Why do Legos drive me crazy?

My house is covered in Legos.  I mean, literally, they are everywhere. 

On The Boy's art table.... 

On the breakfast table....

On the kitchen bar....

And my nightstand....

The bathroom....

On top of the Working Dad's piano....

Welcome to Lego City!

And Ninjago!

Uh-oh, looks like the Empire and/or the First Order and/or the Rebels and/or the Resistance and/or Nexo Knights have taken over Sodor!

Of course, part of it could be my slatternly housekeeping style.  And it does kind of get to me that there's SO MUCH!  I mean we don't have enough flat surfaces in our house for them all.  Sometimes I get to the point where I want to just put up a Lego embargo. No more room, no more sets!

Disassemble them you say?  Noooo, not an option. Once built, the Boy wants them to stay built so he can play with them.

He loves them. And he's good at building them. And then he plays with them. Imaginatively. He gives them voices, makes up stories. It's a joy to watch. 

So far, this has been my solution:

It's imperfect, and, inevitably, things fall apart, but at least it's an attempt to keep them from piling ever higher on our tables and window seats. 

So, now, I guess, it's confession time: it's not just him. No, I have to admit that it's me too. I also like to build. 

This is my Scooby Doo plane and Mystery Machine. 

Nothwithstanding the fact that I have no idea where to put the Legos once built, I bought that Mystery Machine set for myself because I wanted to build it. (My brother gave me the plane for my last birthday.)

These Lego minifigures are also mine. 

That worried Unikitty: mine. 

I bought this set and asked the Boy to build it for me because I wanted it:  It's Hera Syndulla in a tiny version of her ship, The Ghost. (Star Wars Rebels....)

Chinese knock-off Ahsoka Tano minifigure, mine too.

And lest you think that it's just me and the Boy, may I introduce you to the Working Dad's piggie man minifig, four-armed Lord Garmadon, and Lego Creator airplane. 

We are a Lego family.

And just like any family member might, sometimes you love the Legos and sometimes they make you a little nuts.

So we will keep building.  It's fun. It's often challenging (especially when tired or after a glass of wine).

It's something we can do together...as a family.

So yes, we'll build every Lego set that comes our way. And we will free-build with the loose Legos too (which must be kept separate from the built sets, of course). 

After all, I've already started stocking up for Christmas. (No, really, I have.)

"Heather has Two Mommies."

Slate.com published an article a few months ago entitled The Straight Parents’ Guide to How Not to Raise a Homophobe—and How to Be a Better Ally .  I started writing a blog post inspired by it then, but I am just getting around to finishing it now.  Hey. I'm a busy working mommy....

Anyway, the article gives some suggestions on how to talk to your kid about same-sex-parent families, and how to make the reality that they exist a -- well -- reality for your kid.  Because, whether you approve of them or not, these families are in your neighborhoods and their kids are in your kids' school.  And about the last thing any parent wants (or ought to want) is to find that their kid is bullying or teasing other kids because of who their parents are.  Even if you're a straight "gay ally," you can't just assume that your attitudes are going to rub off.  So a little attention on the part of the parents is in order.

I confess that my own ability to talk to my son about same-sex parenting has been made infinitely easier by our having a few same-sex parent friends.  It's easier to point to The Boy's own friends and say it's like Suzie's dads or it's like David's mommies.  Also, the book, And Tango Makes Three, helps.

So I frankly wasn't ever expecting any questions from The Boy on this topic. I assumed that since he sees same-sex parenting first hand that he'd just assimilate it without questions other people get from their kids.

Wrong.

Kids are curious.  And they can see that their families look different from each other. Frankly, I shouldn't have been surprised to get a question about same-sex parenting because I've already gotten questions about mixed race kids (and my kid has half-Asian cousins!), kids of different races entirely, the different religions he has encountered among his friends, and "what is God."

Kids notice differences, and they ask questions about those differences, not to be malicious but because they are little detectives, little knowledge sponges, investigating their worlds.  Kids just want to understand why things and people are different. They aren't judging.  They haven't learned to judge yet. It's we adults with our years of "experience" that judge the differences as better, worse, or not at all. 

