The Valley Advocate: Sitting on the Baby

Spring Fixes Everything

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 11:16:00 AM MST

There's nothing like beautiful weather and the chance to get outside to fix all the frustration of winter. Of course, a week-long vacation over spring break doesn't hurt either.

It's amazing how much better spending the day with kids is when you're in a good mood. I'm being nice to them, they're being nice to each other, I'm thinking wow, where did these angel children come from? They can't be the same ones I had all winter.

I kid. Of course they're my kiddos, but it's just a lesson I have to learn over and over. Even when you're tired, crabby, and cooped up, all it takes is a little bit of being nice to turn a bad day around.

My mentor Pam was working with me for a couple of days and watching her is a great reminder of this too. Just a little bit of intervention leads to such amazing results. She doesn't let anybody get away with anything. She addresses every issue clearly, up front, calmly, in a way that the kids respect. Everyone feels calm and safe because she is unquestionably in charge.

It's truly amazing to watch. So I try to imitate her manner, and sometimes I get it right and sometimes I don't. But the last week has still been delightful. I thought it would be harder to come home from our incredibly awesome family vacation and get back to my grueling job.

Instead I've just been feeling grateful. The kids have had nothing but love for me. And I love being in my messy, dinged-up house that's not where we would've liked it to be thirteen years ago, but then neither of us are either. With my neighbors who I love and can rely on any time I need help. Walking around town bumping into people I know everywhere and getting happy smiling greetings. It feels good, being in this place where I think I belong. I know this is not my normal cynicism but there's just nothing like it. Spring.

Vacation Doesn't Mean Escape

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 3:55:00 AM MST

I've spent the last week in the desert on spring break with my kids. I was hoping to come home and write about our glorious family bonding experiences there, but the world had other plans in store.

Getting details about what happened in Boston in a remote place was hard. My first clue that something had happened was the flag at our campground set to half-staff. I stole away and listened to the radio in our rental car to get snippets and understand what was going on. We wanted to know, but didn't want the kids to hear it until we could explain it clearly.

When I got close enough to internet access I was able to read Dennis Lehane's searing editorial, written in the immediate aftermath of the bombing, before the authorities had even begun their lightning-quick manhunt. In the piece he says, "I’m not used to feeling so limited when it comes to expressing myself, but trying to explain an act of mass murder to a 4-year-old rendered me as close to speechless as I can remember being."

I wanted to tell him: join the club. I've been explaining terrorist acts to my children their whole lives. We've had too many bad things to explain. I don't remember dealing with this as a child, and have no blueprint for how to proceed.

I spent half a hike down a breathtakingly beautiful canyon in Arches National Park, where I was seeking solace from the stress of the news, being peppered with questions from my son about 9/11, terrorists, and how could the Boston guys be connected to Bin Laden, and wait, you mean there is terror all around the world? It's not just some guy in Pakistan who we caught and now that's all over and done with?

Being so far out of the news cycle was a blessing for us because we could explain what happened on our own terms and in our own time. I can only imagine all the parents on lockdown Friday, trying to keep a brave face for their children.

The good news is, even in the far-away towns of Moab, Green River, and Salt Lake City, people cared. I used to live out west and - not to make sweeping generalizations - but folks out there don't always take kindly to "back east." But this time I came home with a sense of comradeship and caring.

Later in the week we stayed in a hotel, and in the breakfast room there were no less than four tv screens blaring the news at us while we tried to eat. I asked the mothers of the other families sitting there if they minded me changing the channel. They all said, "Please do." Not because they didn't care, but because they too wanted to shield their children from the onslaught of terror coverage while trying to plan out their day.

In our case that meant getting on a plane, and my sons worrying not about crashing or turbulence or getting lost, but terrorism. I didn't point out the bomb-sniffing dog I saw as soon as we entered the airport, but just kept reassuring them, "We're not in a place that would be targeted."

In their moments of fear, I tell them that going on means having faith, as we've had to do so many times in the course of their short lives. One of the first responses I heard to the news was that now we finally know what it feels like to live in a country where violence can happen anywhere, any time. Life today means sharing that burden with people around the world who we haven't connected with on that level before.

In the midst of the chaos, the senate shamefully, egregiously, voted down a gun reform bill. Once again another author, Gabrielle Giffords in this case, spoke to this news far better than I can hope to.

Were those senators grateful for the distraction of another act of senseless violence and terror while they voted against protecting us from further senseless violence and terror? My money's on yes, they damn well were.

