TurtleHead

The other day I had to go to a lawyer’s office to sign some papers, and the lawyer called in her assistant to be a witness. I had the girls with me, and The Assistant and Gal Smiley got to talking. When Gal Smiley told The Assistant that she has an older brother, age 6, The Assistant said that she has a little boy, age 8.

Then she turned to me, totally unprompted, and said, “Their behaviour gets a lot better when they turn 8.”

Oh man, did I ever need to hear that. It was like a small beacon of hope shining in the middle of a terrible storm of silliness.

When my nephew AvidReader was about the same age as the Captain, we went to visit him and his family. My sister in law warned us before we came that AvidReader might be annoying. “Why?” we asked. “He just tries to do things that he thinks are funny all the time, but they aren’t,” she said.

I must admit, we didn’t see what she was talking about at the time. Sure, AvidReader was maybe a bit more spirited than usual, but we had fun with him and it was a good visit.

But boy, do we EVER understand what she meant now that we have one of our own. A six year old boy that we live with, day in and day out, who CANNOT. STOP. THE. SILLY.

The crazy faces when you’re trying to discipline him. The shouting out of, “Where’s my dinner? Where’s my dinner?” when it’s sitting right in front of him. The repeating of everything you say, but with the word “poop” thrown in. The random tackling of family members. The frequent sudden declarations that, “YOU’RE BLUE! YOU’RE BLUE!” followed by insane laughter.

And the worst part is that he’s totally corrupted Gal Smiley to his cult of silly. Now all day long all I hear is them attempting to one-up each other in the most ridiculous conversation ever.

Witness this exchange that took place in the van on the way home from The Nutcracker, because there’s nothing like ballet to put you in the mood for a little crass talk:

Gal Smiley: The sun is setting!

Captain Jelly Belly: Bed bed bed wetting!

[hysterical giggling]

GS: The sun is having a poop.

[hysterical giggling]

CJB: My eyeballs are bleeding!

[hysterical giggling]

GS: Blah blah blah dancing queen!!

[hysterical giggling]

CJB: Why don’t you pick your nose and eat it?

[hysterical giggling]

GS: You’re going to step in nose poo!

[hysterical giggling]

CJB: Sid! YOUR NAME IS SID!

[hysterical giggling]

GS: DOOBY DOOBY DOOBY DOO!

[hysterical giggling]

CJB: Sid, why are you driving me crazy?

[hysterical giggling]

And then my head exploded.

A blog post cannot remotely capture how annoying this is. One time, vaguely amusing, maybe. Sixteen hours a day of this nonsense, non-stop — OH. MY. GOD.

And it’s such a grey area when it comes to discipline, too. On the surface of it, they’re having fun. They’re happy, they’re playing well together, they’re making each other crack up. The only real danger is busting a gut from laughing, or perhaps future overuse of the word “poop” in business meetings.

And yet, there’s only so much we can take, before one of us blows up and tells them to KNOCK. IT. OFF.

Half of me says, they’re just kids, they’ll outgrow it.

The other half says, what if the only reason anyone else ever outgrew it is because their parents cracked down on that crap every single time? And if I give up and just try to ignore it, they’ll grow up to be Carrot Top and Joan Rivers?

Eight years old better hurry up and get here!

Whenever one of my friends’ kids has a birthday, or when Christmas rolls around, I always want to know what they are getting for their kids for gifts. It always feels so awkward to ask about it, though. It feels akin to asking about how much money someone makes. It’s just taboo, and makes people feel like they are being judged or compared in some way.

Not that I let the awkwardness stop me from asking, anyway. I’m always on the hunt for awesome gift ideas for all ages, so I just want the info. No judgment here! Just excitement about new finds!

This year, like many people, we are cutting back a bit on our Christmas spending on the kids. Also, we looked around for some non-toy presents since they will be getting toys from their grandparents and aunts this year. So here are a couple of ideas from my own shopping list — no need for the awkward asking!

See, I’m always thinking of you guys.

For the Captain — he’s six and a half — we wanted to get him a Star Wars shirt. He loves the Star Wars, but we wanted something on the theme that wasn’t a toy. There are plenty of cute shirts available online for like, a thousand dollars each plus a million dollars shipping. However, I did find this pretty good one at Sears.ca for just $14.99. Free shipping, too, if you’re willing to pick it up at a location near you. Warning — they fit big, I bought the size 8 (small) and it’s surely going to fit him until he’s 17.

