familytastic!

I stumbled across this post over on Ririan Project today about the 7 habits of highly successful fathers.

Funnily enough, when we first started a family, I picked up that book by Stephen Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Successful Families. While it was an interesting read, I never got to the end of it. It's on my to-do list for when I start working from home.

Ririan's post borrows heavily from the Covey formula, and it's an inspiring read. However, I do disagree with his first point, keeping stress to yourself. OK, it's one thing to not let your mood impact your family, but I try to talk to our children about what's going on in my life.

I came home quite tired from work the other day and explained that I'd had a hard day at work. We briefly chatted about why my day had been so difficult. While it's important to let the children get on with the business of being kids, part of being in a family is sharing your emotions, and I'd like to think the kids can come back to me and talk about their lives too.

We've done it! We've toilet trained a child or the third and final time, and that feels good!

Just before Christmas, Daniel decided that he didn't want to wear a nappy anymore. We had known from late summer that he was ready, but in our laziness kept putting the inevitable off. We just didn't want to spend a week mopping up puddles from every corner of the house.

I got a little weepy tonight as my wee 4 year old blew out the candles on his chocolate caterpillar birthday cake.

In honesty, he won't be four until tomorrow, but we had a party tonight in his granny's so his cousins could join him.

He is such a massive wee boy, he actually looks like he is about five or six years old, but it seems like yesterday when we brought him home from hospital all fresh and new.

His birthday has turned out to be quite power ranger themed. It doesn't matter what other gifts he gets....he has a green mystic force ranger, so all is right with the world.

Our good friend Wooftie - on his annual visit from The States - dropped a couple of small-but-expensive presents on Rachel and Jake: Nintendo DS Lites.

At the same time, Lisa's mum gave us a PlayStation 2 and donated a boxful of old games including the highly addictive Star Wars Lego.

The children instantly became transfixed by Super Mario and Star Wars Lego, and begged to play with them at all hours of the day and night. Lisa's best laid plans - to restrict usage to weekends only - fell by the wayside pretty quickly as the novelty of computer games overtook our self-discipline.

Jake became very adept at Super Mario World on the Nintendo, and would get lost in the game until he hit a tough spot and needed adult assistance. However, he's become adept with the DS Lite in a short space of time, and I've noticed that his concentration is phenomenal as he gets absorbed in the game. Almost to the point of being oblivious to everyone else. I walked into the house one day last week and he was busy playing his computer games, looked up, smiled at me, and went straight back to the game.

Rachel's just as good with the games, probably better since she has a couple of years up on Jake, but her biggest failing with computer games is her impatience. She's alright on her own, but when in a two-player game with Jake or her little friend Lauren, she quickly loses her temper when the game isn't going her way. Jake also can become very frustrated, and you know this because of the anguished animal howls that he makes. That's usually a sign that gaming time is over.....

We're trying to teach her more about teamwork and being understanding when Jake doesn't understand what to do. So far to limited success. What works best is when you restrict them to single-player games and let them do a level or 5 minutes each.

Having said that, there are a couple of the kids' friends who we can't allow to play computer games. Too many kids = major kiddie impatience, screaming, shouting and bad temper. When those folks come to the door, we kick everyone out. They get fresh air - we get a few minutes of peace before having to referee the next row!

We were away this weekend in Ballycastle visiting the folks up there.

Saturday evening was beautiful, so we decided to go for a walk. The weather was warm, but there was a gentle breeze keeping us cool. Rachel and Jake came along on their scooters, riding a bit too fast for comfort (since I was the one trying to keep up with them)!

We ended up in a local playground near the beach and spent a relaxing hour playing with the children on the swings, slides and climbing frames. As the sun started to descend and the air became cooler, we decided to head back up to my parents' house where we were staying.

So, the two scooter kids shot off and I lumbered along in pursuit. The pair stopped at the end of a row of houses and loitered for a minute while I caught up. Running down the side of the houses was a steep hill, which son and daughter were contemplating from their scooters.

Rachel did a little test with her scooter, going a little bit down the hill and then pulling toward the verge to stop. I thought she'd realised how steep the hill was and had decided against scooting down it. Wrong...

