The girls have begun pestering DH about wanting a dog. They had a good go at him on Shabbat. To the point where he said, "We have a lot of work coming up what with the move and getting settled and all. Let's get through that and talk again." Does that sound like a "maybe" to you?
Then this morning he came to me and whispered that the upstairs neighbor lady's daughter had found a German Shepherd and they were looking for a home for it. He said he was thinking of going to look at it just so he could say "Nah!" LOL
We had a quick whispered talk about it in the kitchen. I said I would tend not to go for a purebred. Plenty of mutts waiting for homes without breeding more. German Shepherds have genetic problems with their back legs and also since E is afraid of dogs probably best not to get a large one like that. If we ever got a dog and if the girls intend walking it, it needs to be a size that they can control on a leash. Also smaller dogs eat less and can get enough exercise in an apartment.
I have very mixed feelings about getting a dog. IF we ever did, I'm saying. Nice in theory but....they are a lot of work as well. I definitely would NOT get a puppy. I do not have time or energy to deal with housebreaking and getting my possessions chewed up. I do NOT have time to walk anything in the mornings. And thinking of having to walk it in the cold and rain and get up early on Shabbatot to walk it and up and down 4 flights of stairs on Shabbat.....Am I nuts?
The plus side could be that it would afford the kids hours of endless fun with no effort from me. Yeah. But it could also just add to the existing chaos in our house.
Can you tell I'm of two minds? I guess like DH says best to get through the move and then think again.
Thursday, April 11, 2013
Tuesday, April 2, 2013
Pesach Vacation Summary
Here I am back at work after being off work quite a lot due to Pesach (Passover). I've had a raging migraine since yesterday that still hasn't gone away even after taking something for it on two occasions since last night.
The kids were all off school for 2 1/2 weeks or so and I must be the only mom in the country who delights in school holidays. Just means the mornings are all my own for getting myself ready for work. They've been staying up WAAAAY later than I normally let them and therefore sleeping in later. So I have a full, delicious hour in the mornings during school holidays to shower, get dressed, do my makeup, etc. No kids to argue with over what they'll be wearing, no one's hair to fix, no homework to hound them about, no food fights in the morning over what, exactly, they will let me put in their pita and will actually agree to eat. Bliss!
The kids go back to school tomorrow. Which leaves me counting the minutes until the end of June and the start of summer vacation.
Pesach seemed to be all chag and no chol hamoed of which there were only 2 days. I worked one full day of chol hamoed and was off the other and that day was really nice. We all attended Y's acrobatics competition in the morning and then myself and my three offspring betook ourselves to the beach for about 3 hours followed up with a stop at IKEA for a cheap, kosher for Passover dinner out. The beach and the weather were heavenly. Cool breeze, warm sun. I think the water was too cold still to go in and I wasn't really interested in that anyway. Thankfully, the 2 little ones are getting old enough now where they are prepared to play in the surf themselves and I'm not too worried about them as long as they are in my line of vision. Far more relaxing for me this way than when they were younger and expected me to carry them into the surf, sit beside them, dig sand pits and tunnels with them. I hope to go back to the beach often but then again I say that every summer and it doesn't happen as often as I'd like somehow.
Shabbat of Pesach was....Shabbat. Nothing out of the ordinary. But then DH had the bright idea of inviting his mother BACK to us for chag sheini (last day of Passover) because his 2 married kids and 3 grandkids were coming for dinner and he thought his mom would like to see them all. Great in theory. Bad in reality. I was peopled out by this time. MIL is a nice lady and all but irks me no end. She lurks, hulks, hovers, whatever you want to call it. She's very critical in her dry British way which gets old and she's hard of hearing so it's impossible to have a conversation with her when you have to say everything 3 times before she gets it. In the end, I just left DH to deal with her and spent a lot of the day in bed in my room or out in the park with DS4. Just couldn't deal. I'm sure MIL thinks I'm the rudest person on the planet for ignoring her and goodness knows what she's told the rest of the family about me but.....too bad. I gotta do what I gotta do to cope, right?
So here we are back at work, catching up on 5 days worth of emails and slowly getting back into the swing.
The kids were all off school for 2 1/2 weeks or so and I must be the only mom in the country who delights in school holidays. Just means the mornings are all my own for getting myself ready for work. They've been staying up WAAAAY later than I normally let them and therefore sleeping in later. So I have a full, delicious hour in the mornings during school holidays to shower, get dressed, do my makeup, etc. No kids to argue with over what they'll be wearing, no one's hair to fix, no homework to hound them about, no food fights in the morning over what, exactly, they will let me put in their pita and will actually agree to eat. Bliss!
The kids go back to school tomorrow. Which leaves me counting the minutes until the end of June and the start of summer vacation.
Pesach seemed to be all chag and no chol hamoed of which there were only 2 days. I worked one full day of chol hamoed and was off the other and that day was really nice. We all attended Y's acrobatics competition in the morning and then myself and my three offspring betook ourselves to the beach for about 3 hours followed up with a stop at IKEA for a cheap, kosher for Passover dinner out. The beach and the weather were heavenly. Cool breeze, warm sun. I think the water was too cold still to go in and I wasn't really interested in that anyway. Thankfully, the 2 little ones are getting old enough now where they are prepared to play in the surf themselves and I'm not too worried about them as long as they are in my line of vision. Far more relaxing for me this way than when they were younger and expected me to carry them into the surf, sit beside them, dig sand pits and tunnels with them. I hope to go back to the beach often but then again I say that every summer and it doesn't happen as often as I'd like somehow.
