Thankfulness

Thankfulness.

It has been popular among some of my Facebook friends, especially at my church, to do a post about something they are thankful for each day of November, as a spiritual practice.  I believe deeply in the spiritual practice of thankfulness, and it's something that I try to incorporate into our daily family life.  I meant to do the "30 Days of Thankfulness" challenge, but clearly I am mildly organizationally challenged, and have not gotten to posting on Facebook each day.  But every time I see the posts it reminds me to say my own little prayer of joy, and I wanted to write down some of the things I think about.  Writing in general is about working through our challenges, and I hope by writing this blog I can tell stories that encourage others to work through their challenges as well.  But it is also important to stop and write down the words of strength, blessing, and power.

*****
I am thankful to live in this place in the world.  I am thankful for the beauty that God creates around me each day.  God made beauty everywhere in the world, and I am thankful for that as well, but I am glad that fate set me down in this place.  I love watching the seasons change; I love that I don't know what the weather will be next; I love our long gardening season; I love the cool and rainy days as much as the sunny and inviting ones.  The differences make me more grateful for everything.  In this place in the world, I am thankful to be within a few hours' drive of the ocean, the mountains, and the high desert.  I love each of these places for their own reasons.  I am thankful that we can camp in the summer and explore more of our world.  I am thankful that there are so many places to explore and discover within driving distance of our home.  And this moment, I am thankful for the beauty of the leaves, and the yellow beech tree outside my bedroom window.  And the icicles that hung off each leaf, transforming the landscape, which we were blessed with yesterday.

I am thankful for the community where we live, as well.  I am thankful for my individual friends, and also our church home, where I feel involved and welcome.  I am thankful for all the ways and places that embrace my children and their needs: I feel incredibly blessed to have a school that fits their unique educational needs, and moreover is loving and supportive to them as human beings -- all of which, AND they are well organized!  I am thankful for our local support group for adoptive families.  I am thankful that we have options for classes and learning for our children: I am thankful that we can choose a dance studio based on positives, not just finding one that doesn't play skanky music for little girls; I am thankful that we have options to choose horse riding, gymnastics, and other opportunities for the children to exercise their bodies and minds.  I am also thankful for the professionals in our community.  I am thankful that we have a pediatrician who is respectful of my choices as a mother; I am thankful that we can find counseling and therapy solutions that are appropriate to help our children work through their challenges.

I am thankful for the nature all around us.  I am thankful that I can take the dogs out on the trails near our house, and that those trails are surrounded by trees, and mist, and the blooming and fading flowers of the different seasons.  I love the trilliums and trout lilies which appear for only a few weeks in the early spring; every year they are like a special treat from nowhere, and they remind me both that life is fleeting and precious, and also amaze me with how well they are adapted to live and thrive in such a specific environment.  I am thankful for the orchards and farms near our home, and that we can eat fresh produce grown from our own fertile land.  Nature truly is a place of calm that restores our souls.

I am thankful for the opportunity to have lived in different places in the world.  I have lived on different sides of America, and I have lived for at least some time on three different continents.  I have learned and grown with each new place, and the chance to live in other areas has given me a deeper appreciation and joy for being where I am now.

I especially am thankful for the chance to live in Uganda.  I never planned on it, and I might not have made the choice to spend so long there if I had known what it would entail.  But no amount of reading or spending time simply traveling or visiting can give you the same deep appreciation of a new place, than truly committing yourself to a new place.  It was difficult to be away from my own culture, but when my only associates were Ugandans, I learned a deeper level of friendship.  When I close my eyes, I can still feel the golden warmth on my skin, still taste the red dirt in the air, the constant smells and sounds that are so different from our polite and purifed life in America.  I am thankful to have made some part of Africa, into some part of me.

I am thankful for so many of the small things around my home, all the things of beauty and memory.  I am thankful for my bed which is both pleasant to look at and comfortable.  I am thankful for the antique *** in the dining room, which is useful, lovely, and gives a special feeling to our home.  I am thankful for the pictures of my family on the walls, and holding tight to each little memory.  I am thankful for the mementos of our travels and our special times together: a plate from Italy, boats and drums representing different cultures.  I am thankful for our painted walls, which are beautiful, and which I created in the time before I had children, when I was imagining a house full of children.

I am thankful for clothes to wear, which make me feel both pretty and confident.  I used to try to move beyond trying to be pretty, but as I have learned more honestly to assess myself, I have become a more complete person by accepting my face, my body, and my desire to feel good about myself.  I am thankful for friends and for systems that have helped me figure out what to wear to feel good about myself, and I am thankful for plenty of second-hand stores in town so I can have the fun of shopping without investing too much money in clothes!  I am also thankful for my children's clothes.  They are warm, comfortable, and help them feel attractive and joyful in their bodies -- also I am thankful for the big consignment sales in our community which allow me to do a season's worth of children's shopping at one time, and for a very reasonable price!  I hope that these tools, both the outer accoutrements and the inner wisdom that I am gaining, will help me to teach my children about loving and taking care of their bodies.  I hope to be able to teach my daughters to honor and respect their physical selves, and my son to be able to identify and be drawn to the way inner beauty reflects on the outside of a woman.  I am grateful for a community of women, both near and far, who are supporting my journey towards beauty; both those who advise me, and some wonderful women of color who have stepped up to offer special words of encouragement to my daughters.

I am thankful to be an American.  I spent many years disappointed in many things about my country, or envious of the history and culture of other countries.  I think much of that is youthful idealism, and that over-idealizing any country does not help to work to improve it.  But going through the process of adoption helped me to focus on what I really appreciate: our country is  made up of so many different kinds of people, from many backgrounds, many colors, many cultures, many thought processes.  Our country is still more welcoming than many to new immigrants who come to appreciate the opportunities we have to offer, and as they come they strengthen America and give so many opportunities to learn and grow to those of us who already live here.

I am thankful for our health.  Although each of us in our family has one or two weaknesses in our body, they do not interfere with our daily lives.  We are each strong enough to go hiking, to hug each other and run and create.  We have not been struck with any serious illness, and if one of us were, I am also deeply thankful for the medical care to which we have access.  There are serious problems and stressors with medical care (and the opportunity to access it) in America, but at least it is present.  And many doctors, nurses, and other people involved in medicine are truly helpful and doing their best to connect as human beings and help us be well.


And at this point, I could go on and on and on.... each time I think about something that I am thankful for, it reminds me of something else, and I look around and think of something else.  I am thankful the education and opportunities I have; I am thankful for the people who have raised me or who affected me in my youth; I am thankful for our warm home and running water; I am thankful for small things in life and ones so large I know I cannot fully comprehend them.  I don't think anyone will keep reading if I keep writing all night long!  But every single one of these items that I mentioned are things that I think about every day -- and I do mean every day.  Maybe on one day I won't think so hard about being an American and another day I might not think quite so hard about my furniture, but my daily litany of thankfulness is too long to write down.

******

So I will end with the bedrocks of thankfulness.

I am thankful that we have enough money to make choices.  I recognize that so many of the other blessings come from the power that power.  Yes, there are many blessings that are free -- but the space and mental freedom to enjoy them is directly related to having enough money to first enjoy security.  We still have to worry about where we are going to spend our money, or how to plan for things in the future, but I know it is such an incredible blessing, that we know for sure that we have the basics in our lives: food, shelter, transportation.  And that because we are secure in those things, all of us -- children and adults -- can dedicate our energy to higher mental and emotional processes.
*****

I am thankful for my family.  Every single day, so many times a day, I look around at each of them and I am so thankful to have each of them around me.  I am thankful for my cat, KC, whose fur is so soft.  I am thankful for my dogs, their unwavering devotion and how they inspire me to be outside and active every day.  I would not take care of myself nearly so well if they weren't there to remind me, and I don't need to sigh about my babies growing up and away from me when my dogs are happy to fill that role for the rest of my life.

I am thankful for Sunflower, who made me into a mother.  I don't think I ever would have gone on the journey I have been through since, if it weren't for that love that has transformed me.

I am thankful for Buttercup, and her sweetness and gentle personality.  I am daily amazed how different she is from the other children, and she fills a unique role in our family.

I am thankful for Hibiscus.  Every day with her is full of challenges, but she shines with such a brilliant light.  It is my honor to be her mother, and have the chance to guide her through her life.

I am thankful for my husband.  We are similar and different enough to compliment and balance each other.  I am thankful for the times when he supports me and we work as a team to run our household and raise our family, and I am thankful for the times when we are able to sit down and talk, and we always have new things to say to each other.  And I look back and forward with thankfulness at the trips we have shared and the new experiences in our future!  As much as my children take my time, energy, and physical love, my marriage and my husband is the heart of my family.  I am thankful to have such a good life partner, and that our love keeps growing and deepening as the years pass.

*****
And I am thankful for God and the divine, and that every day and every year offers the chance to deepen my understanding and faith.  I would not have enough strength or courage to continue every day without knowing that some One much deeper is sustaining me.  When I am worn out and frustrated, and yet still find patience and love for my children, it is because He is pouring it through me.  I can manage to see this difficult journey of motherhood -- and personhood -- with fulfillment and joy, because through God I see it as a journey and not a destination.  I do not expect myself to be perfect already, because I know my entire life is a journey towards the "me" that God has dreamed for me.  I can take a deep breath and forgive myself at the end of the day, because I know that God has forgiven me first.

******
While writing this, I keep thinking of more things for which I am thankful.  I remember them and am joyful in my life every single day.

Melatonin and Other Thoughts

I usually give small doses of melatonin to my kids at bedtime.  Yeah, yeah, I know there might be all kinds of mysterious side-effects, and it might not be safe to give every night, or even every week.  But anyone who wants to criticize or worry about this decision is welcome to come along and put my kids to bed, and is especially invited to show up on one of the nights that Hibiscus kneels on the floor and screams at the top of her lungs for ten minutes straight.... or thirty, or forty, and then throws up.  (Which, thank you God, has not happened in several months.)  I can practically guarantee that you will feel much more dismissive about the negative possibilities of melatonin, when faced with the daily realities of my kids at bedtime.

Besides, in the article about how dangerous it is for to use melatonin daily, always ends with some parent saying something about "I know I should have a routine and put the kids to bed at the same time every night, but it's just too hard for me, and that's just not our parenting strength, so we just give them melatonin instead."  Which makes it easy to feel superior to those weak parents who depend on chemical sleep aids.  But I have a routine that is as crystallized as knowing in which order we brush teeth, and who hangs up the towels, and it happens within fifteen minutes of the exact same time every day.  You can't get more precise than that when you have three chaotic children.  And I still start it off with melatonin.

