Middle Schoolers: Attitude

From waking to sleep, a middle schoolers attitude is never in check. Emotions constantly raging with puberty, you need to always be prepared for the outlash.

Time to wake up...
"Five more minutes." I allow this. After fifteen I force them to wake. Attitude commences. They don't have to say anything, their body language speaks volumes. The slow rise, the shoulder slump, the grimace. I know better not to say or do anything yet. Just let them get acclimated to morning.

If they move to slowly, I prod, "You better start getting ready."
"I know! I'm tired!" I back off for awhile.

When there's about 20 minutes to go, they've done the stuff they like to do, eat breakfast, drink cocoa, but still not dresses, backpacks not packed, hair not done. I've gone back to packing their lunches because I realized they were too lazy to make a sandwich or open the fruit drawer, and juice and doritos does not a healthy lunch make. I suggest they do the important things. Commence with the eye rolls and heavy sighs.

If it's raining and I refuse to drive them to school, which is all of three blocks away, I get the "Uh" sound accompanied by the eye roll.

And then there's after school...
I will usually let them hang out after school. If they call and ask to go to a friends or have a friend come over and I say no, I get, "Why?" to which I give my reason, whatever it may be, busy, headache, hate their friend, on deathbed. Then I get, "But," which is always interrupted by "I said no." Then it's "Fine!" hang up the phone.

They show up and it's time for homework. If it's difficult there is head laying on the table, grunts, sighs, pounding, and frustrated growls. I try to help, but some of it is even over my head.

Then snacks. I like them to eat a somewhat healthy snack after school because dinner comes shortly after. But if I suggest fruit or vegetable I once again get the eye roll and "fine."

Chores?
They barely exist here anymore. Mostly, I cook, clean, do dishes, laundry, take out the garbage, everything. I've tried to get them on a chore schedule, but between soccer, basketball, homework, and their social life, chores are pretty much non existent to them. Basically, they're not asked to do much. I'd rather have them get good grades and excel in their sports of choice. However, on the weekend, I will usually ask them to pick up their stuff, clean the bathroom and vacuum. Three very easy things to do that will take approximately ten minutes out of their day. I am met with glares, stares, glowers, grimaces, hip out, arms crossed attitude.

I have to remind them that if I stopped doing all the chores I'm expected to do, we would all starve, live in filth, and be wearing the same underwear for weeks on end. I should be the one giving the attitude.

And forget talking about grades, boys, school drama, and the like. A mom can only take so many eye rolls before she's in desperate need of a straight jacket and padded room.

Tomorrow, Friday Free For All.

Kisses

:*

Megan

Middle Schoolers: Boys

Middle school boys and the girls that love them.

Ugh. Thing One who is now in 8th grade, has not had a boyfriend up until now. She was never interested. She was into soccer and her grades. Yeah, um, not so much any more. Well, let me clarify, she still loves soccer, and is very good at it, the grades, we're going to have to work on that. While she excels in class and with her homework, she has not tested well, which brings her grade point average down. I believe this is due to her more active social life.

The cool thing now is to go to Wheels, the local skating rink. Is there any actual skating done? I know Thing Two skates, Thing One, no. She hangs out, and giggles, and gossips, and I've come to find out, her boyfriend can be found there on any given Friday night. A boyfriend I've never met. A boyfriend my husband has already dug a hole for in the garden. He's a 6th grader, but according to Thing Two, he's hot.

Thing Two is a different story all together. She's obsessed with the idea of having a boyfriend. She's desperate for one. She's even asked boys out, which in 6th grade I have no idea what this means. Mom how do I look? Mom am I pretty? Mom why don't I have a boyfriend? I say all the things a mom should say (and it's not a lie, she's adorable, but men don't make passes at girls who wear glasses). I try to tell her to focus on soccer, and basketball, and school (and she should because getting good grades does not come easy for her). But all her friends have boyfriends. sigh.

It is so hard to teach a girl that having a boyfriend doesn't define who they are. But, I was there once. I was boy crazy, but these days, it scares me. The kids these days are way more advanced then I was when I was their age. And the technology age doesn't help matters with sexting and the like. ugh.

What do you do? You support them, talk to them honestly, which usually scares the hell out of them, you own all their passwords to all their accounts, email, facebook, hi5, etc, and you do random checks on their text messages. It's all we can do aside from lock them in a tower until their 30 (which my husband would do in a heartbeat).

That's all until tomorrow, when I talk about ATTITUDE.

Kisses

:*

Megan

Middle Schoolers: Sleepovers

Sleepovers, the tortuous ritual we somehow get coaxed into about every other weekend. Why? I still cannot answer this question. Momentary lapse of reason, temporary insanity maybe.

We, as parents, get totally taken advantage of when it comes to sleepovers. The children, they empty the dishwasher fold the laundry without asking, and when we gloss over with that mushy look that's something between pride and insanity, they know they have taken control of our tiny parental minds.

"Could I have a couple friends sleep over?"

"Sure dear." No questions asked.

First fatal flaw.

A couple friends...
usually means I have six girls total between the ages of 11 and 14. They hole up in their room. It begins with quiet. This is just a ruse to make us think nothing bad is going to happen. Soon enough it sounds as if a herd of elephants is stampeding upstairs and you're pretty sure at least one of the girls will meet an untimely death.

