I Have No Title Here. Unentitled?

Somehow, I managed to agree to take over art classes for the term with Chas' class, the Primary Fives. It's something I love to do but I REALLY don't have the time and WHY did I agree to this? Anyway, so far so good. Sharon has kept me supplied with ideas for classes, as well as Vicky (one of the class mommies and a friend also). So it's been delegating and teaching but not much syllabus prep or beforehand work.

Last week, we did such a fun project: Sharon sent me some paintings via email (The Mona Lisa, etc) and I printed them out and cut them into 2-inch squares. I gave each kid one of these squares with instructions to copy what they saw onto a bigger square piece of paper. "But what IS this???" When they were done, we put them all together and voila, a really cubist Mona Lisa and a very impressionist Monet! I will definitely take pictures on Friday when I go in for Sam's art class AND dollar day sale, because you just have to see them. They are amazing.

I hope to see Lou and Louie for lunch tomorrow, which will be great. Lou has left four tubes of oil paint in my posession, which is making me all inspired to smear oil paints around now. I have been wrapping things up at work, and soon will have no business left to run which will be WEIRD. Once the tile business side is over, I will be interested to see what happens to my paintings.

It's very cool and rainy here tonight, and I am falling asleep..... Hope you are all well my friends, I am looking forward to the weekend when I can catch up on blogs, laundry, baking and dog hair. And post some pictures. See you then!

Getting Back To The Centre

....Wherever that is.

Today, I got up late, rushed about like a crazy woman, forgot stuff, etc, etc. I know y'all have had days like that so I won't bore you! I was mega-disorganized because yesterday after school when the boys said "Puh-leeeeeeze can we go to the park? You've been saying since CHRISTMAS and we have the new kite and rocket and stuff? Puh-LEEEEEEEZZZZE?" I threw caution, laundry, and tomorrow's lunch to the wind and said "Why ever not?"

Dad came with us as Head Rocket Scientist. The hydrogen thingy did not work the way it should have, and the kite didn't have strong enough wind to keep it up, but we had loads of fun trying!

Anyway, so all of that made me late this morning. We leave home very early in the morning in order to beat the traffic to town and if I am not sorted out the night before, I am in trouble. Plus I was stressed out in general about all of the little crap that stresses out a working mother of three who has to spend half her life on the road etc.

And this morning was Picasso Tuesday (Painters In Chaos Appreciating Sometimes Sane Outings), when a few of us painters get together and paint outdoors. As Lou is here, I was to pick him up and bring him along. It's a good thing, too. If Lou wasn't waiting I would have given up on painting and gone to work instead, I was feeling so harassed. But I couldn't let Lou down. It has been so much fun to meet him, and his son. Lou's just the same in person as on his blog, which is a good thing! And it was a really beautiful day. I actually lay on the grass at the Botanic Gardens and gazed up into the treetops, announced that I was giving up painting for ever, and felt all of the stress melt away into the grass. I saw a squirrel, some orioles, some rude blackbirds and two yellow butterflies.

And then I got a grip and painted some bougainvillea flowers. Which is a very hard word to spell, by the way. I had to look it up.

Lou also painted, and so did Paula and Sharon (Danielle and Flossy YOU ARE SO LAME!), and then we picked the boys up from school and dragged Lou's son Louie out of bed and came home to my house where Sharon met us with a birthday cake because today is Steffie's birthday! And tomorrow is Chas' birthday! We are all about January birthdays in this family, yes siree! So we ate cake, and then Sharon took the boys home with her and I dropped Lou & Co back to their hotel.

And now Lou & Co are out on the town, and my snuggly sons and I are tucked into our respective beds. Alas! I was hoping to abandon the boys with Mum and Dad, but they are out on the town too, darnit! It's the Steelpan Pleliminaries tonight. Well go on then all of you, party on, and tomorrow morning I will be all bright and chipper and YOU will be a bunch of blobs, so there.

Anyway, note to self: When life gets to be too much and you can't get it all done, forget about it for a little while, lie on the grass with a few friends and remember that you are only a speck in the universe after all. And the laundry ain't going nowhere.

Hello again!

It's 10.26 pm and I am TIRED! So I will make this short. First, "My Chutney Garden" has blogged about my amazing Mum and Dad, so go see. Also, I have been to the passport office five times, Sam and Max have had runny tummies, Chas has a cough and I have had a UTI. Sean has gone back to Mauritania today, Mid-Year Exams are going on at school, and ny house is about to implode under the strain of being incredibly messy. And we have been eating too much fast food which is expensive and unhealthy.

