flea

For starters, this time we actually camped, so we started out ahead. We camped at Doll Mountain Campground on Lake Carter (which is a fake dam-lake), which is run by the Army Corps of Engineers and has a shiny new road thanks to stimulus dollars. It was fine; a bit of a hike to the bathroom, and we had a Valdosta State geology class field trip next to us. While they were relatively quiet and respectful, they also got in after 9:30pm both nights we were there.

We had traffic and slowness and got there late ourselves, at maybe 9pm on Friday, and had to put up the tent in the dark. The kids fell asleep right away thankfully, but then Dillo had an hour-long crying fit from 3-4am sparked by, I kid you not, the fact that his nose was stuffy. mr. flea took him to sit in the car during the phase when I was nearly homicidal (I'd been up since 5:15 with him the previous AM.)

We cowboyed up and headed out to New Echota, the Cherokee capital founded in, uh, I think 1819. Most of the buildings on the site are reconstructions or were moved from elsewhere, but it was a pretty good site I thought, and the kids liked it. We ran down to Calhoun on I-75 and had lunch (and COFFEE) and an IHOP, and then went back up to the Chief Vann House, built in 1806 by one of the richest Cherokee, who worked a plantation with 10 slaves (let it not be said that history is simple, folks). I didn't actually go in the house, thanks to Dillo, who dozed a bit in the car, but mr. flea and Casper liked it (Casper told me all about how Joseph Vann drank too much whiskey.)

We picked up some hot dogs and buns at a quickie mart, and I had a nap in the tent while mr. flea took the kids to see the dam. To bed early, but then Dillo was up twice and then spent the rest of the night trying to climb on my head. Picked up some apples in Ellijay rather than pick our own, then home in time for lunch. Which I realize now we forgot to eat, oops.

So, 4 year old continues to be difficult, fall is nice, Casper is big enough to really understand stuff (not just whiskey.)

I feel like I have been really struggling lately, and need to make some changes.
1. I have a bottle of my antidepressant in my purse now, so if I didn't take it in the morning, I can take it when I brush my teeth at work.
2. mr. flea agreed to try a radically early bedtime for the kids. They are SO TIRED, and yet we cannot seem to get them to sleep before 9:30 pm (despite starting the going to bed process at 8). And Dillo (like me) wakes up super-early even if he is still tired, and Casper has to get up at 6:45 during the week for school and usually can't sleep in on weekends because Dillo is up. So we're going to start bedtime at 7pm today, brush teeth and jammies and pull the blinds in their room and read stories. Maybe turn the light off and read the last story with a flashlight, to cool them (mostly Dillo) down even further?
3. I really really need to start getting some exercise. I wake up sore and stiff in the night. I need to find a yoga class and GO and to hell with the fact that I have no free time. There is a $5 class on Tuesday nights, but it runs 7-8:30 and that would live mr. flea with solo bedtime two nights in a row, since I work Wednesdays. Really, a Sunday would be ideal. In this town, so many people have flexible schedules that there isn't much yoga available on weekends, so I may have to suck it up and do a $14 class.

Hopefully these three things will help me feel better. Right now I am feeling tired of life.

We moved the kids into one room this weekend, assembling the bunkbeds for the first time in this house. Bedtime is going okay - still too late. We've started with music at lights out (the Bernstein recording of Peter and the Wolf) which is helping. One problem is mr. flea is reading the crux of Harry Potter IV, and Dillo is bored by it. When he'd done I'd like to try reading to both of them together, whether in bed (chapter books with few pictures) or out on the couch. I think an "extra" birthday present for Casper (turning 7 on Saturday) will be an itty bitty book light so she can look at books after Dillo falls asleep. The other room (Casper's) is the playroom; I'd like to move the yellow futon couch in there for reading and snuggling.

