mathmom's blog

I have mentioned elsewhere on this blog (link missing because I'm too lazy =) that Halloween is not my favorite holiday. I mean, I spend the rest of the year trying to keep candy out of my kids hands, and I'm supposed to be happy about strangers corrupting my kids' taste buds ? (Not to mention the allergy issue, which makes everything more difficult.) I do enjoy the creativity of making costumes, but this year I got off remarkably easy. I thought that Eleanor was going to be difficult, because she kept changing what she wanted to be. I laid down the law: on September 15 th , whatever decision she made was permanent. All summer she talked on and off about being "a skeleton riding a bike." Not easy to make, but not impossible, I thought. But then on Labor Day we went to a party with a Hawaiian theme---they even gave out grass skirts and leis. Eleanor liked her grass skirt so much that she decided to be a hula dancer for Halloween. We then got a purple tank to...

I went shoe shopping with Eleanor yesterday. We had tried to go Saturday, but the wait would have been over an hour! Shoe shopping is hard enough, without trying to amuse 3 kids in a small store with tons of other kids misbehaving and crying and... Yesterday we waited 10 minutes. Eleanor has a problem with latching onto one pair of shoes and not letting go. She also has the problem of feet that are just on the cusp of the younger youth shoes (size 8-1) and older youth (size 1-3). The last problem is that she does not yet know how to tie her shoes (she's working on it, but it's not going very well =(. Combining these problems makes shoe shopping potentially unpleasant. Eleanor chose a pair of white shoes with a sort of quilted sides and lights. They were very nice, but they only went up to size 1. Eleanor is size 1.5. She wasn't really willing to pick out a new shoe, and the one she did pick wasn't available in her size. There weren't very many velcro shoe...

Luke went to the broom closet, got out the swiffer , got out the little pads that go on the base, got one pad out of the box (instead of dumping the whole box out on the floor). He then went over to me and tugged at me and cried, holding up the swiffer pad and pulling me over to the swiffer . I put the pad on the swiffer , and he went off, happily swiffering the floor. If only I could harness this energy and keep it going until he's a teenager... Update: a few minutes later he had taken his cup of milk from the table and dumped it into the 1 cup measuring cup on the floor. Then he had poured all that into a bowl. Then he tried to take the dishwasher powder and spread that all over the floor. So we have a few tiny bugs to work out.

I just wanted to recommend a few new blogs. I'm trying to make them non-political, but some politics seems to be slipping in. http://freerangekids.wordpress.com/ by Lenore Skenazy . She manages to separate sensible precautions from overboard hyper-parenting, and she's really funny at the same time. Also check out the essays she's published . My favorite is the one about skills Sarah Palin could have learned in the PTA. Cake Wrecks This blog has made me laugh so much I've had to sit down. It's about professional cakes that go terribly wrong. My favorites are the cakes that put the instructions for the decorations on the cake. Sand in the Gears by Tony Woodlief . He is a conservative, but his viewpoint is not the typical one---he often points out follies of knee-jerk (emphasis on the jerk) conservatism. He is also raising 4 boys, and his post about going out to eat with them could have been copied almost verbatim from our conversations. Finally, one I just ...

I read a lot of science fiction and fantasy when I was younger, so I was surprised when I was thinking about this list at how few books were on it. The other thing that is interesting is how many books I just remember a few details from, but not anything useful like a title or author. Half Magic and the whole series, by Edward Eager: My favorite is Knight's Castle, although I suspect I would have enjoyed it more if I had ever read Ivanhoe... Mrs. Piggle Wiggle by Betty MacDonald: I'm not sure when it happened, but I now identify with the parents rather than the kids. The Seven Citadels by Geraldine Harris: I came back to the Jr. High library to check this out even after I moved on to the high school. Girl with the Silver Eyes by Wilo Davis Roberts: I always wondered what would happen if I had ESP and other "special" abilities. The OZ books, by L. Frank Baum: I read almost all of these (all the ones I could find in the library, rather). My favorite is Tik - To...