But these poor kids have not yet been farther than a few weeks from changing families, changing houses, changing countries, changing schools, or changing available family members.  Life is rough.  It helps to be able to wake up in the morning well-rested, because you didn't spend two hours traipsing back out to the living room to ask mama if there are any monsters coming in the windows.  And I know that because I've forgotten once or twice.  No more.



Both of the older two children have serious regulatory and sensory issues, and I think that it is very likely that they would be the kind of children for whom doctors would actually prescribe melatonin -- in fact, my son's doctor actually did just that last year.  So I don't have much guilt about giving them a small dose every night, but Buttercup has a fairly balanced system, and I would like to get her out of the habit of needing it.

Today she didn't nap, and she did play outside a lot, so she was plenty tired, so I decided to give it a try.  Although Daddy left for Europe a week ago, so maybe "not in the middle of transitions" doesn't actually apply!

We got ready for bed on time.  We did our routine the usual way.  I turned off the light and started on blessings.  Buttercup was wiggly waiting for her turn, so after her blessing I reminded her to tell her hands to go to sleep, and no more banging and no more talking now.  Then I moved on.

While I was doing Hibiscus's blessing, despite reminders, I heard increasingly more thumping of pillows, chitter-chatter, and eventually the bed started shaking with some sort of gymnastics.  Maybe singing and wiggling oneself to sleep would be acceptable in some households, but all three of my children sleep in the same room, and Buttercup sleeps in the same bed with Emerson, who was already starting to fall asleep.  One singing child is going to set the whole place on fire with energy very quickly.

I tried to not interrupt Hibiscus's prayer time, but as soon as I was done, I snatched up the little firebrand and put her in the guest bedroom.  I plopped her on the bed and told her calmly and firmly it was time to go to sleep.  And I shut the door and left.

A few months ago, she was having sleep trouble, and she would wait quietly, and come out of the bedroom sadly after a while, and I would wrap her to sleep.  But that was when she was going through her "infant regression" sleep phase -- as I thought of it myself; it was also coupled with waking up four to six times a night and needing to be soothed back to sleep.  I didn't want to get into that habit again, as I felt like she was not doing any particular newborn regressing at this moment, she just wanted to stay up and play.  Besides, she will only nap when she is wrapped, which is okay, but she does need to fall asleep sometimes when she is not being worn.

Tonight I was surprised to hear nothing further after shutting the door.  But all parents know that silence can mean "trouble" as easily as it can mean "sleep," and I wanted to kiss her goodnight anyways.  So after five minutes or so I peeked in.

"Look, I do-ed it!" she greeted me cheerfully.  I think she meant getting the entire comforter off the bed, which seemed to be the change.  It's kind of a boring room.  I laid her back down and told her it was time to go to sleep.

"Now do bessings," she chirped.  I said goodnight.  "Now do bessings for me-eee!" she insisted.
"I've already done blessings for you," I reminded her.
"Is okay, do more bessings!' she suggested.
I declined, and continued to leave the room.
"Bad mama!" she yelled at my back, which is her go-to criticism lately.

As I left, she was starting to scream in the familiar toddler-not-getting-her-way sulky tone.  I shut the door.  There is no useful response to "bad mama!"


I did a few more things around the house, but the crying continued.  I was hoping that she would get tired of fussing, which happens sometimes, and either go to sleep, or I would go back in again at that point.  Then I figured that maybe we were trying cry-it-out, toddler version.  I would never, ever use cry-it-out with a baby, but I figure maybe the situation changes when the opening gambit is "bad mama!"

It wasn't more than a minute or two after the screams changed into real, upset cries, and no more than three of four minutes of crying total.  I had taken note before I left, and the room was boring but there was light coming in from outside, so it wasn't dark.  I didn't hear any bumps or sudden increases in volume that would indicate an accident, and no banging on the door.  It was basically long enough for me to gather what I needed to do, sigh, and gird myself for returning to the bedtime fray.

Adopted children can often have abandonment issues, and experts warn that forced isolation isn't the best parenting method for them, because it can awaken their deepest fears -- which does not help improve one's manners.  Just like any, ordinary, special child can have all kinds of fears or thoughts or lonelinesses, and I personally don't think that forced isolation is a good parenting method for any children, who can't explain themselves either.  So we didn't make it long enough to even kind of be a cry-it-out.

I went to check on her.  I could hear the door handle rattling, and I opened it up and found my little girl, totally hysterical.  I picked her up and she clung to my neck.

Then she threw up.  Then there was a giant explosion in her diaper region.  Then she had an asthma attack.

She was doing that sad and adorable little thing where she was trying to hold her vomit in her cupped hands; also while gasping for breath, and burping more vomit up.  I set her on the bathroom counter and cleaned her up and gave her her inhalers, and then I picked her up again.  More toots came cascading out.  I held her and rocked her and patted her back for a while, and she finally said something to me in her tiny little squeaky voice.

"What's that?" I asked.  "What do you want?"
"Me want to go sleepy... your back," she offered, and patted my shoulder suggestively.

After all that, I couldn't resist.  She went "my back," which means getting wrapped up.  She spent a long time snuggling and looking sadly over my shoulder, but finally I peeked up and the big eyes were closed.



So "left alone" is not an option.  I have ruled out "playing enthusiastically on sibling's bed.".  "Crying by self" is definitely a really, really bad choice.

Melatonin is looking better all the time.

In Non-Tropical Weather, I am a Very Mean Mama

The kids were playing crazily inside all morning, so after lunch I sent them outside instead of straight to quiet time.  By the time Buttercup got her outdoor gear on, the other two were ready to come in.  I told them that sorry, it was still outside time.  I put the visual timer in the window so they could see the rest of their half hour.

With ten minutes left, Hibiscus came in the door.  She had been well dressed for the cold, mostly because she got a new snow suit for her birthday, so she was wearing it.

"It's raining," she complained.
"Then put your hood up," I replied.
She came in the door and started to take her coat off, which is kind of the opposite of preparing for the rain.
"Hibiscus, your outside time is not over yet," I warned her.
"I know, but it's raining!" she exclaimed.
"I heard you the first time.  And did I answer, 'go ahead and come in,' or did I say 'then put your hood up'?"

She has experimented approximately every day about coming inside because she has taken off appropriate outdoor clothes, and discovered that I don't actually let her in.  Yesterday I found her sitting in the patio doorway, which was open around her.  We discussed outdoor time being over, which it wasn't, so I told her to go back outside so I could close the door.  She didn't.  She wanted to comb her doll's hair.  I told her to do it outside.  She still waited.  I told her I needed to shut the door.
"So say that thing that you say, and I'll do it," she said.
"Please sit outside to comb your doll's hair," I repeated.
"No, when you say, go in or go out, so I can shut the door," she suggested.  "Then I'll do that."

Yeah, nice try, kiddo, but that's one more choice than I'm prepared to offer!

So today she guessed that more arguing about coming inside might not get her very far, and she slinked outside again.  Immediately afterword, Emerson came up to the door, not dressed very properly for the weather.  I tell them to put on the right clothes, and I insist that they take the clothes with them, but I don't choose to make a fight about whether they actually put them on their bodies.  They can choose to be cold if they really want to.
"It's still outdoor time, so please go back outside," I warned him as he came in.
"It's raining," he announced sulkily.
"So put your hood up, and you'll be fine," I advised.
"But I'm too cold!" he wailed.
"Then put your coat on," I suggested.  Not exactly for the first time.
"It's too cold even WITH the coat!" he yelled.
Which is a little difficult to ascertain, given that he had not tried that method yet.
"I KNOW I'm going to be cold if I put my coat on," he sulked.  Which is possibly true, since he hadn't been wearing a coat for the last half hour or so already.
"Well, you're going to be less cold with your coat on than with your coat off," I reasoned.
"But I'm coming IN!!!" he yelled.  As he kicked off his boots and snowpants.
"No, you're not," I announced.  And I put him and his boots and his snowpants outside.  And his coat.

Last I saw, he was wearing them all.  And do you know what?  All the kids were having fun, too.

Happy Birthday, to Hibiscus

Happy seventh birthday to my wonderful, beautiful daughter.

The sun is fading.  My birthday girl and her busy brother and outside, and the littlest one is in the most snug and cozy nap on my back (in Pavo Hearts, for those who are curious!).  It has been a full and wonderful day.  Hibiscus has the last of the kids' birthdays-in-a-row, and we only made it to America in time for this one.  It's the first birthday in her little life that she's actually gotten to celebrate, or that anyone has cared about at all.  Maybe she's an unusual child who will get to remember her first birthday party!

I hope it was a special day for her.  She and I went out to breakfast this morning, which was actually her very first chance at alone time with mama.  In Uganda, Buttercup had time with me while the big kids were in school, and Emerson got some occasional alone time when the girls had to be somewhere, but there was no logistical way to have Hibiscus with me when the other children were somewhere else.  Today, we selected a cake together, had waffles, and went to the grocery store to get ice cream and juice for the party.  We played Jenga while we waited for our food, and she quickly figured out how to test the blocks to see if they were loose, and control her extra movements to not knock the tower over, as well as waiting for her turn patiently, and discerning the pattern to which blocks could be safely moved.  After two rounds, she said "let's try something else" as she started to make shapes with the blocks.  She said she was making a fence for a horse, and I built a horse out of Jenga blocks inside her fence, which impressed her.  Then we built other kinds of towers.

We ate our waffles and ended up talking about school.  She described how one of the staff at her Ugandan school had pinched her and called her a "villager" because she was eating her eggs in the car, and we talked about how that made her feel.  Well, I talked about that, because she still doesn't really have feelings words yet.  Then I asked what happens at Waldorf school in America, and she described -- her tone is still reverent and shocked -- how when she can't do something at Waldorf school, the teachers HELP her figure it out.  I asked her which way works better, being made fun of or being helped, and she said it works much better when the teachers help her out.  I told her that it made me feel really good that I could send her to school at a place where I knew she was safe from being made fun of, and the teachers help her out, and I'm sorry that that happened to her before, but that was the best that anyone was able to do.


And that pretty much sums up my feelings about Hibiscus's birthday.  I am so intensely joyful for her presence in our family and in my life, and so intensely sorrowful about what I haven't been able to shield her from.  About the things that meant she was on the road to become part of our family.