After a couple of seconds, she shot off down the hill. I couldn't believe my eyes and shouted at her to stop. (Great idea, she was already out of control, how could she stop?) A car was parked near the bottom of the hill with the driver's door wide open. Rachel was heading straight for it. I was pounding down the hill as fast as my legs would carry me, no hope of catching her now, just to pick up the pieces at the bottom.

Rachel managed to avoid the car door, but the road came to a bend at the bottom and she couldn't follow it at that speed. Her only option was to either crash into the hedge or attempt to skid to a stop. She chose the skid.

For a moment, it looked like she was going to make it, but a patch of rough ground caused the scooter to fall abruptly and she was thrown off, landing hard on her knees and then smashing her face off the ground. I was beside her within seconds prising her gingerly off the ground, trying to asses the damage and comforting her and berating her in the same breath. Her mouth and nose were bleeding and she was pebbledashed with small stones which I gently wiped away. Her knees were grazed and bleeding too and she was scared and badly shaken from the ordeal.

Jake appeared a minute or two later, offering to take Rachel's scooter back up the hill, and I carried the patient back to the top, still incredulous at what I'd just seen. As I was going up the hill, I noticed a car had stopped and the passengers staring at us. I inwardly cursed them for sitting there watching our misfortune when the driver got out and came across the road with a first aid box. He explained that he works for the local coastguard and proceeded to clean Rachel's knees and patch her up. When he finished, we thanked him profusely (and I felt bad about my snap judgement).

Epilogue

Rachel then refusing to walk (too sore), I ended up carrying her all the way back to her Grandparents' house. When we got back, I laid her down on the sofa to rest. Guess what? Within five minutes she was up and running around again as if nothing had happened!

Still, the sight of a child hurtling down a hill and crashing at the bottom is never pleasant. Rachel's got a few minor cuts to her face, but it could have been so much worse - we were expecting broken bones.

I read an article today about world birth rates and the fact that the amount of males born is signigicantly higher than the amount of females. It made for very interesting reading, and pointed out that this skewed birth rate is causing problems in some countries (such as China) where men are beginning to find that there just aren't enough women to go around.
Reading the piece reminded me of my feelings and concerns when I found out that I was expecting my sons.

When I was growing up I always imagined a family with at least 2 or 3 daughters, I couldn't imagine what it would be like to have a son.

When I found out that I was pregnant with a boy during my second pregnancy I was slightly nervous. I wondered if I could parent a boy, I imagined a crazy toddler turning into a surly young man who is conditioned to bottle up his emotions and remain difficult to reach.

Everyone I spoke to with sons disagreed. Each and every person told me that wee girls are much harder work, they want to rule the house, while boys are much more placid and easy going.

To date my experience has been immensely positive and I can't believe I was ever worried. My three children are all precious to me, it makes no difference what gender they happen to be.

I think my concerns must have stemmed from the fact I have two sisters very close in age to me, my brothers are a lot younger, one has yet to reach his teenage years. As my father was not around for most of my childhood, my experience of family life was very much a female orientated one.

I am lucky to have an excellent husband who is very much involved in the childrens lives. This will hopefully come in useful in those teenage years, when embarrassing topics have to be broached, and my son may not actually want my input into his love life, or romantic crises. And I am now wise enough to realise that my daughter is unlikely to want to confide in me about her first love or hot crushes either. Surly teenage behaviour is not limited to the males of our species, I can all too well remember the trouble I gave my own mother!

My sister is currently 5 months pregnant and strangely, experiencing exactly the same worries as I did, way back when. I am trying to give her the benefit of my experience, but I know that once the baby is born, no matter what the sex is, she will realise for herself, what a precious gift a baby is, and that sex is irrelevant to the love you feel for that person who is piece of you.

So, Rachel had her nursery graduation ceremony yesterday. Most of the grandparents came to the school to watch the little concert they'd prepared and to see the kids getting their certificates from the principal of the school.

I showed up slightly late, due to my parents managing to get mixed up over timings. When I got in to the assembly hall, the children were already on stage. It didn't take long to locate my little cherub on the left of the stage among a gaggle of friends.

