learning from Daddy

Toddlers have a lot to learn from their Daddies. Particularly the art of juggling...

change of plans

Some days I love our decision to hire a cleaning service on an every other month scheme. Yesterday morning was not one of them. They were scheduled to come right after Jonathan's afternoon nap so we could pack up and head out to the botanical gardens to get out of their way. But when we got back from our morning errands hot, hungry, tired, and cranky their van was in our driveway and they were already cleaning. 20 minutes before nap-time was not the plan. I felt guilty for being annoyed that there were people in my house cleaning it for me. But annoyed I was. I had been counting on a quick lunch, an early nap for the cranky kiddo, and a minute of quiet to calm my killer headache. I took a deep breath, counted to 5, and reworked my plan for the immediate future.

We needed lunch. We needed to get out of the house. We didn't need fast food. The only option that sprang to mind was the stroller so I grabbed some peanut butter and a few slices of watermelon and we headed to the park for an impromptu picnic lunch. Jonathan thought it was great fun to be able to get up and run around between bites and the dog got more than his usual share of Jonathan's lunch. Jonathan rallied while at the park and the dog didn't die of heat exhaustion. I even had fun. Plus I had the treat of coming home to a freshly cleaned house. I guess there is something to be said for being flexible and going with the flow.

beach

The key to surviving this miserable hot is to stay wet. We can see the outdoor pool from our front yard and Jonathan has started yelling "pool" every time we go outside. But the pool is closed on Wednesdays, so this week we took a mid-week adventure to the beach. Jonathan still isn't sure about the sand. He will move handfuls back and forth from the beach, his bucket, and his shovel. But then gets upset that he can't get it off of his hands. He was completely entertained with his reorganization of the sand and watching the waves that I had a nice chance to relax in my beach chair too!

The beach was exactly what we needed today.

slide

Jonathan's playground repertoire continues to expanded beyond sitting in the swing and commenting about the "balls" (sweet gum tree seed pods) he sees on the ground and every car that passes by. Our latest development is going up and down the slide completely by himself. (though he will not come down unless he can see me at the bottom)

mid summer blues

Around this time of summer every year I look around and wonder why on Earth I am doing what I am doing with my life. I feel exhausted and there is an undercurrent of resignation in all of my thoughts.

#1: AP and IB scores are released at the beginning of July. They are never as good as I had hoped they would be and send me into a funk for a few days. I know scores on high stakes standardized tests are not the end-all-be-all of education- they don't take into account a lot of the less tangible aspects of what students learn in the classroom, but it is one of the primary ways teachers are judged and so I can't help caring and thus being disappointed. I start questioning all the things I do in the classroom and expect from my students, which is a good thing in some ways. I make changes in procedures and grading and what-not for next year always hoping the new method will lead to better results. Last year it led me to totally revamp the way I administer and score tests. This year it will probably lead to substantial changes in how I deal with homework. Reflective practice is the cornerstone of good teaching- so in reality this is a part of being a good teacher.

#2: At this point in the season, the things in the garden that are going to fail have, leaving big bare spots where I had imagined glorious vines of fresh beans or bright carrots or crunchy rhubarb. All of the bushels of fresh produce that I had counted up in January while planning out my plots have gone up in smoke, leaving me with a pale reflection of the over ambitious plans I'd laid. This always leads me to take stock in why I put so much stupid effort into trying to things that are just going to fall over and die. So I have started putting together a list of the things that have been successful: garlic, onions, juliet tomatoes, basil, coriander, and potentially butternut squash, peppers, and pomegranates. Focus on the positive.

#3: It is stinking hot here. I can deal with unrelenting heat for a few days or weeks by telling myself that this is summer and it is supposed to be hot. But by mid July I'm over it and would trade my right arm for a cool evening breeze or a bit of crisp morning air. I'm counting the days until we leave for Minnesota. Land of 10,000 lakes here I come!!

food

I love eating it. I love growing it. I love cooking it. Planning to cook it. Reading about it. Looking at pictures. If you surveyed my most visited websites or my google history (aside from my email, facebook and a few friend's blogs) all of the pages are about food.