Shabbat of Pesach was....Shabbat. Nothing out of the ordinary. But then DH had the bright idea of inviting his mother BACK to us for chag sheini (last day of Passover) because his 2 married kids and 3 grandkids were coming for dinner and he thought his mom would like to see them all. Great in theory. Bad in reality. I was peopled out by this time. MIL is a nice lady and all but irks me no end. She lurks, hulks, hovers, whatever you want to call it. She's very critical in her dry British way which gets old and she's hard of hearing so it's impossible to have a conversation with her when you have to say everything 3 times before she gets it. In the end, I just left DH to deal with her and spent a lot of the day in bed in my room or out in the park with DS4. Just couldn't deal. I'm sure MIL thinks I'm the rudest person on the planet for ignoring her and goodness knows what she's told the rest of the family about me but.....too bad. I gotta do what I gotta do to cope, right?
So here we are back at work, catching up on 5 days worth of emails and slowly getting back into the swing.
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
The Morning After
After a long hiatus where life got the better of me, I am making a new resolution to return to blogging - at least semi-regularly.
Happy Pesach (Passover) to everyone who observes it!
Seder was held at our house as usual with my Mom and DH's Mom in attendance and DD16 was with us this year for a change. DD16 was such a big help with the cooking! She loves to cook and she's very good at it and adventurous too.
We begged off of doing the big extended family bash this year by using our impending move to get out of it. It sorta worked. DH's married daughter tried to invite herself and her family (that's 4 people) AND her husband's family (another 4 people) to us for the seder. And when do you suppose we got this phone call?? TWO evenings before the seder!! I heard DH on the phone with her and figured out what she was trying to pull. I rushed into the kitchen where he was on the phone with her and started dramatically drawing my index finger across my throat. As in "if you agree to them coming at this late stage I will kill you, her or myself.....or maybe all three". So it seems her story was that they COULD go to her mil's for seder but she would prefer to come to us so that her kids will have ours to play with! I said to DH, "O I see. So she's gone from telling us that a gay couple having a kids was more normal that us having kids together to actually realizing that her Dad having young kids is a plus for her." In the end DH told her that if going to her mil's was an option then she should take it because we wanted a quiet seder this year but that next year we would be inviting everyone. We will be in the new apartment and it's big enough that if any one wants to get away from anyone else, they can. ;-)
So. Speaking of apartments, thank G-d we finally bought a larger place. Our street is two blocks long so it's just down the block from us. Kinda funny to be moving one block down but it's good. We won't need to change the shul we attend or the kids' schools. We are SO EXCITED about moving. We had been looking like CRAZY for about 10 months and had seen this place last summer. They were asking WAY too much for it at the time and their taste in furnishings/decorating had kinda put us off. We carried on looking at other things and then on Election Day which I had off work, I saw on the internet that they were still trying to sell and I suggested to DH that we go back and take a 2nd look. By this time they were desperate since they'd already bought something else and still had no buyer. This time the place struck us totally differently and we were able to look past the decorating style and see the place's potential. We came home and straight away made a silly offer which was significantly lower than they were expecting to get for it. Man, were we on pins and needles all day long! It was so hard to concentrate on anything, wondering if they'd accept our offer. But they did!
About 2 months before we found the place to move to, a serious buyer for our current apartment had come along and he liked it so much that he was willing to wait until we found something else we wanted to buy. We ended up signing both the sale and purchase contracts on the same day.
The "new" apartment is in a building that is actually about 40 years old but very well looked after. The building is set way back off the street and behind another building so we're hopeful that it will be quieter than where we are now.
The apartment is on the fourth floor of the building and faces east, south and west so it's very bright. Whatever sun is going, we're going to get. I swore I would never again live in an apartment that didn't face south. And I think this is the only apartment we saw that DID face south. Our current apartment is ~100 sq. meters (~1000 sq. ft.). The new apartment is ~160 sq. meters (~1700 sq. ft.). Heaven! It is four bedrooms so the extra bedroom will serve as DH's office and guest room. His work space will FINALLY be out of the way and out of sight. The kitchen is large and an older style and we will be redoing it, at least partially. The apartment only has 1 1/2 baths. DH thinks we need to figure out how and where to stick another shower but I hate to start dividing the place up into little bits just for a shower and ruin the effect of all that gorgeous SPACE! We looked at what other people in the building have done about adding another shower. Everyone did something different and I wasn't crazy about any of the ideas. We may just not do anything straight away and live with it as is until we see what our needs really are.
Our sellers were supposed to be in their new place by Pesach but they don't have the key to their new place yet. So until they get it we can't schedule a moving date. However according to the contract they HAVE to be out by May 1 at the latest and we have to be out of our current place by May 23 at the latest. That gives us a 3 week window to do whatever we're going to do to the new place.
On other matters.....
Mr. Ex has been giving me fits over 5 years of child support that he hasn't paid. I finally took a VERY difficult step and turned off his checks and credit cards. This was about 2 months ago. And since then, with my lawyer's help, we have been trying to negotiate a payment plan for him to pay off the debt of back support that has accrued as well as how he's going to pay going forward.
