The Crappiest Hour

Well, I'm doing a heck of a job keeping up with this, aren't I?  Ha!

I thought I'd come and share about how much I hate the hour or so after I get home.  It's just crazy time, getting the kids out of the car and into the house, emptying Ronan's backpack and lunchbox, feeding the dogs, unpacking all my stuff, dealing with all the things I promised my students I'd take care of, trying to clean the kitchen enough to cook dinner, getting milk for the kids.  Today, this became literally the crappiest hour, when, as I was trying to get the kitchen in order, Tristan ran in, shoved his hand down his diaper and pulled it out to show me that he had pooped.  A lot.  It was gross (to say the least). 

In general, things are going well.  I'm facing the end of the semester craziness, and I have to say that I'm really looking forward to it.  This was my first semester teaching multiple classes, at multiple schools.  Overall, it was a good experience, but I feel like I've been scrambling the whole time and am always behind.  I've been a lot more lax about students turning things in late simply because half the time, I'm late getting things out there.  It's been next to impossible to get any dissertation work done, so hopefully I can do that over winter break.  I'm also hoping that since next semester is pretty much the same set up (only with more students - going from 85 total to 155 if everything fills up again), I can save time on prep work.  We'll see. 

The kids are doing great.  The biggest change has been Ronan's attitude toward reading.  For years now, he's had zero interest in books, which if you know me, you can guess how painful that was.  I gave up trying to read to him when he was around two.  He just refused to sit and listen and I didn't want to make him hate it.  Well, it took two years, but suddenly, something clicked.  About three weeks ago now, he started bringing me nearly every book we own and had me read them all.  Now our bedtime routine includes reading 5 books.  Half of them are "read" by him - he doesn't quite get all the words and it's mostly just what he's memorized.  But hey, I'll take it!  He loves it.  And even better, now Tristan's getting interested in this as well. 

Ronan's also been doing well at school.  He's made lots of friends and has really started interacting with his class.  I had a conference with his teacher on Halloween and she said she was happy when, a few days earlier, she actually had to remind him to "save the silly for outside." He rarely had talked in class before then.  The one tricky thing is gauging how much he actually knows.  he can be SO. STUBBORN. You can ask him something that you know he knows and he'll refuse to say.  His teacher said that he hadn't done very well on the alphabet survey they did (point to the letter she said), but it was hard to really say that he didn't know it or that he just didn't want to be on the spot with it.  I'm still not sure how to address that, but it's pretty clear that he's learning and that his mind is always working, even if he won't let us in on it.

Likewise, Tristan has been working very hard on building things lately.  He'll spend a good deal of a time (for a toddler) building towers out of his Duplo legos.  He also likes to play with trains and carefully lines them all up in a row - and then smashes the line to pieces.  He's still under 2 after all.  :)  I'm also catching the occasional word out of him.  In general, he still isn't speaking recognizable English, but he does "talk" a lot.  He also follows directions fairly well - he'll put his milk back in the fridge (if we open it), close the door, get his shoes, sit down so we can put his shoes on, etc.  Obviously, the following directions is still dependent on his mood, but overall, he's doing really well with that. 

I'm also really impressed with how well the two of them play, generally.  As would be expected, we still have fights over whose turn it is to play with something or Tristan knocking over things Ronan was building, but more or less they really work well together.  Today, driving home from school/daycare, Tristan had a little baggie of crackers (we picked him up right as snack time started, so the teacher gave us a to-go bag).  As I was driving, I heard Ronan ask, very nicely, "Tristan, can I have some crackers?" and Tristan handed the bag over!  When Tristan started crying in frustration because he couldn't get the crackers out, Ronan said, "Here, I'll help you!" I nearly started crying in the car.  I'm sure in an hour or so, I'll need reminding of that when Ronan yells "You're a bad baby!" and Tristan tries to pinch him as they fight over the Candyland pieces, but it was a nice moment then. 

In the meantime, if anyone is in my neighborhood around 4 p.m. on weekdays, please drop by to get me through the crappy hour.  Bring wine.