Halloween!

We don't really celebrate Halloween, I guess, but the girl wanted to do something so we had a mini Halloween party at our house for us and a neighbour. Making decorations consumed the afternoon (yay!) and then we had our spooky supper. Rented a Scooby Doo movie but I had to turn it off. It was called 'Scooby Doo and the witch of ______', but I assumed it would be in typical Scooby style where the monsters are never real and there is no connection to evil forces, etc. Not the case in this one. With phrases like, "We're not witches, we're super cool Wiccans who love nature and use healing herbs', a witch like girl band called 'The Hex Girls', a spell book that could control the evil forces of darkness.... Yah, just not ready for my kids add the word 'Wiccan' to their vocabulary, or to think that being an Eco-Goth witch is in any way cool. We played 'pin the eyes and mouth on the jackolantern' and attempted limbo (our guest had a broken foot so that was not so easy of a game). To replace the failed Scooby Doo, Chris found Charlie Brown and the Great Pumpkin and rented it. Then we trick and treated at Gemma's friend's house as we took her home. Pretty fun!

As we were riding home from dropping Friend off, I told Gemma we had to stop at our across the hall neighbour to trick or treat, and Gemma said, "I have to trick or treat at two houses!!! I'm so tired, mom. Trick or treating is really hard work!" TWO HOUSES! Our girl needs some exposure to more American culture, eh?

Of course I love Saturdays, the kids and I have been having a blast lately. Play play play!!

Art Sale

I'm going to write about the art sale we had here... but I'm too tired. More later.

Really?

Am I really packing away my daughter's 4T clothing? Are there really 4T items in her closet that don't fit anymore? How did this happen? How can it have been 5 years since we watched her kick my belly from the inside, and put all those newborn clothes in the shelves? (carefully washed in newborn soap, of course).

Ok, have to stop before I cry :( sniff sniff.

Thoughtful...

We were watching regular TV (which we don't often do because we don't know the timing of the programming and don't often catch a show I think is worthy of watching)) and Gemma saw a PSP commercial. (a handgeld video game device). She asked if she could have one, and I said, "Well, you already have an iPhone and can use mommy's iPad. I don't think so." She replied, "Well, if Guinness had an iPhone and an iPad, he would be SUPER happy, and I really want him to be super happy, so you could get me the PSP."

Yah right! Along the lines of a book we just read called, "I wanna Iguana", where the boy and mom write notes back and forth reasoning about wether he should get this pet or not.

I HAVE to start putting pictures up here. Might have to take over the family photographer role.

Finally decided...

Gemma was working hard on a Dora coloring book last night. She looked up and announced, "I FINALLY decided what I want to be when I grow up! An Artist! That's why I have to work so hard on my pictures, and practice a lot!"

Sweetie!

So many funny stories, but I can never remember. Ballet classes have started, that's fun for her. School is going GREAT! She loves it and is doing fine, learning Chinese actually and finally speaking it a bit more

Starting to get excited about the big birthday party :)

Jealous!

So, anyone else get jealous of their kid's homework? Gemma does some really neat tracing and coloring. And last week she was learning about shapes so we went on a shape hunt with the camera in the yard and took pictures of the shapes so we could make a book. I was pysched about the whole project, she was moderately interested. And then I had a great idea for the cover which she totally dismissed! And then she didn't even want to put in the cool sticker labels I made!!

I can totally see us each handing in our own assignments to her teachers. "Sorry I have two dioramas, Mr. K. My mom was so excited she made one, too."

Ha ha! Maybe I need a more grownup creative outlet.