After I had his money "turned off", the idiot phoned up DD16 and told her I'd done that. WHY?? We weren't home at the time when he spoke to her and when we got home she was sizzling mad - at me. Her take on it is, "Poor Abba. How could you be so cruel?" DD16 has known that he and I had a money issue but I never gave her particulars. But since he'd already put her squarely in the middle, I decided she might as well have all the facts so I laid it out for her and said a few choice things to her about the situation. She said she didn't care and she was going to live with him. The next morning I left the house to do errands and when I got home she was gone. I was a WRECK for about 3 days. The feelings of being betrayed by her were overwhelming. You know, you give and give and give and give and do and do and do and do for your kid and she slaps you in the face by running off to the parent who has done - I won't say nothing - but, as I see it, SO little for her. I'm the one who sat up nights with her when she was sick and dealt with her tantrums when she was little and handled school issues which have been many and ongoing and I'm the one who worried about her mental health through the years (there were two long periods at different times where I felt she needed someone other than me to talk to about stuff she was dealing with, fallout from the divorce and other things, and I sent her to weekly sessions with a child psychologist), etc. And for some of her growing up years, I did all this on my own until I remarried. Her Dad hasn't been involved in any of this.
Long story short, she missed 2 weeks of school to live with him as a means of punishing me for my "cruelty" to her Dad. And while she was there, he was threatening to enroll her in a school near him. It was two weeks of stress that I wouldn't like to relive but in the end she came back. I had gotten myself together enough so that when she did walk back through the door, I said hi and gave her a hug and said NOTHING. I think she was expecting me to make a scene because when I hugged her she gave a huge sigh. Relief?
Two days later I felt there was a lot hanging in the air unsaid so I suggested she and I go out for a coffee and talk and she agreed. We talked for an hour. Both talked, both listened. We obviously don't agree about her Dad but that's ok. She apologized for hurting me by running away to him and she admitted that she probably took too much of the situation on herself by trying to be the mediator between me and him. So all in all, I think/hope she learned some things from the experience and I am proud of myself for handling it the way I did.
Now it's left for her Dad and I to either agree about the money or not. My lawyer has turned out to be pretty useless, much to my disappointment. If he and I can't agree, then I have no idea what will happen or more importantly what he can or will do about it. I hate to think.
My secret weapon is just to keep thinking happy apartment thoughts.
One of my FB friends posted the following yesterday which I found helpful: "Please keep in mind that whatever you're going through, this challenging time in your life is merely IN your life. It is NOT your WHOLE life. So be sure to keep this SLICE of your life in perspective and don't let it overwhelm you. Remember nothing is everything. The part is not greater than the whole."
Happy Pesach (Passover) to everyone who observes it!
Seder was held at our house as usual with my Mom and DH's Mom in attendance and DD16 was with us this year for a change. DD16 was such a big help with the cooking! She loves to cook and she's very good at it and adventurous too.
We begged off of doing the big extended family bash this year by using our impending move to get out of it. It sorta worked. DH's married daughter tried to invite herself and her family (that's 4 people) AND her husband's family (another 4 people) to us for the seder. And when do you suppose we got this phone call?? TWO evenings before the seder!! I heard DH on the phone with her and figured out what she was trying to pull. I rushed into the kitchen where he was on the phone with her and started dramatically drawing my index finger across my throat. As in "if you agree to them coming at this late stage I will kill you, her or myself.....or maybe all three". So it seems her story was that they COULD go to her mil's for seder but she would prefer to come to us so that her kids will have ours to play with! I said to DH, "O I see. So she's gone from telling us that a gay couple having a kids was more normal that us having kids together to actually realizing that her Dad having young kids is a plus for her." In the end DH told her that if going to her mil's was an option then she should take it because we wanted a quiet seder this year but that next year we would be inviting everyone. We will be in the new apartment and it's big enough that if any one wants to get away from anyone else, they can. ;-)
So. Speaking of apartments, thank G-d we finally bought a larger place. Our street is two blocks long so it's just down the block from us. Kinda funny to be moving one block down but it's good. We won't need to change the shul we attend or the kids' schools. We are SO EXCITED about moving. We had been looking like CRAZY for about 10 months and had seen this place last summer. They were asking WAY too much for it at the time and their taste in furnishings/decorating had kinda put us off. We carried on looking at other things and then on Election Day which I had off work, I saw on the internet that they were still trying to sell and I suggested to DH that we go back and take a 2nd look. By this time they were desperate since they'd already bought something else and still had no buyer. This time the place struck us totally differently and we were able to look past the decorating style and see the place's potential. We came home and straight away made a silly offer which was significantly lower than they were expecting to get for it. Man, were we on pins and needles all day long! It was so hard to concentrate on anything, wondering if they'd accept our offer. But they did!
About 2 months before we found the place to move to, a serious buyer for our current apartment had come along and he liked it so much that he was willing to wait until we found something else we wanted to buy. We ended up signing both the sale and purchase contracts on the same day.
The "new" apartment is in a building that is actually about 40 years old but very well looked after. The building is set way back off the street and behind another building so we're hopeful that it will be quieter than where we are now.
The apartment is on the fourth floor of the building and faces east, south and west so it's very bright. Whatever sun is going, we're going to get. I swore I would never again live in an apartment that didn't face south. And I think this is the only apartment we saw that DID face south. Our current apartment is ~100 sq. meters (~1000 sq. ft.). The new apartment is ~160 sq. meters (~1700 sq. ft.). Heaven! It is four bedrooms so the extra bedroom will serve as DH's office and guest room. His work space will FINALLY be out of the way and out of sight. The kitchen is large and an older style and we will be redoing it, at least partially. The apartment only has 1 1/2 baths. DH thinks we need to figure out how and where to stick another shower but I hate to start dividing the place up into little bits just for a shower and ruin the effect of all that gorgeous SPACE! We looked at what other people in the building have done about adding another shower. Everyone did something different and I wasn't crazy about any of the ideas. We may just not do anything straight away and live with it as is until we see what our needs really are.
