Cotton-Pickin’ Days

Photo oldified using this Japanese generator. The original photo taken in mid April is below the fold.

via Photojojo

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Following up on Sunday Salon member Maxine pointing to Susan Hill’s rant about a survey in the UK regarding women’s reading habits after having children, I went to my reading list to see what I was up to reading-wise in the year after giving birth to Stephen.

It appears that I read 20 books in 12 months which has pretty much been my average over the past 13 years that I’ve been keeping track of the books I read. I’m not sure what happened when my son was between four- to eight-months-old but I lost track of the books I read over those months and lumped them together (November 2002 to March 2003). And while the number of parenting books I read since he was born has increased, the other books I read aren’t much different than what I read before having kids and what I read now almost six years afterwards.

I am certainly not inclined to read celebrity autobiographies by “the likes of Victoria Beckham and Jordan.” I don’t mind reading about them in magazines or blogs, but I don’t think I could tolerate hundreds of pages about them. I am also not among the 60% of mums who read less than they did before having kids although that certainly makes a lot of sense! And I definitely belong in the 8.5% minority who read non-fiction since I have a self-imposed rule about alternating between fiction and non-fiction.

In any case, my reading habits would most definitely be different if I weren’t an independent consultant working from home. Perhaps I’d read more on the commute in lieu of reading before bedtime. And perhaps I’d blog less so as to get more time to read. Who knows. I refuse to think, however, that my friends and I suffer “maternal amnesia” relating to declines in memory and brainpower after becoming pregnant. Those “experts” can go stuff it.

BTW, did you know 2008 is the National Year of Reading in the UK?

Below the fold is the list of books I read in the year after having my first child.

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These two videos feature a school for animals to teach them running, climbing, flying, and swimming. Animal School is a metaphor for the various skills children are taught in school and how they might approach learning. Fascinating!

Animal School video with subtitles.

Animal School narrated by Stephen Covey

HT: The Happiness Project

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…and maybe in the process, we’d free the parents too.

From new blog Free Range Kids created by Lenore Skenazy, the author of Why I Let My 9-Year-Old Ride the Subway Alone.

Is there some snow on the ground by you? If so, do yourself a favor and go eat a handful. Have your kid eat some, too.

Then wait to see if you die. If you don’t — and you won’t — you will be joyously liberated from the latest WATCH OUT YOUR KID COULD DIE FROM DOING A NORMAL KID THING warning, this one about germs in snow.

I’ll tell you what makes me cringe: kids jumping in puddles. That’s right. You don’t have any idea what kind of liquid is in those puddles!!

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From someecards.com via TechCrunch

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Here’s a book I won’t be buying - Your Five Year Old: Sunny and Serene by Louise Bates Ames (via American Family).

Sunny? Serene? Doesn’t compute.

Might be fun to check this book out of the library to see what I’m missing.

What I’m pretty sure is going on in my five-year-old’s head (and mine most of the time when I was growing up so I understand) is verbalized by the creator of HBO series The Wire, David Simon:

I will confess to you now that anything I have ever accomplished as a writer, as somebody doing TV, as anything I have ever done in life down to, like, cleaning up my room, has been accomplished because I was going to show people that they were f*cked up and wrong and that I was the f*cking center of the universe, and the sooner they got hip to that, the happier they would all be … That’s what’s going on in my head.

I should save this entry to show psychotherapists in the future.

(I cleaned up the F-word just to keep my cuss-o-meter low.)

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Stephen has a 10-word spelling test every Tuesday. Here’s how we prepare:

• Saturday - Clarify pronunciation and copy each word twice.
• Sunday - Mock spelling test. For every word missed, write it again.
• Monday - Repeat mock spelling test.
• Tuesday - Re-read words before school.

Aside from the first time when Stephen refused to participate until word #6 because he thought the test was “stupid,” the boy has done well. He’s scored 10/10 on the rest except one and on that one he scored a 9/10. When he had a hissy fit over the one he missed, the TA told him to never mind about the test and just sit it out. The reverse psychology worked.

When she called out the next word, he said, “I know that one.”

“That’s nice, Stephen, but you don’t have to do it anymore if you don’t want to,” she replied. (heh The woman is goood.)

“But I know it! I’ll write it down,” obstinate boy continued the test without further complaints.

So our test prep clearly works. Problem is, he finds something to complain about every single stinking day that we practice spelling. After our last practice session, I said, “You are very lucky you have a mother to practice with you. What have you been getting on your spelling tests because you work so hard?”

“I get 10 out of 10.”

“What do you think other children get if they don’t have parents to practice their spelling with them?”

“Zero out of 10.”

SLAM DUNK! That’s recognition that was long past due.

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1. She gets emotional over silly things like you calling her “mom” instead of “mama” like you used to just a few months ago.
2. She falls asleep on the sofa and doesn’t have a clue what you’re watching on TV.

