The sounds of this morning… April 19, 2010

Were like music to my ears. It’s vacation week here, and it is my goal to firmly follow my roadmap this week. The last time we had a school vacation I got lazy and let all the hard work everybody had been doing slide and we had to start all over.

So this morning TnT woke early as usual and I hear one of them go into the washroom and then head downstairs; a few minutes later I heard the tinkling of the dishes in the dishwasher. Hmmmm…could it be? Thor’s contribution this week is the kitchen and per my roadmap I asked him what he thought a clean kitchen looked like. After much drama and a bunch of “I don’t know”s and some more questions from me to make sure he understood what I was asking he said “nothing on the counter”. Fine. Great starting point. And then this morning happened and I was lying in bed thinking “is he unloading the dishwasher?” How cool. Then he came back upstairs and by this point Talula had come out of her room and he asked her “have you done your contribution? No? OK, let’s do it.” Did I mention it was 6 o’clock in the morning and their Dad and I were still in bed? I almost fell out of bed. So then they proceeded to clean the upstairs bathroom – ok, so it just meant spraying cleaning stuff everywhere and rubbing it a bit with a sponge. But how awesome is it that this was how they started their day. I have been firmly following my plan for 6 DAYS and this is where we are already?!!! Wahooooooo! Granted, it’s not like I haven’t made attempts at this before, so it’s not completely coming out of left field for them, but really, how cool is this? Such a cool thing. No drama, no being angry because it’s vacation and I’m having a battle over what they need to do before we get to go do fun things. Yummy.

Another change I’ve noticed is the decreased number of times that Thor goes to the “I don’t know” card. The other day I asked him something inane like “do you want to take a shower before dinner or before family meeting”. He opened his mouth and I heard the words “I don’t….” trickle out of his mouth and then he stopped, I looked at him out of the corner of my eye with a grin, and he said “before family meeting”. Love him. He’s working so hard.

End of day April 14, 2010

We are nearing the end of our day, baths are happening, back packs are packed and we just had our family meeting.

My husband and I were at choice when it came to family meeting; earlier in the evening I asked TnT if they wanted to do their remembery boards before dinner or before family meeting. They both chose before family meeting. Dinner came and went and we moved on to the boards. Thor was game and jumped right into his stuff and got it done, Talula, not so much. So. My husband and I talked; we could either let time run out waiting for Talula and not do family meeting thereby letting Talula be held accountable for Thor’s disappointment or we could hold family meeting with out her. We went for the latter – for two reasons. One, if we chose not to have the meeting, Thor would be “punished” because of Talula’s choices – that wouldn’t be the first time, so mostly we decided to go ahead with the meeting with out her because she would miss out on the treat (we end our meeting with a treat after the $$ is handed out) and experience the consequence. She did not even notice the meeting was going on in her absence – she was in her own little world, doing her own thing. Then we started oooohing and aaahhing over the dessert (?desert? – always get the # of s’s mixed up) and then she appeared out of no where. Saying “I’ll go do my board really quickly, can I have treat?”. I talked to her, noticed how sad she was, said that it was ok because she had made her choice not to participate in the things we all do as a member of this family and that was fine and then mentioned that maybe next time if she wanted too she could choose differently. Oh the tears. That girl loves her desserts, and we don’t have them often in our house – mostly because I have no self-control when it comes to dessert either. Oh, my heart strings were pulled. But I picked her up and moved her on to her bath and for now she seems to have moved on. Thank goodness.

So I would have to say, that on day two the CONSISTENT part of my roadmap I have managed to uphold. Only 363 more days to go. Actually, make that 12-15 years.

Trip mapped out, finally April 14, 2010

Ok. Seriously, I was on my computer trying to figure out how to get from JFK to Manhattan (yay! Except that I’m going solo, no hubby, booo) googling all the maps etc to figure out how to get into the city without paying the $50 cab fare (or whatever it is). Then it occurs to me that I have yet to do my contribution roadmap. So, NYC roadmap done, now on to my family.

I have now mapped out a year long “master” map – and that has been broken into 2 separate roadmaps; starting with a 3 month one and finishing with a bigger 9 month map. The goal of the first one is about being CONSISTENT - them (TnT) conistently doing the contributions 2 times a day and me consistently holding their feet to the fire and expecting them to contribute to this family. The goal of the second one is to then bring the contributions up to a level that reflects their ages.

We started yesterday, Talula had school, Thor did not (and I started on this day with a purpose). As I expected when they each asked for breakfast and we gave them a “yes, as soon as”. Talula continued on her little way, doing her own thing, couldn’t care less that she was about to head off to school with an empty stomach. The Florence Henderson Mom from the Brady Bunch was sitting on one shoulder nattering in my ear about what an evil mother I was sending her off to school without food. What about all those studies that say children with empty stomachs can’t concentrate properly in school and they all become delinquents? Ha, what about that? Then I had the other Mum in my other ear – some combination of my own beliefs, what I learned from the Mum I grew up with and what I have learned (THANK GOODNESS) from Vicki. Na, she’ll be fine. What could a three year old possibly have to concentrate on? Blocks? Baby dolls? Kitchen sets? Sandboxes? They give them a snack at school anyway. OK, so I compromised, came down somewhere in the middle and gave her a banana in the car.