Saturday Sleepover

If you know anything about Gemma you will know that she has always been a terrible sleeper. A lot of it is our fault, but throw in pretty regular confusional arousals and you have a kid (and parents) who haven't slept through the night that much in the last 4 1/2 years. This summer was the final kicker, literally... it just got to be too much of sharing a bed with her because she kicks and turns and yells and gets mad, and spreads out. She'd go to sleep in her bed, move to our bed, so I'd move to her bed, so then she'd come down there... like musical chairs all night long. So the biggest parenting goal of fall 2011 has been sleep training Gemma. Started with a mat on our floor and the new rule: No More Sleeping in Mom and Dad's Bed. Period. Well, that didn't work at all because she would just 5 seconds for me to fall asleep and come to the mat. Perfect for her because she was right close to us where she wanted to be. Plan B, sigh... so I slept on the floor of her room on the mat for 2 weeks. Why? Well, I've done a lot of reading and research on sleep, and one of the big things about sleep is that everyone wakes up periodically throughout the night. Our body does this to keep us safe; maybe you wake up and smell smoke and then you can rouse yourself out of sleep to get out, or hear a sound, or whatever. But most of the time, when things are fine, your body wakes up, does a quick check that everything is fine, and goes back to sleep. As adults we don't even really notice this. This might be when you stretch out, or readjust your pillow. But children need to be trained to put themselves back to sleep. No you can do this training when they are infants by letting them cry a bit or letting them fall asleep on their own without holding, rocking, nursing, etc, not rushing to them when they wake up.... (and our problems with Gemma go back this far people) and Gemma is is such a habit of WakeUp, My Mom is Not Here! GO GET HER! And so I figured that if I can get her in the habit of sleeping all night in her own bed, that would be HUGE. And it was. Every night for 2 weeks, with no cheating or skipping out, or sneaking back to my own bed at 3am, when Gemma woke up and checked for me, there I was. I could assure her with my voice, and convince her to go back to sleep. The no-cheating part is important because she has to trust that going to sleep in her bed is OK; when you go to sleep worried about something of course you are restless and wake up checking for that exact thing. Knowing I would be there allowed her to relax and sleep better. And so after the 2 weeks, I moved. We've been dialoguing about how she was learning to sleep in her own bed a lot, and she just accepted it. And we've had success! She still wakes up sometimes, but we just remind her that she can't sleep in our bed, and she should just go back to sleep, AND SHE DOES!


Sigh. Of. Relief.


So what is Saturday sleepover? Well, it is the new Saturday thing in the McKenzie house, as a reward for sleeping by herself all week, to meet the need she has for special playtime with Mommy, for the hard work she does by being an 8 hour a day student, for playing nicely by herself on Friday nights when it is grown up friend night. Saturday night is sleepover night! Any theme, any activity, treats, tents, decorations, whatever. Almost anything goes. We rent movies, we make cakes, we have a spa, we do a circus. And we sleep together all night long. Which is ok in this situation because it is on my terms. Yesterday was awesome, because Gemma was so prepared. The first thing she did Saturday morning was pack our backpacks for the sleepover. (We don't usually do backpacks because we're just staying home, but she wanted us to each have a back pack of stuff we would need. Mine had a book, stickers, and a cape. Hers had her jammies, and a book, and some toys.) We made decorations in the morning and hung them up so we'd be ready. It is all too cute, and once Guinness goes to bed it is game on for us. So much fun!!!

A phone call...

So I get a phone call at school this week. From my mother in law. Of course I was worried; why would she be calling me at school??? And she tells me that she just got off the phone with Gemma at our house. And that Gemma was all alone. "WHAT???" I yelp! And MIL eleborates; 'Well, her daddy is sleeping and she is afraid to wake him up because then he'll make her go to school.' Oh dear! The babysitter had come early and whisked Guinness away, and so Gemma was just hanging out watching shows as quietly as she could to avoid going to school. What a turkey!!!

We've had a successful few weeks of sleep training. But it will take me too long to write about it now, so I'll save it for later.

Some of OUR favorite books

I've been working in the library at school this year a bit, and so have taken home all my favorite kids books. Thought we'd share!



This was one o the first books I got from the library for Gemma and she loved it, so I brought it home for Guinness and he loves it too. Nice art.




