Maya
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This Too Shall Pass
When Maya was an infant, the baby books said that if you want your child to go to sleep easily every night, put them in their crib full, clean, dry, burped, and slightly awake. Be careful what bedtime routines you start, because the child will associate them with bedtime, and while you may enjoy rocking your child to sleep at bedtime every night, you may not wish to do it every time the baby wakes up during the night, often every 2 or 3 hours. What they don’t tell you is that they will soon grow out of the phase of wanting to be rocked to sleep, and you will…
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Clarification, s’il vous plait
On Monday, we received a progress report for Maya’s Core Class, and there was a comment in the appropriate field that said, “Missing Work”. Her grade thus far in the class is an A-, so I wasn’t too worried. (I don’t worry too much about grades anyway, but at this school, Core is English and Social Studies, which are Maya’s two favorite classes, so if she’s not doing the work, that would surprise me. Actually, she always does her work, so it would surprise me even if it were a class that weren’t her favorite.) So I thought about it a bit, and sent the teacher an email: Dear Ms.…
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Wordless Wednesday
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New School…
Melissa wrote a few days ago about her kids’ first day of school…and about how glad she is that they have great teachers, and that she’s looking forward to volunteering again this year in the classroom. Her post made me nostalgic for Maya’s old school, Eagle Peak Montessori. Maya started Montessori school when she was 2, at Springfield Montessori, where she went through Kindergarten. We are big fans of the Montessori method of teaching, and were thrilled to find out that she could continue her Montessori education, because one of our local school districts was opening a public charter school. Public = Free. (as free as any public school is…
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Wordless Wednesday – Middle School Edition
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Random Act of Kindness
Maya was thrilled last year when we relented, and decided that it might be OK, after all, if we were to let her pierce her ears before age 16. It was a difficult decision for me, because I wasn’t allowed to get my ears pierced until I was 16. In the Anglo-Saxon Protestant culture in which I was raised, girls with pierced ears were ready to date. And yet…times change. When I was growing up, most of my friends, at least half, did not have pierced ears until they were 13 or 14. Now, all, ALL of Maya’s girlfriends have pierced ears. Partially due to times changing, I suppose, but…
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Crapicola
That’s what I’m thinking. Crapicola. Sounds like a weird deli meat, but it’s one of our ways of swearing around here. Why would I be swearing, you might well ask? Because at Maya’s orthodontist appointment the other day, we discovered that she’s going to need a second round of braces. Can we all say it together this time? “CRAPICOLA!!” 1st, $4,000 is a lot of money. I mean, we paid it the first time, and now to have to pay it AGAIN blows. 2nd, I had braces, and it hurt like hell (personally, I think it’s worse than childbirth, because with childbirth, you don’t have to go back every few…
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Birth Order & IQ
A study came out a few weeks ago, claiming that firstborn children are smarter than their younger siblings, by an average of 2 to 3 IQ points. One factor, the study’s authors concluded, was that firstborn children (and only children) tend to receive more of their parents’ attention. When siblings come into the equation, the amount of time and attention that is available is divided, and therefore, the less attention each individual child receives. So an eldest child that is an only for awhile has more of an advantage than an eldest child whose younger sibling follows closely. And an only child has the benefit of never having to share…
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Wordless Wednesday II
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Sad tales of ears…
(See the tasteful little earrings on her ears? Not the ones in question today…) Anybody remember how Maya got her ears pierced back in August? How I struggled with the decision, because I wasn’t allowed to pierce my ears until I was 16, and here she was, 10, and I had to decide whether this was one of those things where things had changed since I was that age, or not? How we decided to pierce the ears, but only little studs, no hoops or danglies to make her look older than she is? OK, so now you’re up to date. Well, since then, her ears got infected once, so…
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A Birthday Meme for my Birthday Girl!
Last year, I wrote a post about Maya for her 10th birthday. Ted no longer has the mac account, so you can’t go view the slideshow…but the rest of it remains as true today as it was then. (And it turns out, he’s made a new slideshow…be patient, it takes a minute to load) I can’t believe it’s a year already since I wrote that post, and 11 years since she was born. That was an amazing time for us, and we feel blessed to this day. Maya is the child every parent wishes for when they’re wishing for kids, except she’s even better than that. She’s smart and funny…
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Thirteen Reasons my Daughter is Cute…
 I keep a little journal for Maya, and in it, I’ve been writing off and on since she was little…memories of times we have together, updates, cute things, etc. I looked at it the other night and I realized it’s been a LONG time since I wrote in it. Like maybe a couple of years, except without the maybe.  I was looking back, and I found some very cute things that Maya said or did when she was very small…she still says and does very cute things, but since she’s older now, she might not appreciate me sharing them now. 🙂 So, 13 cute things Maya said or did when she…
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Wordless Wednesday
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Wordless Wednesday
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Of Curry and Singing…
Growing up, we at one point lived in a house in ‘downtown Fairbanks’, Alaska. I put that in quotes, because it was such a small town, I don’t know if it would be legal to call it a downtown. Anyway, we had several roommates during our time in that house, one of whom was a chef named Jerry. One of Jerry’s specialties was a chicken curry, which became a Christmas dinner tradition in our household for many years. My mom loved making the curry, and our good friend Linda and she would put it together every year. I think it was more of a Jamacian curry than an Indian one,…