It was Curriculum Night at school last night, so we had a more formal introduction to PreK and 2nd grade. Honestly, because of his home socialization and book-reading and his Montessori daycare, Dillo pretty much has all the skills they seek to instill in PreK: deal with others without hitting or messing with people; understand how books work; know letters and numbers. He accurately read "P E Z" on a pez dispenser last night. His fine motor work is weaker; we need to do more drawing projects, maybe while Casper does homework.

Casper is doing reading in a group with Mrs. H, in another classroom (they mix them up for reading time). She is with Nathaniel, who was in her class last year. She brought home guided reading books for the first time this week, and read them to me okay (reluctantly). Her homework often consists of "read for 30 minutes" and she says she does this at afterschool, but her idea of reading still does not necessarily include actually reading the words in the books. Mr. H, her teacher, said she is doing fine with comprehension and her tendency to guess at words based on context and first letter is a useful skill (this drives me nuts when we read together - I am constantly saying "look at the letters.")

Mrs. U, who is a parent whom I like, is the Spectrum (gifted) teacher for 2nd grade this year, and they are doing recommendations and re-testing this month. mr. flea wants to recommend Casper. You may recall she was tested but narrowly missed the cutoff in K; her increased maturity and test-taking skills (she did fine on the CRCT) should help her this time. I think if it were me I wouldn't bother recommending her again, but mr. flea feels strongly about this.

She's a little down about school right now and I'm not sure why. Complains she doesn't want to go in the morning; told me she doesn't want to do writing and puts her head down on the desk (which Mr. H did not mention.)

After school is still poking along; apparently they are interviewing new directors this week. I signed the kids up for a Spanish class at after school, taught by UGA students, that will start in a couple of weeks and run for a month. No word on Tae Kwan Do, though Casper asks about it. Dillo says after school "takes so long" so I really hope they get a director who does stuff with the kids so they are not so bored..

I called the Girl Scouts last week but they never called me back. Don't they know how hard it is for me to make phone calls, dammit?

We got a letter with Casper's results on the CRCT last night. There were three sections: math, reading, and language. To meet the standard you had to get an 800; 850 or more is considered exceeding the standard. Casper got a 825 in reading, so solidly middle of the standard. She got an 846 in language, near the top of the standard, and an 851 in math, just exceeding the standard. I'm interested by these results in that they do seem to track very closely to what I observe of her abilities in these three areas. So maybe the CRCT is about to accurately assess some kids, anyway. I am pretty sure they are dropping it for 1st and 2nd graders next year, as a cost-cutting measure, and I can't say I'm sorry.

We had a really hard night with Casper last night - devolving into asking to come to work with me today (promising to be really good!). And then we had a hard morning with Dillo this morning. Both kids are tired. I hope like heck we can get them to sleep in this weekend, since we are so spectacularly failing to get them to bed at a reasonable hour. Oh, the woes of June in our latitude, when it's light from before 6am to nearly 9pm.

I've got enough going on right now that I'm a little overwhelmed and paralyzed with it. I'm also really tired; I worked last night and had trouble falling asleep (was the sweet tea at lunch super-potent?)

We did get the license plates and registration transferred to the new car yesterday, so we are officially completely done with car stuff. We are still deep in the bathroom plumbing project (plumbing is done, but closing up the wall in the bedroom is next, and then we need to deal with taking down and replacing the ceiling in the downstairs bathroom), and we still need to decide what to do about the roof and porch projects we got estimates for. I have been doing more research on the house and that is interesting but also distracting me at work.

At work I am giving a presentation to a staff organization the week of May 17, and then giving a talk at a state conference May 28, and neither of those things are fully developed yet, and I'm having trouble getting them developed, due to inability to focus. Part of the problem is that I could totally wing the first, if I chose, and sections of the second (demonstrating a software which I have already trained groups on 3 times and written up a training manual). I need something to give me the urgency to nail it all down.

