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November/December '02 --the latest incarnation

post #1 of 404
Thread Starter 
Okay, here it is. A new thread. :LOL

Eli is cute and handsome and I love to kiss and squish his BeanBean Babyness. :LOL
post #2 of 404
thanks for starting this!

We are on chicken pox watch right now. The times is ticking away and no pox : She got exposed from a vaxed kid a day care. This was the best thing for us as she can still go to dc while she is possibly contagious. I really hope she gets it. (although I must say it does feel weird to hope she gets sick )

post #3 of 404
casina- I LOVED your thought on kids having "issues"- they don't have an "issue" unless people make it an issue. Kids are just kids, they are unique and individual, and they don't have "problems" unless someone says they do (like people telling me my kid has an un-natural attachment and addiction to my breast... UN-NATURAL???!?) Anyway, that thought made me feel good. I'm getting "advice" from every end possible about how we're spoiling our son and he shouldn't sleep with us and shouldn't be using my boob as a pacifier and such. (I'm sorry, I thought he was MY child, and I could parent him however I wanted?) He's still so much of a ~baby~ to me... 17 months in the whole scheme of life is NOTHING. He can nurse until he's 4 for all I care! He'll still be a baby to me...

We had chicken pox here, too. DH was so excited, he called all his friends with kids to come over for a Chicken Pox Party, LOL. Most of them had already been vaxed, though. Crystal had been vaxed and she still got a mild case due to her weak immune system. Julianna just got a few bumps on her legs (we thought they were bug bites from the lake) and had a fever for a day. We never would have known she had the Pox if Crystal hadn't broken out all over her face a few days later. Then it was like a lightbulb moment- "OH! That's what they were!" It was quick and painless and now we're done with the chicken pox in this house I would highly suggest getting your kids exposed while they're still young. I've heard that babies get a milder case of them usually, unless there are underlying health issues or decreased immune response, etc. Like I said, we hardly even noticed the babies' symptoms at all...
post #4 of 404
PS, It takes 7-14 days after exposure to break out with the Pox. They are no longer contagious after they break out.
post #5 of 404
Thread Starter 
I've been kind of wondering how Eli will get the chicken pox, since everyone seems to get vaccinated these days (it's a requirement now for school attendance in PA). But then, he did manage to get the measles somehow... so I guess I shouldn't worry just yet. :LOL
post #6 of 404
casina~I am interested in unschooling my DD once she gets old enough. That means that you don't use any sort of curriculam, right? They just learn what they need to. How did you face your family on this issue? Because I know to most people, not going to school is just the worst, especially the older generation. What do you usually do with your kids in a day. Do they read a lot? Sorry for all the questions.... do they drive you nuts by always being there, hanging off of your legs?
post #7 of 404
We are most likely going to homeschool. I was homsechooled until I got my GED at 16 and started college, and I loved it! We'd definitely get the kids involved in a homeschool group, and 4H, and church and stuff, so the kids can have some interaction and structure. I'm so excited- my mom has already started sending me all her homsechooling info. about books and curriculum and stuff. I like the idea of letting the kids learn at their own pace. My parents were able to travel whenever they wanted and take us along so we learned a lot just from being exposed to different environments.
post #8 of 404
DecemberSun your mom sounds pretty progressive. How great for you. As well as homeschooling I seem to remember that you said she nursed you till you were 3 or thereabouts.
post #9 of 404
Thread Starter 
I am/will be homeschooling all my kids, but I'm definately not an unschooler and never will be. :LOL I'm way too anal to pull that off. Plus, it seems to me that (ironically enough) in a state like mine (second most stringent set of laws regarding homeschooling in the union) it would actually require more organization on my part to unschool. I'd have to work harder to make sure that I was doing everything I needed to to meet the requirements of the state. It's a real pain in the neck, so even if I was naturally inclined that way, I'd likely have reconsidered after reading over the state laws.

My mom totally understands why I want to homeschool, and while the IL's weren't terribly enthusiastic about it, they have to concede that I've got my s*** in gear. (Without ever saying the s word, of course!) :LOL SIL is a teacher at a *very* conservative, private, parochial school. She has some strong feelings about homeschooling, but I think that in her mind she sees it as a step in the 'right' direction. She totally subscribes to that elitist bunk that they push on private school kids.
post #10 of 404
casina i think it is interesting that you think your kids have led you to parent the way you do. I totally agree. Erin would never have been in our bed if she had been a laid back baby! There's a section in the baby book by dr. sears that talks about the personality of parent and personality of baby. I've often thought that if I didn't breastfeed and didn't have such a fussy baby, then I wouldn't know her NEARLY as well as I do.

chicken pox -- send it my way. Although I thought erin might have gotten it before, she hasn't really had it.

sandals...want to see pictures! Especially of the cheapo diaper bag. I too regret my diaper bag purchase. Next bag will be different and more durable!

