Party Time!!

I can’t say enough about the endless irritation of housekeeping. Sparing you the gory details, let it suffice to say that it feels nearly impossible to keep the house picked up. Any victory in this department merits a stopping of the world and a very extravagant party. Given that the holidays are upon us, perhaps this blog can suffice... And for those of you who have already figured the following out, I apologize for laboring this issue that may seem obvious to you. For those of you who are in our boat and could use any bit of help, pull out your party hats, cuz here I go...

Our typical routine in picking up the house is that everyone gets their junk, brings it to their respective rooms and then cleans their rooms. If we are feeling extra ambitious then we split up chores according to tasks. For example, Jossi will dust, Jillian will vacuum, Jeff will work on laundry, and I’ll do the dishes. Well, this weekend, the house had become a hazard of sorts and we had to face the music. Ugh! Dreading the usual routine (Kid’s fighting over who got what out, parents discovering children doing anything but picking up their stuff, and a 45-minute task taking three hours), I had a stroke of genius. Or probably more rightly, a gracious whisper from God. Either way, I heard myself announce, “We are cleaning the house but we are going to do things a little differently!” I proceeded to instruct each child to adopt a room for which they were responsible for everything in that room (picking up, dusting, vacuuming, etc). We proceeded to clean our respective areas and the results were nothing short of spectacular. I couldn’t believe how much better this worked. No arguing over who played with what. No sneaking below the radar. Each child (and person for that matter) had a very clearly delineated task. It worked from a developmental perspective because it was fairly straight-forward. No sorting through what’s mine and what’s yours, missing ½ of what’s mine as a result. It worked from a character perspective. Rather than take care of our own messes, we each served the family in a different way. In fact after everyone had completed their jobs, we toured the home, showcasing each person’s work, and affirmed each person for what we appreciated about the work that was done. Providing each child with a domain of responsibility yielded another surprising result. They took such pride in their chore that each child elected to do additional work. For example, one child decided that it would look nicer if the blinds were dusted and the other child decided that not only should the bathroom mirror be cleaned but the window, as well!

Now I do realize that the bit about cleaning house in a novel way may have added a little extra energy to the process, but I have to say, I’m still hanging on to the potential of some lasting benefits to this new strategy. If you haven’t tried this out, I encourage you to give it a whirl. Just pick a discrete, age-appropriate task for each child, and see how it goes. And, as far as the Verners are concerned, for the gracious little whisper that helped us out with a challenging issue, we offer a heart-felt word of gratitude!!

Disaster Averted!

I am writing to report a small victory from the trenches of family life. I’ll start out by confessing that it hasn’t exactly been smooth sailing in the parenting department. Over-full schedules seem to have blown up in our faces sending shrapnel of hyper-emotionality, short fuses, and exhaustion. My hope is that you have no idea of what I’m talking about, though, if you are a parent, I fear you may.

When things are extra crazy at our house, it is in these moments that I am grateful for tricks of the parenting trade. Those little tried and true strategies that can defuse an escalating situation and spare us all THE DRAMA! Well, this morning, we successfully circumvented a problem and I was reminded of how much I love a particular trick. It involves use of the imagination and I believe I ran across it in a book on emotion coaching by John Gottman. This trick is particularly useful when your child wants something that they cannot have. It’s referred to as giving your kids their wish in imagination and it allows you to align with your child, convey understanding, and ultimately, to stand your ground. When used with humor, it can be extra effective.

This morning, we encountered yet another snag. Early morning fatigue turned the “my jeans are too short” mole hill into a mountain of tears. I’m just as tired as my kids are these days, so my own coping skills are rather depleted. Consider that, much to my own horror, our 2-year-old mimicked us the other day by screaming at his sister, “Stop crying!” I know. Pathetic! Anyways, I found myself encountering yet another challenging situation marked by high emotions, and I remembered the trick. Instead, of my never effective “suck it up” speech, I offered the following: “Wow. I know you would like to have some longer jeans in your drawer. You know what I wish?” (This is the part where I mustered up some animation to my presentation… An early morning miracle and evidence that there is a God!) “ I wish I had a magic wand. And if I did, I would wave it and POOF! You’d have a brand-new pair of jeans sitting in your hands. Super cute, super long, exactly what you want. Then, I’d go ahead and wave the wand again. BAM! Then you would have a beautiful, soft, cuddly, brand-new long-sleeve shirt in your hands, as well. Then, just for flair, I’d clap, just like this, CLAP! CLAP!, and all the tags and stickers would fall off to the floor so that it would be perfectly ready for you to put it on.” Both girls began to laugh and offer their own thoughts and wishes. I looked at my daughter whose face beamed with the look of feeling understood, and I knew that she was ready to move on to problem-solving. I concluded, “But alas, honey. I don’t have a magic wand. What do you think you can wear instead?” Disaster averted!