Last night I went into a Hallmark store to pick out a card for her.  I wanted something sappy and sweet and beautiful, and I thought about the things I wanted to write inside.  I thought about some words that I would say to her, to give her some little message to hold onto about how precious she is to me.  So much of our relationship, so much of our lives, is full of frustration and trying to guide her into place, into control.  Self-control, hopefully; eventually.  I know this time is hard on her, but I have deep faith that eventually she will settle into something much stronger and more positive than if I just let her be crazy and do whatever she wanted to.  But these months have been so hard on me, too, and I have sometimes lost my own self-control.  If I can't model patience and fortitude, at least I try to model handling my anger in a non-destructive manner, and owning my mistakes and apologizing.  But I'm not a very demonstrative person, so I fear that the occasional outburst of anger overpowers my gentle demonstrations of love.  In her birthday card, I didn't want to bring up the difficult parts, but I wanted to tell her about how much I love her despite them.

I stood in front of the rack of "daughter" cards and actually started to cry, although it probably wasn't visible to an outside observer.  (I mentioned that I'm not demonstrative!)  I was so proud and happy to have a daughter, and have a daughter whom I could give a card to and was old enough to understand and care.  It was one of those moments when you can stop and think about your life, and I remembered that it wasn't very long ago that I didn't have any daughter at all, and now I have this amazing and lively girl who is turning seven, and that I'm the one who can teach her about love, and safety, and faith, and beauty, and being a woman.  That whole display of sweet pictures couldn't sum up how proud and happy I am to be a mother of a daughter, of my own daughter, my very special girl.

Then I opened up cards and started to read them, to pick one out.  First of all, it seemed like most of them were written to be given to an adult daughter, so some of them I had to put down because they described "now you've grown into," as though growing into being yourself is a process that is ever finished.  I kept skimming and reading.

They were all filled with phrases like "through the years," and "on the day of your birth," and "your birth made me a mother," and "I remember all your birthdays," and "every year since your birth," and so on and so forth.

And I still felt teary, but now they were suddenly angry tears, and I left the store without buying anything, and I didn't manage to give Hibiscus any kind of card at all.  Writing about love is probably more my way of showing affection than her way of receiving it anyways.


I wasn't there when she was born.  I didn't know I was a mother then, and in fact, I wasn't, because it wasn't my job to protect her and teach her about love, and safety, and everything else.  But then no one else did it either, and I wasn't there to step in and protect her, and make her world better.  I was far away and I didn't know anything about her, while she was learning about loneliness, and hunger, and that when the getting gets tough, no one is going to help you out.  And I haven't been with her through the years, and I haven't seen her change and grow through her birthdays.  A few days ago she was telling us about some scary things that happened in her old life, and then contemplating how she never had "a happy birthday" before, and she wonders why I didn't stop the bad stuff and help the happy stuff along.  And I say "I wish I could have been there, and I would have made the bad boys stop teasing you," and "I wish I could have been there, and I would have baked you a cake."  Solving the problems in fantasy helps her a little bit, and her sad face turns into a little smile, as she imagines me chasing those bad boys away.

My own heart pains with the desperation of that wish.  I know that it makes no logical sense, but how deeply and passionately I wish that I had been able to be there from the beginning.  That I could have put myself between her little baby self and the cruel world that assaulted her without cease.  That I could have picked her up every time she cried so she learned that trust is real.  That I could have fed her, and made silly faces with her, and taught her feelings words when she was a toddler.  I have some misty vision of myself, perhaps time-travelling, in her parents' shack when she was a newborn.  I would say something like, "she's going to be my daughter anyways, so why don't we just start right now," as I picked her up, and they already knew things were bad and had been in the middle of an argument about how they were going to take care of an extra person, a helpless girl, so they would have been just as relieved as they were almost seven years later in real life.  And it wouldn't have saved her all the pain of losing the family you are born to, but it would have saved her six and half years of pain.

But I can't give her that.  I can't give her all those cakes that she missed, getting to take the first bite, the chance to be the most important person of the day six more times.


So we did what we could for number seven.  She picked out a chocolate cake in the shape of a heart from the bakery, which also makes me a little sad, because I always make birthday cakes but I wasn't able to manage it in time for the party.  She did not get a balloon or a box of chocolate or a carton of orange juice in the store, because of course she suddenly wanted everything, but I was determined to keep the excitement of this day within the realm of what she could handle.  But she had some time when a mother paid attention just to her, and acted like she was valuable and reasonable.  And she had a party filled with people who love her, which was ourselves and two other families.  When we sang our blessing and I added a prayer of thanks, for her seventh year, and being finally back in America so we could celebrate it all together, the whole table resonated with agreement and thanks for being together.

And new clothes.  And a dollhouse.  I could give her all those things.

Some times all that seems so joyful.  And other times, it seems so paltry.


So today, very happy birthday to my daughter, my special daughter, the daughter who fills my house with laughter and with energy, my very own daughter.  This year, I will try and teach you about love, about safety, about faith, about beauty, about being a woman.  I will try and do the best I can, and I'm sorry that it's not enough; that I'm six years too late.  We will start with this day, and do what we can with tomorrow.  I love you so much.

Re-entry: Contemplating Richness

We narrowly escaped our rabid apartment manager and left Uganda two weeks ago today.  This is our eleventh day at home.  So far, we have had four days to look around us, three days of normal routine, and this is the fifth day of snow-and-ice storm.  The school days calmed down a little bit, as the more intense kids had somewhere to go and something to think about (and were just plain out of the house for a while!), but other than that, most of that has been pure chaos, all the time.  Everyone has more big feelings than they know how to deal with, apparently!  But around yesterday, I started seeing a return to their normal rhythm and interaction with each other.  And somewhere around then, by the time the kids were all in bed, Mark and I had enough energy to actually talk and connect and enjoy being together.  Although as other parents will recognize, we mostly talked about our kids!

Mark said that he had worried about how the girls would fit into our lives here, but it hadn't been a problem, and they already seemed to belong.  I was glad to hear that, because we have all had a long time to get used to each other, but Mark has had a long time of quiet and potential concentration.  Life with the monkey troupe is pretty much exactly the opposite of that, so I am glad that it feels like a positive change to him.



He also said that our family is so much richer.

I agree so deeply.  I have spent so much of my time and energy and emotion on all the day-to-day details in the last months, from extraordinary things like trying to figure out how to get passports and deal with strange beaurocracy, to ordinary small-child life like managing tooth brushing and mopping up endless spills of water.  That's what my thought train has been about, and that's what I've been writing about, but under it all is a feeling about us all, about who "we" are now.  It's hard to find the time and words to describe what our family, the family-ness of it, is now.  "Rich" is exactly the right word.

All three children have such vivid personalities, and they are all so different from each other.  Our family is rich in Hibiscus's passion and energy, Emerson's planning and ideas, and Buttercup's empathy and concentration.

Our home is so full of feelings, as the little children grapple with their emotions.  Sometimes this means we are guiding through some difficult times, and the light in their little faces and bodies as we help them come through the difficult times shines more brightly than the sun after an ice storm. Other times, the intensity of their excitement ricochets off the walls, and travels through our family like the warmth of fire.  Our family is rich is joy and sorrow, pain and success, longing and fulfillment.

Children naturally soak up everything they can figure out and learn.  Three different children of three different ages and three different sets of curiosities are fascinating to watch through the day. Sometimes they approach life in different ways, and Emerson drives cars up and down ramps, while Hibiscus snuggles with dolls, and Buttercup moves play kitchen items back and forth.  Other times they tackle the same project with different goals and energy, like watching the different ways they approached making class Valentines.  They all love to read books, and we answer questions or hear the stories that resonate in their own hearts and minds, or overhear the lessons they explain to each other over the pages of the book in another room.  The light in a pair of eyes when the child figures out something new or feels successful lights up the house like little suns playing hide-and-seek.  Our family is rich in curiosity, exploration, and new ideas.

Three young minds are always coming to interesting conclusions and unexpected correlations.  I just heard Emerson describing a lego picture as "that's where Satan piles up the dead bodies" -- in a children's book.  Last night Hibiscus prayed for her teachers that "dear Lord forgive all their sins, for they know not what they do," which is a creative juxtaposition of prayers.  At dinner, Buttercup randomly popped out that she was thankful for the "miracle" of flying in the sky that got her to America and Daddy, which was not what we expected out of her lisping little mouth.  Getting to hear three sets of untraditional ideas every day keeps our minds more fresh than endless pots of green tea.  Our family is rich in laughter and thinking of things in new ways.

And other kinds of laughter as well!  Three children bring out the joy and silliness in each other.  They can get re-ignite each other over and over with any emotion, and sometimes they end up collapsing on the floor in mutual, joyful hysteria.  Our family is rich in children's laughter.

Of course, they also ignite each other's frustration, and follow each other into sadness, worry, or fear.  The inner and emotional life of children is deep and powerful, just like it is for all humans.  But we are together, and we can help each other wrestle with the "yucky" parts.  We parents cannot solve all their problems, but it is always a miracle when our loving arms can provide some solace and shelter.  Our family is rich in healing.

Mathematically, three children provide at least seven different relationships, of being alone or together in different combinations, and each combination brings out different facets of each child.  I never, ever tire of watching those relationships.  I never tire of observing the different ideas they come up with in play, or the way they inspire each other to creativity.  I never tire of seeing the gentleness and protective nature of my children flare up to help the younger ones, or the inspiration for trying harder to keep up with the older ones.  Even when they disagree or fight, they are gradually learning to solve their own problems and accept other people's opinions and needs, and they are finding every day that the love for each other is much deeper than their frustration -- or as they would put it themselves, that their siblings are "really good play-ers."  I never tire of watching their interactions grow and change.  Our family is rich in friendships, and ever-growing relationships.

And the love.  I can't even begin to describe the love.  I tell Emerson that love is like the Nile river pouring out of Lake Victoria, unimaginably deep and wide and infinite.  And that's just the love pouring through one person, so now our family is five deep rivers of love, each going five different ways.  Every day is special as each relationship deepens or is rediscovered with their Daddy, and his special kind of love and laughter brings out new facets of their personalities, and new kinds of love in their hearts.  Meanwhile, our love expressed as snuggles puts them to sleep, helps them out of tears, gives them strength to go to school, makes them feel beautiful, rewards them for hard work, soothes the owies, and teaches them that they love books.  The feelings behind those snuggles are the fuel that powers our days, and gives each child the strength to grow.  Buttercup's face lights up when I reach for her, as she puts her arms around my neck and says "here is my mama!"  Emerson's project isn't complete until he brings it to me to admire, and I give words to his confidence.  Hibiscus quietly glows from inside as she leans into my body and absorbs praise and confidence from my words of thanks.  Just contemplating the depth and power of each of my children's love for me brings tears to my eyes, and all the thinking in the world can hardly begin to contemplate my love for these three little beautiful souls in my care.


