Guest Post at Church in Bethesda: The Circle Game – Toddlers, Repetition and Spiritual Growth

March 10, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / Leave a comment

I have a guest post over at the blog for my awesome church, Church in Bethesda. It’s about how doing things over and over and over again with Sprout has fed my spiritual growth and how even those without toddlers can grow from repetition. Here’s the first paragraph to give you a feel for it:

In meditative circles, one sometimes hears, “Solvitur ambulando,” or “It is solved by walking.” Often, this refers to the act of walking around a labyrinth. But it just as easily could be stated as “It is solved by repeating.” Besides the action of placing one foot in front of the other over and over again, labyrinths frequently have repeating motifs or patterns. Most are also fairly small, so you’ll probably end up making your way around it multiple times. Of course, repetition as a spiritual technique is far from limited to labyrinths. Many Christian traditions – most prominently, Catholics – have repeated prayers as a practice, with or without a rosary. While I had never spent much time with these techniques until recently, my baby turned into a toddler and repetition became utterly unavoidable. Fortunately, I’ve been able to embrace the opportunities for spiritual growth this particular season of parenthood provides.

Read the rest of The Circle Game: Toddlers, Repetition and Spiritual Growth

My son and I walking, our shadows in front of us.

32 Years of Disastrous Beauty

February 24, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 5 Comments

I turned 32 years old today. A quarter of the time – if I’m lucky – I feel like I know what’s going on and am at peace. The rest of the time, I’m mentally windmilling every cell in my body in an effort to move forward in some disorganized, chaotic fashion. While the feeling of flailing has accelerated post-Sprout, becoming a mother has made me much more honest about both my strengths and failings. At this odd, not yet mid-life period, I find myself more comfortable with myself than ever before while still being deeply confused by life.

Becoming a mother certainly hasn’t made me less neurotic. In fact, I hear the voices of imaginary critics ever the louder these days. After all, people can judge me not only on my behavior but my child’s as well! But I’m able to call out those neuroses more often and label them as false. It doesn’t mean they’re gone – you can’t logic your way out of something irrational – but they don’t have as much control. I can see them as a conflicting song rather than allow them to become the primary melody of my thought. It’s a bit like the guy profiled on This American Life who loaded all of the most awful things his brain whispered to him throughout the day into a software program. He then programmed it to email insults to himself several times a day. Between the sheer repetition and the re-contextualization, his mind stopped processing them as bad and instead could see them as absurd. For me, the way parenting has turned up the volume on my neuroses has forced me to face them, instead of allowing them to lurk in the dark, dank alleyways of my mind.

Many of my anxieties stem from a need to control situations, which being the mother of a toddler is about as realistic an expectation as thinking he can read Hamlet. Letting go of my vision of “what should be,” of what a perfect mom or “real adult” looks like, is like giving up a mental lovey. My ability to judge myself – and shamefully, judge other people – is what I fall back on when my brain gets lazy. Without those false standards as a safety net, I have to do the hard work of extending compassion and grace to myself and others.

And that’s only one of the weaknesses I’ve been forced to work on instead of just sweeping them to the side. If I want to be the best mom I can be, I have to be the best person I can be, especially in the social skills that have been my greatest challenge. Being self-aware of what I genuinely can improve also gives me something to push back with when my brain waves absurdly exaggerated flaws in my face. While I still have a long way to go before being a good listener, I think I’ve improved a little. Learning to truly pay attention to a person who doesn’t yet speak my language has taken me out of my own head more than an adult ever could.

Fortunately, stripping away the layers of fear and shame and guilt, like Elsa in the song, has enabled me to find my more authentic self. Sometimes it isn’t pretty – although I haven’t caused anything to freeze over (yet) – it’s true. My awkward teenage self was told by well-meaning but clueless adults to just “be natural” and I always wanted to say, “I am! They just don’t like it.” The truth was, I didn’t like it either, so I tried to hide it and failed miserably. Now, I’m at the point in my life that if someone doesn’t appreciate my quirks and isn’t willing to forgive my flaws, I’m not going to worry about it. I have enough people who do love me that I’ll spend my energy and time with them.