So, one day The Boy asked me, out of the blue on the drive home from school (as there is not a warning system for "hard" questions), about Suzie's mommy.  Suzie (not her real name, obviously), has two dads.  And The Boy simply asked, "Where is Suzie's mommy?"  It's not that he thought Suzie shouldn't have her two daddies, but he thought she should have a mommy too. He has a mommy, after all.  So I very matter-of-factly explained the truth:  Suzie's mommy couldn't take care of Suzie, so she gave Suzie to Mr. Jack and Mr. Richard (also not their real names) to raise, and now she is their daughter, so she can have a wonderful life."  He said, "Her mommy couldn't take care of her?"  I said, "No, she couldn't, so Mr. Jack and Mr. Richard adopted her and they are her parents."  And he accepted that explanation without a blink, no further questions.

The key to responding to these questions is to remain calm, to stick to the facts, to make the answer age appropriate and, if possible, to answer the question in the most direct way possible. There's no need to introduce politics or sex or anything else into the conversation with your kid. Frankly, a little kid isn't going to understand the nuances of sexual relationships. They're still in the just-the-facts stage of development, and that's where you should meet them.

Also, answer the question posed to you and then stop there. Your kid doesn't want or need your baggage in trying to process his or her world.  It's very similar to explaining to your kid how he came to be in your tummy, and then came out of it.  Real life example:  "Mommy did you poop me out?"  "No, honey, I did not poop you out. Poop comes from a different place in mommies' bodies than babies, but those places are close to each other."

I'm sure there will be more questions one day, and more complicated questions as time goes by, and The Working Dad and I will field them as best we can.  As long as we are honest, I think it will be okay. Because I do think that honesty is the best policy even with -- especially with -- your kids....  Cheers.

Our Self-Subjugation

We make it hard on ourselves.

I mean, individually, we women, we working moms, we stay-at-home moms, we something-in-betweenness:  we set impossible standards for ourselves.

We put pressure on ourselves where none needs to be:  breast feeding, home schooling, family dinner, organic foods, television, co-sleeping, cry-it-out, baby wearing, attachment parenting, time outs . . . our weight, our looks.

And we judge our friends as harshly as we judge ourselves.

I guess I was reminded of this recently, by this video, a Similac formula commercial, for Pete's sake.  It shows us all in all of our self-righteous glory -- even the baby-wearing dads.

And while we are judging -- ourselves, our friends -- we are doing only one thing.  With all of our self-imposed requirements of parenthood, we are subjugating ourselves as people.  We are crushing ourselves under the weight of expectations that we have no right to demand.  Enslaved by the breast pump.  Defeated by words like organic, natural, free range and whole grain.  Conquered by a thousand "better" methods to discipline and control (indeed, subjugate?) our children.  A tyranny of a crowd of "better ways" and obligations and judgments and joyless self-sacrifice . . . all in the name of "good parenting."  We hold ourselves back and down with our lofty ambitions, instead of pushing ourselves up and forward.

We are parents.  We are love.  Our children are joy.  We should rise and praise and smile and encourage.  Just as we do with our kids, we should do with ourselves, and each other.

"Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn't learn a lot today, at least we learned a little, and if we didn't learn a little, at least we didn't get sick, and if we got sick, at least we didn't die; so let us all be thankful." --  Gautama Siddhartha, the Buddha 

I am thankful for my health, and my family, and my job . . . and I am thankful for you diverse crowd of parent peers who do things differently than me, or the same as me, or somewhere in the middle.

I am glad we are all trying.

 

Get Out of the Office and Into the Kitchen

There's a study out that the suggests that the home cooked family dinner, idealized by the likes of Michael Pollan, Ann Romney, Michelle Obama, and June Cleaver alike, might not be all it's cracked up to be if you're the mom doing the cooking.

From the abstract:

Sociologists Sarah Bowen, Sinikka Elliott, and Joslyn Brenton offer a critique of the increasingly prevalent message that reforming the food system necessarily entails a return to the kitchen. They argue that time pressures, tradeoffs to save money, and the burden of pleasing others make it difficult for mothers to enact the idealized vision of home-cooked meals advocated by foodies and public health officials.