Our family is so rich in love.  We are so rich.

Talking, and more Talking

After I wrote the post about Quiet Time, and friend commented that learning to quietly be by herself would certainly be worth it for Hibiscus later in life.  In fact, there are a lot of things that will be worth it for Hibiscus later in life, that are making me go gray and ragged to start working on teaching her right now.

Like talking.  I feel like ALL DAY LONG I am correcting Hibiscus for talking at the wrong time, sometimes with the gentleness of guiding her to greater wisdom, and sometimes with a great deal of exasperation.  But when I stopped to think about it, I am only correcting a few simple guidelines:
-don't talk when someone else is already talking
-don't talk with your mouth full
-don't make "noise," e.g., utter nonsense at a loud volume for no particular reason
-when it is "conversation time," if you have not heard anyone else's voice except your own for a long, long, time, then it is time to stop talking

Of course, there are subgroups to this.  "Don't talk when someone else is talking" includes "guessing what your brother is saying and finishing his sentences loudly," and also "when your mother is giving you instructions, stop talking so you can hear the instructions," which is closely related to "when you ask a question, then stop repeating the question in a louder voice, so that you can hear the answer, instead of then starting to repeat 'WHAT?'."   Not talking with your mouth full goes hand-in-hand with the other lesson, that it is not good manners to put your mouth up to the side of your bowl, shovel in food as fast as possible while spilling it all over the table and floor, and talk through the entire thing.  (How she even manages that without choking herself, I am not sure, but she is a pro!)  The original two statements we have been working on for a while, and the latter two have been added in more recently.  Gradually adding new requirements is either because I have reasonable expectations for her, or my disgust has just grown overwhelming!

However, these are really the only points we are working on.  I am not drilling her on grammar.  I am not expecting her to make sense all the time, I am not working on telling a story in the right order and naming the important people as you go along.  I am not focusing on conversational conventions.  But "don't talk when someone else is already talking" takes up OUR ENTIRE DAY in corrections.

I remind her gently.  I make it into a teasing joke (which she enjoys).  I point it out in the abstract third person.  And shake, rattle, and repeat, over and over.  I wonder why I am even bothering, but she tries to listen and is starting to learn the rules, although she can't follow them yet.  I ask questions like "what is wrong here?" and she answers things like "Emerson is already talking" or points to her mouth and chews faster.  I create Silent Times when no one is supposed to talk (especially at bedtime), except for me, and except to ask necessary things, to make the talking rules simpler.  She forgets about it 15 seconds later.  I give up and walk into another room; Emerson comes in crying that he's trying to say something and Hibiscus keeps interrupting.  I remind gently, I remind in an irritated voice.

And then I yell.  Yes, I do.  I swear, if Hibiscus cannot actually speed up my genetic hair process and make me go gray, she can manage to turn me into a yeller.  I am not proud of it, but it has been months alone in Africa and four weeks of school vacation and SHE HAS NOT STOPPED TALKING THE ENTIRE TIME.

Is it worth it?  That's the real question.  If it doesn't matter, I might as well save ourselves the strife and arguments of me correcting her seventy million times a day.  But I think it does matter.  I have yet to meet someone who really enjoys having someone else finish all their sentences for them, or feels a calm helpful mood descend on them when someone follows them around repeating the same question six times in a row without pausing to hear if there is an answer.  I think this is one of the social skills that Hibiscus NEEDS to learn.  Maybe I'm wrong; maybe it's just a stage or she only acts like this with her mother or something else.

In which case, then it really IS a social skill that she needs to learn.  Because her mother is an introvert and an internal processor, and I actually need a moment of silence in order to decide what I'm going to say and answer the question.  It can be a short moment, but it needs to exist.  I can handle being asked the same question six times in a row.  I'm a mom; it comes with the territory.  But it turns out, I can actually NOT handle four weeks straight of talking.  Loudly.

*******

I have also discovered one of the difficulties of teaching table manners, which is the one time of day when we try to have a conversation and other subtle things like that.  Table manners are, by definition, an interaction between people.  There is only one person at our table who is fully capable of holding a normal, interactive conversation, with listening to what the other person says, basing your response on what their reaction is, and staying on one topic at a time, until it is mutually enjoyable to all parties to discuss something different.  There is also only one person who is capable of passing dishes, and remembering to not run around without being excused, and for that matter, only one person who has the authority to do the excusing.  Therefore, modelling is not possible, so the only thing I can do is keep saying, "Hibiscus, finish chewing... Emerson, say "please pass" and don't reach over the table... Hibiscus, don't stand on your chair... Buttercup, stay at the table until you're done.... Hibiscus, I hear your brother's voice and your voice starting talking... Hibiscus, how do we sit properly?... Buttercup, that's stuffing your mouth... Emerson, will you please pass me a napkin?  Thank--- Hibiscus, my voice is talking -- thank you... Hibiscus, you are standing on your chair..." and so forth.  I must agree, it is not very scintillating conversation!  I am starting to think that they could pick some of this stuff up smoothly if they had some example to follow than two other little monkeys.

*********

Have you ever noticed how important pronouns are in the English language?  We can technically explain what they do, and how and when we switch between male and female, but I don't think we can explain how the proper pronoun changes the entire meaning.  When someone starts a sentence with a female name, but in the second or third clause uses "he," our minds immediately jump to insert a logical male into the story.  I can't tell you how many times lately I've said "but what was Emerson doing there?" and Hibiscus gives me a blank look, because she wasn't talking about Emerson at all, which was also why I was confused.  So I have decided that paying attention to the gender of our pronouns is our English Lesson Of The However-Long-It-Takes.

Maybe I shouldn't focus on English grammar, and assume that Hibiscus will just pick it up eventually.  Her English is expanding by leaps and bounds, and it would be logical to assume that her grammar will expand with it.  But this is not taking into account the Hibiscus-ness of Hibiscus, who in her first months here actively corrected both Emerson and I when we spoke English.  Not even corrected us on something that happens to be different to what it is in the African dialect, but just plain corrected things into Totally Random Hibiscus Language.  So when a mistake becomes persistent, I am not sure how quickly she will figure it out, or if she is trying to single-handedly change the entire language into something that makes more sense to her.  Meanwhile, when I'm listening to her with half of my ears while trying to figure something else out with half of my brain, I keep inserting imaginary people into her sentences to match the pronouns, which is confusing both of us.

It turns out she had no idea that "he" and "she" depended on the gender of the person in question, and obviously holds that concept in some disdain.  (She also had "Mister" and "Miss" backwards for several months, or maybe just random.)  Now, when I gently correct her by saying "what he is that?" or "is Buttercup a boy or a girl?" she corrects herself to the right gender, BUT THE WRONG TYPE OF PRONOUN.  Instead of reversing the gender, she reverses she and her, and he and him.  So we get: "Buttercup wanted more water, so I gave him a cup --" (wait, who did you give the cup to? a boy?) "is a girl... Buttercup wanted more water, so I gave SHE the cup..."  Every single time, the direct object and the subject switch places, but only when switched to the correct gender.

I can't think of how to explain that to her, so I'm hoping it goes away on its own!

Potty Drama

So, besides Hibiscus in general and Uganda in general, do you know what else is driving me crazy?  "Potty training."  I put that in quotations not because I have the modern ideas that "training" is too harsh a word and want to call it something gentle like "potty learning."  No, it is because there is no training or learning to be done whatsoever.  Buttercup, like all my other children, is completely capable of putting her effluence in the toilet: she knows how to signal when she needs to go, she knows how to pull down her pants, she knows how to walk to the potty, she knows how to call me, and she EVEN knows how to hold it -- really well.  She is an excellent hold-it-er.  So there is not much education involved.  Within a month of being in our household, she was very dependable at going on the potty whenever she needed to.

Unless she decides not to.  All I can figure is that sometimes it doesn't seem worth her time or effort, and she cheerfully just pees all over herself and walks around in it.

At the orphanage, that's what the younger children did, and they were always sitting in pee.  The slightly older ones went on the lawn, and as they got really organized (yeah right!) they went in the dark little outdoor bathroom.  At that point, Buttercup just wet herself all the time, and for all I know, she may have done that in her previous life, although I kind of suspect not, given how quickly she started using the potty appropriately and proudly.  So maybe this is a leftover from the who-cares orphanage life.

But I'm sick of it!  Maybe if she were my only child, I would have the time and energy to empathize with the difficulties in her life that have led her to pee all over herself and not care.  Maybe if she were my oldest child, I would be so proud of watching her progress towards dryness that I would be happy to hold her hand down that rocky road.  Who knows; maybe I am just not a very potty-patient mother.  But with all the other chaos in my current life, I am out of patience with children who are perfectly capable of waiting and peeing in the potty, and yet choose not to.

This afternoon we had the following conversation.  I was washing dishes, and she was playing with a towel in the kitchen near me.  She was singing, but out of the blue said, "I don' need go sou-sou" (which is the local word that we have ended up using).  She doesn't speak very clearly, so I asked "do you need to go sou-sou?" -- no -- "do you need to go potty?"  She looked up at me and widened her eyes and went "NOOO-OH" in that "du-uh" voice that is particularly annoying to parents.  So I put down my dish and dried my hands and flipped up her dress and felt her undies -- no surprise here, they were wet.  I said we were going to the potty, and she did the duh/no again and tried to run away from me.  I grabbed her and started to carry her to the bathroom, and she kicked and fought me, and then I slipped in the giant puddle of pee and we both fell on the floor.

I was mad.

Maybe I'm a bad mom.  We're not supposed to get mad at our kids for having potty accidents.  That's what punitive parents do, and then it makes kids afraid of going potty, or shameful about themselves, or have some whole Freudian complex or something.  But it's maddening.  Even when you can understand why, it's maddening.  It's frustrating enough when the little one is playing with the bigger ones, and you know that they didn't want to leave the game and missing out on something is such a huge disaster at that age; you can kind of understand, as you try and teach a new logic.  But when the child is half-bored and standing by herself on your just-mopped floor, and still doesn't bother to walk the dozen steps to the bathroom or speak to the mother a few feet away, and just pees all over, it's REALLY maddening.