Then there was Thor. Oh boy. He went ape-s–t. Excuse the french. And that is why I started on a day he didn’t have school.  It lasted, more or less, in some form, ALL DAY. He had breakfast when we got home from dropping Talula off at school ’cause he did one thing on his board. Then came lunch “yes, as soon as” and the growling started. Literally. That’s his new thing; he growls at us like a beast when he is “displeased”. Eventually he stormed into his room, crawled under his covers and fell asleep. When he woke, his first words were “I’m hungry”; not feeding him felt inhumane, so gave him a huge snack and talked about what he could do after his snack.

This morning, was better, but still filled with a tad of drama. Little wee angelic Talula thinks that hiding her pictures is all that is required to get out of doing her board. So, she got an as soon as when she asked for breakfast. She ignored that, and proceeded to get herself some grapes, the box of rice krispies – which she ate dry because we hid the milk in the fridge (we are AWFUL, aren’t we?). Finally she asked again, and went up with her Dad this time to look at the board – still no pictures, so still nothing done. We shall see what this evening brings. Thor, he got it done with a bit of grumbling, but no growling.

Socks or swords? April 2, 2010

What was I here for again?

I’ve been in the car waiting for Thor for 5 or 10 minutes and my husband just came out to give me the update: Thor went to get himself socks, but found himself in a sword fight with Talula instead. Oh well, so our roadmap this week with the on time to school was a step backwards – this will be day 2 of 3 late. I asked his dad to give him the “I see you’ve gotten distracted, what did you come up here for” line to get him back on track.

Here’s what I’ve noticed with the way I engage/encourage Thor – I’m afraid to. Ya. I’m afraid to. Well, maybe afraid is the wrong word.

If at some later time I try to talk to him about how this morning went and what he notices on mornings when he’s not ready the night before he will go into meltdown mode and do the “I can’t do it, I don’t know how, I can’t do anything right” dance. I admit that I have no idea how to handle that. I stay calm, ask the what, who, where questions and it gets us no where – except to grumps-ville from him and me throwing in the towel – the conversation will then end with him saying one more “I don’t know” and me responding with an “ok”.

So, then I ask my self, why on earth would I increase the number of times that I have to listen that??? Seriously, I am at best just starting to keep it together on a very regular basis when the meltdown happens of its own volition (ie: ME not asking questions and bringing it on). WHY would I increase the odds of them happening? I know that his reaction is probably just his thing, and for that reason alone I should push the limits and remember that discomfort is ok – but oh, it’s sooooo tiring.

Contribution road trip!!! March 30, 2010

Here we go. As I have said, this is one of the areas that my husband and I have struggled with SO much. And I for one, am not calling SHOT GUN this time round!

After the contribution portion of family meetings on MomTV last week, I decided to re-work our contribution bag, so also it seemed like a good time to do a roadmap to get on track.

Our contributions used to be little pieces of what would eventually become a whole job. After listening to Vicki, I realized that the way I was doing it had me in charge of when/how the jobs got larger and that would certainly result in some resistance and push back from TnT. Instead of having toilet, bathtub, sink, garbage etc etc etc as individual jobs that would slowly be combined into larger jobs; it is now simply “washroom”. This also allowed me to ask what they believed the washroom contribution (and others) involved and thus gave me the starting point to my road map.

So tonight was our first family meeting since I decided that we should make some changes. I’d had to say that the success rate was moderate. They didn’t balk at the “new” contributions and when I explained that they would tell us what they believed each contribution involved I believe that Thor was excited about that. SO, we each drew our contribution out of the bag and then went around and asked what they thought each one involved. Talula, being 3, required some guidance with “laundry” because she went right to “hang it on the rack” which is one of the things she enjoys doing with me; so we worked backwards a bit and got to the starting point of laundry. We continued to get through 2 out of the remaining three that were picked this week and we were left with “kitchen”. When we asked Talula what she thought it involved she went into problem solving mode (?funny?) and was a tad incomprehensible because we weren’t inside the brain of a three year old. Then we asked Thor his thoughts and he pulled out the good ole “I don’t knooow”. Having just been through something similar with him on Saturday, it all felt familiar, so with the eye communication set between his dad and I, we let the time run out.

For. the. first. time. ever.

Phew. I almost caved a few times, asking leading questions – but he wasn’t taking the bait anyway, and continue to flounder in his cries of “I don’t know”. My husband and I declared the meeting over and Talula asked for the treat (Thor’s choice: black licorice) and it was explained we would not be having a treat tonight. They both actually got over it fairly quickly and neither of them asked about money, which surprised me a bit. So, not a rousing success, but not a flop either. AND we got the first failed meeting under our belt – which I’m sure should have happened about 2 years ago, but we were too afraid to let it happen. Parents (ie: ME) can be such suckers.

The week in review March 27, 2010

Wrote this last night…forgot to publish.

This week I was note-taker for family meeting. I was taking notes for appreciations and I started to write my childrens’ names, instead of her real name I started to write ‘Talula’ – it seems to be the way I’m starting to think of them and it made me giggle a bit.

Until this week, it seemed that I spend less time in the car waiting, and as a result I have less time to write. