3rd Grade Field Trip

WoW!

What an exciting, well, let's be honest, exhausting Friday so far.

I went as a volunteer on my son's 3rd grade field trip to the zoo. I don't know how many of you guys have been to the Honolulu Zoo, but it is H-O-T!! It's close to the ocean so it is also more humid, and when we got there it was raining, which made it worse. I could smell the steam off the elephant's poo... UGH!!

Anyhootie, that's neither here nor there.. I was exhausted and acting like a "Mrs. Cranky Pants" going into it this morning, but decided to try to have a good attitude. We have annual passes for the zoo out here, so we go a lot, it is not like it was all new to me. Then the teacher says, after she had already told me she needed no more chaperones but I volunteered to go anyway, that I owe her $2 for admission to the zoo.. Ummmm.. No, I don't, I have the pass, and I got myself in on my own. But thanks anyway..

After not needing to be there, and not being asked to help, we (Sandy and I) were voluntold to anyway. How exhausting!! There are 27 3rd graders in this class alone. One teacher and two chaperones and two voluntold helpers later, everyone is ready to pull their hair out. Half of the things on the schedule were closed when it was our scheduled time to participate in them.

So we are going through the zoo and trying to find out all about the animals that we have seen thousands of times before. The purpose of this trip is to be able to do a report on an animal and its habitat. This, as I find out later this morning, is due on Monday. Oh geez.. Ok.. Thanks, again. LOL..

Then at lunch we were all separated, and I was stuck with the group of 6 boys (who were ALL boy if you get my drift). With the exception of mine, the others were chasing and kicking at the birds to keep them away from the tables. So I say, "if you wouldn't eat like pigs and drop food all over the place, the birds wouldn't be bothering you." They, of course, think it is just funny, so they decide, let's just keep going and ignore the old lady telling us to stop kicking the birds. So I finally ask them how they would like it if someone were kicking at them and they had to go around with a foot up their behind. (I concede that maybe this was not the most appropriate thing to say to these supposedly gifted 3rd graders.) Well, that did the trick. They finally stopped chasing and kicking the birds, they ate their lunch and then we finished our trip around the zoo.... Eventually.. It was a long morning..

So my son is set on doing his report on the giraffes. They are one of his favorite animals from when we came to the Honolulu Zoo when he was just a baby. Well he decides that maybe he can get more out of it if he chooses to do a different animal than the ones he knows more about. What can I say, he's a bit of a genius at times..

So he decides after we get home, that he is wanting to learn about Meerkats. OK!! Gnarly. This will be great. They are so cute!! So he asks me to do a little more research about the meerkat family and their habitat so that he can "supplement what (he) learned at the zoo." Again, genius, right? So I say, OF COURSE!!! So I'm teaching him how to do research online. He finds his information but doesn't know how to word it correctly. So I make a chart (yes, I do believe that is one of my OCD tendencies).

He then has to also draw a picture of the meerkats in their habitats. His ideas became my sketching. I tell him he can use my drawing as a go by, but he needs to draw it on his own for his report. "Yes Ma'am," he says. Ok, going good now. He's in there doing his report, and drawing his picture. No worries, right? WRONG!! He comes in almost in tears!! "MOMMY!!! MY MEERKAT DOESN'T LOOK AS GOOD AS YOURS".... Oy vey!! So I cheat and draw his meerkats for him.. Yes, I used the plural because one meerkat was not good enough. We had to have one digging the burrow, one with his head poking out of the hole in the ground, one climbing up a tree, and one sun bathing... hahahahahahaha.. My son is thorough, if nothing else...

We'll see how his teacher responds... TO MY RESEARCH PROJECT.. LOL..

Stay tuned..

Creative Discipline

I believe that there is are certain times and situations that require a meaningful and purposeful butterin' on the biscuits. However, with that being said, we don't necessarily agree that this form of discipline should be the only form of discipline. Each child is different in personality and learning abilities, so the same form of discipline will not work with every child.

It used to be that I could just look at my son and tell him that his behavior or his choice disappointed me or hurt my heart, and he would break down into tears and do a 180° turn. Easy peasy, right?? With my daughter it has been completely different. I would tell her I was going to take away something until she learned how to change her behavior, and she would cross her arms across her chest and say, "Go ahead". Argh!! So infuriating. With her, time outs didn't even work great because she learned to just go to sleep sitting or standing. LOL.. She's still a work in progress.. Luckily for me, and thanks be to God, I don't need to do a whole lot of disciplining for either one of my children.

With that being said, when we do need to discipline, and by discipline I mean the word in its true form which is to instruct a person to follow a particular code of conduct, we need to be creative to ensure that the discipline lesson fits appropriately with the choices that we are trying to veer them away from or towards.

So I am trying to teach my son to NOT bring EVERYTHING in his school desk home with him EVERYDAY. I told him, "Unpack your backpack when you get into class, and pack it nicely in your desk. When you write your homework assignments down, pack only the items you need to pack into your backpack." "Yes ma'am," he says. And he does... for one day.

So after two weeks of repeating myself over and over and over and over again, I decide it is time for more than just talking. I explain to him that it is bad for his back to carry so much heavy stuff everyday, and also that he could break his backpack, and if he breaks his backpack because he is not following my instructions, then he is going to have to carry his books and homework back and forth every day. I then proceed to have him hold his hands out, and I begin piling his things on him to hold.

Once he has the full brunt of his school belongings in his hands (or on his arms as it were), I tell him to walk around the perimeter of the downstairs of our home 10 times while holding his things, and if he were to drop them, he would need to re-stack them on his own and begin again. After a bit of crying and a couple of re-starts, I think I got through to him on how heavy everything is, and how he should not bring that much stuff home on a daily basis...