I am going to SF next Thursday and need to plan my packing & hem my dress, do some further planning for while I'm there, and worry about how everyone will manage without me (fine, of course, but I still need to worry!) SF-istas, my current plan is to visit the Asian Art Museum the afternoon of Thursday May 13, and would welcome a companion, and I have most of the day Friday May 14 unplanned, though I may want to sleep late. I've never been to Golden Gate Park, but wonder if that is too big a project given transport issues and my potential tiredness.

I spent a lot of this past weekend being angry at Dillo. This is a mark of my immaturity as much as his, I quickly add; he was just being a 3 year old boy, and a fairly easygoing one at that, but I was in no mood for endless snuggles and hands down the shirt and "play with me!" and energy. Sunday night was especially trying; he ate almost no dinner, ran about, took a bath pretty cooperatively, but then ran around the house naked and deliberately peed on the floor, and thought it was very funny indeed. I got to put him to bed and lie next to him as he said, "I'm hungry," over and over again until he fell asleep.

I went to bed angry at him and it was hot upstairs and first the ceiling squirrels and then Food, Inc. on Tivo woke me up, and I had to put the bathroom vent fan on to cool things down, and I finally fell asleep at about 11.

At 3am I awoke to crying in the living room. It was poor brave Dillo, armed with a flashlight, shaking with cold and fear and crying, "Mommy! Where are you?" Usually I'd have woken at the first real cry of his, but due to the fan I'd slept on. He'd peed in his bed and woken cold and wet. He climbed out of bed and turned on the light in his room (as he explained to me, because hew as "a little bit scared,") and accidentally peed a bunch more on the floor. (I guess he is well-hydrated.) I still didn't come so he got his flashlight and turned it on and came to find me. Such a brave scared little boo! I wiped his snotty nose and got him dry pants and praised him for knowing just what to do when there was a crisis in the night and I didn't come, and for being so brave, and installed him in my bed, where he quickly went back to sleep. Such a darling.

I'm at work and the sort of tired that my eyes cross and I have trouble focusing. Luckily I don't have much to do, but it still seems unlikely that hunting out a comfy chair in a secluded sunny corner would be appropriate.

I woke suddenly at about 11:45 last night and found the stairwell light on. I'm almost sure it was off when I went to bed, but I went around the house and the kids were asleep and the doors locked. My best guess is the switch was 7/8 of the way to on and the cat ran down the stairs and that somehow triggered it. The computer was not asleep, either, and I had put it to sleep, but I think she often wakes it up in the night. I didn't actually see the cat on my rounds, though.

I was then up intermittently between 4:30 (when Dillo required a visit) and getting out of bed at 6. Tonight I have to walk home, pay Ms. G for driving Dillo, retrieve Casper, feed them dinner (pre-made but for the pasta), receive the onslaught of my mother at 7pm if I'm lucky, plan tomorrow, and get the kids to bed, at which point, with any luck, I too can sleep.

First a brief note: Dillo slept all night again! Night five in a row! I am so well-rested I feel like I could manage Congress! Seriously, folks, I haven't felt so little tired in SIX YEARS. I am so not having another kid unless it comes with a pre-birth guarantee of sleeping 12 hour nights by 6 months.

(Of course, I am weaning Dillo on Saturday and he will probably stop sleeping through the night to spite me.)

So, Casper has been complaining since Valentine's that we never come to her school events like the other parents. Which we don't, at least the events that occur during the work day. And then Monday I was complaining that I'd had a boring day at work and Casper gave me the hard sell on how much FUN I'd have if I came to school with her - I could COLOR! So, since I am working late tonight, I emailed Mrs. E to see if it was convenient for me to visit class today. She said yes, if I came in after reading group where Casper is already highly distractable (confirming what I knew - it is pulling teeth to get her to read to me). So I showed up at 9 and stayed until 12.

