That's More Like It

Thanks to wonderful, wonderful friends, I think I've almost got this Valentine-party-game-situation licked.  Adelaide is thank-you-God capable of addressing and preparing her own Valentines this year, so that's done.  At least, I assume it is.  I think I glanced her direction all of one time while she was filling them out the other day, and she seemed to have everything more or less under control.  She's come a long way, baby.

Atticus has been steadily working on Valentines for his classmates since Saturday, which meant that, as of 10 pm last night, all that was left to do for this completely useless holiday was prepare Atticus's Valentine box for his classroom.

Unfortunately I had made the mistake of searching Pinterest for "Valentine's Day boxes" while Atticus observed from over my shoulder.  It took several minutes to explain to him just how little I was willing to invest in this whole project:  Zero dollars and maybe two television episodes' worth of my time.  That wiped out 90% of the results on there, but he did find an Olaf box I decided was reasonably do-able.

According to the Olaf Valentine Box Tutorial, I needed:

• One empty Kleenex box
• White Cardstock
• Black Acrylic Paint
• Scissors
• One Orange Pompom
• Two White Pompoms
• One Black Pompom
• Rubber Cement
• Low Temperature Glue Gun and Glue
• Black Craft Foam
• White Craft Foam
• A Sharpie

Of those things, I had:

• One empty Kleenex box
• Scissors
• A Sharpie

Instead of all those fancy materials I cut up an empty granola bar box for various appendages and taped the heck out of the whole thing.  He also sports the tip of a real carrot for his nose, which is rather precariously attached to his face.  I thought about calling him White Trash Olaf, but Fiscally Conscious Olaf or Refurbished Olaf sounds way more pretentious and makes me sound like I made it this way intentionally due to my high-falutin' hippie ways.  The truth is I can't bear to buy all that stuff for something that will no doubt be trash in a matter of weeks.  

Good enough, says I, says Atticus, says Reused Household Materials Olaf.

"I'm SO excited." *Updated*

Today is the first day of another school year.

Adelaide's first day of Kindergarten, she was half excited, half anxious, wanted to stand at the very back of the line of kids at the bus stop, and would not allow me to leave her side as the other kids embarked and the line slowly moved forward.  When we reached the steps and it was her turn, she decided that Nope, Kindergarten wasn't for her, thanks anyway.  I had to go up the steps with her, and while the driver very kindly offered to let me sit with her while he looped around before dropping me back off, once Adelaide was on there and spotted an open seat, she was okay.  She sat down, I got off the bus, and away she went.

We watched the video Derek was shooting of this whole thing a couple weeks ago.  You can tell the exact moment she realizes this was a terrible, terrible idea, as she tries to awkwardly back away, looking more like a dog being dragged into a car on its way to the vet than anything else.

Over the past couple weeks Atticus has at random times quietly stated, "I'm scared about Kindergarten," into empty moments in our day.  Our elder son has a substantial streak of bravery running through him (years of attempting to survive night terrors?), so while I figured the whole thing would be easier than it was for Adelaide, I still worried a little about how he was going to feel on this first of many, many whole days away from me.

6:30 this morning, I woke the two A's up.  They tumbled out of bed, excited for the day, and were immediately drawn first to their bedroom windows.  There was a kind of diffused yellow, buttery pre-thunderstorm cast to the dawn, and it was beautiful.  It felt like a gift, a new mercy waiting for us, and the perfect beginning to this day of Beginnings.

Atticus has had trouble remembering his teacher's name over the past couple days, and spent his time getting dressed muttering, "Upah, Upah, Upah, Upah," under his breath.

This may have made me increasingly nervous for him except for the fact that he spent the next 45 minutes exclaiming "I'm SO excited," and eating breakfast and "I'm SO excited" and brushing his teeth and "I'm SO excited."

In the car on the way to the bus stop, and he's SO excited.  She's reading.

We were the first ones at the bus stop, Adelaide and Atticus were the first in line.  Well, and Caedmon, who probably would have marched right onto the bus, too, had we not kept a sharp eye on him.

You should click to embiggen this one:  Adelaide's reading has been interrupted and she's kind of over this whole school and picture thing; Atticus is SO excited, and Caedmon is just precious.  Derek is... tall.  Hard to tell what emotions were going on up there.

