Parenting

You Would Think I Could Have Prevented This

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / 3 Comments

Noah has a cavity and it is all totally my fault.  UGH.

I who have spent more time in a dentist office before the age of 10 than most people do in their whole life–I have spent so much time in the dentists office that I could earned my DDS or DMD and still have extra hours put in.  I was born without enamel on my teeth and that brought with it a whole host of problems.

It is on the tooth that he chipped at age 1 and is in the back up on the gum line–a pretty common place I’m told.  Noah has to get a filling–he won’t need a shot.  I feel like a complete failure.  If anyone knows the importance of dental hygiene it’s me.  I have been too lax with the teeth brushing, etc and now my kid is paying for it.  Just when I was feeling good about parenting.  Now, not so much.

Musing Of A Three-Year-Old

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / 3 Comments

This weekend marked a moment in Noah’s life.  He had two birthday parties to attend for his friends.  These parties were not the first he has been to but they are the first where he really understood what was happening.  On Saturday, we went to the Magic House to celebrate the the birthday of one of his future classmates.  We have already been invited to another party for another one of his future classmates and school hasn’t even started yet.  Crazy.  The other party was for his “best” friend who lives next door.  They hang out all of the time and really really like playing together.

So, he got to pick out what to buy for his friends–

Me: Noah where should we go shopping for birthday presents?

Noah: Target.

M: Okay, sounds good.

N:  I have an idea Mom.

M: What?

N:  I could by my birthday present and you could keep it for me until my birthday.

M: Noah–you know your birthday is really far away.  Like in March–which is 8 months away.

N:  But I really want an Ironman and Batman for my birthday and you could keep it.

M:  Well, that is a good idea.  But we are going to buy presents for Dayton and for Elizabeth.  Not for Noah.

N:  But you could keep it until my birthday.

Yeah, I so know how that would work.

At Target.

M:  Okay, Noah so what do you want to get for E and D?

N: Spiderman.  I think they would like Spiderman.

M:  Maybe.  But let’s try something else.

N:  Batman?

M:  Well, another good idea.  But E and D are both girls what do you think we should get them?

After thinking–which includes putting his index finger on his cheek and say “mmmm”

N:  I know.  Princess stuff.

M:  Excellent idea.

He finally decides on a tinkerbell something for E and for a Snow White Tea set for Dayton–because “maybe Dayton and I cam play tea party together.”

After successfully shopping for the birthday party presents.  Noah manages to navigate me down the Car aisle.  He looks at some of the Cars action figures (if you can call them figures) from the movie.

N:  Mom, I don’t have these.

M:  Noah, we aren’t shopping for you.  You don’t have any  money.

N:  But Mom, I have been sleeping in my bed all night and the sleep fairy hasn’t been leaving me money.  If the fairy left me money, I’d have some to buy this.

M:  Yes you would.

N:  How come the fairy stopped leaving me money?

M:  So, this is what you want to get?

I hate it when the 3-year-old wins.

I Am Shrinking And Other Randomness

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / 2 Comments

I am officially down 22. 2lbs in just over 4 months.  Working out with my trainer 2 days a week and working hard at eating healthy and watching my calorie intake has also helped.  I hate to post about it, as I have done in the past.  Because I continually have failed in the past at keeping weight off and on reaching my long term goal.  But I am happy and proud and feel like I really am on the right track and will be at my goal weight before my 39th birthday–August 31, 2010.  I have 89.2lbs to go.  I know it is a long road and I am up for the challenge.  It has taken me a while to find a plan/way of eating that works with my super busy schedule.  I work during the day and then I have class at night–this coming semester I will have class on M/T/W nights from 5:30-8:10 and I will have to figure out how to have dinner and have it be a healthy dinner w/out having to eat out on the way–Panera and Whole Food’s hot bar are my eating on the go places of choice.

I am committed to sticking with it.  I know it is what I need to do to not only fell happier w/ myself but also what I need to do to be a healthy example for my children.  As more and more kids in this country are overweight and obese, I want to make sure that I am leading by example for my children.  I am happy that my kids will go to a school where healthy food is the norm and parents are expected to pack healthy lunches for their kids–there isn’t a cafeteria.  Parents are expected to bring in healthy snacks when it is their week for snacks.

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Babies, babies, babies are everywhere.  My cousin just had a baby and she is a doll.  I got to see her and hold her when she was all of about 12 hours old.  It really got my baby desires going.  Oh…the miracle of birth amazes me and I have moments when I am so overwrought with sadness that I have not had the opportunity/ability to gestate and grow a baby in my womb.  The ache doesn’t last long–or maybe it just dulls and I am able to ignore it–but I have moments when I want nothing more than to pregnant and push a baby out of my girlie parts.  But then, my son wakes me up at 3 am just so I can take him back to bed and I wake up a few hours later so tired that it’s to hard to even make oatmeal and I think.  Why did I wait so long to have kids?

I don’t regret the time hubby and I spent enjoying life and our marriage, but now that I am old–in terms of fertility, I wish we had started earlier–much earlier.  Because then I could have more of these…

IMG_0314

But now I am just too tired…

Damnit, I Thought I Had More Time

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / 10 Comments

before I had to deal with one of the toughest questions I imagine will come my way.  We were on our way to the park yesterday and we talked about playing with the other kids and this is what my 3-year-old (not every 3 1/2 yet) asked–“Mom, will the other kids think I am different because my skin is brown?”  This comes on the heels of this comment the night before–“Mom, I want to be white like you.”