The times I’ve been able to actually embrace this freedom have been liberating. On a work trip in the fall, I went out to dinner with my colleagues and we talked and laughed and shared fairly intimate parts of our lives. A little voice said, “You should be more careful,” but I ignored it and I’m glad I did. As it turned out, I learned something in that conversation that helped me support one of those friends when her family was going through a crisis. At Christmas, my in-laws hosted their Christmas Eve extravaganza with their long-time friends, all of their friends’ children, and the significant others of the now0grown children. Normally, I’m jittery at these get-togethers, trying to remember the names of a bunch of people I kind of know and all whom seem to remember every detail of my life. This year, somewhat buoyed by my sister-in-laws’ excellent cocktails, I felt so much more comfortable and relaxed. I could just “be” without worrying – a new sensation for me.

I hope in my coming 32nd year that I can find more ways to embrace the mess, the authenticity, the awkward beauty that is me and the people around me and the world we live in. Because there’s a lot of darkness in the world and in my head. While we can’t get rid of the darkness, we can bring light and love into it. After all, love is patient, love is kind, and love never fails.

Starting Seeds with Sprout

February 21, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 5 Comments

Kids and dirt are natural companions. But while most moms discourage their toddlers from getting dirty, I purposely gave my kid a big bowl of dirt a few days ago. And over a white carpet, no less. The things I do in the name of permaculture and teaching my son about my passions.

The actual purpose of this disaster-in-the-making was to start seeds for my vegetable garden. I’ve been starting seeds for my garden for several years now and even started saving seeds myself. This year, I had tomato seeds and sweet potato starts saved from my garden as well as pepper, cantelope, and butternut squash seeds from vegetables purchased at the farmer’s market. The rest I bought from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange, which in addition to carrying organic, heirloom and regionally-developed seeds, has a lovely catalog with hand-drawn illustrations and stories about the selections.

While I could have planted my seeds by myself, I want to involve Sprout as much as possible in my gardening. Teaching children how to garden increases the likelihood of enjoying vegetables, gets them outside with all of the sensory benefits that involves, helps them feel more like they contribute to the larger household, and teaches them the valuable skill of growing food. Plus, gardening has taught me to be a better parent.

You can also use gardening to teach all sorts of academic skills, including math (counting seeds and measuring distances between plantings), biology (the growth of a plant), and social studies (where we get our food). Personally, I see it as an opportunity to teach ecological principles. In my garden, I practice permaculture, which focuses on working within ecological systems in ways that produce goods for people such as food. Through lasagna composting or gardening, where you layer several levels of organic matter together like leaf litter in a forest, I can demonstrate the importance of decomposition. With cover crops like clover or hairy vetch, I can show him on a practical level how nitrogen fixing works and why it’s essential to the ecosystem. Planting flowers that attract bees and butterflies can demonstrate how pollinators rely on plants and vice versa.

But as he doesn’t understand higher-level concepts yet, we’re mainly working on our fine motor skills. I started our gardening adventure with a big bowl of wet seed starting base. To prepare, I took my old seed starting pots – recycled yogurt containers with holes punched in the bottom – and sprayed them down with a bleach solution, then rinsed them in water. Because new sprouts are extremely vulnerable to mold, you have to minimize potential contamination if you plan to use them in the garden. It’s like sanitizing a newborn’s bottles. Then, I took the seed starting mixture from the garden store and soaked it in water. The soil needs to be thoroughly damp for starting seeds and I find it a lot easier to do that before planting the seeds rather than afterwards. Whenever I’ve done it afterwards I’ve ended up drowning them.

As I set this whole rigamarole up, Chris was giving me a bit of the stink-eye. Not that he didn’t want Sprout to participate in gardening, but he was highly skeptical of my confidence in containing the mess. I would have preferred to do this task outside as well, but as the temperatures were topping out in the teens, that wasn’t an option. As I laid out paper towels, I hoped my hope was more well-founded than his skepticism.