Some friends of ours came over to play yesterday. They have 4 kids, from almost 5 years old to 13 years old. One of the things the Mom does when she comes over is ask, "what can we help you get done?" She wants to help accomplish something that I've been dreading doing, since it is much more fun to work on something with another person, rather than trying to get it done alone. Well, I set the older 2 girls to alphabetizing our library, not a small task since Amanda and Luke have determined that it is their duty to take all the books off of the shelves, at least the ones they can reach. They got about half way done before they went back to playing... I really appreciated it, and I especially appreciated that they could do the work without adult involvement . What an idea! We worked on cleaning out the garage, which had been needed for a long time. We needed to get the styrofoam bits off the floor, and she suggested the shop vac. I was willing to do it, but she cal...

This weekend we had the chance to go down to a beach house of some friends of ours. October may not be the time you think of for going to the beach, but we had a wonderful time. The weather on Saturday was pretty bad: cold, raining much of the time, wet. I hadn't packed much in the way of appropriate beach clothes, so I encouraged the kids not to get too wet. We stayed inside or under the house most of the day. Eleanor went down to the beach, but Amanda sensibly stayed inside. I had a chance to play a board game that is kind of like Monopoly, but much more interesting, since in addition to buying things, you get to do things and make things. Sunday was much nicer, and there was a trip to the beach to go swimming. Eleanor went in a shirt and underwear (I had forgotten her suit!) and Amanda went down in a dress so she could go wading. In fact, since Amanda usually doesn't like swimming at the nearby indoor pool (it's too cold, she says), I insisted that she not be dres...

The coffee paradox states that you are too sleepy to make your coffee until after you have had your coffee. We made coffee with a french press for a long time, but it took time and energy and intelligence, all of which are lacking before you drink your first cup of coffee. We thought we had solved the problem with a Capresso, a nice coffee machine which has a burr grinder and a basket that swings over to the water side after the beans are ground, keeping the steam from getting into the beans. It makes quite good coffee. Unfortunately, if you forget to set it up properly you end up with a pot of hot water in the morning. And if you aren't awake in the morning, you pour the pot of hot water back into the coffee maker, which melts the coffee maker. Which is what I did this morning. Hopefully Michael can fix it (his practice repairing waffle makers and clock radios should come in handy). If he can't fix it, maybe he can help Luke take it apart. This isn't the only machine...

Today Luke and Eleanor and Amanda were playing under our two oak trees in the front yard. I cam out to check on them, and Luke led me over to the oak tree. He said something unintelligible , pointed up at the tree, said something else, and put his hands on his head and ducked. He did this 3 or 4 times to make sure I understood. Given that the ground beneath the tree is thickly covered with acorns, can you figure out what he was trying to communicate? I think it shows that you don't need to know the language to tell someone a story.

These books take place "a while" ago. Mostly they give a good sense of place and time, and a child can learn a lot from them if she isn't paying attention. The "Shoes" books by Noel Streatfeild :England from the 1930s to the 50s---from the depression, through WWII, and afterwards recovering from bombings and dealing with rations. Plus, stories about being on the stage and performing, which I have no personal experience with. My favorite is "Skating Shoes" or "White Boots," which is not available in the US (except by amazon.co.uk)... Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder: Whenever I feel like my life is difficult, I reread "The Long Winter." At least I'm not grinding wheat in a coffee mill to make bread for my only meal of the day. I also really like "Farmer Boy." There are new books coming out about Laura's daughter, mother, grandmother and great-grandmother. They are pleasant to read, but no...

Here are some more books from my childhood and later. I read a lot as a kid, and these books are the ones that stand out in my memory. I figure that if I can remember them 25 years after I read them, they must be pretty good. I'm calling this the "Reality Segment," not fantasy, not science fiction, not history, just real life. The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin : This is probably my favorite children's book of all time. I read it in 3rd grade or so, then read it again to clear it up more. Then I read it in 6 th grade and finally understood what was going on during the second reading of the will. In more recent readings I've understood more about Sydelle Paulaski and the relationship between Dr. Denton and the lovely Angela. What a pleasure. Ellen Raskin has written many other good children's books (all quirky and surprising) but this is the jewel. Bruno and Boots books by Gordon Korman : As the FNDP (Friendly Neighborhood Developmental Psychologis...