A Bitter Pill and a Warm Hug

Big confession: One of the hardest things for me to do is to forgo the temptation to allow other’s mistakes to justify my own failings. If it shows up anywhere, it shows up in marriage. Lucky Jeff! He and I had a crazy busy weekend that predictably ended with a fight over getting the dishes done. Clearly a life or death matter! Given that we were both tired, I would offer that we each made decisions that were informed by our fatigue. Unfortunately, my way of coping with things when I’m tired is probably the most aggressive which often sets off our typical pattern. I get in his face, he withdraws, and we limp along in silence until we have the courage to pursue some sort of active resolution. Hours, days or maybe even a week later. Ouch! This time, I put our silent evening to an early death by hitting the hay.

It was upon waking the next morning that the haze began to clear. It’s amazing what a little sleep can do. In my morning clarity, I had to admit that failing to wash the dishes was not in fact a critical incident. In fact there are people who live healthy and vital lives with a sink full of dirty dishes. Not only was I recognizing that a clean kitchen was not a quintessential lovely household attribute, but at least one part of me was willing to admit that perhaps I had been a little difficult. This admission of guilt hesitantly emerged amidst residual chatter of bitter rantings regarding his "clear" transgressions.

This time, unlike many other times, I made the active decision to attempt to own only what was mine and to leave his possible transgressions between him and God. His potential wrong-doing in no way negated my poor behavior and nobody could own that but me.  Dang it!  And so I bit my tongue and confessed something like, “I know you were tired and I can understand that you may not have been up to doing the dishes. I was tired too, but I expressed that in an unkind way and I am sorry.” The quietness that followed was filled with the temptation to sneak a little critical dig in, but I didn’t. I left it alone and waited. A couple tears rolled down my cheek and my husband turned to me and hugged me with a hug that trumped all other hugs. His sweatshirt felt soft, his body felt strong, (Look out Harlequin Romance!) and I was filled with love. The reward of reconciliation far surpassed the indulgence of keeping score and I was sold on the idea of forgiveness.

“Those with good sense are slow to anger, and it is to their glory to overlook an offense.” Proverbs 19:11

Feelin' Giddy!

I encountered a bit of giddiness this afternoon and thought I might allow a bit of it to spill over to you all (And yes, I do realize it may be necessary to use the term “all” loosely... As in all 3 of you! :-P ). Driving home from a busy day, I was chatting with my husband on the phone and learned that he had finished painting a shelf that could now be re-hung at the front of the house. His words transformed me into a giggling school girl. You would have thought he said something like, “I didn’t think it was possible, but you and your fresh skin are more radiant to my awe-struck eyes than the day I met you.” No, he was merely updating me on the status of a honey-do. I know it’s a bit pathetic, but I couldn’t help it. I simply could not contain the thrill of no more nude brackets shooting out into our front walk-way shouting from the top of their metal lungs, “Look at us! We live with the Verners where projects are clearly started but never, ever finished!”

I don’t know if you have any idea what I am talking about, but as a working mom, it can feel like I’m running up the down escalator. I’m all too familiar with one step forward, three steps back. We mess up a house faster than we can clean it, eat food faster than we can buy it, and dirty laundry faster than we can wash it. It is from within this defeating rhythm that we still insist on adding those special projects, the most recent of which is our ½-painted house (Fortunately, we strategized well and as long as we don’t invite anyone into the backyard, it’s a bit of a secret that we aren't done!). In spite of the seeming impossibility of completing extra projects, I can’t live without them. It’s the extra projects that give me the sensation that I am engaged. I’m not simply sprinting on a treadmill, but I’m actually moving forward. I’m dreaming and daring to try new things. They are the positive thoughts of progress amidst the trials of day-to-day life.

And so I leave you with the following challenge. Can you delay the laundry or ignore the mess just long enough to do something you’d really enjoy? Plant a flower, clean out a closet, write a real letter on cute stationery to a friend. Inspired by news of a soon-to-be finished shelf, that’s what I did. I let the kids occupy themselves with the candy drawer so that I could take a moment to share with you. And let me say, it’s feeling pretty good!