He’s also getting some Ricky Ricotta books that he saw at the bookstore a few weeks ago, and fell in love with. But if you have a six year old, may I recommend the Wayside books instead:

They are hilarious, and their short-story format makes them perfect for bedtime reading. They’re probably too hard for your average six-year-old to read themselves but we just finished working through the third book as the Captain’s bedtime stories and I think it’s safe to say, he’ll love them forever.

Gal Smiley is five this Christmas, and she is a tough person to shop for. She is not into girly-girl things like Barbie and Polly Pockets and fashion jewelry and handbags. She’s all about the cargo pants and climbing trees. One thing she really likes is playing “camping,” so she is getting a hand-crank flashlight from Lee Valley, for just $10:

She also loves to have a cup of milk in a mug in the mornings, so we are getting her a custom photo mug from the Photolab at the Superstore, with a picture on it of her with her favourite sleep buddy, Shearly the Sheep (starting at $14, depending on how fancy you want your mug).

She’s going to love it. There’s lots of other great custom photo gifts to consider too, like t-shirts or Christmas ornaments or puzzles, with a picture of a special toy or brother or sister on it. For Gal Smiley’s birthday, I printed out several photos that she had taken with the Fischer Price camera we got her last year (totally awesome gift, absolutely perfect for her, by the way) and put them in a little album and it’s one of her favourite things — another inexpensive gift that was a big hit.

Little Miss Sunshine is two and a bit, and she’s so easy to shop for. Unlike Gal Smiley, anything pink and sparkly will do just fine. So, she is getting sparkle shoes from the Joe Fresh line (the Loblaws/Superstore brand). I’ve seen sparkle shoes at the mall for $35, and I’m sure they are excellent quality, but considering the Little Miss is going to wear them when she is digging sand at the park, the $14 price at the Superstore will be just fine. Unfortunately I could not find a picture of them online because the Joe site is SO ANNOYING, but they come this year in black, silver, and gold (we got silver) and they sell out super early, so act quickly if you are interested.

The Little Miss is (not suprisingly) obsessed with ballerinas, so she’ll also be getting a couple of books about ballerinas, including this one called Ballerina! by Peter Sis:

It’s about a girl getting ready for a ballerina show and practicing her moves. Oh man, am I ever going to be ballerina-ed out three days after Christmas.

Lastly, if you have an almost-three-year-old, I highly recommend the Letter Factory video by LeapFrog, which is just $11 online:

We already own it but we are buying it for my nephew this year, because it totally changed our lives. Actual education and early reading skills, passed on to your kid while they think they are mindlessly watching TV! We just started bombarding the Little Miss with this one and she already has learned that the A says “aahhhhh!”

Okay, now it’s your turn! What funky and different and inexpensive ideas do you have?

Disclosure: I got bubkis from any and all of these companies for mentioning their stuff. I just like it.

This week we got the Captain’s first Grade One report card. It is such a mysterious document. I mean, the letter grades are there and I guess that’s fairly straightforward. But reading through the comments is like reading a foreign language.

I’m guessing that Board guidelines, formulated so as to not offend anyone ever, instruct the teachers to couch all their real comments in such convoluted sentences as to be completely misunderstood. You have to read each sentence at least ten times to understand its basic meaning; then you have to read it several times in the context of the whole paragraph to understand the nuances of each word.

For example, here’s a sentence:

“He usually prints letters legibly and leaves a space between words.”

On the surface, that sounds good, right? He’s printing things! He’s doing it! He’s making it happen!

But the key word here is, “usually.” Usually is the word that indicates the level at which he is doing these things. In reality, handwriting is the Captain’s weakest area. With this sentence, the teacher is trying to communicate the he needs more handwriting practice.

If he were doing well in this area, she might have said, “He always prints legibly.” If he were having a lot of difficulty, she might have had to go all the way to, “He sometimes prints legibly.”

Instead, the selection of the key word “usually” is meant to flag it as a problem area that needs work, but isn’t threatening his ability to pass.

Crazy, eh? It’s like every single point in the report card must have a positive sound about it, no matter what it is really trying to say. You really have to read between the lines to understand why your kid got the mark they did, and what they really need to work on.

Here’s another one:

“He applies knowledge and skills in familiar contexts with considerable effectiveness.”

This comment is about math. The key word here is “considerable” — this means he’s doing very well. If he were having trouble in math class, she might have said, “with some effectiveness” or maybe, “He usually applies knowledge.”

It took me a very long time to learn to speak this kind of language.

I guess the Board is just trying to protect its teachers from ugly confrontations, but we really just wish they’d tell it like it is — it’d feel a lot less like homework!

