Sigh. So, it's March Break. I was debating with myself earlier today about whether I'd keep doing school with Honour this week. I'd say the girls, but really, Verity is not so much doing anything pressing. I really should keep up with Honour, as we're behind one week I think in the total curriculum and many pages behind in reading. She finished her first Math-U-See book last week and I thought I had ordered the new one in plenty of time, but it hasn't arrived yet.
The other consideration is that we're doing VBS. By "doing" I mean the kids are attending and I am running one of the four stations. The music, of course. I think this is about the 14th or 15th March Break VBS I've done in my life. There's always a bit of a love/hate relationship with VBS. I love the kids. I love teaching them the songs. I love that I get a great response, as opposed to the response I normally get most Sundays in MountainKids, which is rather dismal. I hate that I have to bundle four kids out the door all 5 mornings of March break, so my "break" from getting Jairus to school is nullified. I hate that I expend about 125% of my daily ration of energy all in 3 hours of the morning, leaving me useless and yearning for a nap all afternoon. I hate that this also makes me rather resistant to doing anything special with the kids for the rest of each day. I am planning to take them to the GodRocks event on Friday at the Burlington Christian Bookstore though. Honour was especially bummed that we couldn't stay the night of the concert a few weeks ago to get an autograph because Verity was sick.
Honour is sitting at the top of the family room steps (actually lying on her back at this moment), talking to one of her little friends on the phone. 6 going on 16 I'm tellin' ya.
I've been musing recently about a pet peeve. Maybe you can relate to this one....
I hate it when other people parent my child in public. It's especially irksome if they are strangers. It seems to have happened a couple times recently which is probably why I'm complaining about it.
Every once in a while, it's merited. Like a couple weeks ago I had the opportunity to get some ballet tickets at a great discount, so I took the girls to see Hansel and Gretal at Hamilton Place. Our seats were down on the left wing of the first balcony. We sat down and I was looking through the program. There weren't many people sitting near us and no one in our row. I was somewhat engrossed in reading the program and didn't notice that Verity had snuck over to the inside end of the row, which looked over the balcony towards the centre of the auditorium. As Verity is prone to doing these days, she hiked herself up on her tummy, under the railing, to peak over the edge. The wall she was peaking over was quite thick, probably 2-2.5 feet wide. Suddenly I hear a woman a few rows up speaking sharply to Verity and looked over. Truly, it was probably a good thing that she noticed, although I'd like to think her actions would have caught my eye shortly after anyways. She barked something fierce though and Verity scurried back to me like a wounded kitten, nearly starting to cry. She crawled on my lap and stayed there nearly the rest of the performance and started complaining not long after about an upset tummy.
I'll admit, I give my kids probably more leaway than alot of parents. I positively despise the supermarket check-out workers reprimanding my kids (mostly Verity) for spinning and climbing on the chrome bars that separate the check-out lines. I was just like Verity and bars like that were just a siren song to me to climb and turn somersaults on. I don't see anything wrong with letting her do it after a long grocery trip. I figure they are probably just concerned about liability and that if Verity should fall and clunk or head or worse, break a bone, that I would go screaming to a lawyer. That's pathetic. If my kid is climbing on something and I've allowed her to, and she falls and hurts herself, it's no ones fault but my own. Ridiculous. And she's not going to fall. Like I said, I was just like her as a kid, turning cartwheels where ever I went, climbing anything that had footholds....I never fell in those situations and I'm pretty confident she won't either.
I said above that it was especially irksome if the person "helping" me parent was a stranger, but I take that back. It's more irksome if they are someone I know. This is differentiated by a very good friend speaking to my kids. I have a few friends that I'm close enough with that I don't mind them reprimanding my kids when I'm around. But there's not many. So what gets my goat is when an acquaintance or casual friend tries to discipline my kids, especially when I'm right there in the room. Um, hello? Parent right here?
Now, this can turn on me as I know I've been in situations where some kid is acting up and the parent is in the room but not doing anything about it. It's always a hard call because you don't know if the parent is just ignoring it...not noticing it....not bothered by it. Afterall, like I just said, my parenting standards are looser than alot in some ways. If my kid is being hurt I would for sure speak up, parent in the room or not. But I'd like to think that otherwise, I let parents be parents and mind my own business. Anyway, have I complained enough?
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