Haha! Super super funny!!! (If you don't know about Mo Willems, you need to get on board. Knuffle Bunny is another favorite of mine)






Fancy Nancy ; Ooh La La! Its Beauty Day!!!

Ok, I was laughing my head off! And if you do not laugh your head off when you get to the second last page then call me crazy, but it is one of the funniest things I've seen in a book. Fancy Nancy teaches some great new words, and she is very thoughtful and kind to others. She has good ways to solve problems, too. We also liked 'The Show Must Go On'. Awesome story!

In an amazing turn of events...

We all know that Gemma looks just like Chris, but her 'brain' is a lot more like mine. Scatterbrained, forgetful, can't find things like an inch on front of her nose, ditzy. But she is showing signs of having hand eye coordination, something which I am lacking and her father has in spades. We were playing tennis today and she hit about 7 in a row, really nailing them. She hits the ball a lot of the time. Could it be possible that my children have a hope at athletics???

Play Therapy?

How can you tell that our daughter has two tired working parents?

When her brother asks her to play, she says, "Not now, I'm tired. I need to have a short rest."

Funny, and sad.

Thankfully her desire to play won out over her desire to express her frustration with her parents, and now Guinness is busy scuttling back and forth getting the things she needs for her rest. "Go get my blanket." "Go get me something to cuddle with." And Guinness is happy to oblige.

Megaphone

Today Gemma was using a slinky held up to her mouth as a megaphone. This was her message to the world:

"Parents should not punish their children anymore. Instead they should just whack them and then let them play" (This was just after I left Guinness to howl and cry in his high chair for 5 minutes because he walked away from the table without his hands being washed and then he wouldn't listen or come with me and made me spill a cup of water)

"Parents should also not ever boss the children around, or make them do things for them like get a diaper. This is the command of the LORD!!"

She's also been trying some new phrases lately, like 'Let's shake it up'. And once we have 'shaken it up', maybe by letting Guinness sit in the back of the sit and stand while she rides in the front, she'll announce to everyone we see how we 'shook it up' on the way here. So proud of her new phrases! She had one other one today but I forget. Give it a whirl, maybe?

Singing Class

So this is how I can tell that Gemma has had more formal music class at Chinese school than anywhere else: when she is performing a made up a song for me, it is filled with the syllables do re mi fa so bo po mo fo la ti do ge ke he le...

(this is a mix of singing syllables of course, and bo po mo fo, the Chinese phonetic alphabet.)

Gemma's Joke

What did the pig and the cow say to the police man?

Waaahhhh!!!!! (slight pause) Sausage pants!


??????????????????? Oh dear when does the comedy section of their brain develop??

Gemma's friend

I am so thankful that Gemma's good friend Halle is still here! They have played together everyday since we've been home, and it is so nice.

Today I played with them a lot, I was the pet shop owner and the veterinarian and sold and cared for a variety of exotic pets. We made a craft, played with water up on the roof... but I seriously can't keep up with the demands of 3 children.

You come watch my monkey show.
Hold the hose
Blow some bubbles
He pushed me
Let's have a snack
Lets do something
You be the teacher and you say this and then I'll raise my hand and answer the question, ok?
Can we do this?
Can you do this?
Can you say this?
Come watch this!


Not to mention the parental responsibilities I am trying to manage at the same time; water bottle, sunscreen, safety, cleanliness, behavior, time keeper. My head was spinning at the end of the day.

I'm so romantic...

"I'm so romantic I should marry myself!" Thats what she said. I think she heard this on a movie though, but I can't think of which one.

I have some fantastic fun things for us to do on the plane tomorrow if Guinness isn't being a major stinker. She is at such a neat age for she can sit and concentrate on a coloring book or drawing for more than 3 seconds, which is great. So I think she'll have her best flight ever. I hope!

