Holiday round-up

The Clappers came for Thanksgiving...

And the Texas Rausers came for early Christmas...

And the then Pennsylvania Rauser-Clappers had a quiet and relaxing holiday. Wait-- who am I kidding?!?! There're a 6-year-old and a 3-year-old residing here. Christmas was a high-stakes affair. Henry in particular seemed consumed with anxiety for much of December, with a quite-visible internal struggle alternately to express and to master his strong desires for stuff. I decorated our stairwell with garland and dangling Advent presents on little ribbons. It was so pretty, but I'm not sure if it added any daily joy or wonder to our household. As Michael put it: "Advent presents: Something to fight about every SINGLE day." On Christmas Eve, Henry rehearsed how it would go the next morning: he'd stay in bed till 6 am, then come into bed with Mom and Dad, and wait till Agatha woke up, then we'd open our stocking presents, then we'd have oatmeal and "do our morning routine," then we could open one gift every hour till they were gone. This idea was another of his strategies to demonstrate his control over this crazy holiday, when all normal rules seem to be suspended. (We didn't, of course, do this; we opened all our presents right away like normal people.)

We did have a very nice holiday, season, though, high-strung children's occasional tantrums aside. We had many lovely invitations to parties and dinners with friends. We got beautiful, thoughtful gifts in the mail from Tim & Kirsti, Grace & Jim, and our dear friends Eric & Meg. On Christmas Eve, I made a special midday meal of chicken, sweet potatoes, and this amazing French pastry (the Paris-Brest!), and then in the evening we had pate and cheese at Mom's house by the fire. On Christmas Day we ate turkey and stuffing at Mom's house. We did LOTS of crafting, including a whole village of five gingerbread houses. (Then at a family New Year's Eve party last night, the hosts gifted us with MORE gingerbread house kits! I think seven houses is enough for one season, don't you? I have gotten pretty good with the pastry bag, though.)

Quiet wonder and peaceful reflection are not the way to celebrate Christmas with little children. But as I said to Michael on Christmas Eve, after we'd tucked in the kids and I'd stuffed their stockings and put Agatha's new scooter under the tree: truly, happiness is being the parent of a 6 year old and a 3 year old on Christmas Eve. It is a great joy to provide for them, to create sparks of amazement and pleasure, to feed their imaginations and cause them to think about hope, surprise, and light amid the darkness. We are so greatly blessed to have one another, and we celebrated that these past few weeks, as we try to every day.

Report Card

Last week we got Henry's first report card-- our first-ever as parents. First, the degree and specificity of feedback was amazing. There were eight categories (literacy, writing, science, art, music, PE, etc) and within each category, there were between six and fifteen individual grades, on a 1 to 4 scale. There's always something deeply fascinating about hearing about your child from someone else. At our teacher conferences in the past, I've always been starved for information and evaluation of my child, just to have an outsider's perspective. I don't know many children intimately, so my two define the norm for me. Preschool feedback generally seemed diplomatic and bland, and so I didn't get a strong sense of perspective-adjustment from that. If you had asked me to evaluate Henry's strengths and weaknesses, I would have said he's very physical and sporty, he's smart, and he's not too musical or interested in art. (One thing I do remember his toddler teacher saying, when he was two, is that he enjoyed all the activities in the classroom except painting. She was surprised to learn that his father was a painter!)

Now, for the first time, someone-- many people, actually, since each different specialty subject has a different teacher-- has graded my child's performance and abilities. And what do you think he's good at, at least right now? Well, overall he is doing very, very well, and we're very proud of him. But his strongest special subjects (outside reading and math) were music and art. He got high marks for accuracy in singing (have they heard the tuneless renditions of 'This Land Is Your Land' I get every day?!?), and special praise from the art teacher. They also do art projects in the regular classroom, and his regular teachers noted his careful, precise work as well. His two worst subjects, on average? Science and PE. In PE, he's not so good at the throwing and kicking skills. And the only item for which he received a "1" (which basically indicates complete cluelessness) was in the science category: drawing a conclusion from evidence.

Oh, the shame!

On reflection, of course, this makes perfect sense: while we have a crafts table in the living room, permanently stocked with art supplies, Henry is not enrolled in any organized sports. Of course he's good at art; our norm for artsiness is just probably far outside the social norm. (The failure at drawing scientific conclusions is harder to explain away; you can bet I'm ordering a science kit for Christmas!) Despite our sturdiest self-delusions, then, we are raising not a sporty polymath with a sharp analytical mind, but a little clone of ourselves: artsy, craftsy, very fit but not skilled at any team sport, creative and a good leader but not so good at observing the facts of the natural world, and a little high-strung with a tendency toward perfectionism.

Whose report card was this, anyway?

Oy yoy YOY yoy yoy

Those of you who knew Ruth Rauser will recognize the title of this post!
Mommy feels a bit under siege. This is so both at work and at home. Despite my complete and utter reasonableness, people are not doing what I want. Imagine! Wherever I turn, people small and large, seem to be standing in front of me with their hands balled up in fists, on their hips, saying, "No!"

After a blissful fall of sibling love and cooperative play, we've entered a new phase-- I hope short-lived-- of constant bickering. They are both at fault-- Henry baiting his sister or instantly coveting and taking over whatever she's playing with, and Agatha, less subtly, just screaming at the top of her lungs or pounding her fists on his back when she thinks I'm not looking. Sniffles make it worse, because people are sick and grumpy. Tuesdays are hard, because Agatha stays till 3 pm at school those two days and thus does not nap. By 6 pm tonight (a Tuesday), I had had it. It was bedtime.

Agatha protested. "I'm hungry!" (We had just eaten lentil soup, salad, and bread.) This is a common stalling tactic, and we've developed an accommodation where I bring her a small bowl of nuts and dates in bed, which she eats while we read a story. It's just naughty enough to make her feel like she's had a victory. But tonight when I did that, her tantrum just continued. "This is NOT what I want!" After unsuccessfully trying to talk with her, I left the room and returned the bowl to the kitchen. She followed me, screaming and crying.
"You did NOT bring me what I wanted!"
"What did you want?" I asked in a neutral (I hoped) tone.
"I'm only going to say it ONE TIME. I said it ONE TIME, and you didn't bring it to me!"
This went back and forth for a while. Finally, she admitted, "I don't KNOW what I want!"
"We can continue to talk about food for two more minutes, and then it'll be bedtime," I said. "If you'd like to request any food, now is the time."
"I want YOU to tell ME what I want!"
"Okay!" I said brightly, "you want... some walnuts!"
"No, cashews!"
"We don't have any cashews. We have walnuts."
"Okay, walnuts!"
"I'll bring them."
"No! I don't just want ONE THING."
"How many things do you want?"
"I want SEVENTY-EIGHT things!" (78 is her favorite number. This afternoon she asked me how many fingers she was holding up. Although I answered three, the correct answer was 78.)
"I don't have 78 things. I have dried cherries, though!"
"YES, dried cherries! AND... a prune!"
"Okay!" I answered. "Walnuts, dried cherries, and a prune!"
"AND... a fig!"
"All right, four things: walnuts, dried cherries, a prune, and a fig."
I think everyone needs a vacation.