Another Jedi Knight

I'll begin by offering many thanks to Will and Jenny for the Jedi Sleep Test idea. I didn't actually ask if I could borrow it, but...well, I'm counting on our friendship! :-)

A couple of months ago, Ryan's doctor had a sleep study scheduled for him, because of his loud snoring, poor sleep patterns, and, upon examination, huge tonsils and adenoids. After we came back from the beach and realized the test was in a matter of days, Dave and I began to have misgivings about it, as Ryan's snoring hadn't been quite so bad in recent weeks. Even up to yesterday evening, we were feeling some anxiety about it and were unsure of what to do, and were proceeding with reservations. And when Dave came home, he suggested that I take Ryan, an abrupt change of the plan that had Dave taking him. I hadn't thought Dave would have wanted to deal with Chase all night, so I hadn't even brought up the possibility earlier, but it seems Dave had heard horror stories about sleep studies from some guys he worked with, and he thought he might fare better with an unhappy toddler than with Ryan, who can be in a category of his own when it comes to resistance. :-) I was uncertain of this plan at first - I'd never been away from Chase for the night before - but it was also killing me to send Ryan off with Dave, when I'm almost always the one to take the kids in for doctor's visits and procedures, not to mention the fact that I might have some quiet time by myself if Ryan fell asleep okay, and that was VERY appealing. At any rate, I eventually agreed, we had prepped Ryan for this event, introducing the Jedi Sleep Test idea, and he was extremely excited. Once we arrived, he was slightly nervous, but I could tell he was determined to be brave. As I was talking to the respiratory therapist in our room, we looked down at him at one point and noticed he was holding his arm out stiffly and silently. Amused, the RT asked him what he was doing, and after a couple seconds, I realized he was showing her he was ready for the "stickers." She thought this was very cute, and she laughed most of the way through putting the rest of his electrodes and wires on, as Ryan was highly impressed with himself and thought it was all the coolest thing ever. I was glad he was so compliant, but I wondered how it would be when he woke up in the night. After all, this was the kid who just the night before had spent an hour screaming about a mosquito bite on his toe - how was he going to handle waking up with gauze wrapped all over his head, wires coming out from everywhere, and, most troublesome of all, a sensor just below his nose? But amazingly, he woke up only a couple times, and didn't fight any of it at all, and when he was awakened this morning to have everything removed, he submitted to it calmly and - as he kept mentioning - bravely. He was so proud of himself, and so was I! It's awesome to catch a glimpse of what your children are really made of - in this case, of the self-control, determination, and spunk deep within little Ry-Ry.

Vacation

We returned on Sunday from our annual, week-long trek to the beach, this year, as we did last year, going to Edisto Beach here in SC. We loved Edisto last year - it's a quiet, almost wild beach, with very little commercialization around the island. That could, I suppose, translate into "nothing to do," but that's the way we like things. The island is pretty and full of character, dotted with centuries-old churches - and their slightly spooky cemetaries that tell so many sad tales, honor noble lives, and hint at intriguing mysteries - and covered with big, gnarled trees adorned with Spanish moss. There are a couple of restaraunts, a few gift shops, a Piggly Wiggly, and, a few miles back from the beach, the Serpentarium, which the kids love, and that's about it! When we've gone, the beach has always been sparsely populated, and the ocean is usually fairly calm, which is good for little ones. Last year we also saw dolpins leaping just off the shore almost at least once a day; this year, because it rained half the week and there some pretty wild storms (i.e. the fingertips of Tropical Storm Fay!), we only saw the dolphins a couple times, and the ocean was sometimes rather rough, but we still came away regarding Edisto as one of our favorite places.

We've been planning this trip for months, which gave me plenty of occassions to announce that we had to cancel it, for one reason or another. :-) But we made it to the scheduled departure day, the Sunday before last, and I had bought a ton of food and had packed our things, so off we went! It's only about a 2 1/2 hour drive, but it took us about like 3 hours - still, not too bad, and the last half hour or so is a scenic winding across the island. Last year we stayed at a small and rather run-down house a couple rows back from the beach (not complaining, though, because it was a fun week!), but this year, we chose a larger (and nicer!) house on the marsh, a few more rows away from the beach. The pictures showed a spacious and beautifully decorated house, and of course the reality was not quite so pristine, but it was still lovely, and everyone had a good time looking over the house and claiming beds as soon as we arrived. A neat feature of the house were what was advertised as "sleeping alcoves," small nooks on attached to both upstairs bedrooms that contained a bed or two and a dresser, so that the upstairs worked wonderfully for our family. Dave and I had a room with a queen-sized bed, and our alcove contained two twin beds that we pushed together to make a great space for the little boys. The other room had two bunk beds, a spacious place to play, dresser drawers full of games, and a nook that Aimee immediately claimed as her own, setting up all her things as fast as she could get them upstairs. It reminded me of the nursery in Peter Pan, and when I mentioned that to the kids, Aimee said, "Drew, you could go out on the roof and be Peter Pan!" I expressed my opinion that I didn't think that Drew could do that, and he replied, eyeing the window critically, that he was pretty sure he could get out there. I strongly advised them just to pretend! Anyway, Erica and my mom took the gorgeous, quiet room downstairs, with a king-sized bed and large garden tub. All the rooms had a beautiful view of the marsh, which, by the way, was far less "buggy" than we thought it would be. Here's the house from the front and the road it was on, as well as one view of the marsh:

Almost as soon as we got there, Dave went out to explore the dock, and he caught a trout on his first try, so he went out often during the week. He and the older kids also went crabbing a couple of times, which they absolutely loved. Yes, they probably should have been wearing life jackets, but Dave only took them out when the water wasn't very deep at all and there was little or no current (as far as I know!):

We did go the beach, of course, and the first day the water was so calm we could actually swim in it. Chase didn't want to go anywhere near it - I imagine to a toddler, the ocean doesn't look anything like water (or "wa-wer", Chase's favorite word), but rather like something strangely alive. So I didn't push him, and he was content most of the week, or as much of it as we could spend down at the beach, to play in the sand. The other three had a blast both in the water and out of it, and Aimee in particular was incredibly fearless in the waves. My Mom bought boogie boards for Aimee and Drew, and Aimee almost drove us crazy with her persistence with hers, but she figured out how to ride the smaller waves on her own, and I was duly impressed.

It rained a few days, and there were some crazy moments when we thought it might be better to just be home, but we stuck it out, and I think week was refreshing overall. We loved seeing my sister Erica, down from New York, and it was hysterical to watch the Olympics with her and my Mom in the evenings. Quick sidebar: as we were watching one night, there was a Korean athlete - I can't even remember what his sport was - and Drew casually asked if he was from South Korea or North Korea. We answered his question, and, impressed, I asked how he knew there was a North and a South,because we haven't studied that area. Casually, he replied, "'Cause there were two flags at the opening cermemony." Laughing, my mom said to me, "You have to write that down somewhere - he gets distracted going from one side of the room to the other, but he remembered North and South Korea!" And that is something, indeed, beacuse it was a four-hour program - how in the world did he capture and file away something that subtle?

Anyway, I am beginning to ramble, and I would have loved to have chronicled our trip on a day-by-day basis, but it's now the middle of the next week, and if I don't post this now, I'll never get it out. I'm going to try to put the rest of our pictures in a web album and post them later, but here are a couple of parting shots:

Observations on the Spectrum of Self-Esteem...

I know that comparing children is a parenting faux pas, but this is really just me marvelling at differences in personalities... I've mentioned that I've had difficulty with Drew complaining that he "just can't do" first grade, etc, and for me, it's highlighted something in the kids I hadn't noticed so keenly before. He's not always so emotional about feelings of perceived failure, but I've realized that his angle has always been in that direction - if he struggles with something, it's because he feels that HE is flawed in some way. In the almost polar oppostite direction is Aimee, who has no self-esteem problems whatsoever. I've always loved that she is so secure and self-confident, even though sometimes her incredible strong will often leads to conflict. Until recently, however, while watching her more closely because of paying more attention to Drew's self-esteem issues , I hadn't noticed how completely free of insecurity she really is. She had a horse riding lesson last week which didn't go very well at all - she couldn't control the horse and wasn't paying attention or following through. She was in tears later, but only because she was frustrated that the horse was so stubborn (her teacher had said that the horse was the most easy-going on the the farm). I kept quiet and resisted the impulse to say something motherly and wise - that would really just be ill-recieved correction and advice - but noted how amazing it was that Aimee never once questioned her own actions or abilities, and was not crushed by her teacher riding her rather sternly. She was simply angry that the horse hadn't been cooperative and the teacher hadn't been more understanding. (It was hot, and there were gnats, for heaven's sake!) And then tonight, she wanted to help peel potatoes for dinner but was having trouble figuring out the potato peeler. If it had been Drew having such difficulty, he would have thrown it all down and stormed out with something like, "I'm just no good at peeling potatoes! I can't do anything!" But Aimee came out with something astonishly amusing when she exclaimed in indignation, "This potato just won't peel!" There was no way anyone could have told her she was doing it incorrectly - and I didn't try. Eventually she figured it out herself, but I shuddered a little to think how hard lessons in humility will be for her down the road. On the other hand, she won't be afraid to tackle anything, and she'll be able to take criticism without crumbling -indeed, if she listens to some of that correction, she will be all the better for it.

