And now for one about the oldest child. . .

So it turns out that my blog has found a few new readers, even my husband.  He brought it to my attention that I haven't blogged about our oldest child, Kaiya, lately.  It's not that I don't love her as much or pay her as much attention.  She just doesn't do as many off-the-wall things as the other two.  There's enough weird in her to match them, though.

Kaiya is a very logical kid.  She puts a lot of thought into everything and often over-thinks the small stuff. She's always been this way.

One of our favorite movies is Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.  No, not Charlie and the Chocolate Factory with Johnny Depp.  The original, well as original as you can get when you base something on a book.  The one with the one and only Gene Wilder. That dude is a genius, but as you can see, I'm drifting off topic.  She saw the Oompa Loompas for what had to be the hundredth time and she heard Willy Wonka explaining the tragedies of Loompaland, with the horrible Hornswogglers and Vermicious Knids.  As this scene played out I noticed that Kaiya's gears were turning.  She needed to know if the Oompa Loompas were a real tribe.  We've learned a lot about gene mutations, such as the blue people of Kentucky and even our favorite genetic mutation, red hair, so she had to know if there really was a race of orange-skinned, green-haired people.  She brought up the fact that some people fake-tan their skin until it takes on an orange hue and wondered if they were trying to imitate Mr. Wonka's favorite employees.  I assured her that no, Loompaland was not a real place on Earth.

She asked if I was sure.  Since then, she has googled Loompaland.

Ronin also inquired about those mysterious inhabitants of the candy factory, but that's another blog post.

You're not Miley Cyrus, so put your pants back on and sit down.

Everyone is tired of hearing about Miley Cyrus.  I know I've been sick of her for the past few years.  This is more about the aftermath.  I know I'm no expert about what's appropriate for kids (The Purples' favorite song is You're Gonna Go Far, Kid)  but wow.  I'd much rather tell my kids that it's not okay to say, "Dance fucker dance" than explain why it's not okay to grind on random people.  By the way, they still think Dexter is saying frogger.

What kind of person lets a kid watch Miley Cyrus' performance at the VMAs?  I ask this because I caught a younger relative in Daisy Dukes demonstrating Miley's twerking performance to my seven year old, complete with crotch grabbing, booty shaking, and the outstretched tongue of a brain damaged serpent.  My daughter stood there, looking disgusted, much like I did for a split second before I told her that we don't do this. 

Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus and their ilk have never been allowed in our house.  My children probably think a Kardashian is a breed of dog.  We'd rather watch Jurassic Park or Doctor Who than any of those Disney skanks.

I'm no helicopter parent and my children aren't exactly sheltered.  I just happen to think that certain things aren't for young eyes, especially things of a sexual nature.  My oldest two children already know more about the life cycle of reptiles than most adults, but they don't need to know how humans attract a mate.  

Why are people allowing, or even pushing, their children to mature as quickly as possible?  Let them enjoy their childhood without worrying about body weight or whether they appeal to the opposite sex.  Let them play with dolls without the intentions of it being for practice because they'll have real babies in a few years.  Let them be children, for crying out loud.  There's nothing funny about it.  There is nothing cute about an oversexualized child.  I'm not looking at this from religious viewpoint, but a common sense viewpoint.  You can't pray away a lost childhood.

Homeschool rant #1

This will be the first of a long series of homeschool rants.

Why do people feel the need to weigh in on homeschool's effect on the social development of my children?  Maybe I think your child is an insufferable brat, but I keep my mouth shut.  I don't blame public school for their faults. 

Sure, my oldest child is shy.  Kaiya has always been shy, but she's started to overcome it since she left kindergarten.  She approaches other children and plays with them now.  She's not being forced to socialize with rabid little beasts who seem to have been raised by wolves and then left outside to catch the bus.