Our sellers were supposed to be in their new place by Pesach but they don't have the key to their new place yet. So until they get it we can't schedule a moving date. However according to the contract they HAVE to be out by May 1 at the latest and we have to be out of our current place by May 23 at the latest. That gives us a 3 week window to do whatever we're going to do to the new place.
On other matters.....
Mr. Ex has been giving me fits over 5 years of child support that he hasn't paid. I finally took a VERY difficult step and turned off his checks and credit cards. This was about 2 months ago. And since then, with my lawyer's help, we have been trying to negotiate a payment plan for him to pay off the debt of back support that has accrued as well as how he's going to pay going forward.
After I had his money "turned off", the idiot phoned up DD16 and told her I'd done that. WHY?? We weren't home at the time when he spoke to her and when we got home she was sizzling mad - at me. Her take on it is, "Poor Abba. How could you be so cruel?" DD16 has known that he and I had a money issue but I never gave her particulars. But since he'd already put her squarely in the middle, I decided she might as well have all the facts so I laid it out for her and said a few choice things to her about the situation. She said she didn't care and she was going to live with him. The next morning I left the house to do errands and when I got home she was gone. I was a WRECK for about 3 days. The feelings of being betrayed by her were overwhelming. You know, you give and give and give and give and do and do and do and do for your kid and she slaps you in the face by running off to the parent who has done - I won't say nothing - but, as I see it, SO little for her. I'm the one who sat up nights with her when she was sick and dealt with her tantrums when she was little and handled school issues which have been many and ongoing and I'm the one who worried about her mental health through the years (there were two long periods at different times where I felt she needed someone other than me to talk to about stuff she was dealing with, fallout from the divorce and other things, and I sent her to weekly sessions with a child psychologist), etc. And for some of her growing up years, I did all this on my own until I remarried. Her Dad hasn't been involved in any of this.
Long story short, she missed 2 weeks of school to live with him as a means of punishing me for my "cruelty" to her Dad. And while she was there, he was threatening to enroll her in a school near him. It was two weeks of stress that I wouldn't like to relive but in the end she came back. I had gotten myself together enough so that when she did walk back through the door, I said hi and gave her a hug and said NOTHING. I think she was expecting me to make a scene because when I hugged her she gave a huge sigh. Relief?
Two days later I felt there was a lot hanging in the air unsaid so I suggested she and I go out for a coffee and talk and she agreed. We talked for an hour. Both talked, both listened. We obviously don't agree about her Dad but that's ok. She apologized for hurting me by running away to him and she admitted that she probably took too much of the situation on herself by trying to be the mediator between me and him. So all in all, I think/hope she learned some things from the experience and I am proud of myself for handling it the way I did.
Now it's left for her Dad and I to either agree about the money or not. My lawyer has turned out to be pretty useless, much to my disappointment. If he and I can't agree, then I have no idea what will happen or more importantly what he can or will do about it. I hate to think.
My secret weapon is just to keep thinking happy apartment thoughts.
One of my FB friends posted the following yesterday which I found helpful: "Please keep in mind that whatever you're going through, this challenging time in your life is merely IN your life. It is NOT your WHOLE life. So be sure to keep this SLICE of your life in perspective and don't let it overwhelm you. Remember nothing is everything. The part is not greater than the whole."
Monday, November 19, 2012
See What I Mean by "Adventure"?
I did entitle this blog "The Israel Adventure". Yep. That's a good name for it, alright!
Israel is in it's 6th day of Operation Pillar of Cloud - fighting Hamas after how many? - SEVEN years did someone say? - of daily rocket attacks on our southern cities. Enough is enough. Gilad Shalit is no longer being held captive there and there is no longer any reason NOT to do something to stop the attacks. I still wonder what took us so long to spring into action.....
I just got back from the U.S. a month ago (more about that in another post) and while I was there I was trying not to think about the possibility that "something" would happen while I was there with a husband and 3 kids here and of me not being able to get home. Thankfully, it didn't happen while I was so far away but it sure is happening now!
We and all our friends knew that we would all be in range "next time around" and sure enough we are which is a first. Thankfully, we've still been getting uninterrupted nights' sleep and haven't had ONE air raid siren alert yet. However, we have been hearing plenty of "booms" throughout the last 6 days which I can only assume is our Iron Dome anti-missile defense system intercepting the rockets that were headed our way.
Last Thursday night I left work at 4:45 with a co-worker and just as we left the building we heard 3 booms. We looked up in the sky and saw three black puffs of smoke hanging in the air basically right over our heads. O-KAAAAAAAAAY! This isn't something happening in "the south" anymore. This isn't fun and games. This is REAL. Now when I'm driving, my eyes are scanning the sky and my heart leaps at every bird flapping by until I realize it's JUST a bird.
On Friday, Y said to me, "Ima, the principal came into our class and told us the bomb shelter was open and if we have time we should run there if there's a siren but if not we should find a wall and lie down next to it with our hands over our heads. If a bomb goes "pop" on me, what good is having my hands over my head going to do?" I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Why does an 8-year-old have to think these things??? Nuts. Just nuts. But she's taking it very much in stride.
My prayer is that we do NOT give up before the job is finished, that we do NOT cave in to pressure. Otherwise we'll be in the same or worse situation a few years down the road. I also hope they don't jump the gun and send in the ground troups prematurely. IMO, they can do a hell of a lot more damage from the air without endangering anyone. They should send in the ground troups at the end to sweep up the pieces when it's all over.