But I love watching these things emerge in my children. Some of the traits I recognize as coming from myself, and some of them come from something I've never known, something that was knit in my kids from the beginning and makes them totally unique. What is in those young ones right now, at nearly midnight, I don't know, as they are bouncing all over the place and appearing to be far from settling down!

The Olympics

In short, I love them! We're watching the opening ceremonies right now, even the kids who are up far, far, past their bedtime and who are one by one dropping off into the Land of Nod. I grew up loving watching the Olympics, some of my favorite memories coming from the times my sisters, mom, and I watched gymnastics or ice skating (depending on the particular Olympics) with breathless enthusiasm as my dad scoffed at the ridiculous scoring systems. Of course, there really was - and probably still is - all sorts of unfairness, and some of the athletes really do take things too far, I suppose, but I really do believe there must be some intrinsic value in this kind of finely honed athleticism. I know it can be abused and perverted, but there is often something so stirring and beautiful about the patriotism and personal triumph displayed at the Olympics. The intensity, the shadows of years of sacrifice, the soaring joy, the sinking sorrow of defeat - and the unique combination that often emerges in one sweeping moment, as in the poignant story of the runner whose father helped him hobble over the line simply to finish the race. How deeply it moved me when I first saw it, and remembering it with each airing of the "Go World" spot on TV still brings tears to my eyes. "I beat my body to win the prize," said the apostle Paul, and I think he was using this analogy in a positive light. Disciplining the body, pushing the limits, going faster, reaching farther, even the fierce edge of competitive desire - I think these are divinely-bestowed qualities woven into our human nature.

And so for the next two weeks, our TV will be on, streaming the Games!

Toddlers and Libraries

I love the toddler stage. It's exhausting (to parent) and hysterically adorable all at once, and we are now enjoying this phase for the fourth time. (Actually, because our little ones are relatively close, all these stages have just been running together, in one perpetual display of childhood!) Chase, of course, is no less entertaining - and tiring - than any other toddler, and I daresay he's probably one of the most active and amusing toddlers I know (forgive my shameless bias!). This afternoon, for instance, when I was trading pieces of Pirate's Booty for a grammar lesson that included recitation of "The Caterpillar," Chase was quick to get in on the deal, standing by each sibling as they quoted the poem, and eagerly jabbering what must have been his rendition.

However, the toddler stage is not compatible with library privileges. In the very beginnings of my mothering career, when my only charge was a little girl who always seemed to know the rules, this was not so much of an issue, but a couple more years into my parenting journey gave me the delightful experience of trying to quiet a uncoopertaive and very loud young man as I attempted to manuever him, his sister, and a load of books up to the circulation desk at the library. We repeated this on every library trip for the whole of his second year at least. I also began to hear at home, with alarming frequency, that dreadul, sickening sound of pages being ripped out of books - and they were ALWAYS library books. Just as Drew grew out of this stage, his baby brother began to grow into it, and as is usually the case with Ryan, with even more intensity. Even confined in the sling or stroller, taking him to the library as a toddler was often a nightmare, and I often left insisting that I would leave him with his father next time - maybe for every trip for the next ten years... We have now come to the happy place where he behaves at the library (and with their materials) fairly well more often than not, and of course, this is just in time for Chase to step up as the library's nemesis, which he has, with gusto. This evening as I was picking up around the house, I found a corner of a page from -you guessed it - a library book, and finding it was made all the more upsetting by the fact that only this morning, I had witnessed him gleefully tearing a page out of another borrowed book. "No more library books!" I said in exasperation to myself, then recanted instantly, because the library is a lifeline for us. So we'll simply weather this descructive stage - and continue to support our library financially all the while. And we'll be thankful that Chase is just so cute! It covers over a multitude of transgressions. :-)

Confession

This may ony be shocking for those of you know who have known me for a very long time (i.e. Carrie!), but here it is...

Our history chapter this week touched on some of the early French explorers who attempted settlements in Canada, so one of the suggested literature books is Anne of Green Gables. Susan Wise Bauer admits that this is not a study of 17th-century Quebec, but insists, correctly, that AGG is just something every child should read, so why not now? Well, it happens that I own, as my dear aforesaid friend Carrie would know best, the entire Anne of Green Gables series - battered and torn after numerous readings and re-rereadings. I own two copies of the first book, and one has perfectly "good feeling paper," according to my Aimee's all-important standards, thus I have already tried repeatedly, with a variety of low-key tactics, to introduce Aimee to this delightful literary world. But... MY daughter wants nothing to do with of Anne of Green Gables!It's almost unbelievable, and if you knew me in my early years, you would know just how unbelievable. I think I shall have to resort to making it the next read-aloud, or perhaps I could find it on CD - there's something always interesting to my children about a book on CD or tape.

The littles ones are beginning to wake and emerge...the day begins!