love bucket

thursday:

we have a child with a strong sweet tooth.

her teacher just yesterday, in our parent teacher conference,  shared that she's noticed middle child seems to lose all sense of manners when the class has earned access to sweet treats.  middle child rears up in ways atypical of her, and asks like an angry brute, when the treats will be given out.  teacher said she wasn't concerned really, just a little surprised and taken aback at this side of our normally pretty great mannered daughter, and  that she's noticed it, as pretty much the only thing that makes her think zhi has some aspect to her that isn't seemingly dreamy.  she's a dreamy student.  that acts in a surprisingly rude way when it's treat time.

oh boy.  what do we have on our hands?

i can freak myself out if i read into this.

i've noticed when i pick this child up at the bus stop in the afternoon, she asks me in a similar brutish monster like way, if i have a treat waiting for her in the car.  sometimes i have been known to.  she has translated that into, 'you should always have them waiting for me, and if you don't, i will be a horrid force to reckon with.'  aka bitch child.  veruca salt.

fun.

have a little homework cut out for me now, don't i?  david and i contemplated this morning sending her with a whole package of oreos in her lunch box.  wondering if that technique of no limits might get this weird sugar bug out of her system.  i have a friend who's done unschooling to some kind of extreme, i think,  and she's not limited any of the things we limit.  tv, sugar, bedtime, stuff like that.  i've always wondered if that would work for us.  it works for her.  she has no control freak inside her.  she trusts. how lovely that would be.

and on a side note,  i've heard people who crave sugar might be having a protein deficiency.   that is not the case here.  this is also the heaviest meat eater in the family.  that too can sound unhealthy.  i'm just saying, she gets enough protein.  and i'm a virgo moon.  me and limits are lovers i think.

this sweet child.  i heard myself as i said bye to her at school this morning, saying, 'bye sweet~thing,'  or something like that.  it was sweet~something that i said.  sweetie~pie?   i drove away wondering if i stop calling her sweet~this~and~that, if that might be a good start.  instead, maybe  i could call her miss manners.  or she~who~does~not~too~many~sweets.    something that at least sets the intention for one of the issues involved here.  or love~bucket.  i call her that sometimes and it feels good and whole.  a whole full bucket of love she is.  well,  there are three options i have to replace the sweety name thing.  i will start a list and work on that.  we had a nice simple random talk about manners this morning.  i kept it simple and non-accusatory, while also calling her on the rude language and manners.  just like pragmatically identifying it.  i am feeling hopeful.


saturday:

we had a blow out last night.  it was max and zhi and me.   (david and olive went away last weekend on an adventure that i will tell the tale of later, when i've settled more with it.  mmmmm, mystery!)