Israel is in it's 6th day of Operation Pillar of Cloud - fighting Hamas after how many? - SEVEN years did someone say? - of daily rocket attacks on our southern cities. Enough is enough. Gilad Shalit is no longer being held captive there and there is no longer any reason NOT to do something to stop the attacks. I still wonder what took us so long to spring into action.....
I just got back from the U.S. a month ago (more about that in another post) and while I was there I was trying not to think about the possibility that "something" would happen while I was there with a husband and 3 kids here and of me not being able to get home. Thankfully, it didn't happen while I was so far away but it sure is happening now!
We and all our friends knew that we would all be in range "next time around" and sure enough we are which is a first. Thankfully, we've still been getting uninterrupted nights' sleep and haven't had ONE air raid siren alert yet. However, we have been hearing plenty of "booms" throughout the last 6 days which I can only assume is our Iron Dome anti-missile defense system intercepting the rockets that were headed our way.
Last Thursday night I left work at 4:45 with a co-worker and just as we left the building we heard 3 booms. We looked up in the sky and saw three black puffs of smoke hanging in the air basically right over our heads. O-KAAAAAAAAAY! This isn't something happening in "the south" anymore. This isn't fun and games. This is REAL. Now when I'm driving, my eyes are scanning the sky and my heart leaps at every bird flapping by until I realize it's JUST a bird.
On Friday, Y said to me, "Ima, the principal came into our class and told us the bomb shelter was open and if we have time we should run there if there's a siren but if not we should find a wall and lie down next to it with our hands over our heads. If a bomb goes "pop" on me, what good is having my hands over my head going to do?" I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. Why does an 8-year-old have to think these things??? Nuts. Just nuts. But she's taking it very much in stride.
My prayer is that we do NOT give up before the job is finished, that we do NOT cave in to pressure. Otherwise we'll be in the same or worse situation a few years down the road. I also hope they don't jump the gun and send in the ground troups prematurely. IMO, they can do a hell of a lot more damage from the air without endangering anyone. They should send in the ground troups at the end to sweep up the pieces when it's all over.
Wednesday, September 5, 2012
Diary of an Aliyah-nik blog
I stumbled across this blog today by chance called Diary of an Aliyah-nik which looks wonderful and I look forward to perusing it more in depth. Many of her posts look good but in particular her post from August 28th jumped up and bit me on the tush. I couldn't agree with her more and I wanted to stand up on the table and CHEER after reading it. Good for her! Take a look.....
Thursday, August 30, 2012
A New School Year Begins
After an eventful, fun-filled summer, Israeli kids started back to school on August 27th - 5 days earlier than the usual September 1st start date. This, obviously, made many working parents (except for me) happy, as it meant 5 fewer days that they had to scramble to find and pay for child care coverage.
In our house, we now have an 11th grader, 3rd grader and E started in a new gan which, happily, is walking distance from home, unlike the gan he was in for the past 2 years. The first day of gan he walked in like he owned the place and didn't cry at all but on every subsequent morning he has been clingy and cried. It's ok. I know it's a phase and he'll get used to it but it does send me off to work with a not-very-nice feeling in my tummy knowing I've left him there crying.
After the craziness of this morning, I've decided I have to get up a bit earlier at 6 am and get myself ready first otherwise it ain't gonna happen.
Apropo of which, I received by email these tips from the Sara Silber Psychological-Educational Clinic in Raanana for how to get your child organized for school. I thought there were some very good ideas here so I'm passing it along
1) Color code the child's schedule and subject materials with specifically colored covers and stickers. If math is red then all math books, notebooks, and workbooks should either be covered with red book covers or have a big red sticker on them. If there are 4 math items to be taken to school then write the number 4 on each item so that the child knows that when he has to pack up math materials he has to count 4 items . On the child's chart of his schedule of subjects, the subject of math should also be outlined in red so that he knows that he has to pack all the red items.
2) Put in your child's schoolbag 2 differently colored big folders. One will say on it "take home and show parents". The other will say on it "give to teacher". Explain to your child to put in the first envelope all the notes that he has to show parents regarding school trips, money requested, etc. In the second folder he puts completed assignments, and the envelopes containing the signed letters, money, etc that he has to give back to teacher. For kids who do not yet read put a photo of yourselves on the show parents folder to help them differentiate. This will serve other purposes too as the child can look at it if
missing you during the school day.
3) Child should have a big bulletin board in his room for notices he needs to refer to such as birthday party invites, school trips info, etc. You can make vertical divisions with strips of colored paper on the bulletin board to demarcate sections of now, this week,next week,this month, and child adjusts the position of notices with the thumb tacks as time goes by and he sees what he has to attend to now.
4) Teach your child how to make lists and checklists for daily routines and place them in strategic spots. Also, children need to be taught how to manage a diary efficiently and how to organize their belongings. If you yourself are not an organized person it will be difficult for you to teach your children so get someone else to help you with this. Organizational skills improve self-confidence and will help your child succeed in school.
5) Teach your child early on how to wake himself up with his own alarm clock and to get ready on his own with minimum physical assistance. Give lots of reinforcement for being ready on time for
school. Good habits should be instilled early.
6) Morning time is usually very hectic so anything that can be done the day before should be. This includes preparation of sandwich, fruit, and water. Each child should have his personal colored bin in the fridge for his own items. Child can help prepare this himself when all the food is out on the table at dinnertime, just supply the baggies and give some guidance. Also to be prepared the night before are the child's schoolbag, according to the color-coded system outlined above, and the child's clothes, which he can lay out himself. All this should be done before the child is allowed to watch his last television show for the day.
