Does anyone else have a 3-year-old who continues to pine for more gifts to unwrap?

One who looks longingly into the corner where the Christmas tree stood and says, offhandedly, "Any more presents?"

A child who peers into backpacks and bags hopefully, thinking maybe a bonus gift was forgotten inside?

Here's what's helped us stem the disappointment of humdrum, non-present-opening life between Christmas and his birthday:

Giving each other pretend gifts wrapped in pretend paper.

I just need to preserve the cuteness.


(Dit-do is the name Karsten has given Alrik. We have no idea why. Dit-do decided on counting to 13 for hide-and-seek. Also no idea. I just go with it.)

And you'll see in the video that's only with about 70% success as it is.

I love the so-called terrible twos. Two-year-olds are adorable, and everything they do seems clever. Here's a video we uploaded mostly for the grandparents of their genius grandkid knowing his colors. And objects! And letters! Whut!


This is the "odd one out" color book we were reading. You can get it for cheapo used. But if you don't already have one bazillion books of colors and desire a new one, here's a link for your shopping pleasure.

He might be too young to play it, but he's not too young to say it.

Well worth the 24 seconds this takes to watch:



P.S. If you can't tell by the awe-inspiring attitude,
someone just turned 2.

Every autumn, we take photos in front of
a sweet maple tree outside our home
as the leaves change colors.



Karsten: 22 months
Mikko: 9 years
Alrik: 5 years

Breastfeeding on the left side so my right hand is free for important swiping-related activities.

I was curious why button-down shirts tailored to women button right over left whereas men's button left over right, and I came across this article from The Straight Dope by Cecil Adams (emphasis mine):

"Buttoning left over right — the man's way — is supposedly easiest for right-handed people. According to legend, women button right over left because in medieval times they were dressed by their right-handed maids. Don't buy it? Can't say as I blame you, but the alternative explanation is no improvement: men had to keep their right hand tucked into their coats so as to be ready for cold-weather swordplay, whereas women always breastfed with the left breast (hey, that's what it says here) and protected their babies by covering them with the right side of the dress or coat."

Now, these might not be the real reasons for the button differential, and I don't really care. (I find theories just as satisfying as answers for some of these burning questions in my brain.)

What interests me more is the new question that formed: Do you breastfeed more on your left side than your right, too?

I decided Karsten needed his own post of cuteness.















Was I right, or was I right?

I've often thought that dandelions are a child's perfect flowers.



They grow everywhere.

Guess it's official!

Over the years of helping our little pumpkins enjoy pumpkin-patch excitement, Sam has come up with a few tricks (treats?) for involving little kids in carving a jack o'lantern without losing any fingers in the process.

You could go with just drawn-on pumpkins if you want to make the easiest choice, but if you want to wield a knife and really cut that pumpkin up, here are our best ideas for toddlers, preschoolers, and elementary folk.

You can see the tips in action in our video, and I'll also describe below:

Welcome to the May 2014 Carnival of Natural Parenting: Ages and Stages

This post was written for inclusion in the monthly Carnival of Natural Parenting hosted by Hobo Mama and Code Name: Mama. This month our participants have talked about their children’s most rewarding and most challenging developmental periods. Please read to the end to find a list of links to the other carnival participants.

---

I'm currently living with an almost-three-year-old and an almost-seven-year-old, and I have to say: I've enjoyed all the ages so far. Here's my breakdown of what to expect and what to cherish from each age:

0 years old

This is a huge span, because you're going from a newborn to a toddler in one brief year. I say brief, but in my experience, this first year is one of the longest years of your life! In general, that's probably a good thing, so you can enjoy the newborn sleep-all-the-time phase (but then be quickly done with the never-sleep-anytime phase), those first early smiles (just gas? please!), the belly laughs of the four-to-six-month variety, and the burgeoning mobility of crawling, scooting, standing, and even walking (depending on how far your tot gets that first year) and the accompanying leaps in independence and learning. What an incredible year!

This is one in a series of guest posts by other bloggers. Read to the end for a longer biographical note on today's guest blogger, Mercedes from Project Procrastinot. I am in awe of parents of twins — and particularly those who manage to breastfeed two hungry babies through toddlerhood. Mercedes gives us her tips and comparisons for breastfeeding twin newborns vs. twin toddlers, so if you're in the same boat, take heart: It gets easier. Or, at least: different.

Guest post by Mercedes of Project Procrastinot

When my twins were born, I couldn't know for certain if I would reach my goal of breastfeeding them for one year. Now that they are sixteen months, the idea of weaning them seems very strange. It just doesn't feel like our time is up, although nursing toddlers has its own challenges.

Here are the main differences between nursing twin newborns and nursing older twins, in my experience.

Since Mikko was a baby, we've been dealing with drama surrounding elimination. When he was a toddler, this morphed into an unwillingness to defecate.

This is a post I've been debating whether or not to publish, and one I might take down at some point as Mikko gets older and needs more privacy. For now, I've decided to post it, because: (a) You're not alone if you're dealing with this same issue, and (b) there's nothing shameful about toileting issues, no matter what age. It can be really worth it to talk openly about struggles with going.

There are many reasons a child might have resistance to eliminating — some physical and some psychological. It's appropriate to rule out physical reasons first, and I am not a doctor, so check with your own medical providers for advice on any physical obstacles. We ruled out any sort of issues with physical structure or internal disorders with Mikko, so we were cleared to proceed with examining other causes.

