Mommy of Many®

Back in 2008 I finally came out and said what I had thought, for almost 20 years of parenting…Motherhood is Full of Shit. Truly! We are continually dealing with the clean up of bathroom issues by our little bundles of joy. You can read the original blog here.

Tonight, I was reminded and wrote the following Facebook post;

I have long said that Motherhood is full of shit.

Yes, it’s predominately the first 2-3 yrs of diapers, diaper explosions and toddlers who like to remove diapers. But it doesn’t end there. No! There are clogged toilets by overzealous wipers. There are overly excited kids who are too deep in play and don’t make it all the way to the bathroom. There are the over-confident bouts of gas etc. I will spare you the current details. But I am confident that I am not alone in my saying….

Yes, Motherhood is surely F.O.S!

Doing the Dance of the Children with rubber gloves on~

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On the way to work, this morning, I got a phone call. On the other end was one of my kiddos.
They said, “Mom, I forgot something.”
I asked, “What did you forget?”
Kiddo-”I forgot something at home.”
I replied, “Ok. What did you forget?”
Kiddo (whispering into the phone)-”I forgot my underwear.”

Thank you to beautiful people who are willing to go into my house, rummage through my dryer, find the underwear, text me a pic to make sure it’s the CORRECT underwear and then deliver it to the school in a bag, under the guise of it being “lunch”.

Doing the Dance of the Children~

It’s 7:30am and the kids just rode off to school on their bikes. They are dressed, fed, hair-fixed, teeth-brushed, backpacks-packed, school-ready kids. It didn’t happen without a morning filled with Mommy Madness.

I sent Max to bed last night, to get recharged and with the hope that he’d wake up and have a new perspective on his homework. It’s a technique that’s worked in the past. Today it was an utter failure. We sat for nearly 2 hours and got about 7 problems done. This is not because he is incapable of the work and it’s not because he doesn’t understand the work. It’s because he simply decided he wasn’t going to do it. Once he makes that decision, all bets are off! This is the same child that, as a 1st grader, hid MONTHS worth of homework under his bed. ~Sigh~

The best tactic I’ve found to keep my sanity when dealing with difficult children, is madness, goofiness, humor. A silly song about the situation goes a long way to break tension for all involved. I can choose to scold, berate or punish or I can Do a Dance or make up a rhyme. The number of times my kids have heard ridiculous songs can’t be counted.

Once my other children saw that Max was being difficult, it was like a Difficult Free-for-All. “My shoes are too tight”. “I don’t like this food”. “I’m freezing”. “I’m sick”. Name it, I heard it. I broke into song about peanut butter bread;

A little bread
A little spread
Gives us all a very good head

Hey, I have to make the point for the importance of breakfast, somehow!

Next it was scolding shoes that were too tight;

Bad shoes!
Bad shoes!
Why must you be bad shoes?!

I’m sitting here, knowing I need to start my work day and feeling absolutely drained from the last few hours of Doing the Dance! Perhaps a song will help motivate me;

Put on your shoes
Put on your pants
Put on your makeup and get on with The Dance!

I think Paulo Coelho said it best;

Doing the Dance of the Children~

Just finished hanging up and folding clothes with a lil help from Rod Stewart, of course. I have WAY more clothes when I actually get them onto hangers!

Gabi and Tristan came to spend the night. Max and Lex visited for a little while and I made a simple pasta dinner (spinach, red pepper and grape tomatoes in garlic, olive oil and white wine, with a white sauce, over bow tie pasta).

I picked up my book-Journey Through the Great Fast-and realized that I’ve missed quite a bit of reading lately. But reading the meditations for Holy Thursday and looking ahead to Good Friday, put me in a reflective space. It will be weird to be working on Good Friday. I honestly can’t remember the last time I wasn’t able to shut down with the kids and pray and reflect on that day. Tristan has asked to stay here, alone, tomorrow to have quiet time, pray and watch The Passion of Christ. I’m grateful that the seeds of faith our growing in him and that he recognizes, on his own, that the day should be solomn. I think I’ll take my lunch at noon tomorrow and go for a walk with my rosary.

I just realized that some of you might not know that I’ve started a new job! February 19th I started as the Marketing Coordinator at a local marketing firm, Tytanium Ideas and am working full-time (and then some). It’s been a really good transition for me and the kids and I are adjusting to our new schedule. I’m REALLY proud of them for helping me make this happen.