but, like i said before, sometimes i wonder if limiting the sugar / tv / gamesonphone / whatever~it~may~be~that~is~bad~in~large~doses, if the limiting is what the problem is.   ?    if actually,  they need to find their own stopping place on their own, their own internal desire to stop.  to say nah, i don't want anymore sugar.  mom, where are the  nuts?  so because i wonder that as often as i do, i let the reigns go yesterday.  they had a pretty sweet breakfast, pretty sweet granola and milk.  we had beans and rice and egg kinds of things for lunch.  huevos rancheros for max and i, and a brown rice and black bean/cheese burrito for zhi to be exact.  at dot's diner.    then i bring max to school and zhi and i go to a coffee shop together, while we pass the time max is at school,  and i say get what you want, basically.  whatever.  i feel relaxed about it today since it's friday afternoon...weekend time.  oh, i also let her play hooky.  my sister and her cousin were in town, they had just spent the night, and sending zhi off to school, after her dad and olive just left, and her favorite girls were in town, just didn't seem right.  so, she gets and italian soda and a (large) date bar.  she eats it all.  no big deal.  i had a rooibos tea.  with milk and honey.  and a few almonds.  cuz you all want to know what i had too, right?  then after we get max at school, we meet my sister and niece at the bakery.  i say have whatever you want again.   they split an izze soda, and each have a black bottom cupcake.  i have a ginger tea and an old b cookie. claire has an earl grey tea and a black bottom. juniper is asleep in the car.   then i take myself max and zhi to a movie.  claire and june go to another date they have planned.  we might have gotten pop corn at the movie, but i mixed the times up in my head for the lorax and the secret of arrietty, and get there just as the previews for arrietty are ending, so not enough time to get popcorn.  but it's 4:45 ish, so no big deal, to just eat dinner after.  after the movie, zhi asks if she can have a honey packet.  there are some at the concession stand she spots.  i say no.  we need to stop eating sweets now and get some dinner.  she gets really mad at me.  i get really mad at her for not being cooler about this.  we walk in silence to the car from the theater.  we get in the car, and i go on some rant about how hard it is to monitor their sugar, but if i don't they act like jerks and won't ever stop asking for it.  max had asked right as we got to the movies, if he could have a soda.  i said no, he had just had one that he had just finished 10 minutes ago.   i remind zhi how she will not feed her rats one tiny bit of anything with sugar in it, because we were told that sugar is very bad for rats.  i go on this rant and zhi cries.  max is just in a daze.  i drive us to the grocery store and say ok.  let's go in and get whatever you want.  and i am bitchy.  i say, you guys can get cake cookies ice cream whatever.  they won't get out of the car.  so we go home.  in silence pretty much.  we get home and i say just get in your pjays and we're going to bed now.  like i am totally not gonna make dinner.  i can't eat when i am mad anyways.  and i'm being a bad mom all around.  they get ready.  i get ready.  brush teeth. me and max.  zhi doesn't.  i notice this but don't say anything.  we all get in bed.  it's quiet and i'm tense.  zhi puts on her headlight and reads.  max just lays on his bed.  i lay down for 5 minutes and just swirl.  and then i guess i stop swirling.  i have this idea come.  i call them in to my room, on my bed, and to listen to something i want to tell them.  i have a hot water bottle on my bed that zhi notices and hugs to her belly.  we all sit down in a circle sort of way, and i tell them that i realized, after noticing what happened today, was that i like limiting their sugar.  that i did an experiment with them today by giving them almost as much as they asked for, and they acted like total assholes afterward, well, mostly zhi did.  AND they were still asking for more.  i said i am not gonna do that again anytime soon.  that i feel good about choosing to limit sugar.  and that i am gonna continue to do that.  they both seemed relieved.  we moved on and watched tom and jerry in bed together, and then they both slept with me.  slumber party in mama and papas bed.  just me m and z.  so nice.  i woke up at 2 am with zhi's foot in my face.  the blankets were more tangled than ever.  there were crumbs all over the sheets.  it was crazy and it was lovely.  i will do that again if given the chance.  slumber party with my kids after a fight in a grungy bed.  awesome.

i woke up the next morning and got my moon blood.  well that explained my horridness.  i can see now after writing that all out, that i am a full on control freak.  i just am.  take it or leave it.  it's a blessing and a curse.  i feel embarrassed to share the details of all that we ate on friday, because really it's not like they had that much sugar.  but they are sensitive.  i know these kids.  behavior goes down the tubes the more sugar they get.  they stop wanting to eat real food.  do i seem crazy?  sometimes i want to curse this society for targeting sweets to kids everywhere we go.  for blowing this culture's relationship with sugar into this huge obsessive unhealthy thing.  these little kids are so innocent.  that makes me crazy for sure.


sunday:

i asked zhi yesterday to tell me what i said to her after our fight friday night, in bed.  to remind me please, cuz i was curious how she remembered it.   she said, 'you said you did an experience and that it didn't work.'  she meant experiment.   then, i ask, 'how do you feel about  that, and about me feeling like limiting your sugar is the best idea? '  she says, 'i feel great about it.  i don't want to eat sugar all day.  doesn't feel good.'  and she's sincere.  and happy.  and connected as she says that to me.  looking me in the eye in a relaxed way.