The concert began with a few songs from the children, sung in that tuneless, half shouted manner that kids do best!

My heart melted as I saw Rachel scanning the audience and as her eyes settled on my she broke into a huge grin and waved down to me. We spent the rest of the concert intermittently nodding and smiling at each other across the hall.

When the time came, she had to walk out to the middle of the stage to receive her certificate from the principal. As she did it, she looked slightly nervous, but she turned and gave a big wave to the whole family as she walked back to her seat!

It's always great to see Rachel in her element, mixing with the other kids. She's such a little butterfly, and she knows it!

My husband will often tell people that I don't allow him to have any money, or carry an ATM card to withdraw from our bank account. I resent this, as it makes me sound like a tyrant, while the real reason is that he is a pea -brain who loses absolutly everything!

Each time he gets a new ATM card he loses it within a matter of months, if not weeks. When this happens, both our cards have to be cancelled, leaving us with no access to our account for at least 7 days. It's a real hassle!

I have bought him a wallet, which he never uses, so in the end I just stopped ordering new cards. When he lost his, I kept mine and became the main administrator of our finances.

For the last year things have ran smoothly, until last night. I lent Gerard my card to get some petrol for his car, I then let him look after it while we went out for a meal for my dad's 50th birthday. When I asked Gerard for the card this morning to get some groceries, it was nowhere to be found! He is adamant that he didn't lose it, but it isn't anywhere in our house, so I don't know what other conclusion I can draw.

Once again all our cards have now been cancelled. We have no access to our bank account until we can get to the branch on Monday, so we are going to have to scrape by this weeked on the few pounds we have lying about the house and hope we don't starve.  Bang goes that takeaway I was hoping for tonight!

They say you can raise the perfect child, until they mix with other children. Over the last few weeks I have had some detailed insight into that topic.

Over the last month or so Rachel has been playing outside almost every hour that she isn't in nursery. She has become so sociable, and it is so funny to see her playing games like 'mummy and daddy' and hopscotch. She seems to have aged 4 years in just 4 short weeks.

I love seeing her interact in a large group, I love how confident she is, and how much she enjoys the company of other children, especially girls.

However not all the behaviour changes have been positive. Rachel has always been strong willed, but rarely cheeky. Yet when out playing she has started to really stand her ground, and refuse to come in when I call her, telling me " I will come in when I want to come in!"

We also heard her talking about boyfriends yesterday. To be fair the kids were playing 'mummy's' and Rachel asked one of the other girls to be her boyfriend, so she obviously doesn't get the concept, but still it's a word and a concept that she has never used or thought of before.

So you see nothing too bad has occured, and she hasn't been intorduced to hard drugs or anything, but slowly it is beginning to dawn on me that there is only so much I can protect her from, and only so much I can influence her, or stop other people influencing her. From here on in she will be exposed to things outside of my control.

I have never thought of myself as a control freak, but now I am beginning to wonder.........

I love our local library. Its a fun, educational place to take the kids....and even better its free! 

We got Jake his first library card when he was only two months old and Rachel was just turned two and ever since we have been regular visitors. 

Our local library is very small, but the librarian knows everyone, and always has a smile and some kind words for the children. 

On entering, Rachel and Jake make a beeline straight to the childrens tables and chairs at the back of the room, and always play first with the bead frames and jigsaw puzzles. While they are occupied Gerard and I can choose browse the shelves and choose our books, I laugh at his weird choices, and he admonishes me for picking yet another piece of 'chick lit'. 

The we settle at the back and read a few stories before letting the children pick some books to take home. 

Children model their reading behaviour on on their parents, and many studies have shown that children who don't have parents who read, often don't see any purpose in learning to read at school. 

Cultivating a love of books in your children at an early age is vital to ensuring they develop good literacy skills. Visits to the library are a great and enjoyable way to enforce their love of reading. 

I am especially grateful for the library in the winter time. The storytelling and craft sessions that they host for children are a great way to keep the family amused when the weather is too cold or wet to play outside.