her fierce sense of right and wrong. Now her teacher....meh. Maybe my expectations are too high. I only asked a few questions about how they teach math these days because my girl likes to practice math at bedtime and the teacher discouraged that and said if kids want to learn more in math a tutor is a good way to go. Yeah....no.


One of my favorite parts of the day with her is after I put my son to bed I go in and it's her turn.  I kneel next to her bed and we talk about whatever she wants to talk about, or she asks to play games (which is doing a color game, or even division, multiplication- she asks me to quiz her!) Then when it's time to settle in we hold hands....then I say it's time to give kiss hug.  I kiss her on the forehead or cheek and lean in to hug her. And she whole heartedly hugs me back and says 'I love you mom'. I know she really means it.




One of her cool inventions: She named it: The CAT-ANATOR 5000

 

 

 "Cunshrunshins" (instructions) for her science experiment where she needed "ingrediens", "cemacls", and "gere". I thought this was so awesome!!

Bunny habitat, complete with a sky, grass, and a piece of plastic lettuce.

SUMMARY OF 2018:
Yes, this year was a tough one. It really was.  Looking back.....we had a lot of sickness with both kids, my son broke his leg, and no sleep for most of the year......work was tough, the construction house was tough. But, through all of those hard, tough days......we also had a lot of moments of cool family time and make-my-heart-melt times. I love my kids dearly and yes, parenting is hard. Dang hard at times.

JANUARY: First snow day in many years down south!

 

MARCH: We made this for the finish line of our dog obstacle course we made in the backyard. Of course we were the dogs and had races.

APRIL: Sidewalk paint turned into...well,you get the picture.....and looking out the window to see our family bikes lines up.

MAY: Kinder Graduation--throwing her hat up high!

JUNE: We celebrated Fathers' Day for our cat....he got two new 'children' and my girl wrote him a card: "Happy Foovrs Bay"!

AUGUST: First tooth lost and First day of school!

 

NOVEMBER: Family photos; Thanksgiving trip to New Orleans

 

 DECEMBER: Christmas Eve Candlelight service.....melt. Heart.





I am looking forward to 2019 and with it....some more sleep!!





And so it goes....

A few good things: I tried to see if I would like a fake tree this year as my girl thought we should 'save the environment' and not cut down any trees....jury is still out. I think I would like it more if I hadn't gotten such a tall one at 9ft. I have high ceilings, but man is this thing big. My sister's throat issue is a minor cyst, no scary things in there, so that is good.  I went back to work last Mon/Tue and it wasn't the greatest, so the work nurse suggested phase back in so I worked 3-6 hours rest of last week and will this week too. It's in the good news category because it gives me additional time just to breathe and rest.  Nothing is going to fix years of sleep deprivation overnight, but if I can just have a release valve for now, it's better than chugging through and feeling overwhelmed most of the time.


In the eh, could be better....lots to deal w/ at the construction house. The tile guy decided to get an attorney and threaten to sue me if I didn't pay him thousands of dollars. Gimme a break he didn't finish multiple areas of his work. So, I got an attorney myself. We are negotiating now and I hope we can just reach a settlement because I just want to move on. Will see.
Asbestos--after doing some floor testing we found out that the back of the orange vinyl in the main living area had asbestos. Since my contractor didn't think he could demo out what the new floor guy did without disturbing the orange floor,  I called 3 abatement folks as referrals from the testing place and one guy stood out--awesome to work with, been doing this for 30 years. He came in and once I told him the vinyl was 'hot' (industry term), he was surprised to hear the adhesive underneath it or 'mastic' was not. I told him that I was the one who got the sample piece and he suggested maybe having guy come and re-test. I also showed him the kitchen and some concerning areas (not originally tested) and he said it's best to just do it.  SO, the tester guy came back out last week and sure enough, there was asbestos in the kitchen underneath some tile they laid. It was showing as heavy asbestos content approx. 80%. In addition, the main living area that didn't initially test 'hot' in the adhesive did a second time. I'm not surprised as the abatement guy said it likely would have.