All the sad news rung in my ears as I read this Facebook post from a friend, and I leave you with it:

"Arkansas State Representative Nate Bell tweeted, 'I wonder how many Boston liberals spent the night cowering in their homes wishing they had an AR-15 with a high-capacity magazine?'

I'd like to answer that: Probably none. Believe it or not, we Boston liberals slept just fine, thank you. Unlike you, we don't need a gun by our side to feel unafraid. Unlike you, apparently, we know that no gun, no matter how powerful, would have done a bit of good in preventing the Boston Marathon bombing. Do you really believe that guns would have given you, or anyone else, the prescience to know that these kids were going to plant bombs? And if it had been so, what would you have done? Shot two people in the middle of a huge crowd of spectators?

I slept fine last night, even without a gun by my side, and I'll tell you why. Because I saw how our law enforcement agents and elected officials responded immediately to a crisis, taking extraordinary measures to protect the public, to bring the bombers to justice, and to assure people that everything possible was being done to keep us safe...In short, I saw how civilization triumphed over evil, how a rational, coordinated effort limited the potential loss of human life. I saw how my city, which I, as a transplant, have often seen as cold, unfriendly and uncaring, pulled together in a way I would have thought unimaginable, with a sense of common purpose that even now brings tears to my eyes. I saw how this common effort prevented further loss of life. I don't need a gun. If you think that your firearms would have made you any safer in our situation, you're entitled to your opinion. But don't assume we share it. We happen to believe that there are stronger protections than lethal weapons. Mr. Bell, Wayne LaPierre, Alex Jones and other gun worshippers, maybe you would cower in your homes if you didn't have firearms by your sides. We Boston liberals are made of stouter stuff than that." - Brian Folkins-Amador

Last week of March, day care style

Sat, 30 Mar 2013 5:25:00 AM MST

The kids and I spent the week waiting for March to go out like a lamb. It felt like we were almost there but the cold wind still had a lion's bite. We played with the snow shovels, hopefully for the last time, hacking away at the last snowbanks and throwing the chunks on the driveway.

Like a 3-2-1 coundown, we chanted, "No! More! Snow!" and flung the frozen snow onto the pavement, cathartically watching it smash. The babies imitated us by flinging smaller snowballs (usually straight up in the air or behind themselves) with calls of "So! Mah! Ohh!" parroting ours.

This was the yard at the beginning of the week. I glanced out the window and realized that the mowers were waiting to come out and play:

But after a few warm days (and our pillaging) the snow was GONE. Just in time to decorate the egg tree for the Bunny to come.

Yep my little guy on the left there just dumped out the whole bag - but that's how we get the job done. There were a few eggs crushed under snow boots and I found the shards later, but it's ok. They loved this activity and it's so sweet to watch their faces as they work to bend the pipe cleaner (or as we call them now, "chenille stems," which is why no one at the craft store ever knows what I'm looking for) around the branch.

When we finished there was a chorus of oooos and ahhhhs, and the kids exhorted me to put more eggs up high so it wouldn't look so bottom-heavy.

My middle schooler once decorated this tree with the same gusto as the little ones today. When I asked him what he thought of it his comment was, "You're taking that down next week, right?"

Nothing like a little pre-teen embarrassment to burst my bubble. I like my job because it lets me do little kid stuff and have a perfect excuse for it. Why wouldn't we have eggs in our tree? I have four little girls who coo and tell me how pretty it is, and it makes their day. That's all that matters to me. If the bus stop kids think it's stupid I can live with that. Inside their that's-the-dumbest-thing-I-ever-saw poses, I know they're dreaming of chocolate bunnies.

Apologies to my non-Christian, lapsed Catholic, atheist non-capitalistic holiday crap, and other friends who recognize a variety of religions. The boys learned that the holiday was based on an ancient fertility rite, so look at the eggs on my tree in that way. And just enjoy this hard-earned beautiful spring weekend!

I Can't Do It All

Sat, 23 Mar 2013 4:18:00 AM MST

Just for kicks (and because I can't stop my mind from racing about all the things I have to get done), I thought I'd make a list of everything I have to do in the next two weeks.

Finish taxes (yearly receipts for clients, add up income, hours, and meals served, go through receipts and add up supplies, screw owning a business whose idea was this)
Meet with my kid's soccer association board members (eight of them) and create an interactive document with their organization structure, duties, and calendar of events
Make Easter happen
Prepare class I'm teaching for child care providers
Plan getaway weekend with Grammy
Interview clients for next school year when I lose half my day care kids
Pack for spring break camping trip in which we take all our camping supplies in three giant wheeled bags onto a plane (plus one small bag of clothes per person - whose idea was that)
Get costume for son's play
Rehearse for son's play
Shop for son's extracurricular project and build a lemur habitat (of course)
Write a blog post for the Advocate
Soccer game in three hours
Raise two children and work fifty hours per week caring for six others

And instead of doing any of those things, I'm sitting here listing them all, worrying about how I'll get them all done, and dinking around on Facebook. God bless mothers, every one.

