Food genius

Yesterday Nat invented the ketchup sandwich and required my mother to eat part of it. Today they are snacking on homemade bread with peanut butter, covered with uncooked oatmeal, and watermelon, likewise covered with uncooked oatmeal. Both boys have told me their snacks are delicious.

My seasonal insanity

I just found tons and tons of this stuff growing along a small street on the way to the park. It's mallow, which is the same family as hollyhocks, rose of sharon, and marshmallow plant. They're all edible. It apparently tastes like spinach. Judith, it's all along that street with the houses on only one side, east of Woodbine. I identified it- it's not ground ivy, which is similar but smells like mint. Thomas and Elizabeth helped me ick some. It's very popular in Turkey and in Egypt, and is an ingredient in a traditional Greek soup. I'll try shredding it into some pasta sauce or something and let you know how it goes. If it's good, I'll see if I can dig some up and transplant it. Goodness knows we have enough weeds in our yard- useful weeds would be great.

Do I take them to the park?

Elizabeth unleashed

Nat and the wonderful lollipop

Had a crummy night with Nat refusing to go to bed until after nine and the girls waking up many times and then bringing them down at six to nurse them... and they promptly fell asleep on the couch. I like them, I really do. So given sleep deprivation and grumpiness (mine) should I drag them out to a park I've just remembered which is slightly farther from our house than the usual one, but has a fence around it? Probably yes, and hope to wear them out.

ETA:  I did take them, for three hours, to an enclosed park with a whole lot of toys and a splash pad, and a fence, which was lovely. And now I'm completely and utterly exhausted but (I hope) so are the kids. Except Elizabeth, who thinks naps are for wimps. And because I'm insane I am seriously wondering if the plants we saw on the way were ground icy or mallow, and am thinking about going back to check. Because, if mallow- free food.

Child at one with nature

Why I never get anything done

The picture is actually of Cynthia, but it's a pretty typical position for me, except in this picture she doesn't also have Thomas on her. It's quite hard to do useful things with the twins attached. They are cute, though.

Raining again, drat

It's pouring rain out, Thomas didn't fall asleep until nearly eleven, and the girls were up about six or seven times last night and got up at six-thirty. I am drinking strong tea and thinking about the fun of hauling everyone down to Mass on the bus. I do not feel enthusiastic and full of energy. I may make it to Mass, but I will probably leave the boys behind, since if I don't I will probably murder them in church (a less dignified act than Murder in the Cathedral).

Sorry. Was reading Eliot last night. And am very tired.

About the reading

I think I'm reading about five books concurrently, most of them about children, education, brain development, and the pitfalls of peer socialization. Jocelyn just lent me Last Child In The Woods, and I've skimmed the first chapter. I'm also reading about Catholic unschooling, the effect of the new neuroscience on education, systems theory, how to teach the three Rs, attachment theory and parenting.

The book on education, systems theory, and neuroscience (which I'm only a hundred pages into) proposes that our public school system is based on a mechanistic theory of the universe, Newtonian and Cartesian, and also presupposes that education is something done to children and not a collaborative effort between teacher and student. It says that at the core of the education system lie the beliefs that information is produced by experts and  more or less programmed into children, and proof of success is the amount the children can regurgitate.The book says that most educational reform fails because instead of trying to change those core beliefs it adopts a 'If it doesn't work, do it harder!' approach. There's a lot about how systems work, and how self-organization in complex systems happen, and I haven't really digested it yet.

I haven't got to the part where they show a clear model for how a new system with new core beliefs would look, but it's churning in my head with the John Holt assertion that children want to learn, and that child-led learning is the best. I'm thinking about freedom, virtue, and prescriptive versus holistic technologies. If education is the formation of character and giving children the ability to learn, awakening wonder, and developing the discipline to manage tasks, develop goals, and follow through, then... then what? How ought this best to be accomplished? Watching Nat and Thomas learning, strewing interesting materials, reading aloud, and spending a lot of hours in the yard seems to be working. Nat is reading and writing phonetically and his math has advanced until he is deliberately writing out equations wrong as 'math jokes'. We've talked a lot about natural sciences, and I am not even a bit concerned about academics. I'm just wondering what path our family will take in the next year. I know Nat and Thomas will both still be at home. It'll always be interesting.

Seven Quick Takes: Random Assorted

1. We just had a disastrous visit to the park. Nat was pestering two little girls his age who really didn't want to play with him. He thought they were running and hiding as part of a game, but we found out that it wasn't when their grandmother came over to ask me to get Nat to stop. Also we were in the sand box and Thomas sprinkled sand on another little boy's head, and his grandmother said loudly, "Whose kid is this? He just got sand all over my grandson!" so I picked up Thomas and told him to sit by me in Time Out, and to apologize. He didn't, so I held him for a bit and then sent him over to play with Nat, who was bothering a little boy, and whose nanny told me to make Nat give the boy's toy back.

