a prisoner of mood swings

We have been having some really great days with 8 yo. No, we have not changed anything that I can say. Daddy has been around a bit more, and they have been horsing around a bit more, but not in any new way. We have not started any medication, supplements or therapy. We have not cut out gluten (although I do try to avoid food coloring and extra sugar, but I am not strict about it). Anyway, it has been almost gloriously smooth.

Until today.

Today we were supposed to go to the nature center for a homeschool day. We have been in the past, and I always wonder how much schoolwork to plan on a day like this. On one hand, it's a field trip, and I get quite tired from it to do anything extra. On the other hand, I find the kids are sitting around, when they could be learning or reviewing something. So I decided to keep it to a minimum.

10 yo was learning mishna right after shacharit, and then I asked him to do one page of math. For 8 yo, who also went to shul, I asked him to do math only, hoping that if my husband comes home early enough, they can do some chumash. 10 yo shrugged and proceeded to math. 8 yo dramatically dropped to the floor, and laid there,  motionless.

Now this was going on as my daughter was pulling out large scissors and glue stick for her project, and 1 yo was diligently dumping books off the bookshelf. I still had to pack our lunch. I had it all laid out, it just had to be placed into the cooler backpack. I knew that if I focused on 1 yo, and read him a book, he would stop, I knew that 4 yo wanted me to read to her, too, only 1 yo kept yanking that book out of my hands. I was getting upset that 8 yo balked at one school thing that he was assigned. Meanwhile, 10 yo was having difficulty with his math, and also needed help.

I found myself helplessly sitting at the table, yelling at 4 yo having scissors where 1 yo can get them, yelling at 10 yo rounding off answers and not showing his work, yelling at 8 yo for being so darn freaking dramatic and not even trying. It might be hard to explain what it feels like to be held hostage by a child's unpredictable mood.

In the end, he sulked off to his room to do his math, 10 yo did not even finish his one page, and I forgot to grab my cellphone. We were running late, and 1 yo was screaming. I shushed and shushed kids in the car, even though they were not doing anything objectively objectionable. We barely made it.

Today's homeschool class involved a Starlab, an inflatable dome onto which the night sky is projected. I knew it was meant for kids ages 5 and up, but I was not sure whether my daughter would stay. (For the purists, she will be five in a month, so this is a technicality). She chose to stay with her brothers to go inside the dome while I took 1 yo out in a stroller to see the beaver in his enclosure.

Later, the kids came out and even did the little prepared crafts. 8 yo was concerned about making a "holiday" craft, which involved pinpricking the stars in a printed constellation and then decorating a frame with nature objects such as acorns, tiny pine cones, seeds and leaves. I said that I do not feel that there is anything wrong with making such a craft.

As the kids were working at various stations, a staff member came up to tell me how much 8 yo knew about the stories of the constellations. I assumed he meant 10 yo, the master talker, but he said, no, the younger one. I asked 8 yo where he learned all these stories; I certainly do not recall teaching him any, or him reading up on the subject matter. He reminded me of the astronomy class he took at the coop last year. Yeah, I definitely do not give this kid enough credit...

Then we drove home, and the math was still looming. 10 yo sat down and did his one problem, incorrectly. Then he moved on to his mishna homework. 8 yo went back to complete meltdown. I told him to step outside. His best response was, Hashem made a mistake in creating me. I said, Hashem does not make mistakes, and you have to be the best kid that you can be.

Soon, it was time to leave for taekwondo. I told the boys to bring their schoolwork, and to do it there, while waiting for their class.10 yo brought his mishna, and the second volume of Harry Potter. Harry Potter won. Meanwhile, 8 yo brought his math binder over. We ended up doing it after his class. He finished the whole page, with very minimal help, in five minutes. As we completed it, I asked, were your fits worth it? He responded, no, and that he is sorry for his behavior.