With my containers, starter, seeds, and masking tape for labeling, we startd the work of planting. Sprout’s main task was to move seed starting mix from a big bowl into the individual containers. With a bit of explanation and demonstration, he understood quite quickly. It must have tapped into toddlers’ love of moving stuff from one container to another. Tackling the job with gusto, he stuck his little hand in the giant bowl fully of mud and grabbed what he could. Picking up a small clump at a time, he shifted it from one container to the other with relatively little leakage. And he never purposely threw dirt.

After we filled a container up 3/4 of the way, I took several seeds and spaced them out around the top. Sprout then sprinkled a few more bits of dirt on top, which I smoothed out with my hand, making sure all of the seeds were covered but too deep. He actually was working so fast that I had to tell him to slow down so we didn’t bury the seeds by mistake. Then we handed it off to Chris, who wiped down the container and labeled it with the plant name.

As quickly as it started, it was over, with six containers of seeds to show for it. There was a lot of dirt on his crafts table, some on the mat underneath, and a little bit on the carpet. Most of the dirt that ended up on the floor was because he brushed it off the seat of his table in a mistaken but well-intentioned attempt to keep things neat. The main loss was the majority of a packet of tiny basil seeds that Sprout had mistakenly dumped. They were so hopelessly mixed in with dirt that retrieving them was impossible.

For his help, I gave Sprout a special present later in the day – the book Growing Vegetable Soup. Written and illustrated by Lois Elhart, who illustrated Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, it describes the process of vegetable gardening from start to finish, complete with comprehensive labels for every tool and veggie. I saw the book back when I was shopping for Christmas and decided I would put it aside until we actually started the gardening process. While he probably doesn’t understand the steps yet, I hope reading the book over and over again will improve his comprehension of what’s going on by this summer.

As we move forward, I’ll keep him in the loop of caring for the plants. According to my gardening book, “petting” seedlings makes them stronger, so that will be his job if he can be gentle enough. He also loves turning lights on and off, so I’ll let him pull the chain for the grow lights.

Starting seeds shares some elements of parenting a toddler: the mix of unpredictability, anticipation and potential for the future. It’s also taking a bit of a stand for hope as this brutally cold winter drags on. It reminds yourself that yes, I do believe that one day the warmth will return. It’s these little symbols that get us through the tough times – the image of one tiny seed, nurtured by love and water, eventually producing a wealth of delicious vegetables.

Butterflies, Spiders, and Insects Galore

February 18, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 2 Comments

What could be more beautiful than an iridescent blue butterfly alighting on one’s hand? A lot of things, according to my toddler, and it didn’t even land on him. While I smiled the moment it touched my skin, he shuddered. Fortunately, it flew off before he had a more extreme reaction. While the trip to the Smithsonian’s Museum of Natural History’s butterfly exhibit didn’t quite go as planned, it was still worth the trek out in some frigid weather.

The temperature on President’s Day in Washington D.C. was in the single digits. And yet, I knew I needed to get out of the house; cabin fever sets in on me quickly. I had planned to go to the butterfly house for weeks, so I wasn’t going to allow a little chill stop me.

So we bundled up layer upon layer, complete with a fleece blanket over Sprout in his stroller. While we shivered our way to the museum, it turns out that the butterfly exhibit is a great place to visit in the winter. Because many of the butterflies are tropical, the museum has to blast the heat to keep them active. I had to strip off my fleece jacket to keep from sweating.

Entering the exhibit, I expected to set Sprout down and have him hold my hand as we walked. I also expected him to enjoy the butterflies – butterfly is actually one of the few signs he knows. But I underestimated the sensory overload butterflies cause in a toddler. Instead, he just wanted me to carry him the whole time. On my hip, he displayed his typical watchful eye. As I pointed out the flying wonders perched on leaves and flowers, his attention followed. He was like a little field biologist, seemingly making mental notes about all of the things he saw – blue morpho, Viceroys, blue-banded swallowtails. But that interest didn’t dispel his dislike of their unpredictability. The few times butterflies came close to his head, his whole head twitched. I told him several times, “I know they seem scary, but I won’t let them hurt you” and added, “They’re more afraid of you than you are than them” for good measure. That was, until Chris pointed out that insects probably don’t have a sense of fear. Thanks for the scientific insight, honey.