At the very last second, I’ve decided to take Gal Smiley and Captain Jelly Belly to see The Nutcracker at the NAC. We got tickets in the very back row of the upper balcony. Two hours trapped in seats with two small children, miles above the stage! Should be a good time!

This weekend I took Gal Smiley to the library and she checked out a beautiful picture book about The Nutcracker. We talked about how it’s really a ballet with dancing and music to tell the story, then we listened to a few excerpts from the music that I had on a Christmas CD.

Out of sheer curiousity, I searched the NAC site and was surprised to see it is playing this very week. It seemed like too good of an opportunity to pass up, so I decided what the heck, I’ll try it. The Captain misses Dance! Show! (which I don’t watch with him anymore, too many uncomfortable questions about why the boys are never wearing shirts) and so he asked if he could come too, so the three of us are off.

I hope it’ll be fun — I love The Nutracker and it’s been a while since I saw it. I’m completely prepared to leave early if need be, though. And oh! I have to remember the binoculars.

If you’ll be there for the 1:30 show on Saturday and you see me doing a craft in the lobby before the show, come say hello!

In other news, my blog has been nominated for a Canadian Blog Award for Best Family Blog. If you’re so inclined, you can vote for this blog to be a finalist here. Scroll down until you find Turtlehead in the list, and then use the drop box to the left to rank me 1st. Or, you can rank any and all of the blogs listed in the order of your choosing, then click “vote” to submit all your rankings.

We had a rough night last night, so by the time Sir Monkeypants and I dragged ourselves out of bed this morning, it was an hour later than usual. We had to run around doing everything in half the time.

Usually Sir Monkeypants gets himself ready in the morning in time to drop off the kids at school on his way to work, but this morning, there was no time for himself as he rushed to get the kids dressed and fed. So when school time rolled around, I threw on a coat over my PJs and drove Gal Smiley and Captain Jelly Belly over.

Gal Smiley hopped out of the car at the kiss-n-ride just fine.

The Captain, who did not sleep well last night, had a small meltdown.

The poor boy was simultaneously upset by about six different things and by the time he climbed out of the van, all he could do was stand on the sidewalk sobbing. I hopped out of the car, which you aren’t supposed to do at the kiss-n-ride, to try to comfort him. Luckily the vice principal came over and sympathetically told me to just leave my van, as traffic was dying down anyway, and walk him inside.

Which I did, and he calmed down quite a bit. By the time we got to the building, he was fine.

I was a total mess, though.

Seriously, I don’t know how Sir Monkeypants survives drop off every morning. It was like the first day of school all over again. It sure didn’t help that the Captain was crying, but even seeing Gal Smiley playing happily in the kindergarten yard made me well up. My babies! Going away for the day! Into the big wild world all on their own!

Oh my God, excuse me while I get ANOTHER tissue.

Clearly, I need a nap. And a cup of tea. And possibly a lobotomy. I mean, they LIKE school! They are happy there! They are learning things and growing up to be lovely people!

I miss them. Sniff.

I just wrote a long post, complete with links and pictures, about some of the deals I’ve found around town for the kids’ Christmas presents. But then I had an attack of writer’s remorse, and couldn’t post it. For some reason, talking about presents you are getting for your kids seems too close to the big taboo — Talking About Money. So I’m thinking it over. Maybe I’ll post it next week if I get over myself.

In other news, I went out this morning to the IKEA to get one last little thing I need for the advent calendar activities (which start tomorrow, whee!). I have to pick up Gal Smiley at 10:30 and the IKEA doesn’t open until 10, so Little Miss Sunshine and I were at the door right when it opened. Along with FIFTY OTHER PEOPLE. When I am ready to go back to work, I am totally getting an IKEA franchise. I bet I could open one a block away from the current IKEA and still pack them in.

While I’m at it, I may as well add a Tim’s franchise inside. GOLD MINE, I tell you.

Between the IKEA this morning and a “quick trip” to the mall on Saturday afternoon, I think I’ll be fleeing to the safety of exclusive internet shopping in the years to come. I love you, internet!

My shopping this morning also included a trip to Lee Valley, which meant that my list was much done. DONE. I still have Christmas cards to write — if I get around to it. I’m a Christmas card FANATIC, but for some reason, I’m having trouble getting motivated this year. I think it’s Giant Fundraiser hangover.

But other than that I’m am now free to do the fun Christmas stuff, like wrap presents with the kids and decorate the tree and sing cheesy Christmas songs at full volume and make mixed drinks with creme de minte.

Time to get festive!