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Wednesday, August 04, 2010
Something is stressing Jack at the moment - he is back to picking his
nose and licking his lips more often, and his moods are strange and very
up and down. Tonight, on his third or fourth stay in the naughty corner,
Jack had a visit from Grace. She wandered over to him, said hello,
grabbed him by his hair and gave him a kiss. It was as if she knew he
wasn't having a good evening, so tried to make him feel better.
I'm going through an organising, neatening and throwing out phase at the
moment - trying to de-clutter the house a bit. The study has been the
focus of my attention for the last few days.
Posted by Doug at 8:02 PM
Thursday, August 05, 2010
We are in a strange new phase with Jack. All of a sudden our regime of
punishments - the naughty corner, going to bed earlier, and no computer
time, are all of no consequence to him. Instead of tears we get a
turned up nose with a nonchalant or defiant look. Often, soon after,
his punished behaviour returns. He also seems far less grateful than
usual, and is far more prone to lying to us.
He only just turned 5, not 15.
Anyway, we think he has probably been on too good a wicket for too long,
in the sense of getting want he wants and asks for more often than not.
He rarely has to wait long for anything. We are contributing to the
making of a spoilt brat…
The only level of unease about this diagnosis is the fact recently he
has taken to licking his lips all the time, ending up with a red clown
like ring around his lips. That is usually a sign of higher anxiety
with him. That might be something going on at childcare, or he might
already been stressing over the occasional mention of school.
Either way, Jack is going to be hearing the words "no", and "you have to
wait" a lot more in his future.
Posted by Doug at 7:02 PM
Sunday, August 08, 2010
Al turned 38 yesterday. Birthdays can be a bit hit and miss when you are
a parent with young kids. It is hard to feel like it is a special day
focused on you, when the normal demands of life are thrown at you
between fleeting moments of unwrapping presents and eating cake.
We managed to cook breakfast and lunch for her, give her some quiet time
in the middle of the day, go on a family outing to the Museum, and have
takeaway for tea, which overall made for an acceptable day. The real
“me” time for Al comes tomorrow, where she has taken the day off, and
has a couple hours at a day spa and then an appointment at the
hairdresser.
Posted by Doug at 11:13 PM
Monday, August 09, 2010
Grace is currently running into and out of my Study yelling "Hooray".
(And I mean running - in a precarious skipping / hoping sort of way.)
She seems rather pleased with herself.
We had the front fascia on the house repaired / repainted today - after
10 years of weathering and a beating from that hail storm.
Posted by Doug at 5:33 PM
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Al and the kids have just left. Al was a little flustered due to
running late (her relaxation from yesterday probably a distant memory),
Jack was crying because Grace had hit him in the face, and Grace was
chuckling to herself. Al is off to work, the kids to childcare, and I
have a quiet day at home working.
Posted by Doug at 9:27 AM
Monday, August 16, 2010
Grace has two new tricks. The first is picking up 3 or 4 small balls at
once and carrying them around. It can be amusing watching her getting
all the balls grasped firmly against her arms and chest. The second is
to open doors by herself. That one isn't so amusing for us...
Posted by Doug at 7:26 AM
For the last few days Grace has gone to bed just after 7pm. This has
worked well from a scheduling point of view, so tonight Al has decided
she would try to make this the new routine. Up until now Grace has
generally decided when she would go to sleep, and tonight that wasn’t
going to be early.
You can see where this is going.
After 40 minutes, some unusually distraught crying, and 4 attempts
later, Grace appears to have gone down. Score one for Al. Of course,
it took much more effort than normal, and Grace has the rest of the
night to extract her revenge. And there is of course tomorrow night,
and the night after, and so and on and so forth…
Posted by Doug at 8:40 PM
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Revenge turned out to a cheerful awake period between 3 and 4am, a
handful of other shorter wake ups, and a 6:20am start to the new day.
At least they are both still cheerful enough.
Jack was also up at 2am last night complaining of a sore stomach and
farting like a trooper. It is still borderline on if we send him to
Childcare or not. Waiting to see how he is after breakfast.
I have the week off to rest and catch up on things around the house. It
will be a struggle to be cheerful if I lose one of those precious and
much needed down days to taking care of a sick child.
Posted by Doug at 8:32 AM
Thursday, August 19, 2010
So far for my week off…
On Monday I ran errands, visited Officeworks to restock the stationary
supplies, and cleaned, neatened and organised half of my study,
including some of the cabling.