The most common cause suggested for trouble pooping was not what Mikko's problem was. To whit, he does not suffer from constipation. Any time we brought up his hesitance to poop, we got advice on constipation — whether it was with his pediatrician or other well-meaning parents. But Mikko's stools are soft and well-formed and come along with regularity. Constipation was not his problem.¹ So what was?

Welcome to the Sunday Surf, a tour of the best blogposts I've read throughout the week.




Links!

3 hours ago

#photography
#newborns
#postpartum
View high resolution 
Touching Portraits of Mothers with Their One-Day-Old Babies - My Modern Metropolis, by photographer Jenny Lewis
3 days ago

#feeding
#Holidays
#food
#food intolerances
#dietary restrictions
The Holidays and Your Health | It Takes Time →
Really love these wise and simple rules for navigating emotional food-related land mines at holiday gatherings.
4 days ago

#baby-led solids
#solid foods
#toddler
#babies
That Mama Gretchen: Introducing First Foods →
A perfect primer and FAQ on baby-led solids.
5 days ago


#feminism
#parenting

The Imperfect Art of Raising a Feminist | ourfeministplayschool →

Beautiful article.

Parenting my daughter for the last 12 years has tested my understanding of myself, revealing the hypocrisy and imperfections inherent in my feminism. It’s an uncomfortable place to be.

Alrik is tootling along the potty learning road, but I feel like I don't know where the next turn is. Maybe you could help me navigate!

We did a very loose form of part-time elimination communication (EC) with Alrik from newborn age, combined with cloth diapering. I was much less active in ECing Alrik than I was with Mikko, partly because of some residual bad experiences we've had with poop withholding in Mikko. As time has gone on and I've researched it more, I've chalked that up to a sensory issue, but I'd had some fears that we'd somehow "caused" it by ECing so wasn't feeling as avid about infant pottying when Alrik was born, for fear we'd spur a repeat.

So, the good news is, when Alrik is pantsless, he's a near-100% potty user. The bad news is, when he's got anything on his rear, he doesn't bother to remove it before going.

What, then, is the next step?

By rights I should be putting up a massive Halloween retrospective today, but I'm too worn out from posting Gift Guide reviews.
(Stay tuned for the giveaway, live later today — it's going to be epic!)

So instead, I'm going to post a few pieces of
random cuteness from these past couple weeks.

First up, a very brief video of Alrik combining his quadruple loves of
martial arts, balloons, not wearing pants, and Team Umizoomi:



This kid's fierce.

Being a parent has taught me an important lesson: Kids love a ham. {Tweet me!}

Fortunately, parenting has also taught me how to become one.

Here are some more of our family's playful parenting ideas that work on toddlers, preschoolers, and elementary-age kids. (Try it with tweens and teens, and let me know….) Some kids will need a warmup period if they're not used to this kind of silliness; others will jump right in, so take it at your and your child's pace.

I've mentioned some of these before, but here are my kiddos' current favorites at 6 and 2, a mix of old and new.

• Baby washing machine

  I came up with this one randomly. I sit Alrik on my lap and tell him he's very dirty and needs to go through the washing machine. You know how you crack an "egg" on someone's head? You (gently) tap your fist with your other fist against the person's skull and then spreeead your hands all down their head and shoulders as if the egg is smearing all over. Well, I decided that worked just as well with fake soap and water. So I crack a detergent egg on his head: "Gotta get soap all over you!" And then: "Now it's time to get you wet!" Back the hands come to spread the water all down his head.
  
  Then, the fun part: "Agitate! Agitate! Swish-swish-swish-swish." I take him by both arms and (gently) shake him back and forth, back and forth.
  
  "Now we have to rinse you off!" Back with the water "egg" on his head. And then, the coup de grâce: "And now into the dryer with you!" And I blow on his head till his hair flies.
  
  Alrik is astonishingly patient during this whole process. He thinks it's funny and yet apparently something he needs to sit very still for. It cracks me up. So, enjoy — Baby Washing Machine!

• Stop scaring me!

  Alrik likes to pretend to be a dinosaur or other monster and jump out to scare us. Woe betide us if we roar back or do anything but pretend to be terrified.
  
  I'm thinking you could initiate this game with a kid if you give the suggestion that the child is a dinosaur (or something equally ferocious) and then feign stark terror.

You'd think kids starting their first day of (un)school would look a little happier
and a little less like facing a firing squad.


Oh, well, good enough.
This was Mikko's first (homeschooling) day of first grade,
and you can see he was thrilled to start the day.
We went out for breakfast and then debated our options.


Bowling!


I'm pretty sure all of those are too big for you, sweet thing.
As were all the bowling shoes.


But he was top notch at rooting for everyone else!


This local alley was cool, because they entered into the computer that Mikko was a kid;
when it was his turn, metal bumpers automatically rose out of the gutters and then
went back down for my turn. (Sniff.)

To celebrate the release of my new book on homeschooling, I had a thought of doing a Wordless Wednesday with a catalog of all our recent unschooling, home-education, natural-learning photos. As it turns out, there are far too many, so I decided instead to put in a few examples from the eight class headings the state of Washington informs me are the key curricular subjects that every home educator must address.

Enjoy a glimpse into our kids' everyday learning!

Language Arts

A very happy boy with a book


Reading clues in a scavenger hunt


Writing letters to the grandmothers

Mathematics

A chess match


Playing with shapes


Um … measuring things?