Raising Strong Girls

In October of 2011, I ran the Milwaukee Marathon. I followed a training schedule and made sure I would be prepared for it. That meant giving up several long mornings to fit in 20-mile runs, which also left me pretty exhausted for the rest of the day. It was difficult balancing my family with my training. Months of preparation, both physically and mentally went into the run and I felt like it was a huge accomplishment. I was proud of myself. However, what made me the proudest was not that I finished for myself, or my husband, or the friends and kids on my cross country came who watched me run. It was seeing my three girls as I ran that last leg to the finish that brought tears to my eyes. Knowing that they saw their mom do something that a lot of people can't do and something that took determination and goals and literal blood, sweat and tears to do, made me feel like I accomplished something huge as a mom.

I often try to show my girls that women can do anything. I tell them they can be anything they want to be. They can be a doctor, a teacher, a firefighter, a waitress, or even the president. I make sure they know that I can do stuff around the house just like Daddy can and even though Daddy can run and bike faster than me, I still run and bike the hardest I can. This past week, I built a small brick wall by our patio and I had to chisel two bricks in half to complete it and Lydia told me there's no way I could cut a brick in half, but I made sure that once I did, she saw it and she knew that something she thought was impossible actually wasn't.

I let them choose to wear whatever they want. Audrey is a huge fan of dresses and skirts. For her birthday, she wanted a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle T-shirt. When the grandma of one of the kids who came to Audrey's birthday party asked me for some gift ideas, I listed a bunch of things and kind of threw that in as an afterthought, "Oh, you know what else? She said she wants a Ninja Turtle T-shirt." I'm so glad that grandma got Audrey not one but TWO Ninja Turtle T-shirts that Audrey just loves to wear. Often with skirts.

I know it's not a new idea to try to raise strong girls, but I feel like I didn't become a very strong person until later in life. Not any fault of my own mother, but I was just a very quiet kid and not very outgoing. I was very self-conscious.  Team sports embarrassed me because I was never as good as the other kids on the team. Individual sports were absolutely terrifying. I rarely spoke up for myself and was fine not rocking the boat. That's not how my girls are, and I hope they continue to be strong in whatever they do. And I hope that years down the road, they will be grateful for my role in what they became. 

Latest Interviews

I like to interview the girls a couple of times a year just to document what's going on in their lives and what they're like. So, here are today's interviews. My favorite is the last one, which is Lydia interviewing Audrey while Charlie behaves like... well, Charlie.

Lydia's interview:

Audrey's interview:

Charlie's interview:

Lydia interviewing Audrey:

More From the Girl with the Camera

Lydia has been quite the shutterbug lately. Here are some more examples of her work.

I will spare you the following:

• Several pictures of her name on various pieces of paper from school.
• Several pictures of her room.
• 115 blurry pictures from the Prom grand march at my school. Most with people in them. In some, you can even tell who the people are. Also, a 27-second video. She did get some actual clear shots of the king and queen being crowned.
• Several pictures of TV shows on the TV. I'll include this one though, because I like Audrey's cameo.

Here are some she took with Charlie:

This video had me laughing until I cried. I have no words.

There's another one very similar to it that I can't post because Jayson is shirtless in the background and he would be pissed, but imagine almost the same video with him walking through in the background with no indication that he is aware of the weirdness our daughter is displaying other than one single confused glance in her direction and then he continues to go about his business. I'm pretty sure that will be his disposition 99% of the time when they're teenagers.

This instructional video of her letting the dog out. I know my phone number is at the end, so don't try anything fancy.

Let the Activities Begin

Our first full week of summer vacation and we hit the ground running. Lydia has baseball Monday through Thursday in the morning and games will be Thursday nights starting in a couple weeks. Audrey has tee ball every Wednesday night. Lydia and Audrey have swim lessons every day before lunch. Lydia has violin on Thursday mornings. Charlie comes along for the ride because by the third child we figured out that paying $75 to go in a pool with your kid and sing, "Look Who Came to Swim Today," isn't worth it when you can just go swimming by your dang self and toss her in the water.

I LOVE keeping the girls busy. They are occupied, they fight less, they don't get out every single toy we own and leave it in the front yard, and they are EXHAUSTED by bed time. Like, their head hits the pillow and they're out.

A few things that have happened this week:

• Lydia has Coach Nick for baseball again. Lydia LOOOOOOVES Coach Nick and Coach Nick has a soft spot for Lydia too. It's a good situation.
• Jayson and I have been taking turns biking to baseball with Lydia and then going on a ride while she has her practice. Biking with a child is not easy. Unless the road is completely flat. If it's uphill, her legs hurt. If it's downhill, she's scared. But, she's getting the hang of it. I'm amazed at how far she has come this spring.
• Audrey passed Lydia in swim lessons on the second day. When it happened, Lydia was OK with it and figured she would just pass to the next level the next day. She didn't. Audrey was in the deep end learning the freaking front crawl while Lydia was bobbing with her kick board. It was humbling for her. And heartbreaking for me. I wanted to tell Audrey how amazing it was that she passed a 7 year-old and was already in level 4, but it was hard to do when the 7 year-old was Lydia. It was a good opportunity for me to talk to Lydia about many things, including: Staying positive, not worrying about others, staying focused when she's supposed to be listening, and emphasizing her strengths. She asked me in tears, "Tell me again all the things I'm better at than Audrey."
• Audrey is a fish. She would wear her swim cap and goggles all day long if we let her.
• We have a playdate tomorrow with one of Audrey's friends. His mom told me that she thinks he would die if he had to go the whole summer without seeing Audrey. We can't let that happen. This kid is awesome and I can't wait to have him over. When Audrey had her birthday party, he was super into the water, so we're planning on a lot of water play again. Audrey wants to have a lot of playdates this summer, so I'm going to try to do one every week or so. 