Eleanor: "Mom, can we get some cacti?" Me: " mmmmm ..." Eleanor: "Because if we plant the cacti at the end of our driveway, the deer will think they are in the desert and not eat our flowers." Eleanor did buy one cactus at the grocery store today. She named it Morgan le Fay, after the coolest librarian in the universe (not really the character from the old King Arthur stories). It's easier to take care of than a rabbit, I hope, which is the pet she really wants.

One more post, since it is more interesting than folding clothes or cleaning the kitchen... We got pansies, as I mentioned earlier, and we decided to try to get them in the ground before they perished. Because of a misunderstanding about the size of the flowers, instead of 36 pansies, we actually got 54, a few more than I wanted to plant (I am just glad we didn't end up with 72, which was possible). We went out to the triangle with our shovels and the flowers and started to dig holes. One of the shovels is lost in our car somewhere, so I actually ended up digging most of the holes with my hands. Fortunately, I was just digging in dirt placed over the lawn, so it wasn't too hard to dig. Eleanor picked a pansy, named it, planted it, then picked another one to be the child of the one she planted first. Amanda dug huge swaths out of the mulch, putting the mulch and dirt on our lawn. She planted two pansies. Luke, contrary to expectations, did not want to help me dig holes. H...

Well, we went to the Diwali festival, and it wasn't quite what I had hoped. Not bad, but not what I wanted. First off, we got there late. Which meant that we had to park a long way away, which meant that we got to the festival even later. We arrived at the park just as the dancing was over, which was too bad. Amanda loves to dance, and she had fun dancing to the last performance. I think that she amused people, this little blonde girl imitating the Indian dancers on stage... I ran into one of my professors from graduate school, which was an amazing coincidence---there were hundreds of people, but there he was, with his volunteer ribbon on, telling us about what we had to see. It was hard to find the people we had arranged to meet, much less someone I hadn't seen for probaby 6 years. Eleanor really wanted to go to the bazaar and spend some of her allowance, but it was much too crowded for the stroller. We managed to get some food. Because it was so crowded and we were...

Today, we did errands: get flour from the bread store (freshly ground this morning!) get gas, get pansies and bulbs get our car washed (a free car wash at the McDonalds across from Lowes ---we of course got some french fries and apples and a coffee, so it wasn't quite free) grocery shopping (we ran out of OJ, soy milk, hot dogs and cereal!) Now it's time to plant the pansies. I'm not a gardener, and frankly I believe that the pansies will be regarded as salad for the deer that eat our day lilies. But I will make the effort. At the garden store we bought 3 plastic small spades, and I hope to get the kids to help. Maybe one of them will enjoy gardening more than I do. Luke is sure to like it. "Dig! Dig! Dig!" We plan to go to the local Diwali festival with some friends for dinner. This is the reason we needed hot dogs, so that I can feed Amanda and probably Luke. I'm hoping that Eleanor will try some of the other foods, especially when her friends eat t...

On Friday the girls were out of school, so we had a field trip to the Durham Museum. We had an excellent time. We saw the rocket ship, we saw the alligators, the drums. We met a friend from Eleanor's 4 year old class, and ate lunch. It was going great until Luke reached out for the slushie on the tray as I was carrying it to the table. Between the two of us, we spilled the slushie on Amanda's chair, my shoes, into my open purse, and my soda on the ground. Sigh. The huge spills of sugar on the floor did distract the wasps from our table, and we went back to get a watermelon slushie instead of the grape. The highlight came after lunch when we went to the remote control sailboats (between the two of them, Eleanor and Amanda sailed a number of boats. Then we saw the " ornithopter ". An ornithopter is a machine that flies by flapping its wings. The museum has a huge seat with huge wings attached, and a lift that lifts it 15 feet up in the air. If you twist a...