Ok, enough for now. I need to get to sleep!

Doing the Dance of the Children and of Lent~

It’s been a really long and full day. Part of the fullness is how much I’m feeling filled up with love for my kiddos who are far away. Clayton called this evening, to talk to me and the little kiddos and he gave us all a finish to our day that was full of love and the memories of the few months he was with us, last year. We all felt how much we miss the members of our family who are far off.

So I’m ending today’s Dance with a lullabye that I’ve sung to each of my kiddos and that my mom sang to me.

Good night, sweet dreams and much love; Kateri, JJ (Clayton), Mariah and Maddi. I love you~

I see the moon and the moon sees me
And the moon sees the one that I long to see.
So God bless the moon and God bless me
And God bless the one that I long to see.
It seems to me that God above
Created you for me to love.
He picked you out of all the rest
Because he knew I loved you the best.
I once had a heart called mine you see,
But now it’s gone to you from me.
So take good care as I have done
For you have two and I have none.
I see the moon and the moon sees me
And the moon sees the one that Iong to see.
So God bless the moon and God bless me
And God bless the one that I long to see

Here’s the scenario;

One kid is doing something harmless, but that another kid finds annoying. So the annoyed kid tells the first kid to “stop___”. Kid one wasn’t doing anything wrong, but now does whatever the action was (and sometimes, it’s simply breathing “too loud”) extra, EXTRA annoyingly.

I am then caught between the kid who was needlessly annoyed and the kid who is now purposely being annoying. And let me tell you, it’s AMAZING how loudly a kid can breathe when they know it will further annoy a sibling.

Doing the Dance of the Children~

When I was growing up, I was surrounded by sisters. I’m the oldest of 9 kids and 8 of us are girls. My parents got their boy at the end. So, most of what I knew about kids when I became a parent involved what girls thought, felt and dreamed. As I began having my own kids, I was blessed to get a, nearly even split of boys and girls. And suddenly, most of my girls are out of the house and I find myself raising 3 boys. I’m still fumbling through getting a grasp on what might be going through their heads at any given moment.

The other day, Lex called me into the bathroom for some assistance and I found him sitting on the pot. He looked at me and then pointed to his thighs and said, “if I’m so skinny, why are my legs so fat?”. Fat?! There isn’t anything fat about this kiddo! I knew I had only that moment to help him see his legs differently. I explained that when we sit down our legs spread out a little and that what he was seeing where the strong muscles in his legs that help him run so fast and ride his bike so well and that because he does those things, his muscles get bigger and stronger and help him get even further.

He was suddenly proud of his legs! He told me how long he can jump on the trampoline and how fast he can ride his bike.

In that short interaction, I realized that boys struggle with body image, just as girls do. Yes, I’ve read articles about eating disorders occurring in both boys and girls and depression occurring in both genders. Of course, I know that boys aren’t  just pillars of confidence, roaming the earth. But I didn’t know that my, very fit and healthy 6 year old son, would be scrutinizing himself! I’m grateful he vocalized his wonder and that I was able to help him form a positive opinion of himself.

Lesson Learned!

Doing the Dance of the Children~

These are Max’s old shoes. He was wearing them until 3 days ago, when I got a good, solid look at the bottoms. I drug him into the store to try on new ones while he boldly and loudly protested that his shoes were FINE.

“FINE…My SHOES ARE FINE! I like them like that. It’s not even raining so it doesn’t even matter! They are comfortable. I don’t NEED new shoes!”

We picked out the 2 pair that would be possibilities for him and chose one of the pair. But the next morning, he was back on the kick that the new ones weren’t right, the old one’s were perfect and I needed to just pleaese, PLEASE, P-L-E-A-S-E let him wear the old ones. I didn’t give in. He’s successfully worn the new pair for the last 2 days. However, if you see one of my kids wearing shoes with nothing left to them, keep in mind it’s not because I’m denying them proper footwear.

Kids!

Doing the Dance of the Children~

I’ve recently “liked” a couple of pregnancy and birth pages and they’re fantastic! I love all the amazing pics of women giving birth in the way and environment of their choice. They have photographers capturing all the wonder of the event and husbands/partners/co-parenting significant others (making terms up for things I don’t know the label for) are joining in, being super supportive and experiencing as much of the baby’s birth as possible. Then there are the breastfeeding pics and posts. All beautiful. There are many strong, amazing women out there that are making the decision to be fully present in the experience of becoming a mother, no matter the # baby it is.

