Children

“Not one more” shooting

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I had to wait a day or two to formulate my thoughts about the shooting in a local Troutdale, Oregon school. Social media sites are being bombarded with statistics about the number of school shootings all across the United States, and comparing them to other countries. Maybe I am thinking about it more because it happened less than 30 minutes away from me, or maybe I am sick and tired of watching innocent children be injured or die.

Bulletproof blankets for schools at the low price of $1000 a blanket, metal detectors in all school entrances. What has it come to? I do not really care about your politics or your personal opinions on gun control. I want to talk about the real issue, which is whether our children are safe or not in schools. Children go to school to learn, to trust, to push our boundaries. How can children learn when they are afraid of their fellow students? When they might fear that those that bully them might kill them to? It scares the crap out of me to think about sending my future kids to school. Will all parents have to start home schooling because we do not have the proper security and safety in our schools? Gun control, gun rights, politics, bearing arms aside, what are we going to do to protect our children?

I am angry.

What are we doing as a country to handle and resolve this issue? There was a visual icon on a friend’s Facebook page that said: “NOT ONE MORE” in support of finding a solution to school shootings. We all remember Columbine. We remember Virginia Tech where it was a massacre of lives. We remember Newtown. Are the shootings where one or two kids are shot not as important, or does the large volume of schools where incidents have occurred (fatalities or not) matter? They all add up do they not? There is a real issue, and we need to resolve it.

What are we going to do? What are you going to do? What am I going to do to step up and be apart of the change that needs to happen? How long are we going to continue to watch the news each day, and continue to be desensitized to the issues with guns? This Bill Moyers article lists the actual gun deaths or injuries in schools by date since Newtown – a shocking 79 in the last 18 months.

I am shocked. I am disappointed. I want answers. I want solutions.

Hug your security blanket…

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I saw a photo yesterday that was of a little girl hugging the crap out of her teddy bear. It brought a smile to my face. It made me think about the things in our life that make us feel secure. When you are little it might be a blanket, or special toy. As you get older those security features might evolve and change, yet maybe they all have the same emotional connection for us. We just want to feel safe. Sometimes that happens with something that constantly reminds us of a specific smell or touch.

I remember a babysitter made me a pillow and blanket for when I was a baby. Somehow many years later (after never using the blanket or pillow) it was the pillow that I slept with each night. No one was to ever get between me and my pillow. It was what allowed me to feel cozy and go to sleep at night. It is funny to me that we often negatively call these items in our lives “security blankets.” For me, it was probably one of the constant things in my life. My sister and I shared a room, and since she was older, she often would stay up later than my bedtime. I would drape this small, thin pillow over my eyes and cover my ears so I could go to sleep at night, while she finished her homework.

The funny part? I remember my mom telling me later that her way to ween me off the pillow was to put it into the washing machine and hope that it would not make it through the wash. She was right. I was devastated. I later found a new pillow to take its place. The habit stuck with me and later I found a regular thin pillow and continued to sleep this way through boarding high school and college dorm life.

It was not until Chris and I moved in together that I broke the habit. Maybe I had a new security blanket sleeping right next to me. It was also a new concept for me to have a home where I did not have to block out the noise or the light each night. I know I will think differently about my future kid and their desire to have a security blanket. Maybe we need them for a given time or reason, and maybe over time those items of security evolve and change, but they make us feel safe, and allow us to relax and get the rest we need.

Hug your security blanket today, be it human or pillow.

“Love You Forever”

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I have spent a good part of my life taking care of other people, family members, and probably my favorite of all children. My favorite age is newborn, that are so cuddly, sleep so easily in your arms, and smell so good. (Well most of the time). However, I love the conversation and exploration that happens when you interact with toddlers and onward. The questions at times can get under your skin, and other days they say things that are so completely unexpected that they make you laugh so much you cry. Other times the words that come out of their mouths bring other sorts of tears.