Sprout seemed to like the hornworm caterpillars better, which looked similar to the eponymous Very Hungry Caterpillar and were safely contained in a glass jar.

In contrast to the seemingly innocuous butterflies, Sprout was much more enamored with a creepier creature – a giant tarantula. Elsewhere in the museum’s insect zoo, a volunteer was feeding the big spiders. Maybe because the fat, happy, fuzzy spider didn’t move or because it was in a box, Sprout had no problem peering in. Guided by the docent, I explained to Sprout that like the character in one of his favorite books, the Very Busy Spider, this spider also builds webs. But instead of building a web on a fence post, tarantulas build webs on the ground and even make little caves to hide in.

Elsewhere, I continued to connect his favorite stories with animals we saw. Pointing to a crab, I said, “It’s like the one in This is Not My Hat, that gives away the hiding place!” Looking at chrysalises, I commented that they were like the little houses that the Hungry Caterpillar and Squiggly Wiggly build for themselves. In the wilderness photography exhibit, he “maaaaed” at a photo of mountain goats that looked just like the Three Billy Goats Gruff. I love drawing those lines between stories and nature, showing him how science and narrative are not separate things.

But his absolute favorite thing in the entire museum was both unexpected and heart-warming – the model of the right whale. As we walked through the Ocean Hall, he stopped, looked up, and started yelping at it in excitement. Hilariously, he was making his “roar” noise at the gentle creature. I suspect he associates roaring with any large animal, whether it’s a lion, dinosaur or whale. As I wanted to be a marine biologist for years before moving towards science communication in general, I adore the fact that of all things, the whale caught his eye. I can’t wait to bring him on a real whale watch.

In the coldest weather, it was great to enter a different, warmer world outside of our house for a little while.

Kindie Rock Ahoy!

February 12, 2015October 17, 2022 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 3 Comments

Remembering one’s first concert is often an exercise in teenage nostalgia, full of the haze of hormones and overwrought emotions. Unfortunately, we’ve already denied Sprout such pleasure, as we brought him to his first concert this weekend. But then again, my first concert was Sharon, Lois and Bram and the only lasting effect was a life-long love of music, so I think he’ll be okay. (My first concert without my parents was Santana, where there was definitely a different kind of haze.) On Saturday, at the pre-nap hour of 10:30 AM, we joined the audience for Marsha Goodman-Wood, part of the Junior Jams series and a “kindie rock” artist.

The venue, the FNDTN Gallery, was a small space in a local antiques district, crammed between a furniture store and a fussy, white tablecloth restaurant. Not exactly where you’d expect to a have a children’s concert. In fact, I would have walked right past the entrance if another parent hadn’t given me directions. Most of it was hardly wider than the single door that made up the storefront, a long, narrow hallway with chairs on both sides. Near the stage, it stretched out a bit, a bench with pillows lining the back wall. Despite its odd shape, the venue was warm and intimate. The walls were decorated with colorful, psychedelic paintings and there were art figurines lined up on one shelf. It was so small that there wasn’t a bad seat in the house.

As the musician did sound check on her guitar and the start time approached, more and more families filtered in. While some parents took the seats – particularly those with smaller children – a number sat on the floor, giving their kids lots of freedom to move. We sat in seats right near the front, so Sprout could dance if he wanted, but could sit on our laps if he didn’t.

Finally, after extended tweaking of the speakers and a surprising amount of patience from the kids, the music got started. From the beginning, it was clear that Marsha Goodman-Wood was no ordinary children’s singer. Contrary to stereotype, she was very, very good. Her clear voice reminded me of Carole King, as did her very curly hair. Her stage presence was lively without being grating, a highly delicate balance for a children’s performer.