Only one problem…

All this amazingness is making me feel like I never experienced giving birth or breastfeeding. There were no photographers, no uber supportive/rubbing my back/getting into a tub of water with me, husband-no tub of water for that matter. No home birth and heck, for my last birth, my biggest supporter was my 12 yr old daughter, who was great, but did her best to make sure she stayed near my head the entire time.

I breastfed while toddlers climbed on me, while I pushed a stroller with 2 or more other children in it, while I grocery shopped, while I made dinner, while I did mundane and needed household chores, while I was 1/2 or entirely asleep and there was no one documenting it and putting a lovely lens to the whole thing to show how beautifully natural, loving, life-giving and super fantastic it was.

I never had a belly cast made. Never took belly pics in my bathroom or bedroom mirrors (there were no “smart phones” with cameras) and never, once, had professional pics taken with the glowing and gushing father of all these kiddos. What the heck?!

How is it that I had 9 kiddos and am now feeling like all the new moms out there are sticking it to all of us Old Geezers who finished having babies too soon to be truly amazing? I don’t like it!

I’ll go thumb through the endless baby books, photo albums and scrapbooks that I put together on paper filled with lignin that’s slowly eating away at the only precious images I have that prove that in my day, we were as amazing as we felt we could be and it was pretty ok.

Seriously though-Here’s to you, Moms of the Next Era! You’re making me wish I could do it one more time.

Sincerely,
Mommy of Many

Happy New Year!

I know we’ve all been hearing the crickets over here. There was so much to do with having all my kids home for Christmas that I just wanted to be present in it and not worry about sitting down to write about it. Unfortunately that carried over a little longer than I had planned.

I’m going to do this update in 2 parts or else it will never get done. So…here’s part one of what the Lang Kiddos and M.O.M. were up to in 2012;

2012-What a year! We got a little more settled into our new life. There were plenty of struggles but there was also some really Good Stuff.

Jen-I began working in marketing. Marketing! It all fell together very quickly and I began writing for various clients and events. I’m now one year into it all and I really enjoy it! I’m hoping that 2013 brings me more work!

Me, with other ladies of Social Media at a concert we helped to promote.

Kateri-In May, Kateri graduated from the Franciscan University of Steubenville with degrees in Theology and Humanities. She then went on to become the personal assistant to one of the college’s professors, Dr. Scott Hahn. She also became the University’s assistant diving coach. As of yesterday, she began Grad School. She was able to come out for Christmas and brought her newest love, her puppy, Layla.

Clayton-After 5 years of him being away for school and travel, he came home for a few months to work and then move onto the next phase of life. It was such a joy to have him here! He did a fantastic job of helping with the little kids, keeping them active and showing them new ways to use their imaginations. He did a juggling demonstration for Lex’s class during Lex’s special week at school. He found work on a rice farm and came home tired and muddy after each day’s work. He has since moved on to Ohio and is back in school.

Mariah-She is in her Sophomore year at Bryant University. She has an internship with a company in Sacramento during her summer and Christmas breaks. She’s learning all the different aspects of the company and is doing a fantastic job! She has also been helpful in writing a business model for a coffee shop that a friend of mine wants to open. She is her sororities philanthropist chairperson and put on a fantastic event supporting our troops. Mariah has a bright future ahead and is on the path to making it all happen!

Arianna-She spent the year focusing on sports. She’s in her Junior year of high school and has played tennis, soccer and softball. She’s well-rounded in the world of sports! She’s my “big” kid at home, these days and she would LOVE to get her license in the near future. Earlier this year, she and Gabi did an Adventure Run together as a team and had a great time!

Ok, the news of Maddi through Lex will be on it’s way SOON!

Doing the Dance of the Children~

Elf on the Shelf- we’ve all heard of them and are probably seeing daily pics of our friends’ elves’ naughty, nighttime activities. All this fun and time-consuming effort is in the name of keeping the Spirit of Christmas alive for our children.