I missed yoga on Thursday because of a funeral, (Old Aunty, long happy life) and I have nothing to wear cuz it's all in heaps waiting to be folded. The cats are sleeping on it and shedding profusely. The dog has been giving me sad looks. She needs attention.

Whine, whine, whine!

Okay, done whining. Lou is here, with his son, and just as I expected. Someone may want to buy my business. This may not come to pass, but is an unexpected pat on the back for me. We are all happy and working hard and there are jacamars and toucans and even a red and blue macaw in the garden. I will try to write more coherently tomorrow, but for now I need sleeeeeep!

Zoiks....

"It was the best of oatmeal, it was the worst of oatmeal..."

-Bert, Sesame Street.



This has been a week .... no, two weeks.... of sudden unexpected sunshiny highs and vexatious and fully expected lows. Many of which I will not talk about yet because they are TOO vexatious or I don't want to jinx the sunshiny deals. Meanwhile I am wandering around in a state of perpetual tiredness and longing for the weekend. Chas is going to spend the night by a buddy on Friday so I don't have to drop him to school on Saturday. I am going to sleep in a little! I will hang a sign on myself that says "Do Not Wake Till 7.00."

Anyway, I missed you guys, so I am going to check you all out as soon as I can. Hope all is well!

If You Never See Me Again....

No, not really. But I am really really busy these days, aren't we all? Who'd be a working Mama? We must be mad. We should all stay home and homeschool and grow our own food and sell hand-knitted sweaters.... Hmmmm, that sounds doable actually. Except that nobody's buying handmade anything these days... *sniff*

So before I go off on a ramble about the pros and cons of running a small business, I will just not. I need sleep, yo. This weekend, we are going Down De Islands with Sean's Mum and Dad and assorted family and friends. This week I am working like a madwoman but tomorrow morning I am going to yoga class for an hour and a half. Yessss!

And tomorrow is Sean's Birthday! Happy Birthday Snoogie Woogie! I am in charge of breakfast and Snax for the birthday party weekend, and Fatima is in charge of all other food. Bliss!

Maybe I will take the laptop with me this weekend and write a nice long newsy post about WHY I am so busy. Or maybe I will have naps instead and read my books. I will think about it. I miss reading everyone's blogs. I will catch up soon!

Down With Homework!

This weekend, Sam made a whole bunch of signs and stuck them up: on the fridge, on the walls, on the computer, at Bunty's house, in the garden. They were all different, but they had one purpose: the abolition of homework. "HOMEWORK = SLAVERY!" "DOWN WITH HOMEWORK!" "HOMEWORK SUCKS!"

And when I logged in to MSN today, it appears that the universal subconscious is thinking along the same lines. Vote now! For the abolition of homework!

It appears that there is no evidence that doing four hours of homework a night will improve a child's grades. I had suspected as much. Surely, a child who spends his entire day sitting in a classroom and then the entire afternoon and night staring at his copybook, and going to bed late, will not be more intelligent or better adjusted than the child who is being read a story in bed at a reasonable hour after an afternoon of PLAY and HELPING OUT and CONVERSATION.

It has always surprised me that parents would make a child as young as two "Study" at "Schoolwork". They claim that the earlier a child can get a headstart at his education, the better off he will be later on. This is baffling. Are there any statistics out there? I haven't found any, and while it is possible to teach the average two-year-old (or the average dog, or the average monkey) to recognize words or symbols and "Read" nicely, isn't it a waste of their time? Those formative years when the human brain is developing and soaking in information faster than it ever will again... you want to spend it teaching your child to recognize symbols? Something that they can learn in one-tenth of the time later on?

I can understand that spelling words have to be learned, times tables revised, the work of the day looked at and discussed if the child does not "get" something. But forty long division sums? Twenty sentences to underline the nouns? Good grief. That is torture. Sam says it's child abuse, constitutionally illegal. He's right, I think. Educational Psychologists everywhere agree. We are incredibly lucky that in the competitive Trini system we have a school that doesn't try to kill the little ones with homework. (We love you, School!) Max usually doesn't get any at all, and I know that Chas and Sam have it easier than some.

Here's an interesting fact: When Max started primary school at nearly 5, he had never shown any interest in learning his letters. He was the least likely to succeed in that department, in a class of kids who had many of them been to extremely expensive preschools and could read, add, and count to whatever. While they were learning these skills, Max was playing in the dirt, making things out of clay and learning not to mess with fierce mama hens.