Summer Vacation!

The girls and I had our last day of school last week Wednesday. Jayson and I are very, very fortunate to have jobs that allow us to be home with our girls all summer. We were so excited for this summer because the girls are finally at an age where we can plan activities with very few restrictions. No diapers, no nap times, no strollers. I have a whole list of things to do stored on my computer. Here is what we have done so far.

Wednesday: After school, I went out for a beer with my coworkers. We do it every last day of school and it's a nice kick-off to the summer. When I got home, the whole family went to Orange Leaf for a fundraiser for The Scenic Shore 150.

Thursday: I had to clean the house. I have a good dose of OCD and ADD in me and I simply cannot live in a good head space when my house is messy. Once I was able to finish cleaning, I felt like summer actually started. I ended the day with a meeting for the cross country team to kick-off our summer training.

Friday: Jayson had a doctors appointment in the morning, then we made a family run to Target. We took the girls out to lunch at one of their favorite pizza places.

Saturday: Audrey had a birthday party to go to, and then we went to a party at a friend's house. They do yard olympics. I had to miss it last year with my emergency appendectomy, but this year Jayson and I won! I also ran into a former student, who was a senior my first year teaching, and is now 24, out of college, and a real person, which is weird. The girls had so much fun at the party playing with the other kids, and again, Jayson and I were reminded of how nice it was for them to be old enough to go off on their own.

Sunday: Father's Day! The art museum had free admission and the girls' favorite band, Fox and Branch was playing. They had a lot of activities for kids and we had a blast. Then we went to the Third Ward to have lunch at the Ale House. The service was terrible and the kitchen was backed up. We waited forever. Luckily, the girls were still going strong and we didn't have any meltdowns.

And today... We began Lydia's baseball season. She got her favorite coach from last year, Coach Nick, and was absolutely ecstatic. Then we began a two-week swim lesson session for Lydia and Audrey. They are the only ones in their class! So, they got a lot of attention and had a blast. They can't wait to go back tomorrow. We had planned on using a Groupon that expired today for pizza and bowling, but the place was closed. A bit of a bummer, but we were close enough to Uncle Kyle's shop to stop by for a visit, then came home to play and mow the lawn.

The girls already are slightly bronzed and exhausted every night, which is how summer is supposed to be! After weeks of getting up at 6:00am, Charlie slept past 8:00 today.

The Day We Rewarded Our Daughter for Mediocre Behavior

Lydia has had her ups and downs at school. We've struggled with poor behavior (mostly not doing what she's supposed to be doing and ignoring efforts to get her on track). We've found a system of rewards and consequences that works well for her and have often bribed her with rewards for a good week at school. It works well and she has come a long way from last year.

Audrey has had absolutely no behavior problems at all. She is a star student. Teachers love her. Other parents compliment us. She loves school and gets off the bus with a huge smile on her face, ready to tell us all about her day. Her teacher has different levels of behavior, with Double Outstanding Choices at the top, followed by Outstanding Choices, Good Choices, Ready to Learn, Turn Your Day Around, and then a level or two lower than that. I don't even know what the lower levels are because Audrey has never ended her day on anything lower than Good Choices. She comes home so excited to tell us what she was on for the day, and even Charlie questions her when she gets off the bus, "Outstanding Choices today, Audrey? Or Good Choices?" Audrey tells us all about the kids who end up on Ready to Learn or lower and talks about them like they have fallen from grace.

Yesterday, Audrey got moved to Turn Your Day Around for talking during carpet time. It was devastating. She eventually moved up to Ready to Learn, but it was still the worst day in her little 4K life. She got off the bus so upset and cried when she told Jayson what happened. Jayson emailed her teacher about something unrelated, but mentioned Audrey's day, and when Mr. K responded, he told Jayson how upset Audrey was at the end of the day and he had talked to her about how it's OK and tomorrow would be a new day and she could do better. He also seemed to feel awful that she felt so bad about it.

When Jayson told me about Audrey's mood when she got off the bus and forwarded me the email, I felt so bad for her. If only she knew what we dealt with with Lydia. Then she would realize that in the grand scheme of things, she was actually doing an amazing job.

So, we did the only rational thing. We took her out for ice cream. We told her how great her behavior was and how proud we are of her for always being so good. Her sisters also had good days, so they got ice cream too. Ice cream for everybody! All because Audrey behaved just OK.

Lydia: Future Internet Phenomenon

Lydia asked Grandma Deb for a digital camera for her birthday, and Grandma Deb did not disappoint. Lydia is obsessed with the camera and is plowing through batteries like crazy. I got a chance to take a look at her pictures and found that she's pretty much got the digital picture thing down. She asked me to put them on the internet. So, here are the classic pictures that every internet poster needs. Here we go:

1) Picture of a picture.

2) Picture of food:

3) Picture of friend making a "duck face":

4) Creeping on the neighbors:

5) Your parents looking stupid:

6) Selfie.

She's ready for Facebook!