7) Make sure your child gets to bed at a reasonable time for her age and has available a nutritious breakfast. If she is not hungry in the morning then give a fruit drink and healthy snacks to eat on
the way or at school.
8) Be available when your child returns home to see her mood, give emotional support and troubleshoot any difficulties early on. If you are a working mom and are not home when the child returns, then give this needed attention after returning home. Children will not open up as readily on the telephone and you cannot see the child's body language and facial cues so it is best to have your conversations with your child in person than trying to do it from the office by phone. Small problems can become bigger problems if not attended to.
In our house, we now have an 11th grader, 3rd grader and E started in a new gan which, happily, is walking distance from home, unlike the gan he was in for the past 2 years. The first day of gan he walked in like he owned the place and didn't cry at all but on every subsequent morning he has been clingy and cried. It's ok. I know it's a phase and he'll get used to it but it does send me off to work with a not-very-nice feeling in my tummy knowing I've left him there crying.
After the craziness of this morning, I've decided I have to get up a bit earlier at 6 am and get myself ready first otherwise it ain't gonna happen.
Apropo of which, I received by email these tips from the Sara Silber Psychological-Educational Clinic in Raanana for how to get your child organized for school. I thought there were some very good ideas here so I'm passing it along
1) Color code the child's schedule and subject materials with specifically colored covers and stickers. If math is red then all math books, notebooks, and workbooks should either be covered with red book covers or have a big red sticker on them. If there are 4 math items to be taken to school then write the number 4 on each item so that the child knows that when he has to pack up math materials he has to count 4 items . On the child's chart of his schedule of subjects, the subject of math should also be outlined in red so that he knows that he has to pack all the red items.
2) Put in your child's schoolbag 2 differently colored big folders. One will say on it "take home and show parents". The other will say on it "give to teacher". Explain to your child to put in the first envelope all the notes that he has to show parents regarding school trips, money requested, etc. In the second folder he puts completed assignments, and the envelopes containing the signed letters, money, etc that he has to give back to teacher. For kids who do not yet read put a photo of yourselves on the show parents folder to help them differentiate. This will serve other purposes too as the child can look at it if
missing you during the school day.
3) Child should have a big bulletin board in his room for notices he needs to refer to such as birthday party invites, school trips info, etc. You can make vertical divisions with strips of colored paper on the bulletin board to demarcate sections of now, this week,next week,this month, and child adjusts the position of notices with the thumb tacks as time goes by and he sees what he has to attend to now.
4) Teach your child how to make lists and checklists for daily routines and place them in strategic spots. Also, children need to be taught how to manage a diary efficiently and how to organize their belongings. If you yourself are not an organized person it will be difficult for you to teach your children so get someone else to help you with this. Organizational skills improve self-confidence and will help your child succeed in school.
5) Teach your child early on how to wake himself up with his own alarm clock and to get ready on his own with minimum physical assistance. Give lots of reinforcement for being ready on time for
school. Good habits should be instilled early.
6) Morning time is usually very hectic so anything that can be done the day before should be. This includes preparation of sandwich, fruit, and water. Each child should have his personal colored bin in the fridge for his own items. Child can help prepare this himself when all the food is out on the table at dinnertime, just supply the baggies and give some guidance. Also to be prepared the night before are the child's schoolbag, according to the color-coded system outlined above, and the child's clothes, which he can lay out himself. All this should be done before the child is allowed to watch his last television show for the day.
7) Make sure your child gets to bed at a reasonable time for her age and has available a nutritious breakfast. If she is not hungry in the morning then give a fruit drink and healthy snacks to eat on
the way or at school.
8) Be available when your child returns home to see her mood, give emotional support and troubleshoot any difficulties early on. If you are a working mom and are not home when the child returns, then give this needed attention after returning home. Children will not open up as readily on the telephone and you cannot see the child's body language and facial cues so it is best to have your conversations with your child in person than trying to do it from the office by phone. Small problems can become bigger problems if not attended to.
Monday, July 9, 2012
Too Pooped to Pop
I feel like so much has happened, my days have been full to overflowing, stress levels have been high and I've gotten out of the sshhhhvung of writing. I've been too pooped to pop.
Things at home have been zoo-y as usual. I thought with the start of the summer vacation the pace would slow. Haha. Silly me. Y and E are in "camp" for 3 weeks - every day until 13:00. After that I'm working every other day so as to share the load of entertaining the kids as fairly as possible with DH. I did the same last summer and it worked out very well.
About 3 weeks ago DH said, "Let's sell this apartment and look for something bigger." He didn't have to tell me twice! We started looking for a 4 bedroom place (the idea being that one room with become an office for him) about 3 weeks ago - 1-5 apartments per day! Don't ask me how we've found the time for this on top of everything else we have to juggle. We found something relatively quickly that we all liked and made an offer that was accepted however the seller is turning out to be a real stinker. Luckily we haven't signed anything yet. DH has a meeting at 10 a.m. this morning with the seller and his lawyer, our lawyer and the agent to try to progress the deal but neither of us have high hopes. DH's background is property evaluation and he tried being a real estate agent here for about 4 years before he got into translations so he definitely knows properties and what to look (out) for. The seller told us he'd replumbed the entire apartment and after DH brought someone in to check, it turned out he hadn't. The seller is also continuing to advertise the place for sale through a different real estate agency than the one we found it through AND he's also advertised it for sale himself on an internet message board. I suppose until we've signed a contract he's entitled legally to continue to advertise but it's not decent IMO and he's the sort that would sell it out from under our noses if someone came along who offered him more. I told DH to do his best in the meeting but not to act desperate. If the answer is no, then it's no and we'll keep looking. We have a young couple coming tonight to take a 2nd look at our place so maybe that's a good sign? All of this has been taking up a lot of time and energy. It's fun looking at places, seeing what's out there, what the possibilities are, what people have done to their places.