So the fact that I married a food-a-phobe and have a tooth-challenged toddler who is starting to venture into the picky eating phase (oh please let it be a phase) has been a source of stress at times. Especially over the last week or so. Trying to plan family meals that are vegetarian, free of sauces, cheese and tomatoes, but high in fresh veggies, and which are edible by a tot who has no molars and is not particularly skilled with a spoon or fork has been a challenge for a while. To top it off Jonathan has started going on crazy binges of particular foods followed by outright disgust at the same food. Two weeks ago the only thing he would eat was bananas. Every time we went into the kitchen he would chirp "Nana?" He ate 3 or 4 a day and started calling Jim "nana" instead of "dada". This week if I put a banana near his plate he gives me the stink-eye and if he gets some in his mouth he does his disgusted dance where he spits out the food, sticks out his tongue, squishes up his whole face like he is eating a lemon, turns his head, and flexes is hands upwards as though the taste of that horrid thing is sending him into convulsions.

I have been disparing of cooking anything that would not be refused outright by everyone but me and dreading dinnertime. Last night I gave up and pulled a tupperware of spicy curried spinach out of the freezer. Being short on time, I made quinoa instead of rice and dumped it in a bowl for Jonathan and I to share. I was prepared for spitting and throwing, but when he looked in the bowl, he delightedly proclaimed "ball!" Jackpot. He loved it and for the first time all week ate something for dinner. Who would have guessed that a spicy curry of greens would hold this appeal? Certainly not me.

I feel a great sense of relief. My best planning is bound to fail most of the time- so I am going to relax, cook what I want, and let the chips fall where they will! On the menu this week: samosas and sesame pasta.

Jonathan enjoying the sesame pasta too!

reorganization

Currently Jonathan is into reorganization. I am looking at this as a welcome and distinct stage from the stage where he just took every thing off/out of a shelf/drawer/bucket/etc and threw it willy-nilly around the house. Now he has started systematically moving all of the things from one locale to another. For example this morning he removed all of Jim's shorts and swim trunks from his bottom drawer and one at a time relocated them to the laundry hamper. The whole project took him about 15 minutes of concentrated effort and many many trips across our bedroom- impressive for a 20 lb little squirt.

This afternoon while I was at yoga class, he emptied the drawer where we keep his sippy-cups and bowls carefully onto the floor on the other side of the baby-barricade

Later (when the barricade was removed) he reorganized again,

Perhaps he can come up with some sort of scheme that will work in my closet...

when a mommy flower loves a daddy flower...

I'm learning a lot in my garden this summer. For example, squash flowers are gender specific. The boy flowers have just a stalk and a flower:

But the girl flowers have a tiny immature squash looking thing just below the flower:

To end up with a baby squash, pollen from a boy flower must reach the girl flower. Then the immature squash will be able to develop into its own seed-bearing squash. One of the problems I have been having with my squash is that it seems to be producing only one flower at a time. Mostly boy flowers. So when I noticed yesterday that there were three flowers blooming at once and that one was a boy and two were girls, I was super excited. But the other garden-wide problem in our yard this year is that there is a serious dearth of bees to do the pollenating.

The bee shortage has also been affecting my tomatoes, who are producing heaps of flowers but no fruit. Many tomatoes are self-pollinting, but still require insects (bees) to either carry pollen around or to stamp their little feet on the flowers, vibrating enough to knock the pollen off and into the right spot. For the past few days I have been out with my paintbrush buzzing from flower to flower tapping on them and transferring pollen from tomato to tomato.

So rather than trust that one would bumble its way into our yard yesterday for the squash, I rolled up my sleeves to do the dirty work myself. I took my little paintbrush and carefully transferred pollen from the boy flower to each of the girls. I'm hopeful that my efforts will pay off, but a little annoyed that the bees are falling down on the job. I may have to start investigating plants that will lure them back into our yard.

expanding vocabulary

,Jonathan's vocabulary keeps surprising me. In addition to being fascinated by shoes, he has recently picked up the ability to say the word "toes". "d" and "t" are pretty similar, so it sounds a lot like how he says "dog", but he definitely means "toes" and thinks it is fun to hang a toy from his toes, or grab something with them like a little monkey and then proudly declare "toes"! It makes me laugh almost every time.

We were at the small park by our house recently and for some reason, there was a large tractor/back-hoe/bulldozer parked near the playground. Jonathan was immediately in awe (I think this must be a universal little boy thing) and spent the entire time at the playground trying to enunciate "tractor". Most of his attempts sounded like "car-car", but by the time we left he was making a slightly different vowel sound for the 2nd syllable: "car-cuuuur".

no words necessary...