The secret to child discipline, according to Auntie

Well, I'm at my brother's house, out of state. No one has killed anyone, which is good. And we're all getting along pretty well.

I have, however, added child-rearing to my list of things I don't discuss with my brother. Why is it that I can order my girlfriends around, and they either say, "Oh, good idea!" and ignore me, or they just plain ignore me, but my brother says things like, "I know you think I'm just your baby brother, but I do have a brain!" Jeez. If he had gotten half of what my sister and I have from my mother, he'd know that listening is optional. Actually taking the advice is just weird. I swear to the living God, if my mother had said, "You know what you really OUGHT to do..." one more time I'd have shot her.

The Boy and Small Cousin (age 4) have been at it hammer and tongs. Until last month, she's been an only child. Nothing happens in this house without her approval. Her parents talk tough, but she's not fooled. She whacks The Boy with a throw pillow because he won't let her play his DS, and he whacks her back, so she cries, "Auntie, he hit me!" Uh-huh. Did you hit him first? And how'd that smack feel? Uh-huh. Maybe he doesn't like it either. Live and learn babe, live and learn. You can almost hear the lights turning on in her brain.

For the most part, The Boy is being very kind and helpful to Small Cousin, taking her outside to blow bubbles, letting her poke his DS occasionally, amusing her in the restaurant. The hysterical part is that she's a bad influence on him. Yup, she talks him into doing things he KNOWS are wrong. I heard her telling him, "I know Mom says no, but it's okay! C'mon!" He can't say I didn't warn him.

See, I'm from the "natural consequences" school of thought. If you smack someone, they may smack you back. Hmm. Maybe you shouldn't do that. Hmm. If you leave the table during dinner, someone may eat your ice cream. Hmm. Maybe that's not a good idea either. After all, I DID promise you that I would. The problem is that tough love is hard on everyone. "I promised you that if you didn't do X, you wouldn't be able to do Y, didn't I? Sorry, that ship has sailed. Move along."

The trick? The secret to handling kids? Shhh. Don't tell anyone, now.

DISENGAGE.

Yup, you have to appear not to care if they scream the paint off the walls. You cannot let them see you grit your teeth, you can't yell at them when they Do Wrong. You just implement the consequence (or let it happen by itself) and tell them that you did promise that it would happen.

After 10 years, I think I care little enough about their "hurt feelings" that I can let it go. Too bad they'll be teenagers soon. And when I try to pass on this wisdom to the younger generation, they refuse to listen. It's enough to make you scream.

Disengage, dear. Disengage.

Living in squalor

Aha! I've just discovered why I (and oh, so many men) don't clean the house until it's filthy.

If you put off house cleaning long enough, it crosses the line between house cleaning and home repair. Home repair: good, fun, creative, big change when you're done. House cleaning: bad, unredeemingly boring, house looks about the same as it did when you started.

Example: If I let the kitchen floor become so filthy that I have to strip and wax it, the job is more like home repair than housecleaning.

Home repair makes you a hero. Mopping the kitchen floor makes you a patsy.

Now, how do I change my lousy attitude so we're not living in squalor?

Spelling list half-full...

You know when you've achieved special-needs-mom nirvana when...

you realize that you're happy the kid learned 12 new spelling words this week, rather than being pissed that she failed another spelling test.

Seriously. Kid's brain half-full, not half-empty.

Selfish woman...

Been out surfing the blogosphere for a few days now, and I'm starting to feel selfish. Not sharing enough.

School ends for us on Friday. The Boy is finishing up a year of Calvert School. It was a good year, but in retrospect, rather uneventful. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or a bad thing. His last year of public school (two years ago) was rather, umm, eventful. And not in a good way. But this was just, well, there.

As I've been finishing up Calvert's 160 lessons and 16 review lessons, I've been slacking on The Girl a little. She hasn't minded much.

I know that The Girl slacking off sounds bad, but actually, it's very good. The Girl tends to get bored with her limited diversions -- drawing, watching PBS Kids, and talking to her small stuffed toys -- so she likes school. 365 days of the year! For fun, outside "school", she has started doing crossword puzzles and multiplication tables. Yes, you heard me, multiplication tables. They all have different tunes, and are sung as loudly as possible. The sixes are done to the can-can: "6, 12, 18, 24; then 30, 32; then 36 and 48 and 54; that's eight!" She brings me the white board and markers. I "get" to write the equations first, then she writes the answers. We are so close to having the frickin' things down that I'm getting giddy.

Anyway, I'm hoping that The Girl takes a little break this summer, just to give me a break for a while. I have needs, too, you know! I need to paint the living room, I need to fix the garage shelves, I need to build a new end table for the bathroom. NEEDS, I tell you!

I've also been collecting stuff for next year. Bwaa-haa-haa!! The Boy is in for a shock. He's spent the last year complaining that school is boring. To be honest, if I have to teach "food webs" again, I'm going to scream, so I kind of hear where he's coming from. He studied grammar that he already knew, phonics that he already knew, and some science that he knew and some he didn't. He wasn't all that interested in learning about the other regions in the country. He read a few books he liked, a few that he tried not to like, and a few he loved. Turns out The Boy loves Nordic sagas. Who knew?

The best thing we got going this year wasn't even in Calvert. It was Writing with Ease by Susan Wise Brown. She contends that first they have to learn to think in sentences, learn to put words on paper, and THEN write down their own thoughts. The Boy buzzed through about half of book 1, then started on book 2. We're learning to summarize text now. It's been very useful to his scattered thoughts. Yayyyy!

I know that no one wants to know what we're going next year, so I'll probably post it later. ;) Lots of exciting stuff!

Shocked! Shocked at all you lightweights!

Two days after school let out, I ran across my first "Take my children. Please, take my children!" post. Jeez you guys... Two days?

I've been living with my kids 24/7 for the last two years, and I don't twitch. How is it that you can't handle two days?

Theory 1: Your kids are used to being entertained and directed for six hours a day, and now they don't know what to do.

Theory 2: Your kids are conditioned by the public school "survival of the fittest" attitude, so now they fight constantly and antagonize everyone for amusement.

Theory 3: Your kids are normal, but you're just out of shape. Use it or lose it, honey.

Theory 4: All that "alone time" made you forget that your kids are still rambunctious, and they're not using it all up at recess anymore.

Theory 5: You're a wuss. Hey, it's possible... I'm just sayin...

Anyone else? Theories?