During June, Y was enrolled in two extracurricular activities - gymnastics, which she'd been doing since the start of the year, and in June she added soccer. Both activities are offered by the community center which is directly opposite our building. After she said she wanted to try soccer (there are no all girl teams around here that I'm aware of) I took her for a trial lesson. She was the only girl there! I thought that would be a deterrent. She was a bit shy about it at first but I told her how special it was and that she should show those boys what she could do! After that trial lesson she said she wanted to enroll so we signed her up for the last month. And she wants to carry on with only soccer next year too. This kid is NOT lacking in self-confidence in the least. She said, "Gymnastics is boring. I need something with action!" LOL She's very fast and very athletic but very girly at the same time. It's a scream watching skinny, dainty, feminine her rushing around after that ball in her flowery jeans and earrings and bows in her hair next to all the noisy, dirty, smelly little boys. But whatever. If she's ok with it, so am I. She'll tell me when she's had enough for whatever reason.
I had about 2 months of atomic stress at work. Everything got dumped on me at once, huge projects, everything was urgent, deadlines. I flipped out at my boss about it once or twice even. I was close to just giving up. But it's slowed down dramatically. Probably because things generally go quiet once the summer vacation begins. The whole country is on vacation it seems. My sense is that under the surface things in the company are going downhill. The frustration level in all the employees over the workload seems to be very high. Yesterday another person in management announced that she was leaving which took a lot of people by surprise. And I've heard rumors that others are also unhappy and thinking of leaving. I don't want to leave but it may come to that. I don't know. By and large, I'm very happy here. I feel they appreciate me and that I have quite a lot of autonomy. I come, do my work and they leave me alone. Which is how it should be. No one is standing over me with a stop watch. If I have a sick kid or have a doctor's appointment or need to go to the bank before work, no one makes faces about it. There are only 3 men in the company. The rest are women with young kids for the most part. So it's just a given that those kinds of situations are going to come up. And somehow it works. It's very refreshing. I guess time will tell.
T told me that she wanted to work this summer. A lot of the kids in her class have jobs of one sort or another. She got herself hired waiting tables at a wedding hall in town. She went for two nights of training and then the manager didn't assign her a night to actually work so I think she's given up on that idea. Legal working age is 16 which she isn't yet so maybe that's why. In any case, she's been working a lot as a mother's helper for a new, young friend of mine who just had her 2nd baby. T is AMAZING with little kids and babies - a real natural. So this is keeping her very busy and she's making some money that way which is good. I'm happy to see her putting in some effort and DOING something with herself rather than spending the summer in front of the TV and computer and moaning about how bored she is.
E's two new words this week were "halleluyah" and "confused". LOL. In case you're wondering WHY "halleluyah", let me explain. DH was listening to a piece of classical music in which the word "halleluyah" appeared. DH asked E if he could say "halleluyeh". E made a few unsuccessful attempts. So then DH broke the word down into syllables for him and he got it perfectly. So then he went around saying "halleluyah" for the rest of the day. So funny. Also, he is a huge fan of chocolate which until recently has come out as "chok-at". Then last Saturday morning we were discussing chocolate and all of a sudden I saw the realization dawn on his face that "hey, there's an 'L' in there!". So he made a huge, conscious effort to put the "L" in there but he put it in the wrong place so now the word comes out as "CHLOK-at". LOL.
The weather here has finally turned H.O.T. and H.U.M.I.D. Big ewwwww! Hot I love. Humid? Mmmmmm. NOT so much. You want to know how hot hell is? Just come to Israel in July-August! We try not to run the a/c very much - too expensive - so we end up turning it on around 8 pm when we're all finally home to benefit from it and we turn it off around 11 pm. Just enough to allow everyone to get to sleep.
DH's uncle (Mom's brother) passed away in England just over a week ago on the same day that DH's sister had invited everyone to her house for her birthday party. The party got cancelled, of course. There were three siblings - DH's Mom and her brother and sister. DH's mom is now the last one left and she is the oldest of the 3. She will be 89 in October and she is still quite healthy and "with it" although getting hard of hearing. DH and Y stayed with his uncle when they were in England in February. Lucky they went then and saw him! DHwas always very close with this uncle so it was a bit hard for him.
My trip to the U.S. is coming up - October 9. I can't wait. Two whole weeks to myself! It's going to be an INTENSE trip I think but I hope it will be good. I hope it won't be so jam packed with running and doing and seeing that it flies by in a blur and I will hardly feel like I've been away.
Anyway, not much else new here. Just trying to stay COOL and get through the summer vacation in a way that resembles sanity. And find an apartment to buy....
Things at home have been zoo-y as usual. I thought with the start of the summer vacation the pace would slow. Haha. Silly me. Y and E are in "camp" for 3 weeks - every day until 13:00. After that I'm working every other day so as to share the load of entertaining the kids as fairly as possible with DH. I did the same last summer and it worked out very well.