So here I am, a hostage to my child's moods. I know that I should be a wise parent, rising above such hiccups, I know that I should take a deep breath, hold it together, stay calm and reassuring. But I also know that there is no rhyme or reason to these fits. Today can be horrible, and tomorrow can be sunny. Today can be peachy, and tomorrow the world will be coming to an end. Today I can plan, and carry out, and tomorrow everything will get scrambled. I am flexible, but this is taxing beyond basic flexibility.

On tzniut (modesty)

Tzniut is not the skirt that a little girl wears, but the leggings or the pants, so when she swings upside down on the monkey bars, the whole world does not see her underwear.

Tzniut is not the early age when a girl starts wearing a skirt, but the insistence that she changes her clothes somewhere private, because her body is private.

Tzniut is the gut reaction I have to my daughter's ballet, with its emphasis on leotard and frilly tutu dress code, and on looking beautiful and perfect.

Tzniut is covering my hair. Under my hats and tichels, I do not stress whether I am having a bad hair day. I do not worry about the grays. I do not concern myself with how often I get a haircut. I do not hide under these wraps, rather, I feel confident. I love my hair, and it did change from all the years of being covered, but I am more than an outward appearance.

Tzniut is not having to "put on a face" and being worried about being seen without makeup. I present my internal "me" instead of feeling that I need to cover up and make myself into something socially expected.

Tzniut is watching which words I use in a conversation with my friends. If it's an inappropriate reference that I would not use in front of a rabbi, I should not use it in front of a friend. G-d is always there, you know.

Tzniut is never about the length of a skirt. Tzniut is not about hiding in a tent. Tzniut is not about being hidden from view, being timid. I do not like Sarah, privately sitting in a tent. I like Rivkah, who crafted her own destiny, and the destiny of her son. I like Leah, who made the best of a terrible situation by going out and brazenly hiring her husband. G-d answered Leah, she had three more kids.

Tzniut is aligning your outside with your inside, not aligning your outside with the outside of everyone else. I am liberated by the freedom to be comfortable, to wear the clothes I love instead of following the current trend.

mug cakes

A friend posted about making mug cakes. 10 yo saw this post this morning, and made me watch the video which showed how to make those cakes. I was a bit skeptical, but he was very excited by it. I emailed the link to him, asking him to print out the recipes. None of them spoke to me (I am not a fan of food coloring or peanut butter), so I looked up a mug chocolate cake to make for myself.

My chocolate cake

By lunchtime, I made my cake. I did eat real food first. It was easy, and I liked how quickly it went from ingredients to edible product. My eldest sampled a spoonful and made funfetti cake next. I warned him that it is not the same as in the video: he will need to mix it in a bowl and then split it between two mugs. Then I got my behind out of the kitchen, hoping not to meddle.

I was called in a few minutes later with a quote: "Sometimes it looked like spilled milk, and it was the spilled milk." There was a small milk spill being mopped up. Only one parve bowl switched to being milchig. 10 yo did handle the instructions by himself. I showed him how to convert the recipe part calling for self-rising flour to the right baking powder proportion. I did not measure anything out.

We did not have funfetti, but we did have some sprinkles. 10 yo dumped in the last bits, commenting how this is the only product that he knows of that contains trans fat. I inwardly sighed: fine, poison yourself, eat totally unhealthy food. He did need help dividing the batter between two mugs.

When the final product came out, he applied whipped cream and dug in. He went from being all thumbs up to disappointed pretty quickly. "This is terrible! It doesn't even taste good. I don't want to finish it." His brother, who got the other mug, had no problem with his cake. I didn't taste it, being all filled up with yummy chocolate.

Over the weekend. we had a whole discussion about the role of teachers in education. I was thinking about today's experience, and the numerous life lessons it contained. There was very little grown-up input, and no instruction beyond following the recipe. It was a purely child-driven experience: he saw something that caught his eye, he was interested, he had time and resources to carry it out, and he had to assess himself whether he was happy with the results and deal with disappointment.

