Project 52: Lesson 2

Triple A Project 52: Lesson 2

Listen.

And listen some more.

I'm not a bad listener, I swear. But I will admit three kids, a cat and a daycare business has spread my attention around a lot lately. I thought I was simply surviving in the only way possible. But as my lesson has taught me this week, either I was over-doing the great art of multi-tasking, or it's finally going to mellow enough that I can change suvival tactics. I'm not looking for the answer to what's already been done, but I do know the answer to the present: Listen!

This weeks lesson comes curtesy of Waffles. Waffles is the latest addition to the family, an adorable six week old husky/lab mix. Somehow adding more to my plate has made me realize how important all the aspects of the meal are as individual flavours just as much as they are as a whole.

Puppies pee. A lot.

My little jewel needs attention, a lot of it. But she has a diaper. I don't need to know exactly what look she has on her face when she needs to go. And, admittedly, she's one of the most easy-going babies I've ever met, and I hate to say that I do take advantage of that. But I also take advantage of every other easy-going aspect of my entire day, of every function of both my family and my job. I've realized this before, in fits and starts, and I resolve to try harder, but I realized just how much it's time to truly change that.

It took paying undivided attention to the dog while she's sniffing around the house (which thankfully isn't often! I'm so glad she's smart and almost house-trained already! I don't think I'd manage it if she was older, more active, and not trained) to realize that I don't give my undivided attention enough, and just how much my undivided attention reveals. I stop washing that last dish to go see where the dog went and make sure she's not squatting somewhere.I stop... for the dog. And if I can stop washing that dish and pay attention, for the dog, I can stop for my family too. Washing dishes isn't as mindless as I'd like to think.

And it's paid off already.

The dog is nearly house-trained.

But more importantly, I've laughed more this week. Naturally. Because the kids are freaking funny, and I've been there to catch it when it happens, while it's still really, really funny. I've discovered just how much my Little Fire's been holding out on me too. I knew, deep down, that he was ready for kindergarten. I also knew he'd never even proven he could sing the ABC's the right way, never mind recognize the letters or even try to print them. But I figured he had learned it, he just wasn't a 'performing monkey'. Well, give that monkey attention, and he sure performs! Ten minutes and a Magna Doodle and there's the whole alphabet in lovely 4-year-old scrawl.

Listen.

Project 52: Lesson 1

2013 Project 52

Over the past year I was drawn in by an old friend's new blog and an online project she had heard about called Project 52. The project was a challenge to take a picture a week for a year, usually taken on by new moms wanting to document their child's first year. After the year had come to a close this old friend decided to continue the project for the new year with a new theme: lessons. She wants to document a lesson every week that her daughter, and being a mom, has taught her. I thought it was a wonderful idea, and being the idea mooch that I am, I've taken on the challenge. For my purposes it will include lessons for me from the kids and our family experiences as well as lessons for them, inspirations and my hopes snd dreams for them, but every week will be some new insight into our family, about our family, for our family. And will likely include a picture or two every week. I'd likecto say one pic per kid. I've been meaning to revive the old blog anyway, a way to keep Aunty J in the loop as well as the mommy brain that will forget everything by lights out tonight. 

So here starts:

The Triple A Project 52: Family Lessons 

Lesson One:

Mama gets grouchy when she's bored!! (and everybody's grouchy when Mama's grouchy)

This is something I've finally put together after years of powering out of Christmas. I was also looking for ways to keep the kids from being overloaded at Christmas and stressing me out with the ever popular idea of holiday over stimulation. In my reflection I realized that for our family it's not overstimulation over the holidays that puts everyone on the edge. It's more likely a form of under stimulation! As much as there's people and toys everywhere, new scenery and tons of food, it's just not the right kind of stimulation. Sitting around talking with people is wonderful... but sedentary! New toys are great... but when the days are so full we don't have time for them, or we're so out of our routine and tired that we don't make the time to play, they're more anxiety provoking than stimulating. New scenery is good... but our routine (especislly with the well rounded daycare routine) stimulation is better. Tons of food is always fun to choose from... but ultimately it's all high fat and dipped in chocolate isn't it? There's really not that much variety when you think about it. 

So, in light of what came out as more of a whiny rant than anything, I've concluded that Christmas holidays (especially with as much time off as I took this year) are, in a sense, boring! I find after the crazy fun-ness of the actual days of Christmas are over, all I want to do is get a semblance of normalcy back and all I have is a messy house and too many distractions (aka lunch dates and opportunities to do things I can't when I'm working) that we end up forgetting how much we actually like our routine. And how much we need it.

Grouchy Mama.