Which happened not twenty minutes later.  20 minutes after a giant screaming fit because she said she didn't need to go potty, and I said she needed to sit on it anyways, and she peed in the potty, and after the screaming was done we talked about not peeing in our undies any more.  Actually, I hadn't even changed her into new undies yet, she was just standing there, and I noticed there was liquid running down her legs.  I hadn't changed her into new undies because she is going through all three children's undies like wildfire, after the difficulties with getting the laundry clean in the first place.  We are living the simple life here; I just do not have the logistics to deal with six clothing changes a day!  (A couple of those are for meals and mud, too!)


This is a discussion without a point, or maybe just without an ending.  I don't have a practical solution, and I have tried a bunch of them:  Alternating with peeing on the floor multiple times in an afternoon, she will go for long periods holding it appropriate amounts of time, so I doubt it's something physical.  She usually has good capacity, so putting her on the potty every 30 minutes doesn't help; she just cries "sou-sous no come!" and they don't, and it's even more crying on the potty.  I praise her like mad whenever she goes successfully.  We talk about what it feels like to hold it and what it feels like to pee.  We put on special clothes that she doesn't want to wet.  The big kids scold her -- that's not mother-enforced, but it's natural peer pressure.  I have calmly had her clean it up and change herself.  None of it seems to matter; she still just randomly pees all over things half the time, and then switches over to being totally dependable.  Some parents' philosophy would say that she's just not ready yet and to put her back into diapers, and she encourages this idea.  However, she is THREE YEARS OLD (in a culture where children are diaper-free as young toddlers) AND she has successfully and consistently gone in the potty for MONTHS.  I feel like going back to diapers is just allowing this state of mind... whether it is laziness for pottying properly, or a disrespect of self to sit around stinky and disgusting.  I understand that it probably came from the orphanage, and it doesn't mean she's a bad girl or lazy, but the attitude needs to be left behind at the orphanage.  My personal instinct is that putting her in diapers full-time would be subconsciously agreeing that she's too lazy or incompetent or dirty to use the potty like a regular little girl.


Or maybe I just need to wait out her behavior, and change my own reaction to it.  Maybe I just need to stop allowing myself to be frustrated when she pees on things, and just pretend I'm parenting a baby again.  Or just turn my brain off and hum a song while I plop her little bum on the toilet and change her clothes.  Easier said than done!


So I don't have the answers right now.  I write this, so maybe in a few months I can look back and remember that this was a challenge that we overcame.  Or maybe I won't be able to believe that I got so upset by something so minor and not even about me.  Or maybe so other parents can read this and feel like they're not the only one getting mad about potty accidents.  Or maybe to comment on the little details, the not-even-worth-mentioning problems with being an abandoned child and living a life like Buttercup's.

Return Trip

It was the water bottle that did me in.  You know how, in modern airports, you can't bring your water through security, you have to pour it all out and get new water in the terminal to bring on the plane?  Well, it's like in Africa, they have to be as modern as other airports, but they have to twist things around to make themselves unique, and in the process they defeat the entire point but they are still stubborn and bureaucratic about it, and just stand there staring at your repeating their stupid rules.  In this case, no one cared about water going into the airport, at either the preliminary security station nor the main security check where you would expect a security check.  But at the last minute, when you are walking into the pre-boarding area at the gate, there is an extra security gate, with no signs or information or anything, but they tell you to throw away your water.  Which means no water whatsoever in the plane.  As though the water they are selling in the terminal is loaded with whatever bombs people can make out of water, or for that matter, that they want people wandering around with those water-bombs in the airport terminal at all.  I protested, and the guy brought over his superior, who repeated the same words mildly and stared vaguely behind my ear, which is the African way of having a passive argument.  I said "what am I supposed to do?" which is the African arguing way of not letting them be passive any more, but they didn't take the bait and just kept staring.  They brought over a third person to be unhelpful, though.  After a while, one of them said that if the water had a seal, it would be okay, which as far as I could tell he made up on the spot to appear agreeable, although of course it could be airport policy -- who knows, as the airport policy is not posted any where.  The water bottle in question had about four sips taken out of it and had cost me 160 Kenyan shillings, and of course we wouldn't have taken four sips if we had known about this so-called airport policy.  I pointed out that other airports all over the world do not randomly take your water away when you are boarding the plane.  One of the guards said calmly that they were not any other airport, and they did not follow any other policy, they were Boma Jaipa airport (or whatever the name is) and that is their policy.  Obviously, duh!  (Those last were not technically words, but very clear.)

I am generally an incredibly non-confrontational person.  As in, if I even think about saying something rude, I start to cry and have to go away in private and think about it the rest of the afternoon.  I'm losing it in Africa, I really am -- my sanity or my Type 9-ness, I'm not sure which.  Although less healthy Type 9's are known for being passive aggressive, and maybe that includes violently throwing your water bottle at the trash can as you walk away.  I didn't actually throw it at a human being, which would be more on the aggressive side.  Actually, come to think of it, it probably IS passive aggressive, because that is what they are experts at around here, and they all expertly ignored me.


The trip back to Uganda technically went smoothly.  There were no lines to check in or go through security, we found our gate, the flight was on time and the bathrooms functioning, I got American dollars for the Ugandan visas, I found a toy that I had promised Emerson for good-shopping-behavior in the terminal, I even had time to get a couple Kenyan souvenirs.  (It takes some searching to find Kenyan souvenirs that are not exactly the same things as Ugandan souvenirs, except maybe there is a different country name painted on it.  In fact, the terminal was full of general east-African souvenirs with every possible East African country name painted on it, just in case you wanted to feel specific to a whole bunch of places.)  Most importantly, the Ugandan customs official laughed and joked with Emerson, and didn't make any kind of fuss about putting the new stamps in our passports.  This was quite a concern, because not only have I heard a lot of airport-official horror stories by this point, the customs official on the way out did not like all my visa extensions, and delayed me for quite some time even thought I was just trying to LEAVE the country.  It is quite certain that she would not have let me back in.  So the trip went smoothly.

But I was so tired.  I actually got more sleep in Kenya than I usually do at home, so there was no physical reason to feel so exhausted, but it was one of those days when I felt like everything was through a fog and my limbs were moving in syrup.  I think it was the fact of returning to Uganda.  The closer we got, the more tired I became, just in anticipation.


The few days in Kenya were such a treat.  Of course it was nice to not have to worry about fixing meals or doing laundry or worrying about paperwork, but the vacation-y-ness wasn't the main thing.  It was so rejuvenating to see something new and think about something new and do something new!  With three children in the suburbs, I am so confined.  I am either at home, doing the same-ol' at home things, or I am doing necessary errands... and with all the children out of school, those errands are gut-wrenchingly tiring and stressful.  It was so nice mentally to think about different shaped buildings, and how the history of the two countries had created such different realities in such geographical proximity, and listen to cheesy stories about elephants, knowing that I had absolutely no connection to the elephants and I wasn't going to come back again or show it to someone else or where I would stand next time, and basically just have NOTHING TO DO with the stupid elephants except to stand there and watch them.  That was refreshing.

And it was refreshing to be a one-child mama again.  It's more than just the number of children, it's that Emerson and I have a rhythm, we understand each other.  There is no question that I have spent more time alone with Emerson than anyone else in the world, since I was his age and spending that much time with my own mother.  (Three weeks older than he is now, my sister was born and that intimacy changed into something new, too.)  Going around Nairobi together was familiar like going around Kampala was a few months ago, a routine that we knew, the excitement and exploration that we remembered, and that we both enjoy.  But there are years of memories like that; Emerson and I have done a lot of traveling alone together.  So it was like settling in with an old friend, to be with my son the way I remembered being with my son.  It was a treat.  But more than that, it was fine; it was normal; it was enough.


The pilot forgot to ask my opinion, but as far as I was concerned, that plane could have kept on flying.  We could have gone right over east Africa and headed back home.  There was nothing I needed to stop for in Uganda; nothing that was so important that I wanted to head down into this morass again.

Almost as often as people try and convince me that the baby I'm carrying isn't actually my baby, they tell me what a saint I am for helping out other people's babies.  That's not true either; people adopt for selfish reasons: they want to dress a girl in pretty clothes or play baseball with a boy or show that they are a unique and open-minded family, whatever it is.  I feel like my decision to adopt has some selfless and loving reasons in it, but it certainly has a lot of selfishness too.


Going back to Kampala this December was not selfish.  I sat there, content with my son and the special bond we shared, and I thought that there wasn't anything in Uganda that would make me, personally, more happy than NOT being in Uganda any more.


And of course, the plane went on, and we got off, and we're back in our apartment in Konge, and I know that's the right decision to make and I wouldn't make a different one.  That was the feeling of a moment, not of a lifetime.  So we went back home, and the girls didn't want to look at me, and our routine was all broken up, and we were all tired, so it was a really exhausting afternoon and evening and they were all crazy difficult, and I yelled at them, more than once.  I never used to yell, never ever.  It wasn't self control, I never felt like yelling.  I felt like walking away when things (and children) got too frustrating -- and I still do, for that matter, but apparently months of not being able to walk away for even a moment has uncovered the yelling-part of me.  My toolbox of parenting ideas has apparently tipped over and everything has fallen out... and don't you dare give me suggestions, or I'll probably end up yelling at you, too!  The only thing left seems to be to imagine the plane flying off, off and away over Africa, leaving it behind.... But no matter how I felt, I have made too many promises to the girls to even acutualy consider not fulfilling my promises to them, and coming back as soon as possible.   I wouldn't really leave.
         

But I want to stop feeling so angry.  And I really want to get out of here.
 

Night Shift for Mama

Many parent of young children would probably agree with me that bedtime is about the worst part of the day, but then the end of bedtime, and moments afterwords, are among the best.

Until your children decide to require a night shift.

Last night, I got myself all the way into bed by eleven, which gives me 8 hours of bed-time, and was feeling pretty good about it.  Then, when I was just about asleep, I hear a funny little screech, and then nothing.  Buttercup had fallen out of bed and was sitting on the floor, dazed and stuck.  Our current bed arrangement is that Emerson and I sleep on the bed with a frame, which happens to be a modern style that is too close to the floor to store suitcases under, and has a funny little railing around it... you know, the kind that is really good for banging your shins in the middle of the night, and just takes up extra space in the room.  Which maybe is fine if you are trying to be an elegant furnished apartment, but less good once you move another set of mattresses into the room.  The girls sleep on two mattresses stacked right next to us, and between giving the closet doors enough room to open and the wall, there is just enough room to walk sideways between the same-height beds.

