Sometimes it is so hard to take the time to write a blog post. Often I find that our lives are full and busy but to put it into a blog post - well, suddenly it becomes repetitive, mundane perhaps.
The kids are growing by the day. Having 2 a mere 19 months apart - it's hard, it's fun, it's chaotic, it's exhausting, it never lets up. During nap time (if I am fortunate enough that both will sleep at the same time) I have grand ideas of blogging, reading blogs, cooking and cleaning. Sometimes I end up just sitting on my couch with pandora playing on my phone. Sometimes I mindlessly scroll through facebook looking at nothing in particular. Sometimes I debate getting off facebook and finding a way to make my phone be less mindlessly alluring. Stupid phone. Scrolling and searching and looking at - nothing really. The ultimate time waster.
Our days have been filled with diaper changes, meal times, the week where I pulled out the mediterranean cookbook and cooked time consuming meals during naps and beyond (it only lasted a week), gym time, thinking about yard work and then not doing it (somehow I just end up holding G all the time). The days are long and some are easy and others are unending. I think the kids gang up on us sometimes - like "hey, I will throw a tantrum and get all worked up, get mom nice and frazzled...then, you need to finish her off with a bout of gas."
G is so close to rolling back to front. He gets his little legs moving to the side, looks for things, reaches for them but doesn't quite make it. He is jolly with a smile that just can't be contained and dimples that sink so deep into his overly chubby cheeks. We call him chunk and other names that most people would be aghast at...terms of endearment in our eyes but I am sure other people would not view it that way.
B is talking a little more. His language has yet to blossom the way I envisioned it but he is a very effective communicator and understands complex instruction so I am not getting to worked up or worried about it. I try to remind myself that adults have varying degrees of talkativeness and perhaps he won't be the most talkative person in the future. Heck, Einstein didn't talk until he was 4.
I have found that I am evolving as a person so much. I falsely believed that once you were an adult, you really kind of were set in your ways. Everyone says people change but I guess it didn't really sink in that I would change so much. It is so interesting to have new thoughts and ideas about things that I never thought I would have. In my early and mid 20's I can't say I ever thought about the second amendment, private school, home school, political beliefs, government, religion or debt. Somehow all of these things have become important to me. I would say part of it results from having kids. You really start to think about the world in a different way. You think further than yourself and you think about the types of people you hope to help shape.
The school thing has been a very interesting change. I suppose before I had kids, I just either didn't think about schooling or just made the assumption that yea, kids go to public school - they learn - they do well - they graduate. It seems that schools have changed so much tho. Social media. I am so thankful that social media didn't exist when I was in school. For the distraction. For the ability to bully facelessly(ish). For the inherent narcissism it creates in people. Class sizes. When did 30 become the minimum with a continuous push upwards? Standardized testing. And how do we determine what is important for standardized tests? What is relevant? The disappearance of physical education (never mind the fact that our nation is getting more and more obese), art, music - basically the disappearance of things that keep us healthy and creative (or perhaps the things that allow us to be original). Mainstreaming (I won't go into that one). Bullying, shootings, violence. Huge schools. When did it become normal for elementary schools to have 500 kids? All of this has me thinking and debating. We have a ways to go before we are in school - we have 4 years for B and 5 for G before they are in kindergarten so we have some time to make some decisions - but it is something I think about often. Homeschool in the early years? Would this make them weird? Outcasts? Halt socialization? Would be be more relaxed and have more quality time with eacholther? Would the kids learn more/less than their peers? Or perhaps private school where class sizes are more controlled and the curriculum has more leeway. A religious private school? Something else? When I became a parent I knew that there would be decisions but I didn't realize there would be so many and that it would feel as though those decisions were really so life altering for the kids. So much of a persons identity begins to be formed in school, through the friends they make, the things they learn, the environment they are in and their general experience. But seriously, no pressure for picking the right path for them...no pressure at all!
But mostly, we just spend our days busy - playgroups, the gym, playing, learning, being outside, being a family.
