There is a constant anxiety in raising kids, whether it is reading, or the dentist, or screen time or bullying or any of it. In recent days, it has felt like there is always something, and unlike embracing milestones as when the kids were smaller, it is like waiting for the other shoe to drop. The best thing to do is to treat them like the milestones they are, but with the stress wearing from work, and life, there is a wearing down, of feeling run down so that it is not as easy to cope with the new issues. Other parents must feel the same way, there are memes and stories on Facebook and anecdotes from other parents that parallel our experience, but like adolescence, it feels like it is unique to you and makes you feel very lonely. All of this is more than balanced out by the joy of your child’s hug or desire to be with you, but it would be remiss if we did not document the challenges as well.
The day before New Year’s Eve, the Tamanahas came by to give the kids their present. On opening it, it turns out they gave the girls two beautiful dresses. These became the dresses they wore for New Year’s. The girls loved them so much they also wore them for the better part of January. If you look through the pictures, the girls wore them in almost every picture and it became a challenge to wash them since the girls would wear them day after day between washes.
We were cooped up most of the month, with trips to indoor playgrounds like Busy Bees, and Dave and Busters, and Scramble. We went to a number of birthday parties with Curie and Elia sometimes not going to them together as we had in the past. Curie has taken the time to have play dates with each of us as parents, and insisted that Albert work out while she watched something before playing (Albert has been on a work out kick for two months).
The girls got their hair cuts again, with a marathon detangling at the hair cutting place. The same day we went to lunch with Natalie’s family and took them to A&Js after the first place was too crowded. Next to A&Js they opened up a new cafe with fantastic lighting and we spent a bit of time there taking pictures of the families and kids. Earlier that day we had tried kite flying, but the wind was gusting too much for it to be successful. We did get the diamond kite very high up but it got too cold and we went to lunch.
When Etta got her first belt we went to her belt test to cheer her on. The instructors were pleased to see that Curie was supporting her friends, so when Isabella started EMA, we also went to cheer her on for her belt test. We have been spending more time with the Nunez’s than with Jamie and Etta, partly because they are willing to be spontaneous with us more than most friends we have. Isabella is a good influence on Curie as well, and that doesn’t hurt our willingness to spend time at all.
Albert has started drawing for the kids (he should be drawing with the kids and teaching them to draw, but that will come in time), and he has been creating cartoon characters of all of us. He has also been making pancakes of flowers and cartoon characters so it made sense that if he was making cartoon characters of us, that pancakes of us would be made too.
So we don’t often talk about our stress, so it is probably a good thing that we do from time to time. Erin’s CEO was let go again, so she is working in a challenging environment again. Albert is letting the little things get to him making it hard to deal with the bigger issues. We are busy and forgetting to do the things daily that we should to be good parents, good people. The house is a mess, we aren’t taking care of the yard, we don’t wash our cars. But we do have dance parties, hugs, long sits with the kids while watching too much TV, and in the end that is what we will remember, so maybe we are doing something right, and we all have to balance so perhaps we shouldn’t be so hard on ourselves (but still have to go make lunch for tomorrow).