mmmmmmmmmmm.  i want to say to her, then why do you ask for it all day long?  but i do not.  in a way, she's still just a baby, and this is a chance for me take care of her, and i'm glad it all went down the way it did.  she knows how much i care.  and she can say from experience, that she doesn't actually want to eat it all day.  she might just want to push up against me.  fine babe.  you can do that.  you can do that as much as you need.  i feel i am in such a better place with this.  before, i was questioning if i should be limiting them.  now i know, for me, for us, the answer is yes.   i doubted.  i lived.  and now i have faith in my decision....  for now.   ha.



monday:

limiting sugar intake is not fun.  even after my revelation, it is not fun.  i just wanted to say that after doing some limiting today.  limiting anything with children is not fun.  teaching them to night wean for example.  or to night pee in the potty.  limiting limiting limiting.  that part of parenting is not fun.  BUT.  knowing this is my way at the moment, helps.  it really helps a lot.  to not have the huge permanent question mark in my mind.  for now i know this works best for us.  and how lovely it is to have my girl affirm that too.  it's not gonna be easy breezy now, but it's better.  i love that we are talking about it.  that there's a dialogue happening that we can reference.  i like being relaxed.  i like setting boundaries.  i like having faith in the boundaries i set.  sometimes it takes a lot of work to find that faith.  worky work work work.

but listen.  this girl is just down right sweet.  look:



 everyone's wanted to kiss her sweetness since she was a baby.  love love love her.  just gotta find our balance.  hers as a kid, mine as a mama.  we are getting stronger and more balanced together.   another reason i get hung up in keeping my faith strong, is that scott noelle guy.  sometimes it takes me a while to find his daily groove.  he says nature follows the path of least resistance, and that parenting can too.  well sugar follows the path to tooth decay and ill health.  and if i don't resist it, i will be passively guiding my child to those outcomes.  however, i am not totally dumb.  i just space out here and there and can be very literal.   but when i go deeper to try and understand him, i feel like what he means, in relation to this situation, is that my path of least resistance is kind-of the one i ended up taking friday night after the fight.  talking.  in a circle.  calmly.  i wasn't resisting that and neither were my kids.  is that what he means?  wonder wonder.  figure figure.  i say yes!



and sew.  on to a little sewing report:

this love bucket has learned to use the sewing machine.

it is a pretty big deal.

those bee patch squares i got a while back on ebay?

she's sewing them into a patchwork something.  i think a pillow.  she's not fully decided yet.  it might be for her teacher who is a beekeeper.  i love that.  or her grandma who just had to say bye for this life to her husband.  i love that too.  she's so thoughtful.

she's a natural.   and i'm of course watching her every stitch right now, just about, being the spotter, controlling, virgo mama i am.

she's indefatigable with her sewing.


olive and i played memory match while zhi sewed.  she's a tricky player.  she likes to set the game up with some matches already in her mind.  such a cheater!  ha!   watch out.  and she DOES NOT LIKE IT when others get too many matches.  gotta take it slow with her.  however her memory is  better than most, but this child has not learned how to lose gracefully.  and you know, of course she hasn't.  we have to keep it fun and silly.  and us competitive adults, have to chill ourselves out and play at their level.  which is good for us.  so so good.  thanks babes.  you guys make me a better person every day.  thank you so much.




no wonder she wanted a honey packet.  but let's say we were bees.  as her sister bee, i'd have to teach her that we can't eat the honey stores all at once.  we have to regulate.  to make it through the winter.  and so we don't keel over from sugar overdose.  right?  oh.  the lovc bucket.  the love bucket of honey that she is.

really weird side note:  as a kid, i once ate from the honey bear until i threw up.  at about her age.  i was all alone in the house i guess, and just ate honey till i couldn't take any more.  i also did this with vitamins once.  sweet kids' vitamins.  when i was 5 maybe.   i probably can't see this all very clearly because i think i had a similar issue.  doing my best here.  yeah?  yeah.  dang.  so tricky!