When the bus arrived, Atticus prodded-pushed-shoved his sister toward the bus and up the steps, quickly ascending right behind her, the extreme opposite of what she had done three Augusts ago.  Derek and I had both reminded Adelaide that she was to sit next to her brother on the bus, even if her friends wanted to sit beside her.  We watched her walk quickly down the aisle and sit in a seat, then we watched Atticus keep right on going and sit in a separate seat of his own, turning eagerly to wave and grin hugely at us out the window.  We grinned and waved right back.  I couldn't see Adelaide in her seat on the opposite side of the bus.  She was probably reading again already.

Then the bus drove on, carrying them away from us.

Derek looked down at our Caedmon and said, "I don't know, bud, I think Mommy may really cry when you go to Kindergarten."  Then he looked at my face, asked, "Are you crying?" and laughed at me.  I wasn't weeping in abject despair or anything, I just had something in my eye.  Like a tear.  Or two.

I mean, our five-year-old didn't have to be that excited to leave me, did he?

I am glad he was so pumped to start school, and satisfied with Adelaide's tolerance for school.  I'm hoping Atticus's enthusiasm doesn't wane anytime soon, and that Adelaide remembers learning is fun and dives into third grade.

42 minutes 'til we go get them from the bus stop.  Not that I'm counting, or anything.



UPDATE:  How did each of their first days go?

Atticus:

Adelaide:

Under-Achieving Moms Anonymous

Do you know what I spent my Saturday doing?  Paying for a mistake I made three years ago.


August of 2011, and Adelaide is getting ready to enter Kindergarten.  She is anxious, positive that she will have no friends and get lost and be bored and not entirely sure why I'm abandoning her to the cruel whims of the United States public education system.

Included on the exhaustive supply list was a required 12x12-inch pillow.  They use this for the post-lunch rest time, which five- and six-year olds need so they can get ready for some afternoon learnin' and I can only assume the teachers need because they spend their days in a cramped room with 25 small children, in return for which they receive a pittance of a salary and, ahem, "feedback" from parents even more irrational than their "genius" offspring.  ("Genius":  the second most overused word in the English language, right after "surreal.")

Because Adelaide was having such a hard time with the idea of going to school and being away from me, I wanted her to have something at school that would be familiar and comforting, and so, rather than a generic pillow, I cut up one of my old shirts in her then-favorite color- pink- and made it into a pillowcase,  embroidering her name and some multi-colored flowers on the front, because I am an idiot.

I knew better.  Or I should have.  I do not scrapbook.  I do not throw lavish birthday parties.  I do not celebrate arbitrary holidays created by vast corporations with a product to push.  I set the bar as low as possible the first time around, because I know that each time I do something and label it a tradition, as far as our children are concerned, I am signing a blood contract to forevermore execute said tradition in at least as exciting a way as I did the first time.

I understand the impulse to over-celebrate the crap out of every tiny milestone that comes your child's way, and I am not saying you shouldn't make your child feel cherished and loved to absolute pieces on a daily basis.  What I am saying is that every time you're in the store and you see that simply darling last-day-of-summer-vacation pinata or you're on Pinterest and All The Moms are making four-course breakfasts for their child's first day of school, the question you need to ask yourself is this one:  How much do I hate myself?

When you're doing that extra-special kid-centered thing you've gotta realize that you should be taking the time, money, and energy spent on it times the number of years they're going to live in your house times however many children you have, because even as I was hunched over Atticus's Kindergarten pillow embroidering his name into a scrap of some old corduroy pants of mine, Caedmon was mouth-breathing in my face, "When am I going to get a special pillow with my name and a picture on it?  Can you make it out of this?"  He was touching and asking for the actual shirt off my back, and three years too late, I realized this is the price you pay for over-achieving even once.

I finished our second-born's pillow, then made a gourmet lunch of popcorn, raisins, and granola bars, which I wouldn't even allow them to eat in the house because I was just done.  That pillow used up, like, a three-day supply of motherly patience and creativity.

The one upside to my anti-Martha Stewart parenting practices is that our children are in awe when I make the slightest effort.  I made them each a little book to write in out of squares of white paper I cut up and stapled together.  You'd think I'd felled the trees to create the paper, mined the iron ore from the ground for the staples.  Their mouths were literally hanging open at this wizardry.  So if one of our children shows you one of their "books" they've written, do me a favor and act astounded at this creation.  Maybe throw around terms like "Best Mom Ever" and "Luckiest Child Alive."  Also don't show them all the incredible things you do for your own children.  It takes a village to keep expectations this low.

The Birthday Girl

Remember how, just about a year ago, I dedicated the whole week preceding our daughter's birthday to posts about Adelaide?