I hadn’t even considered getting an elf, until last night. I was talking to the kids and my sister about various Elf activities I’ve been seeing pics of and my kids were really intrigued. Then I pulled up Google pics of different Elf-doings and Max and Lex were both amused and shocked; “That Elf wrote on that baby’s HEAD!”, “HAAAAAA! The Lego guys tied him up!”. They went to bed in agreement that Elf on the Shelf was best kept in other people’s houses. As Max put it, “That is one creepy little thing!”. I was relieved that I was off the hook.

Then this morning, Max got out of bed and immediatley started talking about what the Pro’s of having an Elf might be; “The kids would behave better”, “He might make us cookies while we’re sleeping”…Uh oh! I explained that an Elf loses his special magic if a child touches him and that once you adopt an Elf, you’re pretty much stuck. At first Max talked about how to keep our would-be Elf in-line, then he simply said, “If we get a naughty Elf, I’ll rip him to shreds and we’ll be done with him”. I told him that probably wouldn’t be necessary, and suggested that if we WERE to get an Elf and if he WERE to be naughty, then I could just let the kids touch him and he’d lose his magic. Lex pointed out what a bad idea that was because then he might not be magical anymore, but he’d still be stuck in our house and would surely cause even MORE trouble then. Quick thinking kiddo! I guess we’ll have to look into what the actual powers of an Elf on the Shelf really are. Are his powers simple to get to Santa or without his powers does he completely stop coming alive. This is a lot of head work and we haven’t even gotten one yet!

So now I’m at a crossroads-jump on the Shelf or back away from the ledge?

Who’s Elfing? Is your Elf mischevious or simply a quiet messenger between your home and Santa?

Max had these final words of wisdom for me to ponder; “If we get an Elf, I’m going to want you to attach a camera to him so we can see where he flies to. But if you do that, we might find out you were just lying about the whole thing. Or, we might find out you were just trying to keep our imaginations alive”.

Doing the Dance of the Children~

For the last few weeks, we’ve been battling some issues with Lex. All of a sudden, he’s started having uncontrollable bowel movements. Some days, he’s been in the bath or shower 4 times. At first I thought he had gotten a flu bug. Then it kept going. I took him off of all dairy products, which were a pretty decent portion of his daily intake; milk on morning cereal, butter on toast, string cheese for a snack, cheese on sandwiches, yogurt for breakfast or an after school snack, chocolate milk for a treat…After 2 days of no dairy, we had an accident-free day. Then 2 accident-free days. Then he went to his dad’s house for the weekend and he was back up to 4 accidents a day. When he came back to me, we went back to completely dairy-free, but the accidents kept coming. So I cut out gluten and anything processed and tomatoes and all juice. After 2 days of eating only plain veggies, almonds, apples and chicken with nothing on it, he was back to being accident-free.

Yesterday I took him to the Dr. because I want to rule out the possibility of a parasite. After-all, he is an adventurous boy, who spent much of the summer tromping around in the greenbelt next to our house. He brought me tiny dead fish and picked up snakes. Who knows what made it’s way into his mouth and then his system. But after hearing all I had to say about the history of Lex’s bowel movements (over the last 3 years, since he’s been potty trained), the Dr. insisted that he is blocked up and afraid to go to the bathroom. He would have no other word or idea about it. He declared with great confidence that he knew exactly the problem. Never mind that I’ve been through that with one of my other children. I remember the pain they were in. I remember rushing them to the Dr., afraid it was an appendix or something terrible. Never mind that Lex is in NO pain and told the Dr. this. He sent us off for xrays and told me to give him a tablespoon of mineral oil once a day. I can’t wait to get those xrays back and hear his explanation for why they don’t show anything!

So we wasted a day at the Dr. I took Lex to school today with his lunch packed and instructions in the office to call me if there’s any issue.

I’ve been given the name of a Dr. in the area who helped my cousin with her children’s food issues and also the name of a chiropractor that’s close by who does stick-free allergy testing. Into the unknown I go!

I’m really hoping to get some answers soon! Lex is looking pale and thin (he’s never been a heavy kiddo, but he’s pretty thin right now).

Prayers and suggestions are appreciated.

Doing the Dance of the Children~

This morning I listened to an exchange between Gabi and Max that kept me giggling. Either Max just learned new nuances of sarcasm or he’s been faking us all out with this whole Aspergers bit.