Yay. So I did, and then told both the boys we were going home, and Nat ran away from me, giggling, and so did Thomas, and I rounded them up by main force while carrying the twins and then lectured them all the way home. And then (this is the fun part), tested Nathaniel's blood sugar and found out that he was low. So he was basically drunk and unable to control himself, and I spent twenty minutes intermittently upbraiding him.

I am thinking about getting a shirt that says, "I'm Not Negligent- I've Just Got Four Kids Under Six" for when I get death glares from other parents because I was on the other end of the playground when one of my kids misbehaved. I feel annoyed and ashamed that my kids ever do anything like putting sand in another kid's hair (The Horror! The Horror!) and annoyed at other parents for bringing my small miscreants to me and telling me to properly discipline them. Sigh.

2. We just got a load of outdoor play stuff at the dollar store. We have little water guns, bubble stuff and wands, and shaving cream, because I've been reading about using shaving cream as an outside play thing. And we still have the cloud dough. So we might use some of it this afternoon if I've recovered enough.

3. My fridge is full of leftovers, so I may not have to cook for several day. This makes me happy. I have a bunch of dishes planned but at this minute I just feel tired. We'll eat leftover butter chicken and samosas and scalloped potatoes until they're all gone, and then we'll have ground beef pasta and chicken caesar salad and whatever else it was I planned.

4. Lunch was Triscuits and hotdogs cut up and served with ketchup, for the nutritional win. The boys really liked it.

5. I had lemon meringue pie for breakfast, and dal and naan for second breakfast (I'm trying to eat more frequently, since the low blood sugar thing last week). Both leftovers, both really good.

6. I want potato pizza and ice cream sodas for dinner. I could make those, if I make crust. And if I bought club soda.

7. I'm reading a lot right now. I've just started a book on attachment theory and parenting, and I'm partway through Education on the Edge of Possibility, which Jocelyn lent me, and I'm re-reading The Little Way of Homeschooling, which is about Catholic unschooling and I think I'll lend to Judith, if she wants to read it. Oh, and I just read a Brandon Sanderson novella called The Emperor's Soul. I had all this time because my aunt was doing all the chores and childcare. Speaking of which, since she's left presumably I'm in charge of all of that now, and I should probably go do some of it!

Well, it's ten

I's now ten in the morning, and I haven't had any other adults around, and we're all surviving. So far today we've:

Read a storybook
Done Nat's glucose test and figured our his injection
Eaten breakfast and are right now doing snack
Watched Bill Nye about animal locomotion
Drunk two cups of tea (me)

Last week's sprinkler party

Had Nat just now bring me a sheet of paper with PEZ written on it, as a request.
Nursed about fifteen times
Done some potty training with Thomas (he's in underwear today for as long as I can stand it)
Thought about organizing my fridge
Swept the floor three times (all for naught- it's currently covered in goldfish crackers again)
Wondered if I'll ever have time to sew again
Read a little of a book on Catholic unschooling
Gotten everyone dressed
Put the laundry on
Cleaned the floor where Thomas peed on it
Wiped the floor where Miriam poured water on it
Cuddled Thomas when his heart broke because he couldn't eat Cheerios with scissors


It's only ten. I haven't snapped at any kids or thought about the cloistered religious life yet, which is good, since it's a rainy day and we're not going anywhere. It would be nice to all still like each other by lunchtime. I need to sweep again. I've had two toddlers come over to nurse since I started writing this, and I should figure out lunch, since it's less than two hours away. We'll probably do lots of writing and reading and cutting up paper into tiny shreds today, and go upstairs and make tents, and I'll probably be cranky by mid-afternoon, but my aunt and uncle and cousin and my parents are coming for dinner, and we're having Indian takeout and several bottles of wine, and it should be great.

I hear babies on the stairs. Running away now.

"Bottled by Hartburn Insecticide Company"

"Early one Friday afternoon, Arthur and Humphrey, the leaders of the church mice, were strolling in the churchyard grumbling about how small the portions of pudding had been at lunch. Humphrey was saying that prominent members of society should have double helpings and Arthur was agreeing and saying that somebody should do something about it when suddenly..."

I was just reading my very elderly copy of this book to Nat and Thomas, with optional Babies Crawling All Over us. I love the Church mice books, especially the illustrations, which are hilarious (it pays to read all the labels and signs- Plum jam- contains no fruit-).I've had church mice books and loved them since I was probably five or six, and Nat started requesting them at about age two, although he'd only sit for a page. Now, barring incidents like Babies All  Over Us he'll listen to the whole story and sometimes read some words out of it.

WHY?

WHY IS ELIZABETH RUNNING HER HANDS UP AND DOWN MY LEG AND LICKING ME WHILE SHE PINCHES ME? Why are babies so weird? Why will Nat not leave Thomas alone, and relishes his screaming as sweet music? Why don't they have any empathy?

Why has my completely marvelous aunt left and left me alone to take care of my own house and children again?