Both of these comments from my son who is only 40-months-old, literally broke my heart.  I just kept thinking, he is too young to deal with these issues yet.  I am not ready for him to be dealing with these issues.  There is nothing like feeling you are prepared and then finding out that you brought a knife to a gun fight.

We talked about being different and being the same and that there are lots of ways that we are different and lots of ways that we are the same.  We talked about how he was born in Ethiopia and that the amazing people in Ethiopia all have shades of brown skin and how his sister is also brown but a lighter brown and how his skin color is a way to always feel connected to Ethiopia and the woman that gave birth to  him and land that gave birth to all of us.

I asked him why he asked if he was different or if kids would think he was different?  Well, his best friend who will be 3 next month is a very very white little girl and they run around together all the time-mostly in as few clothes as possible and it is easy for him to see the difference in pictures of them.  I asked him how it made him feel to be different and when he sad said I asked him why.  He wants to be just like his friends.  So, I asked him if he was sad that Dayton didn’t have a penis?  I know a weird question, but when you are dealing with such complex issues with a kid who can only really see the surface–I needed something.  He laughed and said “No, she’s a girl.  Girls don’t have penises.”  We talked a little more about it and pointed out as many differences as we could about all of us and about how it is important to have people be different.

I think it went well, but it makes me realize how viciously I want to protect him from everything and how I can’t and most importantly how I don’t and can’t understand how he feels being a brown kid in a mostly white world.

So, Internets–give me your words of wisdom and experience.  Let’s help each other out.

Reclaiming Our Bed–Thank You Sleep Fairy

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / 2 Comments

We have reclaimed our bed.  Well, we are in the process of reclaiming it and we are pretty close to claming success.  But I have learned to not claim success too soon.  That can really backfire on you.  The whole bed sharing thing started off innocent enough out of our utter laziness.  Noah would wake up and come down to our bed in the middle of the night and being two people who love sleep and have gotten use to sleeping through the night would let him climb up and sleep with us.  Well, this laziness quickly snowballed into him just going to sleep in our bed and that has been going on for a few weeks or more.  We also were making the mistake of allowing him to stay up to late.  He had always been a good kid and would tell us when he wanted to go to bed.  But now that he is older (if you can call 3 older) he wants to push the limits of bedtime and we let him.  It was easier.  I know bad parenting–but I am gone 2-3 nights a week between school and working and daddy is a bit of a softy.  So, we had a family bed and we didn’t really want one.

So, I had decided that after our vacation we would begin putting Noah to sleep in his own bed.  Then I got an issue of Parenting the Early Years and in there was an article titled “Reclaim Your Bed.”  I couldn’t believe my luck.  The article couldn’t come at a better time.  I read some of it with Noah and told him over and over that when we got back from vaction he was going to start sleeping in his own bed because he was a big boy and it was time.  He didn’t like that but agreed to think about it.  He’s a bit of a character our little Noah.

So, we came home from vacation and he got to have a few more nights with mom and dad–we arrived home from our trip late and he had been such a good traveler–and I was going to be gone the next two nights and hubby wanted us to both be home when we started the training.  We prepped him again and again that this would be the last night.  I easily handled the “Why Mommy?  I really love sleeping with you and daddy.”  I explained to him again that he was a big boy and it was time for him to start sleeping in his bed, etc.  I know there are plenty of people out there who think that sleeping in a family bed is great and I applaud you.  But I wanted my bed back and I wanted Noah to begin adjusting to sleeping in his own bed.

The first night was okay–we figured out that the bedtime window for Noah is 8:15-8:45.  Any later than that and he gets a second wind.  So, I took him up to bed and we laid in bed and read a few stories and I laid with him until he fell asleep–I told him I would stay until  he fell asleep and then I would be going back down to my own room.  I didn’t want him to wake up and wonder where I was.  He woke up at 2:30 and came down to our bed asking/pleading/begging to sleep with us.  I said no and marched him right back up to his room.  He cried for 40 minutes or so, but fell back asleep until about 6:30. He was surprised and happy to find money under his pillow from the Sleep Fairy.

Night two and three–he prolonged bed time  w/dad and then I got home and read him a story and he fell asleep pretty well.  He was up at both 12:30 and 3–but we marched him back to his room and he went to sleep eventually–w/quite a bit of screaming and crying.

Night 4–went to bed okay (we are still laying down with him until he falls asleep)–he was up at 11:30.  I took him up to his bed.  He was crying/screaming and it was not good.  I was up with him for close to an hour trying to calm him down and get him back to sleep.  It finally worked and fell asleep and was up again at 4.  He cried quite a bit but fell back asleep.

Night 5–didn’t go to bed as good.  He would fall asleep and hubby would leave the room and he would cry–that went on for about 30 minutes.  But he finally fell asleep and stayed asleep and drumroll please…slept in his bed all night.  WHO HOO

He didn’t get money from the sleep fairy on the nights he was up twice.  We told him she probably came but he wasn’t in his bed so she couldn’t leave the money.  He was sad about that, but he was really proud today that he slept in his bed all night and that the sleep fairy saw him sleeping in his bed. He has his money in a pink purse–he loves the purse.  Bill has offered him a wallet on several occassions but he loves the purse.  He is saving up for a batman car/motorcyle–he can’t decide.