About 3 weeks ago DH said, "Let's sell this apartment and look for something bigger." He didn't have to tell me twice! We started looking for a 4 bedroom place (the idea being that one room with become an office for him) about 3 weeks ago - 1-5 apartments per day! Don't ask me how we've found the time for this on top of everything else we have to juggle. We found something relatively quickly that we all liked and made an offer that was accepted however the seller is turning out to be a real stinker. Luckily we haven't signed anything yet. DH has a meeting at 10 a.m. this morning with the seller and his lawyer, our lawyer and the agent to try to progress the deal but neither of us have high hopes. DH's background is property evaluation and he tried being a real estate agent here for about 4 years before he got into translations so he definitely knows properties and what to look (out) for. The seller told us he'd replumbed the entire apartment and after DH brought someone in to check, it turned out he hadn't. The seller is also continuing to advertise the place for sale through a different real estate agency than the one we found it through AND he's also advertised it for sale himself on an internet message board. I suppose until we've signed a contract he's entitled legally to continue to advertise but it's not decent IMO and he's the sort that would sell it out from under our noses if someone came along who offered him more. I told DH to do his best in the meeting but not to act desperate. If the answer is no, then it's no and we'll keep looking. We have a young couple coming tonight to take a 2nd look at our place so maybe that's a good sign? All of this has been taking up a lot of time and energy. It's fun looking at places, seeing what's out there, what the possibilities are, what people have done to their places.
During June, Y was enrolled in two extracurricular activities - gymnastics, which she'd been doing since the start of the year, and in June she added soccer. Both activities are offered by the community center which is directly opposite our building. After she said she wanted to try soccer (there are no all girl teams around here that I'm aware of) I took her for a trial lesson. She was the only girl there! I thought that would be a deterrent. She was a bit shy about it at first but I told her how special it was and that she should show those boys what she could do! After that trial lesson she said she wanted to enroll so we signed her up for the last month. And she wants to carry on with only soccer next year too. This kid is NOT lacking in self-confidence in the least. She said, "Gymnastics is boring. I need something with action!" LOL She's very fast and very athletic but very girly at the same time. It's a scream watching skinny, dainty, feminine her rushing around after that ball in her flowery jeans and earrings and bows in her hair next to all the noisy, dirty, smelly little boys. But whatever. If she's ok with it, so am I. She'll tell me when she's had enough for whatever reason.
I had about 2 months of atomic stress at work. Everything got dumped on me at once, huge projects, everything was urgent, deadlines. I flipped out at my boss about it once or twice even. I was close to just giving up. But it's slowed down dramatically. Probably because things generally go quiet once the summer vacation begins. The whole country is on vacation it seems. My sense is that under the surface things in the company are going downhill. The frustration level in all the employees over the workload seems to be very high. Yesterday another person in management announced that she was leaving which took a lot of people by surprise. And I've heard rumors that others are also unhappy and thinking of leaving. I don't want to leave but it may come to that. I don't know. By and large, I'm very happy here. I feel they appreciate me and that I have quite a lot of autonomy. I come, do my work and they leave me alone. Which is how it should be. No one is standing over me with a stop watch. If I have a sick kid or have a doctor's appointment or need to go to the bank before work, no one makes faces about it. There are only 3 men in the company. The rest are women with young kids for the most part. So it's just a given that those kinds of situations are going to come up. And somehow it works. It's very refreshing. I guess time will tell.
T told me that she wanted to work this summer. A lot of the kids in her class have jobs of one sort or another. She got herself hired waiting tables at a wedding hall in town. She went for two nights of training and then the manager didn't assign her a night to actually work so I think she's given up on that idea. Legal working age is 16 which she isn't yet so maybe that's why. In any case, she's been working a lot as a mother's helper for a new, young friend of mine who just had her 2nd baby. T is AMAZING with little kids and babies - a real natural. So this is keeping her very busy and she's making some money that way which is good. I'm happy to see her putting in some effort and DOING something with herself rather than spending the summer in front of the TV and computer and moaning about how bored she is.
E's two new words this week were "halleluyah" and "confused". LOL. In case you're wondering WHY "halleluyah", let me explain. DH was listening to a piece of classical music in which the word "halleluyah" appeared. DH asked E if he could say "halleluyeh". E made a few unsuccessful attempts. So then DH broke the word down into syllables for him and he got it perfectly. So then he went around saying "halleluyah" for the rest of the day. So funny. Also, he is a huge fan of chocolate which until recently has come out as "chok-at". Then last Saturday morning we were discussing chocolate and all of a sudden I saw the realization dawn on his face that "hey, there's an 'L' in there!". So he made a huge, conscious effort to put the "L" in there but he put it in the wrong place so now the word comes out as "CHLOK-at". LOL.
The weather here has finally turned H.O.T. and H.U.M.I.D. Big ewwwww! Hot I love. Humid? Mmmmmm. NOT so much. You want to know how hot hell is? Just come to Israel in July-August! We try not to run the a/c very much - too expensive - so we end up turning it on around 8 pm when we're all finally home to benefit from it and we turn it off around 11 pm. Just enough to allow everyone to get to sleep.
DH's uncle (Mom's brother) passed away in England just over a week ago on the same day that DH's sister had invited everyone to her house for her birthday party. The party got cancelled, of course. There were three siblings - DH's Mom and her brother and sister. DH's mom is now the last one left and she is the oldest of the 3. She will be 89 in October and she is still quite healthy and "with it" although getting hard of hearing. DH and Y stayed with his uncle when they were in England in February. Lucky they went then and saw him! DHwas always very close with this uncle so it was a bit hard for him.
My trip to the U.S. is coming up - October 9. I can't wait. Two whole weeks to myself! It's going to be an INTENSE trip I think but I hope it will be good. I hope it won't be so jam packed with running and doing and seeing that it flies by in a blur and I will hardly feel like I've been away.
Anyway, not much else new here. Just trying to stay COOL and get through the summer vacation in a way that resembles sanity. And find an apartment to buy....
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