Now that I have my own children, I’m questioning the wisdom in this philosophy.  First, are we really asking kids to know and judge in advance something that might be harmful or dangerous?  My kids are 2 and 4, and fairly regularly my 4 year old does something which I would consider to be unsafe.  I don’t think he’s purposely out there looking for things to do that might hurt him, his brother or his friend, but he is still finding them.  The other (main) problem I have with this philosophy is the idea that kids will learn to work things out on their own.

It has been my experience that unless kids are taught these behaviors and words,  and they are modeled and used repeatedly, the bigger, more aggressive, or older child will often get his or her way.  This doesn’t often seem to happen with a calm exchange of words.  More often than not, it is done in a way which I would consider to be unkind or undesirable (as far as social norms go).

So, as much as it is frustrating and at times annoying to stop what I’m doing each time my kids have an instance which leaves one or both upset, I think it is very much worth my time to go to them, model the words they can use (or help them come up with their own words), and help them work towards a resolution, I think it is worth it.  We don’t expect adults to have the skills to work things out on their own when a situation becomes very intense or heated.  I know many adults who have sought counseling either individually or as a couple/group for situations which were not easily resolved.  Why is it we expect children to be able to identify these situations and work on them without our input?

For a while now I have been thinking about this topic.  I feel like I am missing the friendship and knowledge of older women.  Right now, as I’m in the midst of trying to make wise choices about finances, grow in my faith, prepare healthy and tasty meals for my family, raise two boys, and consistently grow and improve my relationship with my husband, I think I could use a friend like this.

I have many incredible aunts, a great mom, a great mother-in-law, and friends my age who I can talk to about the things I listed above.  I’m looking for someone in my area who I can invite over for tea or coffee.  I’m looking for a friend who can pop over while she’s out running errands.

Do any of you have friendships like this?  Any thoughts?  Have you found this to be beneficial for both you and your friend?  If you don’t have a friend like this have you ever thought about it?  Does anyone else feel like it would be so amazingly great to have someone to talk to about these sorts of things?

Those of you who know me in person have most likely heard me talk about wanting to move back into town.  Three years ago, we bought the house we currently live in, and it is about 10 miles out of town in a small bedroom community.  For various reasons, we want to go back to town.  We decided some time over the winter that we were going to put our house on the market and see what would happen with it.  Our original goal was to have it up by May 1, then May 15, and finally June 2 or 3.  Well, for the last month, Jason and I have been cleaning, organizing, and decluttering.  We missed our goal of having it up on the market by June 2 or 3, but we did list it on Friday.  By Friday at noon, we had appointments for three showings (with a fourth added later that evening).

It was a crazy day.  I ended up taking all of our extra stuff out of the house and taking the boys to a friend’s house.  We were supposed to have had another friend and her family over for supper here, but because of the timing of one showing, we decided I would make supper at her house.  I threw all the food for supper in the van, too.  I got the boys out of the house at about 1:00 for the 1:30 showing, and we were out for the rest of the afternoon and evening.

We found out that two of the parties who had seen our house made offers.  We accepted the second offer on Saturday, and our house is officially pending right now.  Isn’t that amazing?  The buyer had initially proposed a closing date of July 8th, but because we haven’t looked at ANY houses yet, we are planning to close some time on or before July 16th.  Any prayers for the situation would be appreciated!    God has worked this all out so wonderfully, I am not worried, but I know that even with everything going as planned buying and selling houses can be very stressful.

We are planning to look at houses this week with our realtor.  We made a list of all the houses that fit our price range and criteria.  We looked through it, and we managed to eliminate 2.  Now, we only have 11 more to look at!    Eleven seems like it might be a smidge too many, but I just couldn’t not see them!

This is why I am not blogging right now.  I am not reading.  I am not exercising much.  I am not cooking as much as I want.  I was only cleaning, organizing, and thinking about cleaning and organizing.    It seems unblievable that when I go to BlogHer in about 6 weeks, I will no longer be living in this house!

Then comes my identity crisis.  I think of other things I could share.  I wanted to write about my books I am reading.  I wanted to share some new recipes.  I wanted to talk about running and how my asthma is affecting it.  Then, I think “The Beautiful Letdown.”  It is a breastfeeding blog.  I considered for a while starting a new blog with everything other than breastfeeding, but I decided against it.  I am not keeping up with this blog.  I don’t think that the best thing to do is add another one to my list.  I know that there are people who do this, but I don’t think I am one of those who should.