And the lyrics to her original songs reminded me of They Might Be Giant’s Here Comes Science album, a high bar to clear. (I’ve never seen anything else on Amazon related to kids that actually has 5 stars.) In a song called “Why Can’t We Dance on Jupiter?” she explains that because it’s made of gas, there’s no dirt or grass. However, with 68 moons, “there has to be one where you can groove.” Along with random facts, she also did an adept job of explaining scientific theories. She opined that “gravity’s not just a good idea, it’s the law” and reinforced the fact that invertebrates have no bones about 20 times in a catchy number about giant squid. The music was fun too – upbeat, with her on guitar accompanied by a drummer.

In addition to her original songs, she also did some covers. I recognized “All Around the Kitchen” from one of Sprout’s Music Together classes. She also sang Jason Mraz’s Sesame Street adaptation of his famous song, which I think I like much better than his original.

As the music was quite danceable, plenty of kids took advantage. Marsha Goodman-Wood encouraged it, of course, suggesting possible moves that included imitating spaceships, astronauts, sea creatures, penguins and roosters. While some kids tried to take direction, most just wiggled their little bodies to the beat (sort of). But the absolute cutest thing that happened during the entire concert was three little girls that joined hands and twirled in a circle, like a nerdy version of Ring Around the Rosie.

While many kids were grooving, Sprout watched with an focused but rather blank expression on his face, chewing on his hand. This isn’t exactly unusual – when he likes something but is still processing it, he tends to just stand and stare. In fact, it was the same expression he had for most of Disney World and when I read to him. As he insists that Chris or I read at least 15 books a day to him, I know this is not an expression of discontent. But despite the rational part of my brain telling me otherwise, I was still anxious that he wasn’t enjoying it. How his stillness contrasted with the other kids’ energy just made me tense, even though I knew it wasn’t his fault. Thankfully, my anxiety ebbed when he climbed up on my lap and receded further when the musician handed out bells. While he wasn’t super-enthusiastic in his bell-ringing, he did show some interest.

While Sprout’s reaction to his first concert wasn’t the stuff parental dreams are made of, I do think it was worth it. After all, we all enjoyed it, in our own way.

Play with Your Food!

January 29, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 1 Comment

In high school, my husband was the slowest eater I had ever met. Although his future as a professional cook seems like a surprising turn of events, I often comment that they actually had something very important in common – Chris playing with his food. While that observation is half-joke, we both like to think of cooking as play instead of a chore. We want Sprout to enjoy cooking healthy, delicious, sustainable meals as he grows older rather than merely tolerating it. With this in mind, we gave him a toy kitchen and food for Christmas. What we didn’t realize is how many real-life skills we could teach him as a result.

I spent a lot of time researching and considering the options for toy kitchens before I made my final decision. I wanted one that was sturdy, gender-neutral (along with the pink drenched options, there are also ones designed to be acceptable to “manly” dads), had a lot of different play options and looked somewhat realistic.

What I like about the one I bought is that it functions in many ways like a real kitchen. There’s a “cutting board” and sufficient counter space (with “granite” countertops!) for preparation, which a surprising number of toy kitchens lack. It has a knife block with tiny chefs’ knives so we can discuss the proper storage of kitchen cutlery with him. It has a little sink that you can pretend to fill up a pasta pot or (ugh) wash dishes. It came with different types of pots and pans, allowing you to match the right kind of dishware with cooking techniques, whether that’s boiling water in a pot or searing a burger in a pan. To help Sprout learn good safety techniques, I cut apart an old dish-rag so he can use little towels to take items out of the oven. The kitchen even comes with little baskets that you to collect and empty “food waste” into the invisible compost bucket.

Unlike most toy kitchens, this one even has “food waste,” even though it’s non-compostable plastic. In addition to the hamburger and hot dog that came with the kitchen, I bought my little (sometimes) veggie-lover a basket of toy produce that requires preparation. You can peel and section the orange, cut the tomato, peel the banana, cut the cauliflower, and shuck the corn. All of the pieces are held together with Velcro, so they’re easy to put back together. What’s really neat about it is that you can introduce actual knife techniques with them. Pushing down on most play food with a play knife usually causes it to slip and cause what would be a nasty gouge in real life. In contrast, this set rewards good knife skills – cutting with the curved “sharp” side is much easier than the straight, “blunt” side. The toy food also allows us to teach him safety skills, like choking up on the knife to improve control and curling under the fingers on his holding hand so you don’t slice them. While he’s far from that level of comprehension, it’s absurdly cute for now to watch him “cut” through fake vegetables with his little plastic chef’s knife.