It's Indoor Picnic Time!

Mon, 11 Mar 2013 10:07:00 AM MST

A day care friend of mine always used to say that February is the "make or break" month for providers. I've decided that if February is make or break, March is just mother nature screwing with you.

It was sunny, then snowy, then an absolutely gorgeous, sunny, warm spring day to give us that tantalizing glimpse of warmer weather. After a long, cold winter, we were finally able to start getting outside.

The older kids put on snow boots and clambered around the last of the snowbanks while I pushed the babies up and down the driveway in the stroller. We were all just so happy to be out of the house.

Fresh air...sun on your skin... And then, the rain comes. Back inside. Damn you, March.

People think that child care workers are magicians with a constant stream of macaroni-necklace-activities up our sleeves, but even we run out of ideas. By 4:00 on a Thursday in the second week of March, after four months of wracking your brain for ways to keep kids entertained, things can look pretty bleak.

So I gave up trying and just sat down. On the floor, in the middle of the room. I'm practicing some kind of meditation while impatiently waiting for spring to come. But when you do this, the kids swarm you, and soon you're all just playing on the floor. I'm actually able to read a whole book to the older girls, and the babies are happy to have a lap to climb in (or fight over).

In the middle of this floortime one of my girls said, "Let's have a picnic!" and I realized it was one of my great winter ideas that had slipped my mind this year. So out came the blankets, and a relatively carpet-friendly snack, and suddenly the boring afternoon was looking much more fun.

After the snack was over the girls kept up the picnic while I cleaned and put cribs away. They left me at the end of the day with this montage:

I love it when I find crazy stuff like this. A frying pan on the second floor of the house. A fire truck, a block, a piano, cupcakes in the leftover toy baskets, and a giant baby lying in the middle of it. I particularly like the tea pots all lined up at left. But they had a reason for every item placed here, and why it's there, and why it's in the perfect spot.

AND it kept them busy for twenty minutes.

Still. Come on, spring. The indoor picnics are only gonna get me so far. We need some outdoor ones and fast!

The Scourge of the Red Ham

Sat, 23 Feb 2013 6:47:00 AM MST

I was changing the sheets on my son's bed when I found this little guy hanging onto the bed rail for dear life.

Just like that, little pleading eyes looking up at me. He'd fallen down behind the headboard, under the pillows, and God only knows how long he'd been there, clutching on to any last hope of being saved.

I rescued him and could feel his gratitude. I thought, oh no, your stuffed animal friends tried to save you but they couldn't! And now I have! Happy day!

Then I thought, maybe he's the evil one and they pushed him down there to begin with. He is a little devil-ish looking. He'd been clawing his way back to take Tarantino-style revenge. Stuffing everywhere. The others thought they were safe from the scourge of the red ham, but now he was back and I'd destroyed their lives.

This line of thinking explains why I'm better off as a child care provider than, say, an office worker.

Just to be sure, I've kept him separate from the others for a few days. I'll have to check with them before I bring him back to the bed.

Why UPK is a Bad Idea

Wed, 20 Feb 2013 11:21:00 AM MST

Everyone’s all abuzz about President Obama’s mention of universal preschool (UPK) in his state of the union address. I’m totally against it, and it’s shocking all the people who know me as a dedicated early childhood professional.

But Amy, don’t you love the little children? Don’t you think they deserve the best start they can get? As an early childhood educator (ECE), don’t you agree this is a long time coming and should be a natural next step?

As an early childhood educator, I know what happens when government gets involved in education. It’s not pretty.

But before I begin on early education, let’s look at our track record with our existing school system. Which, globally, ranks somewhere in the middle. Just average, in the richest and most powerful nation on earth.

There are a million reasons for this, but I’ll just go on my family’s experience. Like the rest of the nation, my kids are getting a mediocre education. They’re being standardized-tested to death. They don’t have recess so they can have more test prep time. We’ve only been able to keep a music program because the music teacher is also the gym teacher. And THAT’S because my town is down fourteen teachers this year. I’m not talking luxuries here. We haven’t asked for an iPad for every student. We. Need. Teachers.

That’s not an outrageous expectation, is it?