Commercial Day

I prayed a lot today, I was so nervous about what to expect. Especially when on Tuesday I got a text saying it would be 10 hours. I called the agent immediately and said, "You do know she is only FOUR years old, right?" and she said of course, it wouldn't take that long, and that was the maximum number but it definitely wouldn't be that long, etc etc. So ok, here we go.

Annabelle took her to the north end of the city to meet the agent, who then drove them to a location. I guess it was a pretty big deal shoot. Lots of models, locations, etc, and for a pretty big name company (in Taiwan, anyway :) So Annabelle and Gemma waited for a while, then it was her turn. She told me, "There were these machines that lifted the people up and then they dropped the petals on me! I just had to catch them and play with them. It was really fun!!" I mean, what little girl wouldn't love to have millions of flower petals tossed down all around them ??? There were other kids there to play with, too, which made it fun. After that scene, they waited. And waited. And waited. The agent said they wanted to do one more scene yet, but then after about 3 hours of waiting, they said Gemma could go. So her day started at 11am, and she was done by 5. And over half that time was playing with other kids and visiting with Annabelle, which is so precious since our time with her is almost gone. The pay? 6000NT - about 200 bucks. Which of course we have to pay Annabelle out of, etc, but not bad for standing around at Danshui all day.

So we'll see if we do it again. The risk of having my kid out working for hours and hours and hours is not cool, so I will definitely ask about that before agreeing to the job. For us, we need to have someone who can take her to the jobs, since Chris and I work. But to me, if she likes it and is having fun then its not a big deal. The lady asked Annabelle if she trained Gemma to act like that, because she was so professional, and I laughed and laughed. Nope, lady. That is just how Gemma acts :)

I have no idea when we'll get to see the commercial, if ever. We don't watch a lot of TV here (that's not downloaded). But who knows? I hope to see it sometime.

The diva continues...

Gemma will be shooting her first commercial next week.

Very interested in the process. Very interested in how long it takes, and if she'll behave for that long. Very interested in how much it will pay, ha ha!! She is thrilled about 'acting surprised' as flower petals fall down all around her; this was part of the audition and a part of the commercial storyboard.

Will let you know...

Doing things her way

It is so funny that we had this argument again so close to mother's day; what she wants to wear. She has SO MANY cute clothes. I want to try them all, match carefully, see all the different outfits on her. She picks her favorite skirt and then we argue about which shirt matches it. I prefer pants or shorts, she likes skirts every day. She likes her long and down straight. I like it up and off her ears. The reason this is funny is I have very vivid memories of fighting with my mom about clothes, too. It takes all of my strength to bite my tongue and let her pick because I want to pick so badly. But our relationship being intact is more important than her wearing the outfit I like, and so I will do my best to keep it to myself!

Also doing things her way, she's been a bit constipated the last few weeks. Tonight she was super uncomfortable, I could tell by how she was walking and complaining and after her customary 10 second potty run and crying about how she can't do it (actually, her exact words were, "There's no use Mom, I can't push it out!!" ) I made her sit down and try for a longer time. We put the stool under her feet, got a story book and sat. And she's bouncing up and down on the toilet seat, saying this helped. I got her some water, and she would swish it around her mouth and then swallow, because that 'helped' too. Water swishing would be followed by more bouncing. "If I just do this 20 times, then it will come out" I was DYING trying to stop myself from laughing, it was absolutley hysterical. After about 10 minutes and no action she decided some PE was neccessary. so we went to the living room where she lead me through a series of stretches and exercises, and sure enough after that we went back to the potty and ta da!

When does it stop being ok to tell poop stories? It was just so so funny.

She does lots of funny things. I just can't remember them. Need to start keeping a list as they happen.

Meat

I know I facebooked this but I have to blog it, too, because it is so funny.

While talking with Gemma about the farm tour, the truth about where meat comes from came out. She totally doesn't believe it of course (that meat comes from cows) and has trying to process this new information. She asked me again on Saturday, "Are you SURE meat comes from cows?" Cuz I milked a cow at the farm and I was watching and no meat came out!"

Love it.