To a certain extent, I reject the study authors' suggestion that a reform of the food system does not entail a return to the kitchen.  Mass produced, restaurant food is, by and large, not that great for you.  You're better off making it yourself.

But I take their point:  the burden, disproportionately placed on women, often outweighs the benefit.  There are many problems:  picky eaters (including the adult men in their lives!), time, physical exhaustion, food prices.

I am lucky enough to be well-off enough that, though they are concerning, high food prices are not an obstacle to me cooking a meal.  But I feel the pressure of the foodie culture too.  I want to have a delicious, nutritious, sit down, home cooked meal every night with my family.  I think it's better.  It's the one time in the day when we're all together.  We can talk about our day and share, you know, good old fashioned family time.

Although, if I'm honest, the everyone 'round the table, every day meal from my childhood that I remember the most isn't dinner.  It's breakfast and that bowl of oatmeal and glass of orange juice and Flintstone's vitamin next to my spoon.  My mom may have had dinner on the table every night, but it's the mornings I remember.

And that's Point Number One that I'd like to make:  It doesn't have to be dinner.  If breakfast works better for you, why not bowls of cereal and a little morning conversation?  But if breakfast and dinner aren't feasible, well, maybe a snack.  Or maybe your family just doesn't share a meal together.  But the family meal to me is more about the family and less about the meal.  Finding a time to be together as a family without the TV blaring for about 30 minutes a day is really important.  No family time, no family connections, no family.

And so that's my Point Number Two:  If you only have thirty minutes free in which you can either cook a meal or spend time with your family, I vote you throw a frozen lasagna in the oven, open up a bag salad, and spend those thirty minutes hanging with your family.  Yes, good nutrition is important.  But careful label reading can steer you towards healthier pre-packaged options.  If feeding your family something quick gives you more time to have a conversation with them, do that.  (And, by the way, The Working Dad pitches in and cooks too, and his fajitas rock.)

Which brings me to my Point Number Three:  Holy smokes, give yourself a break and take some short cuts.  Some people make a lot of crockpot meals.  That's never really worked for us, but if it works for you, do it.  And I hereby give you permission to buy prepackaged stuff.  Just read the labels, friends.  Mrs. Dash even has sodium free marinades, for instance, that are pretty good.  And it's okay to make Kraft Macaroni & Cheese every once in a while.  It won't kill your kids, just like it didn't kill us.  Use canned food.  Use frozen vegetables.  It's okay.  (Obviously, if you've got food allergies, lots of the prepackaged things are irrelevant to you, or even dangerous. But not all of them. If this is you, though, you're probably already a good label reader, so keep doing what you're doing.)

As much as I love Martha Stewart, I understand that Martha has a whole staff backing her up and bringing her her farm fresh eggs and "best" vanilla.  When it's just me in there, I'm okay tossing a bag of frozen, tail off gulf shrimp into my quick creole that I will serve over Uncle Ben's boil-in-bag rice.  Go ahead and order in or carry it out every once in a while.  You've worked all day.  Sometimes, there's not the energy, even if there is the time.

So to my Point Number Four:  Dads, if you aren't helping out in the kitchen, you need to start, particularly if your wife is a working mom.  That you do not know how to cook or that your wife is a better cook is not an excuse.  She works hard at her job just like you do.  She's tired when she gets home from the office too.  Give her a break:  learn a couple of tasty meals that you can reliably cook once or twice a week.  (What?  You can't grill burgers or chicken breasts and toss some frozen veggies into the microwave?  What kind of man are you, anyway?  Just kidding . . . a little.)  She will appreciate the effort you make, and the opportunity to play with the kids while you cook, for a change.  Trust me.  I relish every bite of The Working Man's excellent fajitas every time he makes them.  (And the great thing about his fajitas:  I can't replicate them.  I can make my own version, but not his.  His are far superior.)

So, I may not have all the working parents' culinary solutions. But I've got a few. If you take nothing else from my little tirade tonight, take three things:  relax, help each other out and spend time with your family. Somewhere in there, you should eat too, but don't let Michael Pollan make you feel badly about your canned green beans. You're doing okay. 

And Monday....