So let’s apply this winning formula to preschool. In the decade I’ve been in this field, the more that “education” creeps into the picture, the less real care for children remains. That’s why I don’t like education reform in the manner it’s done today. Because as an ECE, I know what kids really need to learn, and it’s usually the opposite of what education reformers think it is.

When the regulations come down, they require child care providers to have degrees. I have seen my field be quietly but systematically stripped of some of the wisest, kindest, most sympathetic and caring teachers because they didn’t have college degrees.

These are the women who taught and helped me when I entered the field. I am living proof: you can NOT learn what you need to know to work with children in a college classroom full of adults. As my kindergarten teacher aunt said, “Amy, they’ll eat you alive.” She was right, and I had to learn the hard way, almost not making it past my third year. I had a master’s in education but was totally unprepared to work with children.

Some people are convinced that accreditation is the best route for ensuring quality programs. My kids went to the best preschool I’ve seen in my experience. But the director was forced to close after becoming nationally licensed, only to find out that the amount of work required to maintain that status cost too much to run her business.

Our closest relative to UPK, Head Start, is failing, with 100,000 children being cut out of the program this year. When the budgets come down and my child care friends are shocked at the programs we’re losing, I always remind them: Women and children first!

Add to all this the simple problem of staffing. A child care center is expected to provide nine to ten hours of care for an eight-hour working day. The pilot UPK program now being run in Massachusetts requires the same full-day, full-year services.

Think for a minute about how long schools are staffed. Half of a year, for six hours a day. And we are barely keeping them alive as it is.

So we would be asking our preschools to be something between a child care and a school, but so much more. Where will the staff come from? Child care worker is still one of the lowest-paid professions in the country, making less than minimum wage in some areas.

On top of her normal child care duties (which is enough work to kill an ox), a Head Start provider must do hours of paperwork, plan individual curriculum for each child, perform assessments and plan goals, meet with parents on a monthly basis, and have a state employee review her curriculum and facility every other month. For all this extra effort she earns an extra $8.40 per day. This is shameful.

I don’t even have the space to get into curriculum changes and the impact on programs – and the children they serve – here. I still have some semblance of control over my little world, and I’m holding onto it for dear life.

The fact that I can even let my kids swing is in jeopardy, as I’m barely allowed to keep my grandfathered-pre-new-regulations swingset. I won’t be surprised if they make me remove it after the next round of changes. And then I’ll tell the kids, whose best interests have been served, that the swings are just too dangerous and scary.

We, as a country, have never had the money to back up government mandates. Period. So our schools, preschools, and Head Starts struggle under the burden of unfunded regulations that can’t possibly be maintained. How is any of this, in any way, good for the little children? In fact, I do love them. That’s why I try to protect them from a system that puts their real, true educational needs last.

Many people have pointed out that we can only move forward with a first step, and Obama simply took the first step. That’s great. Of course kids deserve a real education and more than just pipe dreams being used as filler in political speeches. I hope that this will be done the right way someday. But let’s fix the educational system we have now before we drag our four-year-olds into the debacle.

By the way - between the time it took me to write this piece and post it, my town lost $700,000 in its school budget. Eh. Education's overrated.

Being Dragged into the Future...Kicking and Screaming

Thu, 31 Jan 2013 5:59:00 PM MST

When I was growing up there was nothing I hated more than an old coot who did nothing but sit around and endlessly harp on the good ol' days.

Do you want to know who I am today?

This whole line of thinking began this morning when I looked at the calendar on my wall and realized I'd turned into my grandmother.

You know you're old when you don't even go buy yourself a new calendar for the year - you just use the free one from the dentist's office.

But this segues into a bigger problem I've been having regarding calendars, phones, and my stubborn resistance to change. For years this pencil and paper wall calendar held our whole family's schedule. It was the beating heart of playdates, practices, half-days, birthdays, and the few moments when my husband and I would be allowed to carve out our precious free time.

But recently my husband's schedule became so busy that he needed to be able to see our calendar at any time. He took my wall calendar and sucked it into his smart phone. Made it obsolete in a matter of minutes. (Or, hours of cursing at our respective laptops and phones while we tried to make them all coordinate electronically. LOVE technology.)

And now I'm confused. I can put the appointments on the Google calendar but then can't see them unless I come to my laptop. And what happens when the internet goes down and I can't see my schedule?

So I printed the Google calendar. That's it there on the wall with the days checked off in good ol' fashioned red China marker.

It actually does make sense, since this is where I spend most of my working time, to have the calendar here instead of having to run into the kitchen every time I need to schedule something. But I can't see the whole text of the appointments in the printed version, so I have to look at it online every day anyway.