You venture up to check on them. You enter the room and they're all sitting quietly on the floor talking. "What's going on?"

"Nothing."

"What was all that noise?"

"We were just bouncing the soccer ball around."

You leave them in their said circle, close the door, and wonder if the World Cup finals had just been played in your daughter's bedroom.

So, you go back to your movie, or whatever it is you're doing, crocheting, facebooking, drinking yourself into oblivion, and revel in the momentary quiet.

It starts again...
You fear the ceiling will cave in atop your head. You brave the stairs for a second time. By the time you reach the room, again the girls are sitting in a circle on the floor wearing smiles like something from the Village of the Damned. You're suprised there's not a pentagram surrounding them.

"What have you guys been doing?"

"Just talking."

"What was all that noise?"

"What noise?"

You back out of the room quietly, close the door, and wonder, only for a second, if their will be a human sacrifice made that evening.

But that's just the beginning. Earlier that day your wonderful, dutiful children have asked if you will buy stuff for rootbeer floats. You agree as they've earned it by doing their chores and both scoring goals in their soccer game the week before.

Second fatal flaw.

The sugar high begins...
At least now you know you're not crazy, because the noise races down the upstairs hall like a poltergeist, thunders down the stairs like rhino, and runs in circles through your living room, kitchen, hallway, back to the living room, again, and again, and again, all the while giggling and screeching. You begin to get dizzy, your head starts to pound. You feel like you will faint or vomit or both.

"Hey, why don't you guys watch a movie." Good idea Mom.

So they finally sit, with popcorn, and pop, and doritos, and anything and everything edible in your house that they can get their hands on, while they watch Mean Girls, or Ten Things I Hate About You, Juno, or Whip It, whatever angsty teen movie they're in the mood for.

They sit on the couch and chairs with their iPods and cell phones, texting, facebooking, etc during the beginning of the movie. Peace. This brand of quiet lasts about ten minutes. Then it's group trips to the bathroom, commence with the giggling. Up for water, more popcorn, juice, pop. You put up with it, you have to, you don't have a choice. The only way to stop it is to send them home, yet you don't want to be THAT mom. You go in your bedroom, lock the door, and hide until the movie ends.

Bed time...right.
You send them up to the bedroom, have them lay out their sleeping bags, crawl in them again with their iPods and their cell phones. This quiet lasts a little longer because they want you to think they're going to sleep. It could last thirty minutes, and hour, usually it lasts until you fall asleep.

Then you hear a scream...
Then giggling, then loud talking, then yelling, then stomping, pounding, thundering. You send in the big guns, Dad. He tells the girls to keep quiet. Lather, rinse, repeat. and again. and again. Repeat until you're so deliriously tired that even their voices that carry all the way to China and the stampeding can't keep you awake.

Then what do you do? You clean up after and reward the little dears, you who've found have stayed up until 5:00 am with a breakfast fit for queen, french toast, bacon, sliced strawberries, juice.

The parents can not come soon enough.

You vow never again. Of course, never again becomes, until-I-forget-how-horrible-it-is. And in two weeks you're doing it all over again.

Yeah, we're the ones in charge.

That's all for today.

Kisses

:*

Megan

Veering from my normal format

Since it's Thing Two's 12th birthday today, she invoked the power of the birthday and told me I should blog about her today.

Rachel came into the world in a difficult manner for all involved. She was born on Superbowl Sunday, Broncos vs Green Bay. It was hard keeping Rusty's attention through the pre-game show. I'm just thankful she was born before the game actually started. I was disappointed in the Bronco win, but what can you do?

She ingested meconium on her way out (yeah, I know, yuck) which almost killed her. So right off the bat the girl caused me trouble. Luckily I was really out of it and didn't really understand what was going on.

I was not so lucky when she was five weeks old and contracted the RSV virus. She couldn't breathe. We took her to the doctor, he said to watch her respirations. What he failed to tell us is that she could die. When her breathing got extremely labored we took her to the ER. The doctor there informed us of the severity of the virus and to keep an eye on her respirations. He also said if they had any open beds he would have admitted us, but the hospital was full.

A couple nights later, she could barely breathe. My dad and I took her back to the ER, we were immediately taken in back where her lungs were cleared. She was admitted to the ICU for a night, where the doctor told us that RSV for children that young is a big contributor to SIDS, and if we would have let it go one more night she would more than likely have died. We were in the hospital for five days total. I had an 18 month at home at the time that I missed terribly and only was able to see once during that time, but no way was I going to leave my baby's side. She was on a nebulizer for almost two years after that.

One more incident, we're crossing at the cross walk, the light is ours, and right when we are in front of a van, he decides to turn. I yanked Rachel's arm hard and pulled her out of the way. While I'm sure she wouldn't have been killed, I'm sure she would have been injured.

Since then the majority of our problems have involved temper tantrums, homework, and messy rooms. So we've been pretty lucky.

She's turned into a beautiful, talented, smart, and funny child, and I look forward to watching her continue to grow and mature.

So here's your blog Rachel. Happy birthday. I love you.