Mommy of Many®

This morning, I was driving the kiddos to school and Max asked me this, thought-provoking, question;

“How do people just know what to say and what to do, without practicing or rehearsing?”

I asked what he meant and this was his example;

“Like when you’re at a big, fancy dinner and the guy in charge stands up and says, ‘Thank you for coming. Now eat!’ Then they all say ‘Thank you’ and start eating. How did they know to say ‘Thank you’? How do people know what to do and say?”.

Ah ha! This is what I told him;

It’s called learning Social Graces. As you go through life and you go to more events and meet more people, you learn what to say in each situation and then you’re able to take it with you to the next situation. It’s something you learn as you grow and get older because as you move through your life, you have more experiences and learn more things. These are the things that come with time and age. Don’t worry! You’ll learn them. We all do!”.

Then I drove the rest of the way to school and work, thinking of all the situations I’d been in over my lifetime that taught me just what to say or do in different situations and how many many times I fumbled it all and had to learn from feeling awkward and ungracious or ungraceful. Those lessons are tough ones, but we all learn them, piece by piece, situation by situation.

I love that my boy, who’s living with Aspergers, is noticing that there are certain things that people seem to just know and just do and that he wants to learn them, no doubt to help make being in social settings less anxious or even less confusing. I wish I’d understood that I was going to learn as I went and that I was OK not automatically knowing each of the proper things that need to be done in every social situation! I would have certainly had less anxiety and felt a little more at ease. I sure hope he does!

Doing the Dance of the Children and Hoping To Do it With Grace~

The conversation between me and Lex concerning love;

Lex-How do we love our friends? Are we supposed to love our friends?
Me-Yes! Jesus told us to love one another. We love them by wanting whats best for them and being kind to them.
Lex-But not kissing!
Me-Right. Not kissing. There are different kinds of love. The kissing kind of love is for when you are with someone you think you might marry or you want to spend a lot of your life with them or for when you are married. For friends we love them by being good and kind to them.
Lex-Our hearts grow to be able to have all that love for all our friends. We can have more friends because our hearts will keep growing and growing to give more and more love.
Me-Right! We can have really really big hearts and love all the people in our life.
Lex-But not kissing.
Me-Right, not kissing. But the kind of love Mommies and Daddies have for their kids means lots of cuddles and kisses and hugs. But that’s different than the “kissing” kind of love.
Lex-Wow, we are going to have really big hearts!

He sure makes my heart grow!

Doing the Dance of the Children With Lots and Lots of Love~

It’s somewhere around 2am and I’ve been busily making lists, writing emails and rummaging through paperwork. I went to bed around 9:30 but had set an alarm to wake up and pick Mariah up from work at 11:45. Once I got home and climbed back into my bed, the list of to-do’s wouldn’t stop forming. After a little while I figured it was better to get up and get some things written down than to lie there all night, stressed that I’d forget what I needed to put on the lists.

So here I am. I got most of it out of my head and onto paper. Something I’ve found helpful with making lists is to include items that you can immediately cross off. “Make List” is a good one! This way, when you’re looking at the daunting list, you can see a little progress. Right now my life is so incredibly full of things going on-important, life-changing things, that if I don’t write things down I’m afraid I’ll go bonkers and be sent off to the Funny Farm (though…then I might not have to tackle all that’s on these dang lists. Sometimes the Funny Farm doesn’t sound so bad!). I’m trying to stay focused on moving forward with all that Max needs, while worrying that Mariah has all she needs, as she heads off to college in August, while trying to piece together all that needs to happen surrounding this move, while wondering where I’ll work, while wondering where, exactly, I’ll live, while trying to make sure the kids are all squared away for school next year-which means getting all school physicals done before we move (in about 26 days!), while making dental appointments so that I don’t have to worry about doctors and dentists right off the bat, while wondering how to best finish up Maddi’s orthodontic treatment, while wondering how to get my house work done, while wondering…So basically my best tools for avoiding the Funny Farm right now are lists and prayer. I’m finding both are quite helpful. Sleep would probably be good too. A personal assistant probably wouldn’t hurt either! Any volunteers?

Well being that I don’t get to take any breaks in Doing the Dance of the Children, just because of lack of sleep or feeling overwhelmed, I suppose I better try to feel comforted in my lists and try to get some sleep. It might be Saturday, but I still have to get these kiddos fed in the morn and put on my Dancing shoes by 6am.

G’night~

Overheard on the drive home from school today;

Lex to Tristan-”I almost kissed Eleni at school today but then Mom looked at me and I had to stop”.

Great! Does this mean I’m going to have to go to school with him until he graduates?!

Doing the Dance of the Children~

Today I went grocery shopping and I bought a lot of fresh fruit. With so many wonderful fruits in season and on sale, I loaded up with watermelon, strawberries and others. I knew the kids would appreciate it all and how much each of them likes certain fruits. It all got me thinking about how we think and how we set standards.

Each of us has cut into or bitten into a fruit that sets the standard in our minds of how that fruit should taste. At some point we’ve bitten into a perfectly ripe strawberry that set for us what a strawberry “really” tastes like or we’ve cut into a watermelon and decided that it was exactly as firm, sweet and juicy as a watermelon “should” be. From that point we set out to recreate that same experience. We continue to buy the fruits, hoping to taste exactly what we have before. Yet, there are countless times that our strawberries are too sour or we cut into a watermelon only to find it mushy and tasteless. But we keep trying. We don’t decide that the standard is now these, less than perfect fruits.

This is what keeps me believing in the human spirit. We set our standard by the best that we’ve experienced and we keep trying over and over to recreate those experiences. Having tasted excellence, we move through life, giving each shopping trip, each day, another chance to bring us another taste of what we know to be the best. I believe this shows that we are innately positive and focused on the good. We don’t stop buying our favorite fruits, even though it may be that the majority of our shopping trips turn up fruits that are less than the gold-standard that we know is out there.

Once we’ve tasted, felt and smelled excellence, we continue to move through each day looking for it and giving each new day, each new basket of strawberries, each new watermelon, the chance to show it to us again.

Never give up on striving for excellence. You know it’s out there. You’ve tasted it.

Doing the Dance of the Children~