Recently I've been rereading some books from my childhood---I pretend that it is to find out which ones are good for Eleanor, but I really just enjoy them. Here are 4 series that I enjoyed then and now which involve experiments, the scientific method, and fun things you can do with engineering and technology. Although the descriptions here are dry (they reflect what I notice re-reading them as an adult) the books strengths are in fun, and in having smart, thoughtful protagonists (you could call them geeks...). Mad Scientist's Club by Bertrand R. Brindley . A bunch of kids do experiments and get into trouble. Probably the most technical (I think you could actually learn things about designing rockets and such from the text). Danny Dunn by Raymond Abrashkin and Jay Williams. 3 kids use their friend Professor Bulfinch's experiments to get in trouble. Pretty fanciful, but loaded with ideas about testing hypotheses, thinking through to conclusions. We only have the homew...

Today for dinner, in honor of the kids' aunt and uncle and cousin, we had: sloppy Uncle Joes, with Anderj juice, and Aunty pasta Amanda got much more enjoyment out of eating the meal after the boring names were changed. Even Luke wandered around the table, laughing like a maniac (he imitates his older sisters very carefully) although he didn't want to actually eat anything else.

Eleanor had many toys that she slept with, but she never seemed particularly attached to any particular one. Her favorite was "Sprinkles," a soft giraffe, but she never really carried it around everywhere she went. Amanda slept with one toy, Baa the lamb. We had a backup, who she eventually named "Mr. Maa ", Baa's brother or mother, depending. Amanda does take her toys everywhere, which means they get lost for the night fairly frequently. We explain that they have gone on an "adventure" and she sleeps without them for the night. Mr. Maa was lost for a long time once, and she kept asking him. Eventually she found another sheep, about twice as large, a different brand, a different color... "Look who's back from his adventure! It's Mr. Maa ! He got bigger!" A few weeks later, she found Mr. Maa , and then she had to explain the third sheep... The third sheep eventually was relegated to the toy box. Luke got very attached t...

Last night, just before we were going to eat dinner, Luke started wailing. He didn't stop, he wanted to be picked up and put down and curled up into a ball, all the while screaming at the top of his lungs. I gave him motrin , but it didn't help. So I called Michael and over the screaming, told him to come home as soon as he could. Since it was 5:30, I know that wouldn't be very soon, since traffic is awful at about that time. So I made Eleanor and Amanda eat their sausage beans and rice (several times I offered to let them go to bed early if they didn't want to eat dinner). I offered Luke a popsicle , and he wouldn't even eat that. Finally, after 45 minutes of uncharacteristic screaming, I called the nurse line. The nurse was helpful and asked a few questions, and then told me to take Luke into the emergency room. The hospital across town has a pediatric emergency room, and she said she would call them to let them know I was coming. At that point, I figured ...

There used to be a book called " snigglets ," full of words that aren't in the dictionary, but should be. For example, " picklessence " was the waiter's art of interrupting you when you had a mouthful of food to ask, "Is everything OK?" The " hozone " (or "hose-zone") is the place where lost socks go in the laundry. I have been plagued lately by children's socks disappearing. It was especially troubling when one of Eleanor's fancy socks would go missing, since she is particularly picky about how her socks and shoes fit. A few days ago, the washer came up with an error code. Of course, this happened just before we went to sleep, but Michael got up and investigated. It turns out the washer was not draining very well. Well, after we got the laundry out of the washer, I was poking around and found a hiding hole under the rubber gasket around the door. In that hole, there were about 10 kids socks. Later, Michael foun...

If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.

Luke has the normal 19 month old fascination with dogs. Here is something like a stuffed animal, only it moves! how exciting! Since he loves sound effects, his natural response to seeing a dog is to say " oof oof ". We went over to a friend's house for a potluck lunch the other day. The friend had a smaller dog in a kennel type thing (it actually looked like one of those fold down laundry baskets). Luke didn't eat, he spent almost the entire time bending down to look at the dog, and saying things like " da bka lskt ncal da oof oof dlkba sha ckalsdgf kadl oof oof ." It is becoming clearer to me that he thinks he's comprehensible, and will throw in words we understand every once in a while just to confuse us. (Note: he spent most of the rest of the time in their house opening all the drawers in the kitchen and trying to start the dishwasher. The hosts (who have 2 kids, one in college and one graduated) didn't know how to set the ...