The Mother Bear Surfaces

The hair on my neck is standing up and I'm pacing back and forth growling - one of my cubs has been threatened!

Here's the story:

Yesterday was Sierra's first full afternoon of preschool (last week was just an intro session).  We baked chocolate chip cookies in the morning so she could have a special treat for snack time.  I also hadn't been grocery shopping in awhile so the options were limited otherwise. 

Off she went with her little backpack and lunch bag.

The first thing she says to me when I pick her up, in a slightly dejected voice, was, 

"I have to have a healthy snack."

Pause.

Oh really?
 

"Who are you to say what my child eats?"
I think in my mind as my defenses rise.

Through some discussion I discovered that a teacher made a healthy snack comment to her.  I also recognize that Sierra is only four and it may have been a very innocent comment misconstrued by a four-year old mind. 
But no matter what they are trying to teach the kids why are they even saying that?  How many three/four-year-olds pack their snack entirely on their own for pre-school?  What do they mean by healthy?  Sierra had a homemade cookie and often I cut the sugar and add healthy ingredients such as oatmeal, whole wheat flour and flaxseed in my baking.  That one cookie had less sugar in it than many yogurts.  So what if she has a treat for pre-school?  They don't know how she eats the rest of the time, maybe pre-school is the only time she gets treats.  (not the case but they don't know that)  Besides, most fruit doesn't survive well once cut up and Sierra will not eat veggies for a snack.
I could rant on.
Seriously though, what business is it of theirs what a child eats?

(Yes, I was a little offended to say the least!)

Now I've since heard that more and more schools are going to limited sugar, such as banning any beverage other than water or milk because of issues such as ADHD.  I scoured the school website and read all the letters they've sent me in detail and the only thing mentioned in regards to the content of said snack is that it should be peanut free.

When the first thing Sierra says to me is in reference to her snack I know that it affected her.

So this mama bear phoned the school and confirmed that there was no policy regarding sugary snacks.  The teacher said it was a general comment to the entire class about bringing a healthy snack along with a treat.  I explained that comments like that affect my daughter negatively and that I would appreciate being told personally regarding issues like that. 
Like I said above, most four-year-olds don't pack their snack without parental guidance so why even tell the children?

 
I told Sierra that if she wants to bring a cookie for a snack, or if she wants to bring a fruit or something "healthier" for a snack she sure can as long as Mommy says she may.

Grrrrr!

My Little Eden

 I absolutely love my vegetable garden this year!
I sowed seeds in a plot of soil for the first time in three or so years.  Wouldn't you know it, those seeds actually grew and are flourishing vegetable plants - with vegetables!
 
I grew up helping my mom and dad with their large garden and enjoyed fresh vegetables every fall so gardening was not a foreign concept to me.   Once I finished high school and left home gardening went a little by the wayside.  I went to college, got married, lived in rental suites with crappy yards, and then when we built our first little house we reserved an area for a vegetable garden.  I was quite excited by the possibilities.  

But by the time the yard was garden worthy we sold the place and relocated. 
When we first moved back to this area seven years ago the house we bought had a mature, established yard complete with a garden plot.  So I planted a garden.
I pretty much hated it.

The weeding.
The watering.
The weeding.
Hoeing the impossibly hard dirt.
The weeding.

The only thing that kept my me going was the fact that I love fresh, home- grown vegetables.
We sold that house after a few years, built another one and now, four years later, I once again have a garden worthy yard with a garden.


This time I've enjoyed the entire process:
The weeds have not been hard to control.
Underground sprinklers make watering a cinch.  
The newness of the soil makes it unnecessary to hoe - much.

It looks so pretty as I stare across the yard.  So full, and green, and satisfying!

And we've been enjoying the produce.  Green beans and peas are it so far as the garden was planted late.  Tomatoes will soon be in abundance, then corn, then potatoes, then carrots...
Yum!

Ketchup Boy

Awhile back, while hanging out with a friend at McDonald's and visiting while Sierra played in the "Play Place", Sawyer discovered ketchup.  I ordered a small french fries for the kids and Sierra sat nicely dipping each piece in her little container of ketchup.  Sawyer, who'd learned to enjoy fries early on in his sold-food-eating life, was refusing the fries and whining. Huh?  Eventually I figured out that he wanted to dip his fries in ketchup too!

Since then ketchup has been deemed the best thing ever, no matter what the food is.  This is much to my chagrin as ketchup is not a tidy way to eat!

School Girl!

Sierra started preschool this week.

When I dropped her off she gave me a fierce hug than walked right in without looking back.

I cried on my drive home.

 

 It's not like I haven't left her before.  

It's only two afternoons a week.

But it's in a real school and represents the beginning of the passing from one phase into another.

There's a small knot in the pit of my stomach.

