Around Here 6: 02/03-02/09

A peek into what it is like to live in our home just this minute.

Intentional Outdoor Hours:  9+ hours (of 1000)
Didn't get more than an hour accumulated this week but grabbed some time walking back and forth between the chicken coop. The groundhog saw his shadow, so anytime spring wants to start showing up around here would be fantastic. hah.

Reading and finishing One Beautiful Dream by Jennifer Fuliwiler and also finishing One of Us is Lying by Karen M. McManus. I really connected with One Beautiful Dream from a writing momma perspective. I gobbled up McManus's book like any good YA mystery, sorry family for ignoring you to read - hahha!

Endlessly grateful to my classroom fairy godmother, Ashley, who sent new Spanish novels my way and a whole bunch of Dove chocolate hearts with a note to me and my students for a sweet February. (thank you so much, you are beyond thoughtful and I am so lucky to have your support and kindness!)

Patching Gemma's foot back up after Grey accidentally ran over it with the hoverboard at full speed (?!!) It was more like a burn than a scrape and it's been making her crazy all week. It's right on the top of her foot so it's in a terrible spot with wearing shoes all day at school, poor thing.

Celebrating cousin Brookie's third birthday at her house with a dinosaur party!

School party supply gathering as the kids celebrated the 100th day of school this week. Gemma counted out 100 macaroni noodles to take into school. Grey started working on a valentines day box and then he and Dad ultimately decided on decorating their fishing krill instead to use as a box (hah). Next up, buying party snacks for the valentines day party and writing out all the kids' school valentines!

Basketball season'ing with three games for Brandon's varsity team this week, including senior night (thank you to the moms and boosters who made the game so memorable!) The kids and I made it to the CT game where we hung out with the Stankans and baby Sukey (!) Only one more game to go for the season and we get Coach Daddy back again (yay!) Grey played in the championship game series for his Duke Andrew league. They won on Monday night and then ended up losing on Friday and Saturday morning to come in second place. He was so bummed but always a lesson to be learned in sports - even when you lose; mostly how to take the disappointment.

Teaching through Señor Wooly to celebrate Wooly Week 2019! Señor Wooly is this wacky former Spanish teacher who has created a whole website (ie: Spanish teacher cult) t in which he teaches through weird and interesting songs. The idea is to captivate the students in these odd songs and music videos while using total comprehensible input in the target language to help them understand and be able to respond. It was an awesome week and one in which I feel like I grew a lot as a teacher too. I joined the Woology facebook page, tried out some new CI techniques, and we listened to so much Wooly music. We had fiestas to celebrate including wooly-inspired food, students who dressed up as Wooly characters, and had the new song: Una Canción Original stuck in my head for about 5 days straight. (even my own kids and Brandon have been singing it at home - jajaja!)

Making shredded chicken and brussel sprouts, ramen noodles, pulled pork in the slow cooker, french bread pizzas, and little noodle soup with copy cat red lobster biscuits.

happy valentines day, b

B,
I posted a picture of us for Valentines Day. It was our first picture together, all the way back from the Homecoming dance in 1999. We weren't even dating then, but we had been flirting with abandon for weeks. Gosh, your smile and persistence and that floating kiss was undoing me.  So we met at Ang's house to ride together with her and Tom (who are still together and married with four kids too!)

The face you made when I came down the steps was everything rom coms are made of and 20 years later I don't know that I've ever recovered from the way you make me feel like the brightest star in the night sky; that night or any day since.

The thing I love the most about this picture though is our hands.
Your hands are so gently and hesitantly resting on my waist.
and my hands shyly and awkwardly held high and in front of me because I didn't know where to put them.

because even then,
even before we were anything really
the touch of you felt electric
like if we lingered too long, we might start to spark

weeks later, when we finally had our first kiss, it only proved this theory
because to this day, we corroborate that electricity passed between our lips.

Now, all these years later, our bodies have been carved and polished into a complimentary fit. twenty years worth of shared triumphs and losses and heartbreak and babies and pets and homes and work and worries and laughter have obliterated that delicate consideration as to where to place our hands when we are near each other.

we know how we fit together
and all these years later,
we are well versed in the management
of controlled fires

happy valentines day, handsome.
xxo

Life Lessons: Sitting with disappointment

Greyson got to play in the championship series for his basketball league this past week and after a win followed by two close losses, his team ended up in second place. He was so bummed (tears) and when he came down from the team locker chat, he immediately asked for me to check his grades.

I knew right away that he wanted me to do that so I could see whether or not he'd be able to play the xbox when we got home (if he has a C in powerschool, he loses xbox privileges). And I understood right away that he was feeling disappointed and he wanted to get away from that feeling as soon as possible.

*

But I'm his momma, and I need to constantly be playing the long game.

So, I told him no. No I wouldn't check his grades because no matter what he had in there, we weren't going to go home and distract ourselves from feeling bad. We were going to feel this for a little while so we remember how it feels to lose, to be disappointed and we can work out feeling better together.

And we went home and called a screen free break and we figured our way through the disappointment. Grey whined/cried for awhile (both about losing and about not getting a distraction in the form of a screen). We made and ate lunch together, the kids had some chores to do, the kids played together around the house, and we talked about the game and about whatever else came to our minds. We figured it out until everyone seemed back to balance again.

Do I enjoy to see my child upset or disappointed? Of course not, but I also know that in the long run, it is important for him to learn to cope with feelings of disappointment. He needs to know how to deal with those feelings.

The thing is - we live in a world of readily available distraction - literally at our fingertips. As a high school teacher (and the wife of a varsity basketball coach), I see every single day the way kids don't have the coping skills to deal with disappointment or adversity. At the first blip of a challenge, more often than not, my students' first instinct is to shut down.

Many times, students will go so far as to try to remove themselves from even the possibility of failure; if they try they might fail - but if they don't try at all they won't fail (nor will they succeed but the risk of failure is great enough that the possibility of success doesn't matter).

We need to help kids get comfortable with the uncomfortability of failing. 

some minor emotional discomfort will strengthen their backbone for the future. Those get-back-up-after-defeat muscles need stretched and toned for the million more times in life that they are going to need worked. We need to practice with small disappointments now so that when the losses are bigger and weigh more, our kids will be able to withstand them; whether we are there to help or not.

I'm not claiming to have the answers; I'm still only about nine years into this parenting gig. But I lean hard into those before me (thanks parents and in-laws) and I look to my friends who are further along in this parenting journey than me - who have kids who are kind and decent and that I use as examples to my own kiddos. My students who are most resilient and successful are the kids who know how to face challenges head on without fear of failure, because they have the experience to know that failure and disappointment is not something to fear at all - but a chance to learn a lesson and get back up and march on.

let's play the long game, mommas and daddas.

*Greyson posed for this 'disappointed' picture a few days later at my request. it was between smiles and giggling about modeling