(Just in case you're wondering, that random used lunch bag is where I've been stuffing my receipts all year, and it must soon be organized for tax season. This is how my life goes.)

Now, the calendar problem ties into my phone issues. Bear with me. Here's a picture of my current phone.

Don't laugh. I love my phone. I am a crazy texter - it's constant - and this phone works for me. It fits in my hands and I can type so fast I put even teenagers to shame. I can put it in my pocket while I work all day, and it takes a serious beating. I don't want a phone that requires insurance coverage.

But...my phone is dying. It's two years old and no one can hear what I'm saying. I went to the Verizon store and asked them to replace it. They don't make it anymore. Freakin people and their desire for the next best thing!!!

While mulling over the choice between keeping the phone I love and having people understand what I'm saying when I call them (really, how important is that? Only in case of emergency, right?), I realized I can see my internet calendar on a smart phone. I could continue with the paper version, but the more I think about it, I really need to be able to access our schedule at any time too.

So this may be the deciding factor on my phone choice. Not if it's comfortable or I like it or if it fits in my pocket or works for me. It's about being the mom. And of course my superhuman ability to keep our schedule running smoothly.

Ironically, amidst my crisis over technology and its stranglehold on my life, we had a power outage this morning. When it was time to go to the bus my son asked, "How do you know what time it is when the power went out?" I smiled and very smugly pointed to the clock on the wall, with the batteries, that runs all by its little old self, even without the help of electricity.

And during that power outage I thought, "What will I do with the boys all day with no power?" It took me two seconds to realize - it'll be the best day we've had all year. Get their noses out of computers and tablets and video games and actually see each other. It will be remarkable.

Why am I resisting a smart phone? Because I know myself. I spend too much time as it is staring at a screen. It's only a matter of time until I cave and get the fancy new phone, and I hate that I'll probably end up loving it. But I will miss my old phone that I love, like so many other simpler things that are now a part of the past.

Sly

Sat, 26 Jan 2013 5:19:00 AM MST

Here's a little weekend morning inspiration for you. I think we have a few people here in the valley who can relate.

Does anything beat this?

Saying I'm Sorry

Thu, 17 Jan 2013 11:37:00 AM MST

I know, it sucks. Nobody wants to do it (unless they're REALLY in trouble. In which case, it's probably not enough anyway). I've noticed some real difficulties around this in day care lately. No one wants to say they're sorry, and nobody's happy.

I try to teach the kids how simple it is to make someone feel better. Really, one of the keys to working with children is hearing them and acknowledging their feelings. Tattling isn't a problem because it's really the tattler who wants attention. I just listen to how upset they are, and suddenly the reason they're tattling isn't so important (unless it's someone tackling a baby, of course).

So when you tell someone "I'm sorry," it means that you realize that they're upset, and you hear them. Most of the time that's all it takes. (Remind me I said that next time my husband and I are in a fight.)

One of the girls broke something of mine, I can't even remember what it was now (as all anger goes) but I was more hurt that she didn't say she was sorry for breaking it. And here we are a week later, and I'm still angry, when if she had said she was sorry it would've been instantly forgiven.

Anyway. If I can let go of my resentments against a four-year-old child for a moment, I can continue with my story.

After I noticed whatever it was she'd broken, she didn't volunteer a sorry as she normally would. I told her, "When someone is upset at something you did, it makes them feel a lot better if you tell them you're sorry."

She tossed a, "Sorry" over her shoulder as she kept on playing and I thought, you're missing the point.

I teach an early childhood behavior class and I always read a quote from "The Last Lecture," by Randy Pausch. I know it sounds schmaltzy but this is really something I use all the time (both in work and in my real life).

"Proper apologies have three parts:

1. What I did was wrong.
2. I feel badly that I hurt you.
3. How do I make this better?"

Usually by the time you get to #3, the problem is solved, because the hurt party can tell that you mean it. It's so ridiculously simple.

I try to emphasize to the parents in the class that saying "I'm sorry" to your children is just as important as expecting them to say it to you. It's not a one-way street. In fact, probably the best way to teach your kids how to say it is to model it yourself.

The ironic thing about "I'm sorry" is this: we don't want to say it, we'll hold back even if it hurts and the fight is raging on, but our stubborn human nature never wants to let us admit we're wrong. When it's SO easy to make someone feel better by hearing it.

At the risk of veering into starry-eyed hippie dippie territory... well, I'll just conclude that it would be a lot nicer if we heard more I'm sorrys.