Or for Buttercup to fall and get stuck.  I'm not quite sure why this keeps happening, but I've been jamming a couch cushion in the space, but I forgot last night.  She got really wedged in there.  I really don't know how she does it!

Buttercup and I sleep on the insides of the two mattresses, which I cleverly arranged in the new house because she tends to need me the most in the middle of the night.  And she was not done with me yet.

After calming down from the wedged-under-the-bed problem, I was almost all the way asleep again,  when I suddenly hear desperate little-girl shrieking, and then bigger-girl surprised yells.  Buttercup had dived across the pillows and was sitting on Hibiscus's head, screaming and crying.  Hibiscus got woken up but missed the entire context, and kept repeating half-asleep, and then has mentioned several times today, "Buttercup is sleeping too close on my pillow."  The only one sleeping on Hibiscus's pillow was Hibiscus, it just happened to be in Buttercup's escape route!

It had the feel of a bad dream, but Buttercup was fully awake and staring desperately towards something.  I swooped her right out of bed -- and off Hibiscus's head, so she fell back asleep again.  I wondered if she needed to walk around and wake up more, but she seemed plenty awake, and she calmed down when I was holding her.  She pointed to my bed and said "me sleepy dere now."  I asked if she was worried about a bug, and she said "spider," starting to look upset again.  There are spiders around here and there, but nothing that is particularly invasive or scary.  But I'm not unduly afraid of spiders.  I'm sure Buttercup isn't the only one who wouldn't want to sleep in a bed where she had even dreamed about a spider!

We lay down, but she didn't settle.  She snuggled right up close to me and pressed her head into my chin, and then slowly relaxed, but not into sleep.  Then she suddenly started shrieking again and grabbing herself, and this time managed to yell "in my clothes, in my clothes!"  I brought her into the bathroom and turned on the lights, and we unzipped her pajamas and inspected them very carefully.  Then we inspected some more.  Buttercup is a very careful inspector!  There were no spiders of any kind, but I did cut off the tags in the torso, in case she was feeling that.  She was totally satisfied about the lack of spiders on her person, but thought they were all still hiding in the bed.  We got out a little light and did a thorough inspection of both beds, finding no spiders and no evidence of spiders.

Unfortunately, that woke up Hibiscus.  I wanted Buttercup to feel like we were taking the threat of spiders seriously, but not start Hibiscus worrying that there were actual spiders in the bed.    Hibiscus wakes up like a drunken jack-in-the-box, totally confused but totally active.  In this case, she suddenly started throwing pillows around, and repeating randomly "is dream, is a dreaming spiders, is dream spiders, Buttercup sleeping to close on my pillow."  Then she collapsed on one of the disarranged pillows and was back asleep again.

Buttercup spent the rest of the night in my bed.

Tonight, we had a discussion about the non-existence of spiders in the bed before lights-out, which seemed very comforting.  But no matter; Buttercup had passed the baton to her brother.

We started off the night running a little late, so the kids only washed their feet instead of full baths, and I only read one book.  And Hibiscus put up a little me-vs-the-world struggle, which resulted in all the children hearing a little speech about not bothering the other children when they are doing something particular.  And then they got to hear it again.  And again.  Hibiscus was pretending to ignore me, so I would sweetly say "since you didn't understand, I can explain again."  I forget if we got through four or five repetitions before she gave me a tiny acknowledgement.  When she actually agrees to something, she is usually good about following through, and she was silent while I did her siblings' blessings.

Emerson had seemed quite anxious for a while.  First of all, while getting out books, he worriedly asked me how to tell if something was a joke or a lie.  Usually at that point of night, he's more worried about which books he gets to choose and if Hibiscus is going to get more snuggles than he is.  Then when I settled down for his blessings, more concerns came out, with a lot of squirming and wiggling.  After a lot of examples, I told him to follow his heart, and that he could trust his heart to tell him if something was wrong, whether it was himself doing it or someone else.  Squirm squirm, wiggle wiggle.  He said what if something yucky was inside him and needed to get out. I said he could come to Daddy or I and we could help him get the yuckiness out him, and we wouldn't get mad at him.  Any time.  Like now.  He admitted there was a bad word, and it wanted to get out.  I told him he could whisper it to me.  He squirmed and wiggled and wormed.  We went back and forth for quite a while, the girls waiting impatiently for their blessings, and he finally whispered it in my ear.  And I told him to do it again.  He repeated it three times, and then he said it was out.  He told me it was a very, very bad word in Luganda that another child had taught him.  I didn't recognize it, and think it's possible that it wasn't anything particularly bad, but it was certainly bothering him.

But he was still squirmy and wouldn't lay facing me.  I thought something else was wrong, and told him to wait for me to do the girls' blessings and I would come back and we could talk some more.  Needless to say, the girls did their level best to make their blessings go on forever; Buttercup was especially dedicated to the project tonight.

When I came back, Emerson told me his bum was hurting and even swelling up.  We went into the other room to look at it... and lo and behold, there were little bits of poop debris everywhere.  Apparently he had needed to poop at school (which he normally avoids at any distress), and a teacher wiped him but was quick about it.  A half dozen hours in the tropical heat, and his poor unmentionables were pretty unmentionable.

So we went back into the bathroom and I started re-filling the tub again.  While it poured in, I held him close and asked if anything else was bothering him in his heart.  No, apparently it was all in the derriere at that point!

Then Buttercup sauntered in, sucking her water glass and looking all ready to catch the next episode of The Exciting Brother/Sister Show.  Emerson had not planned on airing the owie-bum story live, so he got upset.  I put her back in bed and told her to stay there.  She jumped on the bed and laughed, which got Hibiscus sitting up to scold her.  I had to get something from the main room, and there is the lively little shadow!  After our extensive conversation about not bothering other children, this did not fly.  I put her on a chair, and told her that she was disturbing her brother and sister, and that she needed to stay there until I came to get her, hoping to interrupt the domino effect of excitement.  This is the down-side of having three small children trying to sleep within eight linear feet of each other!

I figured that if Buttercup sat in the living room for a minute or two, she would get bored and sleepy, and Hibiscus had almost been asleep and hopefully would drop off once Buttercup was removed from the bed.  If Hibiscus wasn't alert to immediately respond to her every playfulness, Buttercup would get even more bored and fall asleep.  But when I went back through the bedroom to check on the poop-encrustment-soaking, I heard voices.... Hibiscus was sitting on the toilet, chattering with Emerson.

Hibiscus is firmly and cheerfully of the opinion that sitting on the pot is an iron-clad excuse for not being somewhere else, anywhere else, no matter how recently she has just gone and how firmly she was told to stay put.  In fact, being in the bathroom, and quickly flying her bum in the direction of the potty whenever she hears footsteps, has got to be pretty ironclad as well.  "But I've gotta POO-ooop!" she wails.  And pooping, as we all know, can take any length of time.  Like, the entire duration of a time-out or a quiet time.

This time, I told her to finish up.  And seeing the just-quoted words forming on her lips, I told her that if she needed to poop she could go in the other bathroom (which had fewer interesting people in it!).  I checked Emerson's bathing progress and gave him a one-minute soaping-up warning (because Emerson does better with lots of warning), and went back to check on Buttercup.  She was looking remarkably sleepy and contrite.  At heart, she really loves to be helpful and cooperative, but then she thinks she's got to be JUST like Hibiscus.  When she starts getting the same consequences as Hibiscus, but having to endure them personally and by herself, the charm of being Hibiscus is wearing off pretty quickly.  In this case, she was eager to promise to stay in bed and get some mama-hugs, and we cuddled and laughed off her brief attack of the sads on the way back to her pillow.

And then I went back to my poopy boy, and what do you think I found?  That's right.  Hibiscus was SITLL on the toilet.  And they were giggling even harder.  I told her that she would get in bed NOW, and she miraculously found that her entire bladder and bowels were empty and wiped.  She went scooting off, giving me furtive looks to try and figure out if she would get in worse trouble for not going straight out the door, or not washing her hands.  She made the correct choice of washing her hands.

I think she also knew that I usually separate the children when they're too rowdy, and that Buttercup had just had to sit in the living room after wandering all over the house.  Buttercup didn't really mind being left in the lighted room when she could hear her family, but Hibiscus is actively terrified of being in a room by herself at night.  I think the desire to not repeat Buttercup's fate propelled her straight into her bed.  This is the benefit of having three children in a row!

We got Emerson clean.  We applied two different types of cream and some ibuprofen too.  The bottom itself probably only needed the cream, but I knew the mind was going to get increasingly focused on the pain and discomfort, and hoped that belief in the power of medicine would help comfort it into sleep.

And then they were all asleep.  And now I'm going to go to sleep too. As their current favorite books says "She turned off the light,/ and shut the door,/ That's all there is,/ There isn't any more."  And I'm really hoping that the last line describes the rest of our night!

Hibiscus Drives Us All Crazy

It's the middle of the afternoon, and I said we could have more birthday cake and presents if the kids could clear the table off.  No one started on that project, which seems like actual work, but Hibiscus found a piece of mostly-unused construction paper and made a birthday hat for Buttercup.  First of all she taped it into a cone shape, and when she put it on Buttercup's head the little girl started glowing with her unaccustomed special-ness.  Then she wanted to add a chin band, and Emerson helped her find materials and they all started singing "Happy Birthday" variations happily as they worked on the hat, while Buttercup fairly danced with pride.  Suddenly, Hibiscus decided it "wasn't good" and she ripped it apart and crumpled up the pieces, while the other children watched in shock and disappointment, and Buttercup's joyful little face melted away.

That's our Hibiscus!

Then she spent a while arguing, because I had already said I wasn't giving them any more paper or art supplies until the current mess had been cleaned up, but Hibiscus apparently felt that because she had made the mess even bigger while making all the other children upset, that she deserved an exception to the rule.  Which she didn't get, so she sulked.