I came away with a new respect for Mrs. E, who I think is doing great, and the aide (also, confusingly, a Mrs. E). Most of what I saw alternated between work on the smartboard or a flip chart (easier for the kids to write at), with the kids sitting on their squares on the carpet (or not sitting - more on this later), and work at the tables, a spin-off of something started as a group. They wrote sentences about animals (with drawings - Casper, with much prodding from me: "Pupes drink watr. Pupes catch a ball. Pupes lik pepul.") They glued a shape to a page and created a drawing around it. They counted, together, to 100 and took turns writing the new numbers (the 80s) on the group chart they are making. They sang about popcorn words. They went to the bathroom, quite a production, and went to lunch at 10:50am. I really enjoyed it.

All of the kids were, in the manner of 5 year olds, sometimes distracted, needing to be reminded to pay attention, fussing with one another, etc. Casper was one of the quieter and more attentive ones, but she too had her moments. Four of the kids (16 total) had some significant issues, were more wandery than others, just shut down sometimes, or had outbursts. Sadly, all 4 are black boys. (The class that day was 2 white girls, 5 black girls, 1 white boy, 3 latino boys (who were out of the classroom for a big chunk, I assume at some special language work), 4 black boys.) One of the boys who had issues is, I think, a mainstreamed special ed kid - he looked older than the others, and something happened that I missed that led to him being sent out and not eating lunch with the rest. Another is clearly very smart and engaged and good at the class work but can't control his temper, so sometimes when he was spoken to about sitting still or paying attention (like every other kid) would pitch a loud fit and have to go sit in his chair. The last two seemed very young for the class and just not ready to handle school (remember, we're 6 months into the year). I was sitting next to M much of the time, who was very sweet and wanted to hold my hand and hug on me, and craved attention, but talking to him was only slightly more sophisticated than talking to Dillo (who is admittedly pretty talky for a 2.5 year old boy). At one point something upset M. and he shut down, sitting quietly but not making eye contact with me and not responding to my overtures, not doing the work he had in front of him, just blank. He didn't seem to be working at the class level; could color but I didn't see him write any letters and needed help with numbers. The aide spent the majority of her time running interference with these 4 boys and the occasional pop-ups by many of the other kids. This despite Mrs. E changing activities every 10 minutes, doing motion breaks (jumping jacks), moving back and forth from the desks to the carpet, and constantly monitoring behavior, bringing the group back to focus, etc.

Thank god I'm not a kindergarten teacher. I was exhausted after watching them for 10 minutes.

I knew, intellectually, that the school was diverse and many of the children were from poor families. But it's another thing to see the diversity and see how some of the individual children don't have the same level of basic socialization that I take for granted. And I worry that the ones who are struggling so much already in kindergarten - what is going to happen to these kids in 10 years, when they are 15? J., the outburst boy, is clearly very smart and gets the work - what if he can't learn to handle things emotionally better? To what extent are these kids - the "problem" boys especially - already being labeled, in kindergarten, and what harm will those labels cause them along the way? It was all kind of gutting (though I loved being in the class and I loved the kids and their interest in me and their friendliness and openness). And I also wonder, what might Casper be achieving if she were in a class where all or even most of the kids were from families like hers? She was going to be pulled out with Mrs. B the gifted teacher at 12, and not for the first time - I don't know if for the gifted testing is ongoing, of if she's tested gifted and they haven't bothered to tell us yet. Must email.

I dunno if it's the shingles, the immense honkin' navy blue horse pills I am taking for the shingles, the psychological suggestion that I am sick so I am allowed to slack, or what, but I am about to fall asleep here at my desk.

It also might have to do with the bad week Dillo has had for sleep. He goes days in a row of sleeping from bedtime to 6am, and then days in a row of up at midnight and 4 or other random-ass times. Last night was the 4th or so day of the latter, and he was in bed with me in various locations all night except 15 minutes, and kept kicking me in my sore side. And now the weekend approaching, he will be up for the day at 6am and want me to watch the execrable Rugrats, which is the only reasonably child-friendly TV on at 6am on the weekends when I am too stupid to remember we own DVDs.

Yawn.