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C.J is blessed to have both his maternal and paternal Grandmothers as well as a Great-Grandmother. The Mr. and I would be lost without them. They nag us, they sometimes yell, but we know it’s all out of love (and their crazy need to control). Now that all the niceties are out of the way, I have a theory about grandmothers.
My Theory: Once mother’s become Grandmothers they become liars.
YEP I said it, LIARS. Some like to say selective memory, but that’s just being nice. My Mom has such “selective memory” that sometimes I have to check in with my siblings to make sure I’m not crazy. This all hit me a few weeks ago when I spoke to her about teaching C.J. how to count and identify coins. I decided to get rolls of coins so he could learn to count—a roll pennies to start. He’d have to count to 50 to complete a roll. This would help him identify the coin, how many make 50 cents and most importantly, this activity would keep him busy. Win, Win,Win and for every roll he finished he could keep and deposit it into his account. Genius right? Well I can’t take the credit for it because my mom made us do it when we were kids. I hate coins to this very day because of this chore. The smell of pennies make me want to gag. I do believe some of my fiscal responsibility comes from having done this.
After deciding to share this with my son I called my mom. I was sure she’d be beaming with pride because I remembered this and wanted to do it with my son. But BOY WAS I WRONG! Not only was she upset, she went on and on about how unnecessary it was, and why would I have him waste time when he could just go to TD bank and dump his change for free. When I protested and said we did it she screamed, “No, you did not, Ra stop making things up,” I was flabbergasted! I made up some excuse about having to go because I was questioning my reality.
Did she really not make me do this? Am I repressing some weird memory. I immediately called my older sister, who could barely hold the phone she was laughing so hard. When she settled down she confirmed that YES my mom had us roll coins and I wasn’t going crazy. Thank God I’m not an only child because i could have ended up in the looney bin over this one. LOL!!
Styling and Profiling
When I look back on old pictures of the kids in my family I get a good laugh, but mostly I fall in love with our outfits. My mom loved to shop, so we were definitely stylish, but what I loved was that we looked like little kids; no labels plastered across our chest, bottoms and backs—the closest we got to that were underoos. In 2011, that’s just not the case and I grow increasingly frustrated with shopping for CJ. After a recent trip to Herald Square (a very rare occurrence) I came up with this list:
1. Labels: My child is not a bulletin board for your name brand, or whatever you want to call it. He is a child and his Polo shirt shouldn’t be the first thing people see, (have you seen this new logo?). I don’t make it a point to buy well-known brands (unless I get them from Marshalls or TJ Maxx) and at this rate I never will.
2. Thug appeal: Now look I’m from Brooklyn, so everyone including our kids own “Timbs” and a Champion hoodie. I’m positive that this is in the Brooklyn handbook (maybe even the New York handbook) but when I see 5 year olds dressed in sagging jeans (skinny or otherwise) and coogie sweaters I get upset. Kids don’t need to look like they are off to the club, or to the block to hustle. Cut it out.
3. Expensive footwear: I’m not focusing on Jordan’s. I am talking about high-end designers like Prada. I can’t see myself paying Prada money for CJ to scuff up. I’m that chick that used to clean her sneakers with a toothbrush. So, can you imagine how neurotic I would be over sneakers that expensive! LORD! Why don’t kids wear shoes anymore? My penny loafers were my best friend.
4. Embellishment: While on this shopping trip I saw jeans with jewels and intricate threading on the pockets and down the sides. Why? That just seems like a way to keep kids distracted: look at the pretty little sequins. Trust me, CJ doesn’t need any additional distractions he’s good.
5. PRICES: I am a frugal shopper, but by no means cheap, so when I see a $30 T-Shirt I immediately pause. Once I gather my thoughts, I’m out. Sneakers for $120 for him to outgrow in two weeks, nope. $60 for jeans that he will run and slide in causing holes in the knees, NOPE.
These are things I’ve faced while shopping for CJ. Thankfully I have many alternatives here in NY. For his jeans, I still go to The Children’s Place. They are always on sale. I also shop at Osh Kosh. I use the double coupon days they offer. During the holiday season I was able to get CJ a sweater for 21 cents! You can’t beat that. The prices are definitely a big draw and the quality of fabrics used can’t be beat!
Lastly, is my old friend Daffy’s. A lot of their stock comes from Europe and if you get in early it’s a mommy’s paradise. I hope this guides some parents away from the hip hop attire and back to dressing kids like kids not mini me’s.
More styling featuring Moi
Only the finest for me.
When CJ started kindergarten in September we were anticipating homework from day one to get him in the groove. I wasn’t expecting anything big but maybe a worksheet to finish from the day. That didn’t happen. His new teacher eases the kids into work and homework started around mid November. I spoke to a few parents and they were not happy about it (neither was the Mr.) but I just felt like it gave me more time to get him up to speed.
I was lucky to have a friend whose son also had the same teacher, and she saved all of the homework projects (SCORE!) and gave them to us in the summer. Even though I had them I can honestly say I didn’t stick to them like I should have (*sigh* I’m such a slacker sometimes) but I did utilize other tools that really helped. Here are a few of my favorites.
Writing:
CJ has known his alphabet in song since he was 2 years old, he sang it all the time. He could even identify the letters as long as they were in order. As he got older he started to be able to identify them even out of order but not as easily, that has since changed. The next step was to get him writing. I can honestly say that I felt defeated in that before we even got started because CJ is left handed. I psyched myself out with that and thought if I could teach myself to write really clearly with my left hand it might help (it did a little) but what really made the difference were these cards.
These cards are often used by kids in Montessori programs and are made of sand. The cards have a coarse touch and allow the child to feel what writing the letter feels like. CJ didn’t like them at first complaining that they hurt his finger tips but I can assure you they are not rough enough to hurt, my son can just be a tad dramatic. Now he loves them and when I take the box down he’s ready to go. Even though he has now mastered writing the letters I still use the cards and think I will way into at least the first grade. The cards run about $35.00 on Amazon and are worth the investment. For the DIY moms out there here is a link for making your own: DIY Sand Letters.
Reading:
So we got to a place of ease with writing letters thanks in part to the Montessori sand letters and CJ’s teacher introduced with the first batch of homework the Dolch sight words. Dolch sight words are the 220 most common words and 95 nouns found in children’s book. The Pre-Primer and Primer words should be mastered by the end of kindergarten to give a comfortable start in 1st grade reading. I was kind of excited about this because I’m a big reader and I read to CJ every night so CLEARLY he is going to take to this like a fish in water right? UHM yeah not at first. We started with flashcards, he took to them for all of a day before just getting silly and not wanting to use them. I was frustrated, my husband was BEYOND frustrated and that only lead to CJ being frustrated. So what did we do, we turned to technology, the iPad to be exact. There are tons of apps to be used but the most basic and distraction free is ABC Sight Words.
This app contains sight words from Pre-Primer to 3rd grade and has a separate link for Nouns and cost nothing! It’s one of the best free apps we’ve used. Easily navigated a voice guides the kids through each word allowing the kids to hear the word, each letter (when touched) and more importantly trace each word. This app saved a lot of lives on the way to summer camp(how’s that for a review). Once he was comfortable using the iPad we added the flash cards back into the mix.
So this has worked so far, the challenge is keeping him from getting bored, tired and frustrated. I have a few tricks up my sleeves though. I made myself a promise to review all the tools I’ve been using good and bad because I’m sure I’m not the only parent out there trying to figure it out.