On Tuesday I sat down, closed the blinds, turned up the surround sound,
and watched Avatar for the first time. I had low expectations, and so
found it an enjoyable watch. I also went through the kid’s downstairs
toy collections, and quietly threw out 3 bags worth. Well overdue. (We
sent Jack to childcare on Tuesday, which turned out to be the right
decision. He had no temperature, and simply had not eaten enough food
the night before.)
On Wednesday morning I purchased and installed a new video card for my
PC (no more fan blowing into the case anymore), and in the afternoon
visited Science works with the family. (Jack did not really learn
anything, but he was excited by how much there was for him to interact
with.)
Today I had lunch with Al, and we finally organised framing the last
large studio photo we got. This will hopefully be ready in a fortnight.
Tomorrow I am aiming to do as little productive running around as
possible and just play on my computer for much of the day. I can only
dream…
Al’s reprograming of Grace’s night time routine is going relatively well
– in so much as she is generally getting her to sleep before 8pm without
excessive battling. Grace does seem to be up much more during the night
however, and Al is missing out on her sleep ins most mornings.
Posted by Doug at 10:31 PM
Friday, August 20, 2010
Every other month I gather a collection of broken toys and knickknacks,
open a little tube of superglue, and set about repairing them. Each
tube costs around $3, and you throw it away afterwards.
The other week I picked up a collection of 10 little tubes for $3 at the
supermarket. I used one the other night – but instead of the expected
consistency, the glue came out like water. Needless to say I was not
expecting that, so got Superglue all over the toy I was trying to
repair, my hand and the kitchen bench.
The 9 other tubes have gone into the bin…
Posted by Doug at 11:45 AM
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Al transferred from our room to the nursery at 5:40am this morning. As
she left to answer the crying Grace, I mumbled half sleepily that she
had almost made it through the night. Turned out she had – Grace
decided she had enough sleep and was up for the day.
We had to replace our main TV on the weekend. The digital tuner in the
old one died. (The term old is relative; we purchased it 3 years and 1
month ago…) The new TV is a little bigger, and is able to make the most
of our upgraded network. It connects to the internet, and can show our
photos, play music and view videos from our NAS.
(Funny enough I assumed the TV was out of warrantee, but in trying to
work out how old it was I found the receipt attached to an extended 5
year warrantee. It seemed most unlike me to get such an extension, but
the price suggests it was a rather good deal. I guess I will make a
call tomorrow to see what we need to do to have it repaired.)
Posted by Doug at 6:22 PM
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Al was a touch despondent, grumpy and tired this morning as the logical
consequence of her putting Grace to bed early hit yet again. Grace slept
through the night for the second time – but started her day at 5:20am.
That in turn woke up Jack early, which in turn meant I was woken up
early. Al’s effort to improve the night time scheduling is biting the
morning schedule in the backside.
Posted by Doug at 7:21 AM
The kids have a very busy day. There is Grace's music, then a visit to a
play centre, then Jack's Ready Steady Go, then Play Group, then home for
a while before both go to the dentist this afternoon, and then Jack has
his first evening swimming lesson. Little wonder Al was unsettled at how
early both of them were up.
Al just sent an SMS from the carpark outside music - both Jack and Grace
had fallen asleep in the car on the drive there. It does not bode well.
In my future I see feral overtired children and wife.
Posted by Doug at 9:24 AM
Both kids handled the visit to the dentist well. Jack liked his new
night time swimming instructor – and he went well. The centre is a lot
busier and louder in the evenings, and Jack has gone from one of the
biggest kids walking around to one of the smallest. We had a late meal
of fish and chips (since there wasn’t time to cook), and both kids
conked out very quickly when they went to bed.
Posted by Doug at 7:59 PM
Monday, August 30, 2010
The TV was fixed today – and will be relegated to our bedroom (which Al
is happy about). The whole process was relatively painless, and the
repairman quick and friendly. We now have 4 TV’s –the main one in the
living area, one in my study, one in our bedroom, and the old CRT in the
kids upstairs play area. That is somewhat embarrassing.
We need to find ourselves a small and slim DVD player (there isn’t much
room for it), and get an electrician in for a new power point to finish
/ polish off the TV’s move. I asked the repairman how much the job
would have cost if not under warranty, and he indicated a bit over $400.
The extended warranty turned out to be well worth while.
Jack attended little Lochie’s 4th birthday party on the weekend – which
was at a bowling alley. Jack scored 84 (if memory serves me correctly)
and really enjoyed himself.
Posted by Doug at 6:11 PM
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