   Another mom: Have you seen Mister Maker on Cbeebies?
   Your mom: Mister Maker???
   You: Yes! I saw it when my mom was sleeping.

3. Her tummy keeps growing bigger and sounds like a drum when you tap on it.
4. Her tummy also move and jerks on its own. Very strange.
5. She keeps having to go to the bathroom.
6. She can’t seem to do anything without a moan about something hurting.

   Your mom squeezing between the dining room sideboard and chair: Ouch!! The corner of the sideboard just jabbed me in the butt!
   You: Let me kiss it!

7. She can’t help you learn how to ride your bike without training wheels because she can no longer chase after you!
8. She eats more junk food than you, e.g., chocolates and buttered toast.
9. You no longer get carried up the stairs, down the street, or to the bus stop but you’ve grown up so much that you don’t even ask Daddy to carry you anymore.
10. She gives you lots of hugs and kisses and tells you ridiculous things like the baby will love you the most. You think you’ll be ok as long as you still have lots of Bionicles to play with.

Stephen’s Birth in 2002

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Do I look like dancer material? British ballet company Balletlorent is recruiting 12 pregnant women to star in MaEternal along with six professional ballet dancers.

Artistic director Liv Lorent:

You can’t get a 25-year-old size 8 ballet dancer type body to move with the weight, the gravitas or the sheer cheerful spirit a pregnant woman.

Clearly, she has not been hanging around THIS 28-week pregnant woman. I have the weight and the gravitas, maybe even the sheer spirit, but I am far from cheerful!

But seriously, it sounds like a great opportunity for pregnant women up to 32 weeks. There will also be an active birth therapist at rehearsals who will “advise on the movements and abilities of expectant mothers.” Maybe she could have helped prevent the bad fall I had last month when I twisted my left ankle so badly that it was swollen and bruised for over a week.

via Jezebel

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I was 29-years-old the last time I was pregnant. This time around, I’m 35. And while I wouldn’t say I’ve had a rough pregnancy especially compared to others’, it’s certainly been different the second time in a number of ways:

1. I’m much more short tempered because I have less time to relax from having to take care of a five-year-old’s needs plus his school-related activities and all the other added household duties that comes with having an additional person in the house as compared to last time when it was just Marv and me in the house.
2. I also feel much more emotional than I remember being the first time. It’s probably because there’s a lot more stuff going on now. Needless to say, being emotional is exhausting!
3. I tire more easily even though I think I started out the pregnancy no less physically fit. It’s partly due to age and partly due to increased responsibilities (see #1).
4. I’ve experienced more sciatic pain in my right buttock for no known reason. When I was deathly ill with the flu this past week, the sciatica was 100 times worse. I literally sobbed when I had to get up to do anything, including haul myself down several flights of stairs between our bedroom at the top of the house to the bottom two floors to the kitchen, living room, and laundry.
5. I get heartburn at the drop of a hat. I get it when I’m hungry, I get it when I’ve just eaten, I get it for no reason at all. It always feels like there’s food pushing up on my stomach on through the esophagus. I am unable to eat more than half the amount of food I used to at any one sitting. I guess that helps with keeping the pregnancy weight gain down!
6. Speaking of weight, I am not counting calories this time around. When I was pregnant with Stephen, we were living in Japan where all the women are told to keep their weight gain under 22 pounds (10 kg). Here, no one’s asked me at all about my weight since the first doctor’s visits at 6 and 12 weeks. I feel that I’m eating sensibly and gaining weight at a reasonable rate. It’s a relief not to have the pressure of controlling my weight gain obsessively.
7. Maternity clothes are sooooo much cuter this time around. I’ve got pants that look like normal pants from the hips down with attached stretchy maternity tummy band at the top that stays hidden under my tops. Because I’m pregnant through most of the winter this time, I can still look normal wearing my winter sweaters. Nursing/maternity tops are also tons cuter and less awkward looking.
8. I’ve got blogs to read which makes the wait more entertaining. One of my guilty favorites is Celebrity Baby Blog. Even celebs can look ordinary and frumpy when they’re pregnant or taking their kids around town!
9. I am not nearly as neurotic about preparing for the baby. I have a few books on how to parent siblings but haven’t gone through them in detail yet. I also haven’t bothered buying much of anything for #2 except for a baby bathtub and some towels in green, yellow, and white. Even though we’ve been told that the baby “appears to be a girl,” I’m not going to be totally convinced until I meet her in face-to-face.
10. I am bordering on denial when it comes to the birth of #2. With Stephen, I read and thought about everything related to babies. With #2, I am more inclined to wait until the final moment when I have no choice but to face the fact that I will be the mother of two! I hope we all survive the transition….
11. I am forgetful. The previous two items on the list are practically the same but I didn’t notice until the post was published.

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