To further practice his skills, we recently allowed him to help us prepare a snack. A few months ago, we found a recipe for Chocolate Almond Date Energy Balls, which we found were both delicious and semi-healthy. We originally found the recipe on Sweet Happy Life, but because she’s taken down her blog archives to protect her kid’s privacy, I’m going to share our version (slightly modified from hers) here.

Based on an original recipe from Sweet Happy Life (Ariela Pelaia)

Ingredients
1 cup whole, raw almonds
3 tablespoons chocolate chips
1 cup dates (can often get from the bulk section in natural foods stores)
¼ teaspoon vanilla extract
¼ cup almond butter
1 to 3 tablespoons water
4-5 tbs shredded coconut

Instructions
Using a food processor, grind the almonds, chocolate chips, dates, vanilla and almond butter, until it the combination creates large chunks that separate out from each other. If needed, add water slowly until it reaches that consistency. Pinch off a good-size chunk and roll into a ball with your hands. Roll each of the balls in the shredded coconut. Eat immediately (although they’ll be a little sticky) or refrigerate.

The first time we made the Energy Balls with Sprout, he was very engaged and enjoyed sprinkling coconut over the balls. This time, he was a little more distracted. He didn’t really want to form the balls and seemed more interested in pushing the coconut off of the plate than anything else. Oh well. We’ll keep trying to teach him to play with his food.

Standing in the Bath…Thinking

January 16, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 3 Comments

A few months ago, Sprout decided he would no longer sit in the tub. Needless to say, this was not a decision that Chris and I welcomed. In fact, it was extremely frustrating. Besides making him much more difficult to wash, it was straight-up dangerous. I had to hold firmly on to his arm throughout the entire bath to prevent him from walking or randomly slipping. What was one of my favorite parts of the night became this weird power struggle between us for six whole weeks.

On the surface, this was the first real instance of him pushing limits and testing boundaries. While we’ve always had issues with sleep and he was a picky eater for a while, this was really out of nowhere and not a typical toddler behavior. It seemed one day, he thought, “What would happen if I stood up in the tub?” and then didn’t stop. It was so arbitrary.

At first, we had no idea how to react. I’m against using physical force for compliance in all but the most dangerous of situations, like yanking a kid out of the way of a car. Also, whenever we tried any physical encouragement, like putting gentle pressure on his shoulder or lifting his legs up to encourage him to sit, he squirmed violently. Our cues only increased the danger of the situation. There wasn’t a clear role for punishment, as it isn’t useful for kids that little, especially if it isn’t obviously and clearly connected to the problem. Trying a more positive tack, we praised the wonders of sitting, like being able to play with his toys. But he didn’t seem to care one bit. So we weren’t left with a lot of options.

We finally settled on allowing the natural, uncomfortable consequences of standing in the bathtub to play out on their own. Through no to little action of ours, he was choosing to be cold and have a short, boring bath. He couldn’t play with his toys or splash. I wanted to minimize the time spent in this risky situation, so I washed him as quickly as possible, leaving out the fun interaction we used to have. The one thing we purposely took away was the time we normally spend playing on the bed after his bath while I dry him off. I didn’t want to make it seem like a reward for standing. Plus, when I was that frustrated, I didn’t really feel like singing or playing.

While this seemed to be the best course of action, I felt like I was missing something. Sprout clearly didn’t enjoy his baths anymore – he looked stoic most of the time – but he still wouldn’t sit down. Was this a case of exceptional toddler stubbornness or something else?

I hit upon what that “something else” might be one day when Chris was showering. Since our Disney World vacation, Sprout has been into imitating the “big people.” I guessed that one of the times Chris stuck his head out of the shower to talk to Sprout, he got the idea that big people don’t sit in the bath – they stand. It wasn’t that he was adamantly against sitting in the tub in and of itself, but against doing something for babies.