Ronin's only four, so not of schooling age yet, but people still blame homeschool for his tendencies.  He seems to be acting a lot like a four year old boy at the moment.  Ronin learns best when he's not sitting still.  Last year, I was attempting to teach Kaiya to tell time, I showed her a clock and asked for the time.  He breezed by on his way to the playroom and yelled over his shoulder that it was "tooelf o'cwock".  What the crap, man?  He was 3 and I hadn't even worked on numbers past 10 with him at that point.  He's the type of child who simply cannot sit still and learn.

I went to public school.  What's my excuse for being socially awkward?

trichotillomania

I think I've found reason number 242 why we should homeschool. Kaiya brought home yet another bad habit to add to the others she's picked up this year. She's pulling out her hair. Another girl in her class told her that she should pull it out while holding her breath. What the crap? First the bossiness, then the lies, hitting, the eye rolling, the table manners, ignoring instructions, language. I agreed to send her to public school for the social skills and it's like they've all disappeared and I'm now raising a monkey. I need to go figure out how to hide the short patches in her beautiful waist length red hair. If I cut it off, it will be reason number 242 why family members hate me.

Why is she so happy?

My youngest child, Tanith, is such a happy baby.  People tell me I don't know how lucky I am.  Believe me, I earned it with two high needs babies.  She sleeps most of the night, usually barely waking once to nurse and then peacefully and immediately drifting back to sleep while snuggled next to me.  Sometimes she even sleeps all night.  She's done this since birth.  The other two never did this.  For the first year, Kaiya and Ronin were waking every two hours.  Kaiya still wakes and wanders into our room a few nights a week and she is five.

And that's not all she can do!  Tanith basically came out of the womb with a huge grin on her face.  When we pulled her out of the water, she was too busy investigating her surroundings to be bothered with crying.  When she wakes, it's always a good morning.  This morning, she woke up during a giggle fit.  My husband says that each child is a reflection of my mood during labor.  I was pressured to have my first child in a hospital (more on that later), and it was a miserable experience.  I was sad and scared, so Kaiya became my sensitive child.  Ronin's birth was very empowering, my first birth center experience, and I was all like, "I am woman, hear me roar".  And he does, several times a day.  I was almost angry during his birth, taking back my birth experience with Kaiya.  Last Halloween when Tanith came into the world, I was giddy with excitement.  I laughed between contractions, sang along with Hank Williams, and hummed peacefully during contractions.

If all babies were like Tanith, I'd be a tattooed Ma Duggar.

No Karate

My oldest daughter, Kaiya, is five years old, in kindergarten, and a very smart and sensitive child.  She’s a little shy and not very assertive around her peers, so we thought it would be a good idea for her to take karate classes.  Any class that teaches a child respect, responsibility, focus, and how to kick ass is good, right?  She was excited about it.  We all were excited about it.
Until the first class.  We got there, paid our fees, and class began.  It took the child five minutes to remove her shoes.  A child who hates shoes wanted to leave hers on in karate class!  She seemed a little nervous for the first few minutes, then got a little shaky toward the middle.  Then when they were practicing their yells and stances, she burst into tears.  She couldn’t handle the yelling.  She understood that no one was yelling at her, but just couldn’t take the noise.  She can yell and scream and jump around at home, but when she’s told it’s okay to yell, she cries instead.
We stayed to watch the rest of the class, and then left.  That was her first, and probably her last, karate class.

Move it on over . . .

I was using wordpress, but I've heard good things about blogger.  We'll try it and see.

Hi, I’m Marilyn. I have three awesome kids. Kaiya is 5, Ronin is 3, and Tanith is 2 months. They do lots of things that I’ve been told I should write a book about. I’m too lazy for that, so here you go.

We cloth diaper, breastfeed, and co-sleep, but that’s not my entire life. I was a model in a past life, and a hairstylist, and a piercer. I sell stuff on eBay for a living now and wipe tiny butts several times a day.  Most of my posts will be while nursing at the keyboard, so maybe I should edit the part about it not being my entire life.  I’ve had one child or another glued to my boob or in my oven for over 6 years straight now.