Yesterday a Facebook friend shared this article “The Story Behind ‘Love You Forever’ Is Probably Not What You Thought.” Love You Forever is a children’s book written by Robert Munsch. Now let me tell you, over my 10 + years of marriage I have wanted to purchase baby items, and Chris has somehow won and halted this urge, which I understand. However, I started a bit of a collection of my favorite children’s books well before I met Chris. One on the bookshelf is, you guessed it: Love You Forever. Maybe it is the nostalgia of sometimes feeling like an orphan, or remembering childhood memories with my parents, but this book always brought tears to my eyes as I read it to wee little ones while babysitting, or while working at a day care center in college.

The article shares the true story about the background of this children’s book. You’ll want to read the article and watch the video, but know that it is a teary affair. I cried while reading this article based on not having my parents here to tell me they love me, and now to know that the words in the book actually speak to babies lost, makes it that much deeper. The song the mom sings in the book is:

“I’ll love you forever, I’ll like you for always, As long as I’m living, my baby you’ll be.”

For those of you that have lost babies, born or unborn, or even your grown babies, this book is for you. I even think it is for those that have lost their moms or dads, as a reminder that they are loved. You are loved.

Compostable Diapers – who knew!

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My sister is having a baby soon, so lately our conversations have included the discussion of car seats, strollers, and diapers. I mentioned that no one tells you how much you will truly spend on diapers. Ah yes, the fun part of raising a kid, endless butt wiping many, many times throughout the day. In a recent conversation, my sister told me about new technology for diapers.

The compostable diaper. Regular disposable diapers can take hundreds of years to decompose, and cloth diapers require too much water to wash and reuse. The compostable diaper (I even found ones that are flushable) are diaper inserts that can then be turned into compost. One company will pick up your dirty diapers weekly, and has a commercial grade machine that composts the diapers and turns your babies poo into topsoil for landscaping. Or you can take them out to your own compost bin in your yard (although they say only the wet diapers, not the poopy ones). Your baby will help fertilize your lawn!

Why has this taken so many years to happen? From my research disposable diapers made their debut in 1961 by Pampers. How many disposable diapers are sitting in landfills? Wikipedia says that:

“An average child will go through several thousand diapers in their life…An estimated 27.4 billion disposable diapers are used each year in the US, resulting in a possible 3.4 million tons of used diapers adding to landfills each year.”

Now multiply that times 52 years of diapers and you have 176 million tons of diapers have gone to landfills just in the United States. That is also 1 trillion, 424 billion disposable diapers sitting in our landfills. That is a shit ton of disposable poo. Two of the companies I found are in Northern California, I would be curious to hear if there are similar companies in other parts of the country. Definitely way past time for baby mommas to change the tune and start looking at alternative ways. I do not have the kid yet, but compostable diapers will be on the list.

#putpootogooduse

For further research:

http://www.gdiapers.com/

http://tinytots.com/

http://www.earth-baby.com/p-3-the-earthbaby-story.html

Has this gone too far?

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Seriously? An iPad potty training chair. What has the world come to? While I do not have kids, I have worked with plenty of children, (daycare and babysitting) who were being potty trained. A good book often did the trick. I am sure there are a zillion ways to engage a child, and train them, as well as a zillion ways children respond. They are all different right? Yet, have we gone too far with an iPad potty chair?

My mind has visions of children growing up in grade school, high school, college, and then in the workforce, that can only do their business while holding an iPad. I mean I already have a husband that does his business with the news on his iPhone, and if that is dead, the default is a magazine. I am also an offender, I catch up on Candy Crush in the bathroom. (The only place I am truly a captive audience). No, I am not ashamed to tell you that I give a few mind-numbing moments of my day to Candy Crush.

Having said all that, I cannot even remember how I was potty trained, most likely I was given a book and told to come out when I was done. If we start early with iPads on toilets, where does that lead us? Does that become a security blanket? Why are we not teaching kids to come up with dreams, tell stories, sing songs, read stories, as well as teach them to sit and be. Maybe that form of meditation on the potty is just what the little tykes need in this non-stop, technology seeking world.

What do you think?

#saynotoiPadsonpotties