Gabi was on the computer and Max was DYING to have his turn. Gabi was playing a “girl” game where you decorate a doll; pick out ribbons, hair, clothes, shoes, skin color, etc. Max had been watching her time and bugging her about finishing the game and giving him his turn. This is the usual banter I hear when one kid is on the computer and another wants to use it. I reminded Max that he would get his turn when her game was over.

All of a sudden, everything changed! Max leaned over Gabi’s shoulder and started saying things like, “Oh, long hair! Yes, that’s my favorite!”. Then Gabi would change the hair to short (to spite him) and he’d say, “Or short. Yes, I like short hair too”. Then came the ribbons-Max got right into it, “Pink! Yes, yes! I love pink.” And of course Gabi would change it and he’d play right along.

Gabi started yelling for me to help her. My simple response-”Just love him”. She said she didn’t know what to do with a brother that loved ribbons. I smiled even bigger. Max was brilliant!

She quickly finished her game, handed the laptop to Max and ran from the room.

Max is a mad genius! I love it!

Doing the Dance of the Children~

This is the statement I got from Max when I handed him an egg and cheese sandwich, orange juice and 3 sausages for breakfast.

Even though we don’t have cable, apparently his little mind has been filled with an image of what a “regular” family eats for breakfast.

Then he looked at me in my pj’s and my robe and said, “except that you’re not dressed”.

Sorry to disappoint, Buddy.

Here’s to being “regular” (I’m thinking it must have been the juice that sealed it becaue I cook for them about 50% of mornings and sometimes I’m even fully dressed and ready for the day)…even if for only one day.

Doing the Dance of the Children~

This post has no picture because I’m pretty sure if I had stopped to take a picture before I drove away, someone would have surely called the police.

A few days ago I took my 3 youngest kiddos to the park to kill the 40 minutes we had before picking up my high schooler. I chose the park directly next to the high school for ease of location and because we hardly ever go to that one. AND I chose it because I knew there is a path from the park, through a little green belt area and over a little bridge that leads right up to the tennis courts at the high school. The kids have used this path on a couple of occasions and always come back with stories of what they saw next to the path (a fish, a funny plant, a lost item…). So my plan was to let them play and when the time came for me to pick up their sister, to have them walk the path and meet me over at the tennis courts.

The park was fairly empty except for 3 or 4 moms with preschoolers who were likely finishing up their morning play and lunch and heading back for naps (this was a short day, so the kids were out right after lunch). Everyone played and had fun and then I made the announcement that it was time to go over to the high school. I gathered all three kiddos together and explained that they could use the path and to stay together and that I would meet them at the tennis courts. Lex took off running. Gabi took off after him. Max walked a few steps and then told me it was too hot to walk and that he wasn’t going to. Lex was already far ahead with Gabi behind him. I knew I couldn’t let the 2 of them go on their own, so I told Max he didn’t have a choice and he needed to be the big brother right now and GET GOING!. I started to walk to the car. I see Lex running on across the field and then I see Gabi lying on the grass and Max sitting on a bench. What the heck are you guys doing?! GO! Catch up with Lex! He can’t go on his own (well, he certainly can, but I didn’t feel that it was safe). Gabi and Max start crying. CRYING! They start following me to the car! NO! Go to your brother (who is oblivious that no one is behind him). GET! GO! “It’s too hot”, “I don’t want to”. I knew I had to get over to the school for 2 reasons; 1) to make sure Lex came through the other side with no problems and 2) to be there in time for my high schooler. AND I knew that those two, complaining, stubborn kids needed to catch up with their brother!

So I jumped in the car, kids still complaining at me and drove away. I was prepared for all manner of trouble from the preschool moms, who surely didn’t know what was going on, but saw me drive away from two kids who were begging me not to leave them. Great!

You can see the field and the playground from the short drive I made and when I got to the tennis courts, I immediately got my daughter, parked and ran out to the path to make sure Lex had made it and that Gabi and Max hadn’t been scooped up and taken to the police station as abandoned kids. And can you guess what I saw?

Three happy siblings, coming out of the green belt and across the bridge. Max was SUPER excited because he’d found a lost rocket that someone had surely launched and lost in the brush. Lex never knew he was almost alone on his little journey and Gabi was skipping up the path.

Sometimes things that seem drastic, really aren’t and these stubborn kids of mine, sometimes need me to drive away (figuratively speaking) so that they can be forced into the result I know is coming.

Doing the Dance of the Children~