Another homeschool friend was commenting on inability to do creative things with her older child due to the presence of a much younger sibling. I feel that my kids are finally entering that realm where they can direct their own creative experiences, and I can sit back and wait to be summoned. 1 yo was napping while the mug cake production was going on, but I did not feel responsible for either supervision, or the final result. I was quite relaxed and just enjoying the goings on.

Where are we?

10 yo finished Horaiyot in Mishna and moved right into Bava Batra. Why? He is planning to finish Nezikin. He also taught me that Avot (Pirkei Avot) is in Nezikin. So far he has done Sanhedrin and Makkot, so it makes sense. He is also fired up (today) to learn Gemara. I said that it is up to his rebbe.

In Chumash we are nearing the end of Vayigash. He is comfortable, flying right through. We normally do five pesukim a day, but today it was genealogy, so he chose to do more. He also noticed that both Reuven and Peretz have a son named Hetzron. "Must have been a popular name!" I never noticed it. I look over Rashi before we start and decide which ones to do. Lately, it has been working out to one-three Rashis per day, although I never refuse a chance to do more, if he asks me a question that Rashi answers.

10 yo finished Level II of Rosetta Stone. We also read our way through a Hebrew paperback, a few paragraphs per day. He did not mind pulling out a dictionary to look up words that he did not know. I supplied him with some words that I did know, but left some important ones foe him to look up. My Hebrew was nowhere near the level where I could read the whole book and understand every single word. I hope to read more of those books this year.

As far as Lashon haTorah, he is in the middle of workbook hey, on tzivui. It is easy, and I am almost stretching it out for him.

In math, we are slugging through Math Mammoth, which obfuscates with its Common Core garbage. An example is the drawn-put and confusing explanation of how to multiply decimals. I think they are pushing for understanding that numbers can be rounded off to whole numbers, and that answer still needs to make sense, but I am getting impatient having to explain yet another nifty (and useless) approach to something that can be shown much more easily either with fractions, or with whole numbers. Just teach the kids to stick in decimal point later!

8 yo finished 1st grade spelling program from k12reader.com. I used it to build up confidence, and he really learned how not to get totally frustrated when he does not know how to spell a word. Now, whenever he writes something, he tries to spell, or asks me to help him instead of refusing like he used to. He also seems to see the patterns to spelling rules. Now he tries to write the word out, and read it, and see if his spelling makes sense. While it seems silly to rejoice that he can spell on the 1st grade level, I feel that we have a major accomplishment here.

He is in the middle of Keyboarding Without Tears. He likes those trophies, and always chooses to do typing first. I wonder whether this constant input of words has helped with his spelling and his writing abilities.

We are doing First Language Lessons slowly. He tends to do them on a more sophisticated level than the book expects, which is fine with me. He finds them easy, and annoying sometimes.

In math, he is on par with Math Mammoth. He is reviewing telling time from analog clocks, and it seems to click much better now than it did before.

The boys keep on reading, a lot. 10 yo took put first volume of Harry Potter out of the library, and read it in two days. Now he felt ready for it. It was always available, and he was aware of its existence, but a part of him was not ready to read it until now. After our vacation, he commented how not reading anything besides Calvin and Hobbes for a few days made him moody.

4 yo does her own thing: lots of coloring, lots of imaginative play, lots of snuggles and reading on the couch. I keep beating myself up for not doing more "academic" things with her, but she seems to be thriving. One thing, though: she keeps on playing "school". She is always going to school, coming back from school, and, in some way or other, involved in school. I have a lot of my own reservations about putting her in school next year, but, due to this persistent theme, I am thinking about it.

1 yo is a walking, talking, eating machine. He still spends a lot of energy on unclear communication, but he is doing all normal toddler things: tearing up the house, making messes, coloring where he shouldn't. He now has his favorite books, and will sit through a whole book.