To prove to him that adults do, in fact, take baths, we actually had Chris take a bath with him. It was pretty cramped – Chris is tall and our tub is not – but it worked! When I put him in with Chris, Sprout was skeptical, but eventually sat down. Since then, he’s stayed sitting when I put him in the tub and hasn’t expressed any great interest in standing up.

I feel a little guilty that he was uncomfortable for so long before I hit upon an alternative explanation. But on the other hand, I don’t know if he would have acquiesced if Chris had demonstrated the first night. Maybe he had to experience how unpleasant the alternative to sitting was before mAking that choice. But it did illustrate once again to me how different his perspective is from mine and how difficult that can be to express when you have very few language skills. It made it clear how all the more important it is for me to truly listen to him, even if his communication isn’t always in words.

A Snowy Day

January 12, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 1 Comment

Being from upstate New York, I have many fond memories of snow days. Last week, we had the first big snow of the year and Sprout’s first chance as a toddler to experience it. While he’s been in the snow before, he was barely crawling at the time. My in-laws bought him a snowsuit for Christmas, so we were eager to try it out. Plus, he really loves the books The Snowy Day, about a little boy wandering around the city after a snowstorm, and A Snow Day for Hannah, about a dog playing in the snow. With me working from home due to the weather and having my lunch hour free, it added up to a perfect time to wander around in the snow.

It didn’t start out auspiciously. He absolutely, positively did not want to put on his snow boots. He screamed and kicked like a banshee, fighting the new, bulky, restrictive clothing. At least the very good hood on his new coat meant that we didn’t have to put on a hat on him.

As soon as we opened the door, the whining halted. Sprout gazed out on the white expanse and slowly stepped outside. We carried him over the icy steps and placed him on the lawn – where he immediately started crying again. I tried to show him how to walk on it and even made a snow angel. He just looked at me and frowned. He obviously thought the snow was interesting, so we brainstormed to figure out what exactly was wrong. We realized two things: one, he was still uncomfortable in his clothing, which we couldn’t do much about and two, he was having difficulty walking in the snow, which we could help with. As soon as I offered my hand to him to hold, he grasped it and smiled.

Holding his mittened hand in mine, we explored this new world. I pointed out the animal tracks patterned across our yard, explaining that they were made by a cat. We trundled up the little hill behind our house and back around to the front door, Sprout working hard. He’s so short that he dragged his feet in even the few inches of dry snow, his boots making long, thin lines alongside my crisp larger footprints.

When we looped around the yard, I thought we were going to head inside, but Sprout kept pulling me towards the road. I picked him up and we crossed the street to the cleared sidewalk on the other side. I still held his hand, but he seemed much more comfortable walking on a firm surface, rather than a crunchy, unsettled ground. As we walked, we looked up at the trees, snow frosting the bare branches. The squawking of a large black crow kept attracting Sprout’s attention, although I don’t know if he could quite see what it was, outlined as it was against the bright sky.

We walked down the sidewalk, until I couldn’t stand my feet becoming any colder or number. While I thought Sprout understood we were going inside, apparently he wasn’t paying attention. The moment we closed the door, he started crying again. Even though he wasn’t fond of the clothing or the feeling of the snow under his feet, he really did enjoy being outside.

He promptly forgave us when we introduced the last element of our adventure, one of the best simple pleasures in life – hot chocolate. His reaction was a little like that of the characters in the Hunger Games – surprise, then wonder, followed by pure pleasure. Chris gave him the warm liquid in his sippy cup, so he was expecting milk. Once he realized that it was so much better than milk, he drank it almost without stopping, only pausing to breathe. Next time I drink hot chocolate, I’ll have to stop and savor it like he did.

Like the boy in The Snowy Day and Hannah the mountain dog, I’m glad that Sprout can appreciate the adventure in the wonder of a snow day.

The Night We Finally Did Cry-it-Out

January 9, 2015 / Shannon Brescher Shea / 4 Comments

So far, this winter has been absolutely bonkers. Coming off of hosting Thanksgiving for both sets of parents, we drove to Pittsburgh for my work, and then the week after, I was off to Denver on another work trip. In between, we had two kids’ birthday parties and a puppet show. Needless to say, this seriously messed with Sprout’s schedule and head. Unfortunately, it had the worst consequences at night.

