Random

Oppps. It's been a few days - we've been recovering from Halloween and I've been attempting to read Coming of Age in Samoa and write my 10 page take-home midterm that is due on Monday. Flannery is freaking out about a nutrition exam she has tomorrow - apparently she needs to know ALL the vitamins. Some random lessons we've learned this week:

1. Don't try to "prepare" your kids for the scary parts of Halloween they may encounter while trick-or-treating. You'll just freak them out so much that they won't want to go outside. Last year Collin was petrified of anyone wearing a mask. So, this year, Flannery thought she would prepare him by spending the day telling him that he'd see "a lot of creatures - but don't worry, they are just kids". This resulted in Cayla (not Collin) not wanting to leave our porch and clinging to us for the first few houses saying, "I want to go home. I want to go home." She never truly recovered, but the fact that people kept handing her candy made the "go home/get candy" dilemma quite tough for her. Candy won out.


2. If Collin is having a fit while we are trying to brush his hair, and we say, "OK, if you can't pull yourself together to get your hair brushed, then you can't go to the library", and he continues to have a fit, then someone has to stay home with him. Thanks, Flannery.

3. Giving your kids unlimited access to their candy, under the assumption that they will stop at some point doesn't work. When Cayla started uprapping a new tootsie pop while chomping down on another one, we decided to step in.

4. Be careful what you say to your kids, because they will throw it right back at you. Collin, who basically talks non-stop all day has started saying, "Mama, you need to listen to what I'm saying. Mama, you're not listening to me." And he's right. I often have no idea of what he's said. They also repeat other words that are not appropriate for this G-rated blog.

5. Don't have your kids make presents for people, if they don't have one themselves. It looks as if Sophie isn't getting her birthday presents.







6. And finally, if you aren't planning on supervising the kids while they are creating their pizza, then perhaps you should portion out their toppings. Oh well, he ate it all.