we went to a petting farm today (chicken, bunny, llama, goats, lambs). Erin was afraid of everything! But that was ok. I think she really got a lot out of seeing irl what the animals look like. Right before we were leaving erin said "chickie" directed toward the chickens.

and I also realized that i need to bring erin out to a playing field daily and just give her room to run!! She had more fun running on the dirt road at the farm than she did looking at the animals. Hmmm, tomorrow looks good! I know just the place for baby and the dog -- a semi-contained soccer field.
post #11 of 404
hey ladies. no, i don't have a curriculum, it is child led which is the same as how they learn as babies and how i learn anything now: curiosity, asking people for information, research with library and online, trial and error and learning from consequences. it is really hard for me and the folks. taiwanese pride themselves on education. basically i just can't talk to my parents about it. my mom just about made me crazy when damen was on his back and i was pg and tired and reed and clay fought all day. she could not understand why i would not take at least a "free" break by putting reed in school. me and dh did go to an open house awhile back and that only made us more convinced to homeschool, though i was tempted by having the community. my parents will probably get weirder when reed is closer to seven, which is the legal age, and just to let some of you ladies know, quite a magic number for a child from what i can see, as well as five.

my mom gives me a hard time about everything without saying a word, and i just try to pretend i'm not getting the signal since the disapproval is useless to me. maybe it's easier knowing i can't please her. she still gets upset about my sagging belly. it's not even her own body!

my inlaws i think have given up on saying anything to us. they are good people though insane like any family and ironically my mil started teaching in public school this spring. she teaches middle school math and she told me one class where she spent the entire period working to get her class to admit that the radius is half of the diameter. scary.

curriculum is really for the parents and in some places for the state to feel you are doing okay. i'm still drawn towards the school supplies in the fall. i know many ladies that mix curriculums and do what works for the child. unschooling i find magical. it means his thinking is quite original, and it is fascinating to be part of. i'm also of the mind that learning to cook a decent meal or speak for yourself or be savvy with money is more important than calculus or classics.

the other big thing i never expected is that he has an intense relationship with not only me and dh, but with his siblings, that he would not have if he were in school. he and ruby are peas in a pod. they totally understand each other, and it is a marvelous thing, their being together.

i did not know i would be homeschooling or unschooling until recently and i'm still not solid when strangers ask me where he goes to school. i will also go one and say that most the schools here are just storage facilities, and that the standard of parenting or lifestyle is pretty low here. and there is a big christian homeschooling community here, though i'm in a non religious based group. it's the deep south. people selfishly do whatever they want here, and it is okay for what i want for now. it's just how it happenned. if we had stayed in mpls, i find it hard to think i would be doing things this way. maybe i'm more rebellious because of where i live.

if reed wants to try school later on, he can. he helped make the choice when we talked about it when he was four. we didn't paint the prettiest picture though we really said very little. we told him that he would be there all day everyday and could only eat when they said he could for breakfast and lunch, and that he could run for twenty minutes after lunch and at pe once a week. and that he would have to wake up early no matter what, and go to the bathroom only once or twice with permission, and could not have cold water with him, and would have to nap or stay quiet during that time. i can't get over these simple physical issues! he can barely sit still or stay quiet ever and hasn't napped since turning two. he asked what he would learn, and this we did ask at the open house of the gifted school: they expected the finishing kindergarteners to recognize their letters and count to 100. so he went ahead and learned those things that week.

the homeschool group is a big deal for me it is a social connection. i would not homeschool isolated. ideally, everyone i know would live on my street and the street behind and our kids would run open amongst the yards and learn everything from everybody.

one more thing. most educators agree that kids are getting maybe three hours a day of actual learning at school. something to chew on if you are already staying home. also, boys benefit from being held back a year or so, though i didn't feel i would have had this option since reed is such a talker and big (an inch away from four feet tall.....i think i was this height at nine. no wonder my mom is so impatient with him)

aack! sorry i wrote so much, though i don't have the heart to delete now...
post #12 of 404
casina~I loved your detailed account of unschooling. Do you speak another language (is taiwanese a language? Sorry for my ignorance) Or is is cantonese or manderine that your parents speak? Do you speak it to your kids too? I ask because my partner is french-canadian, and I would love if my DD learned some french. I wonder if it's hard for kids to learn another language if they are not exposed to it every day.
post #13 of 404
Language--up to nine months babies make the sounds found in every single world dialect, the clicking, the dipthongs and so forth. By the time they're 9 mos their ears start to take shape around the familiar language spoken around them and they start to create a paradigm for it, that is, their tongues begin to literally shape themselves around those sounds. Again I am struck by the physicality of language.