We'll see how long it lasts this time..

Stay tuned... :•)

Strange Dream

So I had this dream last night. It was a bit strange and quite tangential. I was really craving a fried egg sandwich when I went to bed, but it was so late I only had a piece of my chocolate cake (which by the way, is not much better of a choice).

I toss and turn most of the night. The last time I looked at my clock it was about 1 am. So I finally fall asleep, and I start to have this dream. I recognize the music and the moves that everyone around me was doing, then quickly realized I was in Zumba class!! I was so excited. I love Zumba. So I'm dancing and shaking my groove thing, turning around in circles when I see none other than the Jonas Brothers in Zumba with me!! HAHAHA!!

So Joe and I are gettin' our Zumba on when suddenly I am pulled from class to be promoted to Chief. Chief of what?? I'm not sure at the time, but suddenly realize it was Chief of Zumba.. LOL.. So Joe is loving this, right? Well, little did I know that Chief of Zumba was going to have to leave for the modern day civil war that was going on outside class.

I ended up being recruited to be a spy for the South. So I enlist as a Chief and don my paint gun given in issue. I take to the streets trying to find out anything I can about the Northern Yankees. I'm rummaging and hiding and running and shooting and I felt as if I were going to pass out. Then I was found out!! Who found me out, you may ask? None other than Mr. Alec Baldwin, himself. LOL.. So he's reading me the riot act, and I jump into his arms to ask forgiveness and leniency. Then I wake up.

Moral of the story?? Think eggs, think nightmares.

Cake Decorating

Ok. So my friend Sandy talked me into taking this beginner's cake decorating class on Wednesday nights. I have always wanted to do it. I used to work in a bakery as a high school student and was always pretty good at the cakes. I think I lost everything in the past "x" number of years since then.

Not only could I not get my frosting to the correct consistency, I couldn't even get my hand to stop shaking. I was not nervous. I don't know why it was shaking so bad, possibly the lack of caffeine.

So back to the frosting consistency for a quick sec. The "teacher" comes around and comments on how beautifully made our (Sandy's and mine) frosting was. Then she says it is too thick to squeeze through the tip and that our wrists are going to hurt, so we needed to thin out the frosting. Ok. So I know I am supposed to stir in a touch of water to thin it a bit, but exactly how thin are we supposed to make it? So I thin it a bit and ask her if it is the correct consistency. No, she says, thin it a little more, just a little. So I do. I call her over again. No, she says, more. Ok. So I thin it some more, and then begin coloring it. My "red" is not so much red as it is pink, but whatever.

So I am trying to fill my disposable decorator's bag that is holding my "16 tip", what a messy disaster. I get the bag filled after about 5 minutes and begin practicing my "stars" on the practice board that came in my kit. I thought the frosting was a little soft, but she's the one that kept telling me to thin it more, so here we go.. I finish the practice board and call the teacher over. She takes one look and says, "NO".. aaaarrrrggghhhhh!!

She says, "squeeze, 1..2.3.. then up". I said, "I did, but the frosting is to soft". "No," she says, "I told you right consistency." So she grabs my bag and starts squeezing. "Oh yeah, huh? Too soft." DUH!!!

So then I have to add more stiff frosting to every bowl of "too soft" frosting and start again. Meanwhile, Sandy is just blowing through everything fabulously (as she usually does.. I guess when you got it, you got it, right?). I'm getting more upset by every minute that passes. I started the class to have fun, and quite frankly, at that point in time, it was absolutely no fun at all. I was livid.

So I continue to try and get my frosting right, with not much if any help from the teacher. I put it back in the bag and try again. It looks fine enough to me, after the 7th attempt to do a straight line of stars. So I say, ok, I'm ready to make my clown. I grab my crummy (pun intended), not so beautifully frosted, chocolate cake and begin filling another bag with frosting.

I soon discover that I don't know how to make a clown. HA!! I saw her show Sandy once, and Sandy's turned out great, so I thought to myself, "Surely you got this one, Ash." So I begin squeezing the frosting through this giant "2D" tip. I was thinking I should have used a different tip, but that is the one the teacher told us to use, so like any good pupil, I do what she says. What do I know, right?

I get my not so joyful looking clown onto my cake and am then informed that I get to unleash my creativity and decorate the rest of the cake. It is already 5 minutes past time for class to be over, so I grab my "16" and pinkish frosting and start going to town. I have to tell you, the best part of the end product, besides the taste, was the writing I threw in last minute to tell my kids "I Love You".. LOL..

A Day in the Life

These days, I can't seem to keep up with my own life. I am constantly feeling behind and exhausted. So today, after I dropped off "Thing 1" to golf and "Thing 2" to dance, I was able to sit down with a dear friend over some chips and salsa.

I crack up every time I am around my friend. She has got a great sense of humor, and often times, we think just alike. We were sitting and talking about how crazy our lives are, and how we continue to add more things to them. I generally feel like the guy spinning all the plates, and I am so afraid that I am going to drop one. The bad thing is, if I drop one, I think they all would topple. I feel like everything is in a routine, and when I get out of it or am stressed about it, I just drop everything to the floor in crushing pieces. Then I have to start all over stacking plates on the top and plates on the bottom.

This got me to thinking.. HMMMMM..... I need organization. I am organized in just about every facet of my life, or so I thought. I need to reorganize my plates. So currently I am gently pulling them down and laying them to the side one by one in order not to crack any. Then I can begin to restructure my structure.

That's the thought for the moment.. Now I have to go cook my gourmet dinner of Ramen noodles for Things 1 & 2, and then it's off to cake decorating class. Maybe I'll start restructuring tomorrow... :)

Stay tuned..