In his third year of school now, I am told that Max is a fine reader. More importantly, he absolutely loves learning things at school. He gets wildly excited at Math, and enjoys reading. He is also terrified of mama hens. Maybe he would have been better off at pre-university after all!

Where Are The Nativity Images?

"Of the channels through which we can choose to send our messages, the visual is the strongest. This is partly because the parts of the brain which handle visual impressions are larger than those dealing with, for example, hearing; but it is also because we can attend to several visual messages simultaneously..... When word and image are used in combination, the resulting image is even richer and more powerful."

("See What I Mean", John Morgan and Peter Welton.)

Can you remember the Christmas Images of years gone by? They were of a loving family. He wasn't the "Real" Dad, so they say, but he had appointed himself the Protector of his Wife and Child. The Christmas Images of yesteryear were about responsibility, love, and making do with what we had. The words that went with those images strengthened the idea that we are loved, there is someone looking out for us, and that we are expected to behave IN THIS WAY: Responsible, Loving, and Content with simple comforts. You never hear about Mary demanding a new carpet. The words Child, Mother, Father, Holy, Love, were burned into our young minds as good words. They went with chocolate and bulging stockings. They went with the gorgeous music of the season, awesome and beautiful.

So what do we have now? Apparently, we are not allowed to wish anyone (or their children) "A Holy And Blessed Christmas", and the iconic images of the Holy Family, and the very IDEA that Family Responsibility can be considered Holy, has been removed. We have been told that some people may find it offensive. And what has it been replaced with?

"Happy Holidays". And pictures of masses of food, way too many things, a reindeer with a shiny nose, and the idea that in order to GET this Happiness that you are very clearly entitled to, you have to have a whole lot of stuff. The kids, in particular, MUST have the stuff or they will be devastated. We have Jolly, Happy, Toys, Turkey, Fashion, Santa Claus, Weight Gain, Hangover, Broken, Plastic, More! Better! Sooner! Cheaper! Now! Stress! Pepto Bismol!

I find those images MUCH MORE OFFENSIVE. As a not-really-Christian, I would much rather someone assumed I worshipped a guy named Jesus who had a great family and taught about love, than that I felt entitled to a Happy Holidays. And you can keep your Jolly crap away from my kids, too. But go right ahead and tell them all about Jesus. I can deal with that.

Whether we are devoutly Christian or not, it should make us sad to lose our annual Christmas Lesson. How on earth could anyone be offended by an image of a family? How has this image been turned into something offensive? The non-Christians I know are perfectly okay with it, as I am perfectly okay with their wishes for Divali Blessings for me, or Eid Blessings, or Hannukah Blessings, or whatever. Someone wants to tell me that they wish their special Blessings upon me? I am touched.

Throw away the Jolly Holly Greetings. Claim back Christmas. We need it.

In Haste While My Potatoes Boil Over

You guys are wonderful. Your comments on my last post kept me educated and hilarified, two things which I need right now. Have I mentioned that my Comments tend to be better than my Posts? Anyone out there reading who doesn't comment, I recommend checking out my commenters for a giggle anyway. And their Blogs too!

So school is in, (Boo! Hiss!) and the homework has poured upon us like.... a bad similie. I can't think of any at the moment, help me out o commenters!

Some of us have mild coughs, so we are drinking Organic Throat Thingy Tea with Secret Yogic Ingredients. It's yummy!

I haven't been online as much as I would like to, because work, school, housework, Sam and Max's passports expire in a month GAH, they need UK visas in three months GAH, it takes one galactic year to renew a Trini passport GAAAAH! But I am pulling strings because I WILL NOT LET THEM STOP ME! I know a guy. There are also 794 other Very Important Things To Do on my List, and I am really missing the tranquility and love of the Christmas Holidays. My tree is still up too, but I will work on that tonight.

Max has fallen out of the hammock and it's ALL SAM'S FAULT so I have to go.

Okay, they have decided to play football outside so I don't. But the potatoes!

Toodle-ooo!

Our Computer: First Annual Report

A year ago, Santa brought us a computer. It is big and flashy, and has changed our lives. Before the arrival of this Media Dream, we had lived without television, videogames and the internet. We watched occasional DVDs on Sean’s laptop but really, the kids’ lived were untouched by media, apart from the odd visit to Grandma’s and friends’ houses. Weeks would go by. Months! Without any media image of violence, advertising or cartoon sassiness.