Why I Love Being a Mom

I turned down the lights and held him for a moment before I sang him a nigh-night song. He rested his little head on my shoulder listening to a voice that only a baby could love. I laid him down, tucked his cozy blankets gently around his body, and said a little prayer thanking God for my special boy and whispered “amen” to which he yell echoed me, “AMEEEENNNNNN!” I kissed him one last time, whispered goodnight and turned to leave. My heart began to race. I’m almost free! A casual tip-toe quickly became a sprint followed by my own version of touchdown show-boating on the opposite side of his bedroom door. I made a beeline for the kitchen. That bowl of cereal that I had been craving was seductively whispering my name, “Come and get me! You won’t even have to share one bite!” Just moments after the milk bathed my mini-wheats in nummyness, my ecstasy came to a screeching halt. It was interrupted by a little boy screaming at the top of his lungs. It appeared to be something urgent. “Moooooommmmmyyyyy!” Staring longingly at my cereal, I ignored the first five to ten shouts. Eventually, I admitted that I would have to suspend the passionate affair between me and my late night snack. Slightly dissheveled, I tear myself away from my lover and head back to the slave cave. Making my way toward his room, the beckoning voice becomes louder with every step. I whisper urgently, “I’m coming honey.” Translation: “Please oh please stop screaming before you wake up your sister.” I open the door expecting to see him standing in his crib, but instead I find him laying just as I left him all nuzzled in his blankies. The only difference is his left arm is raised with his index finger extended. He looks at me and softly comments, “Boogie.” I fumble around his finger to find a miniscule yet sticky fragment, peel it off his finger on to mine, whisper good night and make my way back to my cereal, grinning ear to ear. Despite the intensely hard work, I wouldn’t trade this job for the world!

Ode to the First Borns

When my father was a young boy, he got his picture published on the front page of his community’s newspaper in recognition of bravery for putting out a local fire. What the newspaper failed to report (for the sole reason that he hadn’t confessed) was that the young home-town hero had bravely extinguished a fire that he himself started!
As my first born is getting older, sometimes, I feel a little bit like my dad in this story. As I parent her through new challenges, we are battling fires that, somehow, I feel responsible for starting. From the beginning, I have been the parent who felt the subtle yet irresistible pull toward high expectations, especially when it came to my oldest. I have always felt impressed by her and confident of her emerging abilities. Believing so highly in her, I have observed myself challenging her, oftentimes, seduced to realms beyond what is developmentally appropriate. I still remember with a tinge of pain, the day I took her to kindergarten readiness testing. As I sat in the far corner of the room watching her tiny hands struggle through the most rudimentary of exercises, I was overwhelmed with emotion. Tears ran down my face as I encountered with fresh eyes, the violent dissonance between what I had been expecting of her and this more accurate picture. As a tender green shoot, she had just barely penetrated through the soil into this thing we call life and I had been trying to hang swings from her branches.
Flash forward five years. As I now watch this same little girl, I observe an emerging young lady with a broad, and at times overwhelming, sense of personal responsibility. As her mom, I have taken on the role of trying to help her be gracious with herself, to accept personal limitations, and to give herself as well as others ample space for being human. I want her to be able to cope with the fact that sometimes when you do your very best, it still isn’t enough. I want her to be able to live with the reality that sometimes others let us down. And so I try to help her, and yet I must sit with the awareness that her whole life I have challenged her toward excellence, inadvertently lighting the match of perfectionism and fanning the flames of personal striving.

Dirty Monies

Talk about a super strange week! Jeff was traveling and all three of the kids were visiting family. I actually found myself with some extended time alone. Completely unheard of! While I definitely enjoyed the strange experience of finding everything in the house just as I had left it, I also began to notice a dull ache that took up residence in my heart. It definitely felt like something important was missing. It was particularly obvious when I got to spend some time on the phone with my 5-year-old. She affectionately shared, “Mommy, I miss you so much that I am going to surprise you when I see you! With pictures and money from the ground cuz I found three monies!” My heart leapt at her little expression of love. As I delighted in her cuteness, I was reminded of the strange bind of being a mommy. I LONG for space to breath, and yet as soon as I get it, I am thrilled bythoughts of dirty monies.