Then she started cleaning one thing up, which is generally how it goes.  She wants to be helpful, but as soon as she starts she gets distracted or sees something new to get out.  In this case, she put some cheese from snack in the fridge, as I asked.  For some reason, Emerson was also near the fridge, and he pushed it shut, which Hibiscus thought was too rough, and she started scolding him.  One of our frequent scripts in this house is "who does Hibiscus need to worry about?" and the answer in "Hibiscus."  (In other words, stop bossing your brother and sister around!!!)  Hibiscus ignored me, and opened the fridge again and started fussing around with all the little bottles on the side, putting them in "perfect" order while telling Emerson how bad he was for messing them up.  I agreed that Emerson could have shut the door more gently, but thought there was no reason to stand there rearranging everything in the fridge meanwhile, so I told Hibiscus to get out of the fridge and Emerson to shut the door gently.  Twice.  Maybe three times.  Hibiscus said "I just doing this" and continued to adjust the bottles and then grabbed the door away from Emerson to shut it herself.  That falls under our Just One More criteria for a Sit, so she got one.  And she tried to sneak out of it when I wasn't looking, so she got a longer Sit.

Earlier today, I decided I would do just one little project that would make me feel better, so I had cleared off the couch.  It is the largest horizontal space in our main room, and it was totally heaped up with stuff.  Besides, then I could sit on the couch and do some work on the ipad while being kind of relaxed and drinking a cup of tea.  First of all I got mad at Emerson for climbing right on the newly-folded clothes I was arranging, and then the kids kept passing and dropping the extra parts from their projects on the nice clear couch.  After addressing each incident, I finally told the kids all to look at me, and to not put anything more on the couch today.  Period.

When I told Hibiscus she could come out of her Sit, she went straight over to the windowsill where Buttercup's birthday presents were sitting and picked up her most exciting new game.  I warned her that she better not be playing with her sister's new game without permission, and she said she wasn't.  Then she brought the toy bag over to the couch, and I said she had better not be putting anything on the couch, and she said she wasn't.  Buttercup was watching her lovely toy and her bossy sister with increasing worry.  Hibiscus then proceeded to take the toy that she wasn't playing with and dump the entire thing out on the couch that she wasn't putting things on.        


This is all in about the span of twenty minutes or so, but she is like this ALL.  DAY.  LONG.  She is constantly taking things from her brother and sister, which she is likely to break or just drop randomly in a different place.  She tells them what to do, and grabs things from Buttercup to do it for her and goads Emerson into getting upset, and then "reports" him for using his angry voice.  She ordinarily has a very good relationship with both siblings, although of course they have their little altercations, and they actually have a great deal of patience with her explosiveness.  One morning they were getting ready for school, Emerson and Hibiscus bumped into each other, and Hibiscus rounded on Emerson and screamed "DON'T BUMP ME LIKE DAT!!! DAT'S MY OWIE!!!"  I would have reprimanded her that it was an accident on both sides, and there was no call to scream, but luckily I am a little slow on getting between them.  Emerson turned and immediately apologized and asked to see her owie, and Hibiscus showed him her leg in that special aggrieved manner that young children reserve for small pains, and Emerson knelt down and admired it and sympathized, and then they both went on with their day quite calmly.

Buttercup is even more accustomed to being pushed around and adores every chance to be with her beloved sister, which is a little bit of a problem in itself and I am glad that she is gradually learning to stand up for herself.  Now in the last few weeks, Hibiscus is back to her early behavior in our house, when every time Buttercup says something she repeats it to the rest of the family, and every time Daddy or I address Buttercup, she answers quickly and loudly.  If we ask Buttercup to do something and she doesn't immediately jump into action -- which is pretty much always, because she is either going through a toddler-refusal, or just because she thinks things over carefully before beginning -- Hibiscus repeats it for her in Luganda, ordering her to do the thing in rapid-fire succession which simply confuses Buttercup, and then grabs the things out of her hands and starts to do it for her.

Or then there are times like this:  The morning after her birthday party, Buttercup wanted to look at her new book.  She sat in the middle of the floor to pore over it, and Hibiscus said "you want me to read it to you" and sat down next to her and took the book out of her hands.  Buttercup acquiesced because she likes spending time with her big sister.  But then a minute later I looked over, and Hibiscus is holding the book over Buttercup's head while Buttercup is reaching for it and starting to screech and sob.  Hibiscus saw me ready to interfere and protested "but she WANTS me to hold the book for her, Mama, she is wantin' me to do like dis!!"  Ah, no, my darling, I really think this is a misinterpretation of the situation!   Buttercup is becoming very capable of expressing her feelings about things -- not to mention understanding spoken English -- and yet Hibiscus will announce to the rest of us how Buttercup is feeling.  Which, coincidentally, always seems to be that Buttercup wants what Hibiscus wants, even at Buttercup's own expense.


But that's not the only thing she announces.  She tells me when my phone is ringing, or has the text-message sound.  If I don't come running immediately, she keeps telling me over and over, imitating the text-message sound.  She tells us when a Skype call is ringing.  She tells us when fire engines go by.  In fact, she informs everyone of every sound all day long, which I suppose could make her an excellent assistant if we were all deaf, but as it is she just makes us WISH we were deaf.

One day I asked her if she saw anything poking out of the side of my head, and that they were called ears, and since they were still in their usual place she might assume I could hear things on my own.  I tried to make a joke out of it, but I might have been too irritated to fully succeed.

But that's not all she says.  At the best of times, she is a talkative child, and there's nothing wrong with that.  As Daddy says, she gets a lot of practice in spoken English!  But when she's stressed or tired or excited or generally out of her precarious internal balance, she talks all the time.  And I do mean ALL the time.  One night I started counting to myself, mostly to give myself something to do other than run and scream, and I think the longest she ever went without talking was about three seconds -- and that was the exception.  Most of the time it is more like one or maybe two seconds; just long enough to hear what the next person might be talking about, so then she can tell them what they meant to say, or what she would say on the topic, or that they are wrong, or just because she was in the process of swallowing and was physically incapable of speech for a moment.  Only a moment, though, as she keeps talking through most of the eating process, even when no one can actually understand her because she is also shoveling food in at top speed.

I am a talkative person, as everyone knows.  My son has been a chatterbox since he could string words together, and does indeed have excellent speech for his age with all that practice, so I am used to talkative children.  And I'm the kind of person who doesn't mind some overlap in conversation, and with my good friends we will both be very talkative and sometimes be both talking at once, while also listening and one or the other pauses for a moment and then rejoins the story at an ebb in the other's conversation.  So, "talkative," I can handle.  I have experience.  You will have to trust me that Hibiscus is another category altogether.

So all through dinner, we have either a monologue or, if someone else gets a word in edgewise, she changes course and tells them what they meant to be saying.  We try to discuss conversation rules, but after a while it kind of puts everyone else in an exhausted coma, and no one else can think of anything to say anyways.  Then we get up from dinner, and she narrates what she is doing as she cleans up and gets ready for bed, along with telling everyone else what they should be doing, and of course every major or minor injury to body or soul she feels along the way... which are prolific, since she also is in her manic and awkward stage of the day.  Eventually we get to books.  As in, I read books out loud, and the children listen to them.  Except it goes something like this:

"Hedgie the hedgehog climbed --"
"Oooh, he is climbing, look he climb!!"
"--up to the hayloft ---"
"Mama mama mama, what a hayloft? What is dat one?"
"It's the top of the barn, see, right here.  -- the next morn ---"
"Look, dis one a bird!  Dere a bird in da sky here!"
"-ing to get a ---"
"One, two, tree, FIVE birds, YOU count Buttercup, one, two, no, you doing it WRONG I count da birds---"


I have my masters degree in education.  I know how valuable reading books is to young children, and that a significant part of the value is that it inspires conversations between adults and children.  The children get to explore and learn new vocabulary, and have practice talking about characters and counting objects and so forth, all with lots of interaction with their loving adult.  The conversation is an important part of the reading process.

Nevertheless, this is not what they meant.



I know in my head, that if it's been a hard couple weeks for all of us, it's probably been worst for Hibiscus.  She has by far the least internal regulation (even included Buttercup), so the move with all its change of routine has been the most difficult for her.  She has loved our guests, but they have come with more changes of routine and new personalities to figure out.  In the court room, she is the only one trying to balance complex relationships with both sides of people, and she's picking up all the emotions and understanding none of the logic.  She and Buttercup are more deeply disturbed by loving people having to leave (especially Daddy, but also Diane and it re-awakens how upset she is about Gramma and Bubba being gone), because they have more experience with loving adults leaving than loving adults coming back again.  So I understand.  It's enough to throw anyone off kilter, let alone a little girl who doesn't have much balance to begin with.

But lately, I've been pausing for a while at night to adjust her blankets and say a little prayer over her.  Because it's been easiest to love her when she's asleep.

Home

I want to go home.

As in, right now, I want to go home.  There is too much going wrong around me, and I feel too small and too worn out.  More things went wrong yesterday while the kids were at school, and as I was walking to get them, I was so glad to be able to look forward to holding their little hands in mine.  And I couldn't help planning more.

I'm going to walk in the hot sun on the dusty roads to the little school, and know that they are safe and we're all together.  One lean, strong, little hand on one side; one softer, square, little hand on the other, and a little body solid on my back.

We'll go home.  I'll get out some snacks.  I'll take the suitcases from under the bed, where I use them to organize and store things.  I'll just dump a couple of them out in a pile, maybe on the girls' bed.  I'll put them, open and empty, on my bed.  Then I'll go around the apartment and take what is important; I think I can take the time to fold it properly.  When I've got everything I care about, I'll just leave the rest.  They won't fit in their shorts and playdresses next summer, anyways.  I will pack our paperwork carefully.  I'll take a little more care with our small suitcases, activities and change of clothes and toothbrushes, so we have enough to make it through the long trip.  I'll let the older kids go to work, and if they think something is important, they can put it in.  I don't care if we take colored paper and leave behind the expensive toys.  I'll probably need to wear Buttercup, though.

I'll call our driver, and make a quick supper.  Probably noodles.  Everyone likes noodles, and they only need to boil for 12 minutes.

I'll tell the driver to go the airport.  I will just leave the keys on the counter.  We can stop at the ATM on the way.

There has to be a plane going somewhere, some time.  And all the connection hub cities have connections to everywhere.  I'll let the kids play ipad in the airport waiting room.  We can wait.

And at some point, when we have to go through some gate, and we only have two passports for four people?  Maybe I can keep Buttercup on my back, and put paper bags on her feet and a giant puppet on her head; or I can cut out the part of the backpack that is next to my back and put the rest over her -- I bet she can tuck her feet in.  Hibiscus is kind of long but folds up really small; she climbs in suitcases all the time.  I'm sure she can fit; it's only for a few minutes.