Old Orange Vinyl

Similar view, a bit farther back. You can see the counter and wall are now gone. This pic was taken way before floor guy got ahold of it and added many layers on top of that orange that has already been torn back out.

Basically all that is seen in second picture (kitchen where window is opening up to main living area) is getting abated today and tomorrow to the tune of $3500. Ugh.
However, it was totally the right thing to do. It will be done professionally and the air quality will be checked in the containment area as well as outside of it (due to checking for anything that could have been an issue when they first demo'd). It still makes me worried that demo work was done on materials that contained asbestos, but it was done. I actually didn't know the new contractor was going to try and get up the orange, thankfully I stopped him after he only did small area. And, it didn't even cross my mind to think about asbestos in the kitchen underneath the ceramic tile that was there.
The worst part about it is that my kids have been in/out through the construction process. I said this to the tester guy who has seen a lot of this and said that it had 'minimal risk'. Still......


I also just sent an email to my contractor that quit who said he would repay me $2,000 but has yet to fulfill that.....that he has one week to make payment, if not I will reach out to my attorney--and yes, I do have 'my' attorney now due to handling issue w/ tile guy. I told old contractor that I suspected he could pay what is owed now, or it will be much more than that if attorney involved.
Oy. Vey.


One other thing that I've struggled w/ lately is parenting. Clearly I am under a lot of stress and trying to manage the best I can. However, my girl, who is 6....going on 16....has been in battle mode. It seems for most everything. The worst of the behavior is I find her hollering at her brother all. day. long. Granted she has been sick for weeks and is probably exhausted in general, but I just won't tolerate her lashing out at her brother. Poor kid--my son walks around saying...."she's an-gray"...but as soon as she hears him she screeches out, " I am NOOOOT!".
I have told him several times that yelling is not okay, he doesn't deserve it, he's doing just fine, etc.. but I worry that her behavior is impacting him. I know for sure he is picking up her bad habits of:


obsession with saying 'punch' or 'punching' and play 'punching' all the time
when I ask to do something...it's No. No. No. No. No. Just repeated over and over again.
saying words like poopy and peepee, etc. at inappropriate times and thinking it's funny
wrestling more
yelling more at each other


Yesterday was a rough day. The minute the nanny left, my girl was in rare form and it was rough the rest of the day. I actually broke down in tears at one point because I just felt like I was not getting through and I was playing referee most of the day. Mostly trying to keep my girl from lashing out at her brother or me.


I will admit I looked at therapy or counseling for me and/or her to understand more how to deal with this kind of behavior. The outbursts and other behaviors are disrupting our household. I found a few therapists websites, that don't take insurance of course....but, I also re-read material on parenting highly 'spirited' kids and there doesn't seem to be a doubt that she is one of those.  Feels feelings pretty intensely, can switch moods quickly, parenting them is exhausting and can suck you dry, she is intelligent, has a fierce sense of right and wrong and fairness (boy do I hear this one a lot....it's not fair!)....will negotiate everything, bossy, etc..
I'm finding that timeouts aren't working and I don't want to leave her alone with those big feelings trying to work through them, but I don't know how to deal with all of it in the moment.
I wont tolerate disrespect and rudeness.....but I also need to make sure she knows I'm not 'picking on her' in a way by constantly telling her she shouldn't be doing X, Y, or Z.


I felt a bit better after reading some more materials and researching that hey, there are other kids like this, and yes they are hard to parent, exhausting, you will doubt yourself, etc....but on the bright side, I care enough to want to do the best I can with her. In addition, they say these types of kids are natural born leaders, resist peer pressure, etc.. so that is something. I don't want to pigeon hole her into a label, I worry about that some, but I do need some more tools w/ how to work through these challenging situations.
In fact, part of me wasn't planning to write all of this because it just feels so personal and perhaps my mama bear is coming out that I don't want anyone judge her or me.
She is an amazing kid and yeah, hard to parent.


I suppose if I feel differently in the morning, I can come back and edit.
I still want to put a few pictures of my son's birthday...back from October!