I just need to get over it and write, right?  Write for me.  Write about what I want to say.  Write about what interests me right now.  Post some cute pictures, and viola, I am back in business.  So, that is my plan.  I am going to reinject a little life into my blog, but it will not be exclusively (or even primarily) a breastfeeding blog for the time being.  I am thinking about doing a couple posts that do relate to breastfeeding.  Because of the name of my blog, I get a lot of searches for “should I feel my letdown” “what is a letdown” “I don’t feel my letdown” and other variations of thsoe questions.  Maybe I could save a new mom a little time if I made a post about this even if it is not something I am wondering about.

I hope that this isn’t a major disappointment to anyone, and I don’t think it will be.  I enjoy blogging, and I enjoy hearing from people who read what I write.  I miss that, and I think getting my thoughts out and back on this blog will be something that can be interesting, thought provoking, and enjoyable for all of us!

More and more over the past few weeks, we’ve been hearing K repeat things that we have said to him. One night, Jason was giving him two choices for getting his diaper changed. K kept telling Jason that he didn’t want to have his (poopy) diaper changed. He wanted to wear it. (On a side note, you can tell we’re not exactly steaming down the road of potty learning . ) Jason told him, “That’s not a choice.” Later that night during the bedtime routine, K and Jason were talking and at one point, K said to Jason, “No, Daddy, that not a choice.”

Last week, we spent a little time with my mother-in-law and father-in-law. One of the days, my nieces (ages 6 and 4 were over). At one point, I heard them arguing, and the six year old was saying, “That’s fair!” to her sister over whether or not she needed to share some toys with her. Fast forward to this morning. I was showing K the new library books we had checked out for this week. He was pretty excited about them, and he kept pulling them out of the bag and saying, “That very fair!”

Then, there are the things he picks up that I’m not sure where they came from. “You know better, Mommy!” “A, you being bad!” “No, no, no, no, no!” These are not things we say to him. I know that now that his peers are speaking more and we are around more and different people, his pool of experiences to draw from also grows.

He’s at an age where he is such a sponge. He doesn’t have preconceived ideas of what is fun or not fun (video games vs. books) or what music is good or not good (pop music vs. opera). He loves so many different things. I think that his new tendency to repeat things that we say at just the right time is good for us in more than one way. While it reminds me that he’s always listening to what we say, it also reminds me that he is picking stuff up All. The. Time. I am raising a little sponge, and I want him to be able to absorb all that he can before this time ends.

One of the questions in the study was “When was the last time you saw someone doing something with all their might?” or something similar. I thought about it for a while, and I really didn’t have many examples. The one thing that came to mind was thinking about how athletes celebrate after winning a championship game. Seeing them jumping and screaming and crying and just laying on the ground in awe is what came to my mind. Then, I wondered when was the last time I did something with all my might. I apologize in advance to anyone who thinks this is more than they want to know. The last time, I did something with all my might (here’s your last chance to stop reading) was childbirth and pushing. Most of you other moms who have been through labor know what I’m talking about, right? That was great, because it was for my kids. Of course, I would do all that I could for them.

So, again, I was thinking, thinking… This month, I committed to NaBloPoMo. I missed two days, but I have definitely blogged on days when I would rather have skipped. I mentioned at the end of last year that Jason’s sister is doing a photography project that involves taking a picture every day for a year. She’s sharing them online at her Flickr account. It’s called Project 365. It got me wishing that I had some sort of neat project that I could commit to like that. I’m actually still wishing that, and since it’s coming to the end of the year (can you believe it?!?!?), I’ve started thinking about it again. Unfortunately, last year, I didn’t do much about these thoughts. I’m hoping and praying that this year, I will make a commitment to something. I’d like to do something meaningful and challenging. For a year? Maybe not. I’m not committed to a year, but I would like to do something that stretches and challenges me. Maybe, I can do something with all my might.

I was hoping that this would be fairly easily resolved. I thought maybe I’d be lucky. I’d do the PFT test, and they would get a clear result. I’m actually still praying for that. I do think it’s more likely from what I’ve read and heard that the result will be inconclusive meaning that more tests are needed. I find that to be pretty frustrating. For one, I want to know what’s going on with my body and fix it. The other reason is that I haven’t given up hope for being able to run the half marathon in Fargo in May. It’s a pretty slim chance, and the door is closing on my chances the longer I have to wait. I still have that as my ultimate goal, though. If I end up not being able to do the half, I do know a few people who have decided to run the 5k, so that is my backup plan.

I told Jason today that life is kind of funny. When I was running, I was hoping that something would hurt or stop me from being able to run. Now that I’ve had to take a break, and it looks like this is going to be a harder goal to achieve than I originally though, I really want to do it!

I’m planning to call my doctor on Monday to see if she’s heard anything. I hate to be a bother, but I’m wondering if maybe some paperwork got misplaced somewhere or something. It just seems like 7 work days is a long time to wait for results of a fairly simple test. For all of you who pray, I would appreciate any prayers in this area.