My original reasons for this lockdown were pretty simple: Our first son, Chas, is a super-energized child. As a baby he never slept for long, and if forced to keep still in a car or set in front of a TV show, he would spend the rest of the day climbing the walls, loudly. I did a little research: “Hyperactive children and TV not good” said some website or other. “TV not recommended for children” said another. It was good enough for me. We moved house and simply left the TV behind. It was easy. Later on, it was clear that the boys read more, play more board games and have better communication skills, than the average TV-watching family. So continuing to be a “No TV” household is a no-brainer.

Three babies later, I was advising other Moms: Child overweight? ADD? Rude? Not reading? Struggling in school? Get rid of the TV. Lose the Gameboy. Pack the Nintendo away on a high, high shelf. Some families have taken these steps, and with older kids it isn’t so easy. There is a period of utter boredom while the child’s brain learns not to be handed entertainment. They lie about moaning “There’s nothing to DO!” Until one day, out of desperation, they pick up a book or learn a skill or start a conversation and find that they can be with themselves and it’s all right!

I am happy with keeping TV out of the house, and I realize how easy I have it: We have warm weather year-round, and five acres of really cool back yard to play in. The boys are also close in age, and we often have cousins and friends to stay, sometimes for months at a time. It’s boy heaven here. I can understand that living in an apartment, watching the sleet fall outside, is not quite the same! I can totally understand the popularity of the Wii.

So what about us, and our gorgeous computer, one year later?

Well, Sam gets the addict's gleam in his eye when he looks at it. If Sam is allowed unlimited computer game time, he will just sit there, not hungry, not thirsty, for hours and hours. I have experimented with just leaving him be and it’s weird! He has to tear himself away from the screen when his time is up. The other boys like to play on the computer, but will happily be distracted with anything else that’s going on. And play is what it is. Lego Star Wars, Rally racing games, Club Penguin. I have never been into “Educational Games” and haven’t found any proof at all that they can make a child smarter. My kids are plenty smart anyway. I worry about the violent content in the Lego games, where you get points for blasting anyone and anything to smithereens. It's cute violence, purchased because of the "E" content rating on the package, and I am surprised at the amount of killing that seems to happen in a game marketed to 6-year-olds.

The kids use the internet for homework, and they have their own website. We watch DVDs on the nice big screen. They look stuff up on YouTube and have learned how to use the word “Fuck” correctly in a humorous setting. (Extremely annoying. Does this come under "Educational"?) Google answers our many questions in a wonderful way, complete with great images and scientific explanations. We have downloaded music from Limewire and found guitar and violin lessons and demonstrations. We have excited phone calls, “You’re on Club Penguin? Where ARE you?” We often have a group of kids in the kitchen, surrounding the computer, cheering each other on or laughing hysterically.

For me, it’s been the coolest thing ever. There’s the babysitting function: Put on a DVD or a cool game and four out of five kids will park themselves quietly in front of the screen for half an hour or more of mess-free, quiet entertainment. But the best part for me is the grownup time. I can have grownup conversations. Read about friends’ lives and commiserate with them. Write my heart out. Be connected to a world that isn’t populated solely with chickens and children. Living here is hard for me. It’s beautiful, but very, very lonely. The internet keeps me company. If I am using the computer during the day, I find it easy to ignore the kids and that's not good.

So it's a mixed report here for the computer and internet. The kids' game time is limited, half an hour per child or an hour if you're playing together. NO computer time during school days, unless specifically needed for homework. On-line time is hovered over by me, and I realise there's plenty of negative crap out there that's readily available to kids online. I let them watch the dumb "funny" stuff, even if I think it's in bad taste, because I know it's limited and I can try to counteract it with the "Good Stuff". Our computer is in the kitchen, the busiest and largest room in the house, so there's supervision. The DVDs we have watched together have been great. I still read to the kids, and we listen to audiobooks in the car. They love board games and play instruments still, and read, but not as much as they used to.

Sam says, “It’s been great! The games, our website, the internet where you can find out anything.” So what’s been bad, Sam? Anything? “Nada.”

Max says, “Miniclip. (a games website, featuring Club Penguin) Watching movies.” Anything bad? “Fighting over who’s turn it is.”

Issa says, “Internet! This computer works properly. My favorite thing is Club Penguin and you can look up things like an encyclopedia.”

Chas says, "Our website." Chas is really outdoorsy and doesn't understand the appeal of video games. He will play them when they are new, but soon loses interest. He gets mad when everyone's playing with the computer instead of with him!

The media is a powerful tool, and a good one. My kids would probably not have seen (briefly)Skeleton Sex this year if not for the internet, but they would have missed out on an awful lot too. Darth Vader in the Star Wars Cantina on YouTube? He says "Fuck", but geez, it's hilarious!