"Stop, time, stop!!!!"

No, wait.

As my mom said, growing up and changing is a good thing with kids because we wouldn't want to be dealing with any particular age or stage forever anyway!

P23X

"Who in their right mind does this?"
I thought to myself ten minutes into the P90X Yoga DVD for the first time - back in, oh, January!  I forged on, practically cursing as I "chatarunga-ed" and "downward dog-ed" and did "warrior" poses, wobbling and falling as I awkwardly attempted to contort my body.  Finally after nearly forty-five minutes (the yoga exercise session is an hour and a half in duration) I quit, stomped upstairs, and vowed I was never putting myself through that again!  

What a totally dumb form of exercise.
Bring on the jump training, the push-ups, the chin-ups and the kickboxing - but yoga?
Nope.

Fast forward seven months:  I have since made it through the entire yoga DVD with a different attitude - more than once even - and not hated it or cursed my way through it.  

(whispering)  "I even enjoyed it yesterday!"


  You see, I have determinedly began P90X again.
For real this time.
Previously, I was doing one weeks' worth of workouts over the span two weeks.  It was good with my schedule but other than getting me to exercise it didn't achieve any kind of routine or noticeable results.  I actually nearly made it through Phase 2 of P90X (there are three 4 week phases) Then excuse number 5429 caused a longer-than-normal break in my "schedule" and before I knew it I hadn't worked out in awhile and my clothes were a wee bit snugger than I prefer and there was a family wedding looming up and I wanted to look decent in a dress.

I am 23 days in of punishing benefiting my body by doing the daily P90X exercises.  As I was putting my body through the paces of yoga last night I realized that I felt strong.  I still worked up a sweat but no longer did I feel like my limbs did not belong to me or that I was going to fall over.  I felt myself performing the fluid motions with familiarity and more ease (not to be confused with easy) than before.

I have never sweated as much nor been as consistently stiff and sore as the last three-plus weeks - and I've been working out on and off for over ten years!
But I feel great!

PS I have yet to get on a scale. I'm not sure I will.  I'm not sure it matters.

Weekend Reflections

 It is Saturday morning, the sun is shining hotly with promise of another scorcher.  I slept straight through the night until 7:10 (sleeping in for me!), eaten delicious whole wheat waffles, drank my two cups of flavourful, energy inducing coffee and now I'm feeling a little sad.

There's a certain project that Trevor and I have embarked on in this last month and it has taken him away from us many evenings and Saturdays.  After dealing with the kids the other five days of the week I always enjoy having him around on the weekends.  Someone else to referee the fights and distract them so I can at long last get a thing or two accomplished is always welcome.  I was/am a part of and fully in support of this project but it doesn't make this any more fun and it has made Sunday mostly a write off as we try to recuperate from one week and rest up for the next.  We should be pretty much done after today.  I also have a little cold which never helps things and my parents have been busy or away so I don't even have them to spell me off.  I feel for single parents, or families where one parent is gone a lot, or even families that don't have extended relatives close by for help.

Now it is Sunday evening and as predicted today was the "day of rest" we needed.  As we sat outside this evening after another gloriously hot day the sun was already set before 9 o'clock and darkness was setting in.  Alas, summer is gradually drawing to a close.  I'm not ready for that yet.  I'm loving the heat and ability to be outside any time and the lack of schedule.  I stared at a yard that did not get nearly the attention I had hopes for.  Oh well, there's always next year.

My (Lack of) Sanitary Practices

Sierra and I had just finished baking scrumptious peanut butter molasses cookies and the kitchen had become its usual disaster when such an activity occurs.  Sugar, flour and who-knows-what-else decorated the counters and floor.  I turned and looked at Sierra just as she pulled the dish towel from the stove and wiped the sugar/flour crumb mixture from the bottoms of her feet and then hung the towel back where it came from to be used later.  Then, the other day after my dad spilled some water on the floor he sopped it up with my dish towel, hung it back up, and it was likely used to wipe dry a dish or too the next day.

I'm being honest here.  This is what goes on in my house.

 

Ideally, there would be a hand drying towel and a dish drying towel. A dish cloth for dishes and counters as well as one for the floor messes. I know quite a few people who are successful with this system, and those of them with young kids I especially applaud.  I can totally see how this would be much more sanitary!
Someday I may strive to attain this higher standard but it is so not even remotely realistic in my world. 

In the mean time, my dish cloths and towels get used for everything from feet to mouths to dishes to floors.

Gross?

Perhaps.

I apologize if I am appalling you.  But this is the cloth/towel situation in my house.  In the moment of a spill I can't be bothered to worry about which cloth/towel to grab.

I do try to change them frequently but there are admittedly days where after wiping a spill on floor the same towel/cloth is used on a clean dish.