Or, maybe I will just take that customs official by the shoulders, and look into his eyes, and say They are my babies, and we are going HOME, and don't you dare stop us.  And I will just take those warm little hands and we will all keep walking.

Student Led Parent Conferences

Friday was the special day for conferences at The American Montessori School.  I was supposed to put them on the bus as usual, and show up around 11... and I was kind of confused about what that meant.  Apparently it meant it was Student Led Parent-Student Conferences -- how's that for a mouthful?

A little background: the school is very small, with only about 22 students from around 3 years old through first grade, in four classes.  Two of the teachers are a married couple who founded the school, and it is run in their house.  The school is only a few years old, and they are trying to expand to a much larger facility, but right now the small size is a major bonus for me as a parent.  I appreciate getting to interact with the teachers, fewer kids is much less overwhelming for my children, and they get lots of individual attention.  However, it's a striking example of Ugandan use of space vs. what American's would "need."  The whole school is run in one small front room, with bookcases that slightly divide it into two spaces that are each maybe 10 or 12 feet square, the larger front porch, a toilet room, bath-and-sink room, and kitchen.  They also use the yard, which has a natural divide of a small hill, and around the size of a typical suburban backyard.  The equipment comprises a handbuilt play structure with two swings and a climbing rope net, a sandbox, some painted tires half-sunk in the dirt, and a rusty old mini trampoline with three of its legs missing.

I didn't manage to get there until 11:30, and I was still almost the first parent to arrive... and the lead teacher wasn't even back with the materials!  He rented tables to make different stations, but the shop decided not to open very promptly on Friday morning, so he wasn't able to pick up the tables until the event was supposedly underway.  We're on Africa-time!  So Buttercup and I sat on the couches in the covered patio area, and watched the children line up and be a train around the grounds, and then play Mr. Lion, Mr. Lion on the lawn.  Buttercup was eager to join in, but I kept her near me, and we enjoyed watching how the children did.  They enjoyed playing the game, but I could see why Emerson is not excited about going to school by watching his tired face.  The teacher probably spent 10 or 15 minutes getting the children properly organized in a line to move, and then once they finally got going she allowed someone to change their mind about wearing shoes, which meant that half the kids suddenly had to run around and throw their shoes in a pile or move the pile.  The children who had lined up in the "train" properly from the beginning (including both of mine) just stood there looking bored, or started to get poked by their neighbors, which of course meant they had to get in arguments.

After Mr Lion, the children came back and all sat around the sandbox with their feet inside, where they sang songs and eventually the teacher passed out water.  Again, there was a lot of time spent scolding the children and reminding them how to sit and whether to spread out or squash together, while half the children sat there vacantly.  Perhaps they do better in smaller groups when all four teachers are working with the children, but this also had the air of a regular routine that everyone expected.

By that time, the tables were finally set up, and Hibiscus was called over to start my conference.  There were only about three parents there, and a couple more drifted in over the course of the day.  As far as I could tell, most students never had a parent come by to listen to their accomplishments.  It is a huge and striking difference from participating in American schools, where parents will miss work to attend special school events, and at the very worst send a grandparent or babysitter.  This is a special and expensive school attended only by the (upper) middle class, and yet it still seems like a steep uphill battle to get parents to actually be involved in any way!  The conference notes for the parents described the different stations, and had lots of scaffolding help for the parents, such as "use words like 'good try!' and 'nice work!'." I will note that one of the parents there was a father, and all of the parents who attended did seem to be trying hard to be positive and support their children, and genuinely proud of them.

There were three stations for each class: literacy, numeracy, and science.  You can see what is important in Ugandan schooling -- parents want to know their kids are mastering the basics!  There was no information whatsoever about how they were doing socially, or if they could follow directions or be creative.  I think the school does care about those things, and I often talk with the teacher at pick-up time about these issues, but it seemed like they didn't expect parents to be interested.  Since they couldn't even get most of the parents to show up, I can understand why!

Each station had a table set up, with some different activities.  For kindergarten literacy, Hibiscus was supposed to write her first and last name for me, then move on and write small and capital letters when I requested them in different orders, then sound out and read short words that were in cards in a box.  She wrote her American first name beautifully, and then started thinking about our family name, which she has only written a few times.  But my children are not really "sit still and do the activity as directed" kind of kids; they have to keep thinking of something more!  In this case, Hibiscus decided she needed to write "Hibiscus." As the next activity will prove, her spelling skills are way way below the level of a strange word like that, which she still pronounces "Kah-biscuits"!  She didn't want me to tell her, and we spent a few minutes stalling while I tried to convince her how beautiful she had already written the words, and maybe we didn't need to spend all day writing a nickname.  Finally we managed to move on.  When I selected words from the box, she proudly and successfully managed to sound out "at" but could not manage "hat."  She made all the sounds correctly, but struggled to blend them together.  When I compared it to the "at" she had just finished, that confused her; apparently they don't do much rhyming.  Eventually we moved on to writing letters.  At this activity she shone, and her handwriting has become very neat and nicely small.  I do not fail to forget that she has only had this name for a couple of months, and that he is only learning to speak English, let alone write it.

We moved on to numeracy.  She was supposed to point to numbers on a chart when I said a number, between 1 and 100.  She could manage 1-20 fine, but she still hasn't figured out that there is a system to the rest of them, and just counted from "1" to find whatever I named.  Then she was supposed to put marbles (called "glass balls") in my hand to demonstrate her understanding of number values, and she did a great job at this, although sometimes she rushed and slipped an extra ball in!  Then the children are working at addition by going backwards, when they solve a sentence like "6= __+___."  I think this is a great idea for really learning about how numbers fits together, and Hibiscus did a good job when we used the marbles.  She enjoyed making one column full of 4's, by always having a 4 be the second half of her number sentence.

The science table was simply a pile of their drawings, and Hibiscus was supposed to explain her drawing to me.  It sounds like they do a good job of exploratory, hands-on science, although I never would have deduced it by simply listening to Hibiscus's wandering explanation about zebras and apple trees!

And that was Hibiscus's conference!  I gave her praise and kisses, and she glowed.

I had tried to let Buttercup run around, but "around" became the operative word, as she tried to get into everything and pull all the displays down.  Writing with pencils kept her happy for a little while, but then she was needing too much supervision, and I decided to wrap her on my back again.  The older children get very little focused one-on-one parental attention at this point, and I really wanted to treat this like their own special day. So Buttercup went up, and bounced up and down and sang and grabbed everything within reach, and hit me in the head with books, and when I sat on the couch she got her legs under her and jumped around, which totally ruined the wrap job, but still kept herphysically  contained.  There was plenty for her to watch, and I could pretend to almost ignore her, enough at least for the conference-giver to feel listened to!

Then Hibiscus went back into the kitchen, where I guess they were singing songs, and Emerson came out for his conference.  Emerson notes seriously that he is "in two classes," since he goes to first grade for reading.  So we started with reading, and the first activity was to take full sentences of dictation.  The Montessorians maybe have eliminated most of the "copy work" that defines most Ugandan schools, but they still can't seem to get their minds off the stilted learning-to-read vocabulary, and the sentences were full of boys and girls with boxes and balls and trees -- none of which are very logical early phonics words!  However, I was amazed how excited Emerson was to be taking dictation, and how neatly and competently he wrote.  Fine motor and writing skills have always been his great weakness, and his whole life his writing/drawing skills have lagged far behind his comprehension -- until now, apparently!

He was also supposed to read three pages of a book for me.  Emerson is always worried about failure, and would rather not try than attempt something he doesn't feel confident about, so he sorted through the pile of books anxiously, looking for something he already "knew."  Then he read me a whole story.  Emerson has become an amazing reader in the last few weeks!  He reads through many of the children's books we have around, and starts in reading when he wants to know something.  Yesterday he read the entire "Madeline" compilation to Hibiscus -- all six books in a row!  So I was not surprised to hear him read, but it was nice to be able to sit next to him and really concentrate on what he was doing.  Poor kids, we don't get much concentration lately!

At the math table, Emerson breezed through the first activities, so for the addition sentences I added a digit and made the 7 into a 17.  He was fascinated figuring out how to create the bigger numbers, using our mutual fingers.  Then he told me to change the other numbers, too, to make the game more fun.  I saw the teacher giving us some weird looks; I don't know if he disapproved of me changing the activity or had no idea that Emerson could mentally play with double-digit numbers!  I just see no reason for kids to repeat doing things that are not an interesting challenge for them.

After science, Emerson wanted to keep going, so we went back and did more dictation, and then read a new books.  This time, a younger child was interested in one particular book, so Emerson decided to read that one although he didn't "know" it yet.  I was proud of how he allowed his desire to hear the story triumph over his fear of making a mistake!


After that, I was told that I could go home and pick the kids up at the regular time, but I didn't much care for the idea of walking home and then turning around to pick them up again!  So I was invited to eat lunch with the children, and that lunch was almost ready.... which probably involved sitting around very hungrily for half an hour or so!  But the children were obviously very excited and honored to have me eat with them.

Emerson became very distressed, because some of the parents were carrying bags with presents to congratulate their children, and I had not brought any presents.  Something later at home was not acceptable!  So on the way out, we stopped at a nearby little grocery stand, and I got each child a little treat.  They were talking about lollipops, but then Hibiscus wanted a chocolate coin instead, and I was on the verge of getting Buttercup a lollipop before I realized what a terrible idea a lollipop on my back would be! So she got some smartie-like things that needed to be eaten all at once and had no smearing potential whatsoever!  Of course, Emerson's lollipop was going strong long after the girls had finished their treats, and I could see the wheels turning in Hibiscus's head as she contemplated short-term vs long-term treat value!

Contemplating long-term (or rather, something besides immediate) value is really one of the skills I want Hibiscus to be working on, and I am not really that worried about math and blending letters and things.  I want her to learn to not leave her sweater out on the grass and scuff up her shoes, so they are not ruined for later.  So I'm glad that the teachers say things like "she still needs some more positive support in this area, " which is more pleasant than what *I* can manage when she ruins her things!  And I am pleased to arrive after school and see Hibiscus very focused on learning to ride a bike, and Emerson in the sandbox busily making plans with a couple of other boys, making positive friendships.

But I am proud of the skills that they are learning too, and I was proud of how happy they were to show them off to me!