In September, I truly believed our sleep problems had come and gone. After the chaotic schedule that was our vacation, we had settled into a regular rhythm. We had one tough week where I would let him cry for five or six minutes at night, go in his room, hug him for a few minutes, put him down, and repeat until he fell asleep. But once that week ended, he’d curl up in bed clutching his stuffed Figment and sleep through until the morning.

Then came the molars. Known as the most painful, unpleasant of all teething, the resulting headaches prevented him from falling asleep on his own. When the Oragel wore off four hours after his bedtime – always around my bedtime – he would wake up screaming. Hating that my baby was in pain, I’d pick him up and cradle him on the big chair in his room.

Of course, now that I had broken the routine (again), I was doomed to repeat history. Even when his teeth weren’t bothering him, he’d wail like a banshee when I tried to put him in his crib. I tried the “every five minutes” tactic, but he just got angrier each time. I’d finally acquiesce, settling down in the chair so he could fall asleep on my lap. In the middle of the night, he would wake up and expect me to hold him on my lap, just like at bedtime. Waking up once a night soon turned into waking up twice and soon enough we were back to the hellish schedule we had months ago.

I tried different tactics to varying degrees of success. We slept on the couch, which worked once. One night, I brought him into our bed. That worked twice before he decided it was more fun to crawl on our heads than sleep between us. Unlike kids that just want a parent in close proximity, he specifically wanted me to hold him in my arms sitting up. (It seems like Lydia over at Rants from Mommyland had the same problem.) Despite the absurdity, I was willing to put up with it until December’s chaos was done. We would start over in January.

Then I left on my Denver trip and it really went to hell. Sprout was very unhappy about daddy putting him to bed, even with my mom visiting as back-up. One night, he woke up at 3 AM and screamed whenever they tried to put him down – for more than two whole hours. Unfortunately, my return didn’t improve the situation. One weekday, I had to go to the office the next morning after being up in the middle of the night for two hours.

At that point, Chris declared the situation unsustainable and unacceptable. Sprout was no longer an infant. He had the capability to fall asleep independently – he had previously and still did during naptime. He even had some comprehension of other people’s needs and the fact that we need to avoid hurting people. We needed to set some boundaries and teach him that mommy is not his personal pillow.

Unfortunately, we only saw one choice – cry-it-out. While variations on the Sleep Lady technique had worked previously, they just pissed him off now. If possible, we wanted to avoid him degenerating into angry rabid honey badger mode. He would certainly be angry if we ignored him, but at least he wouldn’t think we were taunting him.

I hate, hate, hate the idea of cry-it-out. I had sworn that I would never, ever do that to my child. That I couldn’t possibly listen to him cry like he was in pain. That I wouldn’t let him stand there like an abandoned orphan.

But then I did – and it was terrible.

Even though I could hear him through our walls, I still kept the monitor on at night. I cringed at every cry. I wept into my pillow, asking Chris, “Why are we doing this? He’s scared, he’s sad, he’s lonely!” He’d reassure me that we were doing the right thing, we had tried everything else, Sprout was choosing not to sleep and he was just throwing a major hissy fit. Most importantly, he told me that Sprout still loved me and that I loved him.

The first few nights were the worst, with him yelling on and off for more than an hour at times. All of us were strung out on sleeplessness and stress. It took about a week – with part of it away from our house – before we restored our previous status. The first night he went down with minimal fussing, I released a huge breath. The worst was over and we would all be the better for it.

Every night is a new challenge, a new opportunity. I know there are some nights he’ll still wake up. Once he’s consistently sleeping through the night, I’ll go in to comfort him without making a routine of it. Once he switches to a toddler bed, I can definitely see him climbing into our queen-sized bed and squishing us. But I am never ever using that chair as a bed again.

We'll Eat You Up – We Love You So

The Adventures of a Mom Just Trying to Make a Difference

parenting