Well, in the past year I've either become a terrible mother, a terrible blogger, or both, because Adelaide's birthday was over a week ago and I haven't written anything about it yet.  Or maybe I've just been really busy. We'll go with busy.

She's six now.  Six, and almost done with Kindergarten.  Six, and either making me laugh really hard or completely exasperating me with all the things she says.

Yesterday's conversation could actually be filed in both columns:


After coming home from school, the three kiddos were running around the front yard.  Caedmon was watching me, waiting for the moment when I would look away and he could dart into the street.  It's one of his favorite games.  Adelaide was leading Atticus around in some sort of imaginary play.  Every once in a while I would hear something about "Monster!" and "Run!"

At one point, the older two ventured close enough for me to hear exactly what they were saying.

Adelaide:  "Atticus- run!  It's him!  IT'S THE CHINESE PERSON!  Ruuuuun awaaaaay!"

Atticus:  "Aaaaah!"

At first I thought I must have misheard her- until I distinctly heard her yell, "Get away from us, Chinese Person!"

Before I go on, let me be very clear:  Our family has nothing against Chinese people.  Sorry, Chinese people.


I decided it was time to intervene.  "Adelaide!  Could you come over here, please?"

"What?"

"Did I just hear you say, 'Get away from us, Chinese Person'?"

"Yeah.  There's a bad Chinese Person trying to get us!"

"Why?"

"Because we're in China."  She said this in a long-suffering voice, like God, why did you give me such stupid parents?


"Adelaide, I don't really think that's appropriate," I told her.

"Why not?"

"Well, I've never heard you say, 'Get away, American Person."

"That's because American people are just people."

"Adelaide, Chinese people are just people, too!"  I was trying really hard, here.

She disagreed and the debate disintegrated from there.  Again- my apologies to the Chinese community at large.


All that was still better than yesterday morning, when I made her cry by not putting enough cereal in her bowl.  When I asked her whether that was really something worth crying about, she sobbed, "You just don't want me to grow and get taller than you!"


Happy Belated Birthday, Adelaide!

Bear With Me Here

It's been an interesting day.

I woke Adelaide up about half an hour before she usually rises.  She got dressed, I fixed her hair.  She had some breakfast. 

Derek and I woke the boys and got them ready.  Then our little family of five all set out to walk to the bus stop, one block from our house.

We waited with the other kids and parents.  Introduced ourselves.  Shared with Adelaide some words of encouragement. 

Then the bus rounded the corner, came roaring up to where we waited.  Our daughter said her good-byes to Daddy and brothers, I took Adelaide's hand, and we joined the queue of kiddos.  Derek hung back with the boys and shot video.  Adelaide was the last in line, and when it came time to ascend the stairs onto the yellow behemoth, she did everything within her power to remain firmly attached to the back of my shorts, crying and generally freaking out.  When just shoving her on proved fruitless ('cause dang, does that girl have some upper-body strength), I held her hand and walked her up the steps, and we began looking for a spot to sit.

The driver, bless his heart, offered to let me stay on and sit with her for a couple blocks while he made one last stop, then he'd come around and drop me back off.  I may have taken him up on it, but I didn't want to set a bad precedent, and thankfully she had calmed down by this time anyway.  I watched her walk down the aisle to the very back, and as she swung into the last seat, she smiled and waved cheerily at me. 

I got off, rejoined the three Crisler men, and waved at her window as the bus took my daughter away from me to Kindergarten. 


As a result of this momentous morning, I'm feeling a little discombobulated.  So I thought I'd share a random smattering of photos from our trip last week- because I'm sure you weren't sick of these already.

My mom, my sister, and her husband, laughing at the ignorant schmucks who don't know that those are soybeans in the centerpieces.

Actually, I don't know what they're laughing at.  But I think my guess is a good one, because what's funnier than soybeans?



Derek, teaching our niece, Aria, to fly.  The smile on her face hides the terror in her heart.

Kidding again.  She loved being launched high into the air and being caught with a splash.

Adelaide bonding with our newest niece, Brielle, her aunt and other cousin.

I had hoped that playing with a baby girl for a couple days would pacify her enough to get off my back about producing a little sister for her.  I was wrong.



Caedmon taking advantage of some warm and willing arms at the wedding.  (Alliteration Alert!) 

And now, I think I'll go back to trying to get as much done as possible and not anxiously stare at the clock, willing 3:30 to come around so I can hear how Adelaide's first day was. 

It should be fun.