As an overview, I see how we are slowly getting there.

staying positive

8 yo is all excited about our trip. As I am tucking him in (all deep and meaningful conversations seem to happen at bedtime), he is telling me how he is planning on bringing one of his stuffed animals on the trip.

8 yo: " I will have to make a warm bed for animals left behind. This one really wants to come with us. It's so cuddly."
Me, distractedly : "If you lose it, it's your responsibility. I will not be looking for stuffed animals that leave home."
8 yo: "Mommy, can't you stay positive? Why do I have to lose it?"

Yes, my dear child, you are absolutely right, I will try to stay positive.

a really big heart

This morning, I ran out to get some scarves from a private showing. It is Sunday, and my husband was planing on taking the older kids to Gem and Mineral Show while I was planing to nap 1 yo and organize the sunroom.

When I came back, steam was coming out of my husband's ears, and 8 yo was crying. My husband asked him to do chumash. He did not expect to do chumash today, so he totally melted down. It took them an hour to torture their way through three pesukim. I was just shaking my head. At some point, I volunteered to take 10 yo and 4 yo to the show, while the learners would sit and finish up. However, they did complete it, had brunch, and left.

I got to the point in the sun room where I emptied out all the messy cubbies, and then 1 yo woke up. So now there is a pile of mess on the floor of the sun room, but the cubbies look nice and neat. The pile is bad enough for the kids to ask: what happened here?

But that is not what I want to focus on.

The car pulls up. The kids pile out. 8 yo comes in, beaming: "Mommy, I got you a gift!" I turn around and see that he is holding a tiny jewelry pouch. Inside are little earrings. "Mommy, these are mystic quartz. You irradiate quartz and you get mystic quartz. Mommy, do you like them? I got them for you for doing all those nice things that you do for us. It's nice to get you a present once in a while to say thank you. Mommy, we're having pizza for dinner? I love pizza, thank you for making it."

He leaves the room, and I am speechless and choked up. I am putting on these little studs. My husbands shakes his head: "Where did you get a kid like that?" Then he tells me how 8 yo got a grab bag of stones for 4 yo since she does not have her own money, and he was considering getting me another set of earrings, but that was outside of his price range. 10 yo was upset; he got nothing because he is saving his money. However, he used golden wire and wrapped it around a black polished stone (8 yo's gift to him as a consolation), and presented me with that pendant.

Before they left for the show, when the kids were outside and out of ear shot, I was complaining bitterly to my husband how I cannot take 8 yo's angry outbursts any more, how his hysterics and dramatics leave me drained; how I feel like a hostage to his emotions. Now I feel like the luckiest mom on the face of this earth: I have a sweet, caring kid. Maybe he will not master chumash, maybe he will not be quick with his numbers, but his heart is so firmly in the right place, that I have a thing or two to learn from him.

enjoying schoolwork

This just happened, and I almost missed it.

The boys were taking a long time getting into bed tonight and I almost did not tuck them in. Then I had pity and went into their room to give them kisses. They already said Shema. As I am bending over to kiss 8 yo:

"Mommy, I can't wait for our trip. (We are going away for Thanksgiving). Why are we going?"
"We are going on a little vacation."
"Mommy, can I bring a little bit of schoolwork? I was thinking just chumash and a pencil and spelling. Oh, and a couple of math worksheets. Can I bring those?"
I am a bit stumped, as in struck by lightning.
"You like doing those school things, don't you?"
"Yes. So can I bring them?"
"Yes, let's make a list tomorrow morning so we don't forget."

Just this week a friend was telling me in the same sentence how she is burned out by homeschooling, and they are going away for a week, but she is planning on bringing some schoolwork. I was advising her to let it all go for a week, and give herself and her kids a real vacation.

My own kid proved me wrong. This child just requested to do schoolwork on vacation! So here is my revised suggestion: if your kid asks to bring schoolwork along, do it; if they don't, leave it at home.

And this is what child-led learning looks like.