Originally Posted by Casina
they expected the finishing kindergartners to recognize their letters and count to 100
There is something very disheartening about this, the discrepancy between where children are emotionally/psychically/intellectually and what is expected of them by their culture.
post #14 of 404
my parents were pretty serious about us learning taiwanese. i'm the eldest of three. they only spoke that to me, and i learned english from sesame street, my mom's soaps and eventually school. my use of it now is rickety, though when i went to taiwan in january it was better than it had been in over ten years, i think because i am listening much better with kids. though most chinese type cultures are highcontext which means what you say does not necessarily mean the same. it has taken me years to figure this out with marriage to my very literal dh.

no, i don't speak much of it with my children though they know the words for different poo poo jokes. by the time we left taiwan in three weeks reed could understand more of what was going on, and the question he asked that still amazes me was "why aren't you speaking as much taiwanese anymore?" when in fact i was speaking less english. definitely the more exposure the better, the earlier the better. you don't have to worry about them learning more than one language at a time, somehow people figure that out.

i think there is something about immersion in a language that is natural, kind of like nursing for me. sometimes of something doesn't feel as right and i'm not fluent enough to speak it all the time (a murky issue where my parents pressured me too far and also refused to teach us chinese due to political reasons though we were just hurt that they used it as a secret language), and i've never really been big on talking to my kids, like my dh and some of my friends. it tends to get in the way for me.

hope, that was a standard that this "gifted" school was using that i know they can attempt to enforce but the learning is not the same. for example most of the several unschooling boys i know up to eight are not reading nor hardly writing and want to but it just hasn't clicked and they lack the fine motor skill, while the girls are at a totally different pace. i'm really struck by the difference of sexes these days.
post #15 of 404
ack! I missed the part about us starting a new thread (now that the email notifications actually have the message in it, I don't click on every one--but eventually you stop getting notified! :LOL). Whoops!

Jacob goes to school. He loves it. I will homeschool him in a heartbeat if school ever becomes a source of angst for him. Right now, though, he looks forward to every day. He actually was just enrolled in the gifted program a few weeks ago.

I was one that LOVED school. I was involved in EVERYTHING--had tons of friends--never wanted to miss a day, so I don't want to pull him out if he's loving it. I have no issues with the school, which makes it so much easier to send him there.

I have several homeschooling friends online. The range from unschoolers to rigid homeschoolers. I would probably fall somewhere in the middle. I like to have a plan, but wouldn't ever worry if we didn't get to doing "school" some days because we were busy. I would have to keep my records well or I would worry about things.
post #16 of 404
Not really sure if this is an update post or just about school but I am just going to update!

Maxi is becoming more and more his Papi! He has a crazy sense of humor and a HUGE vocabulary now. He is even putting two words together.

He is crazy over animals and loves to make the animals sounds of the different animals on his cloth diapers.

He is in preschool now (since mon.) but more out of necessity for day care than because I want him in school. He is doing VERY well there and learning a ton already, even after on 3 days. He is already attached to some of the other toddlers and when we pull up in front of the school he points and asks "Friends?"

So that is about it for us for now!
post #17 of 404
I am still waiting to hear about pre-school for Christopher. The last time I talked to the director, he was still on the waiting list, but there were two opening for boys in his class and he is number 2 on the list. The director told me once they hired another teacher, they would release those spots. The waiting drives me nuts. I think I will call them tomorrow and see if I can get an update.
post #18 of 404
hello. i havnt been on mothering for a while, its nice to see that you are all still chatting. thanks for the unschooling info casina.
i have had such a stressful morning. my ds climbed up onto my sewing desk fell off taking the machine down with him smashed his head onto the cement floor, bumped his nose and the 50lb machine landed on top of him just missing his head. there was blood all over ( from his nose) i took him to emergency, just to make sure he was okay and he seems to be okay, but gosh. it was so scary. i guess all moms have times when their kids get hurt and it just makes you never want to let go of them again. i hope that you all had a better morning than we did! take care,

fern and elwynn
post #19 of 404
Mama Fern, so nice to see you here! I'm so sorry about your morning. I would have been very scared. I'm glad that Elwynn is okay now. Poor Little Guy.

Casina, thanks for all the unschooling info. We are going to a meeting this Sat. that is all about Homeschooling Basics. I'm excited to learn more, and to meet some mamas and kiddos too.

Mariah has said her first sentences - "It's Stuck" and "It's a rock"

This has been a busy week for us and right now i've got to get some dinner going so I will post more soon.
post #20 of 404
oh, ouch! now that you mention it i'm surprised that has never happenned to me. take it easy on yourself and rest up. those weird milestones are really tough in the midst of your baby being hurt, and it takes time to use the fear constructively. before i had kids i had a friends tell me that it was the worst part of mothering, that a hurt child could make you feel so vulnerable. but i know those are the some of times that have strengthened me the most as a person. it does remind you of the preciousness and sweetness of life.

i'm glad there is school that works for some of you. i'm so used to having so much control over reed now, that it would be a tough decision if there were a school for him.
i'm starting to hate the weather here again.
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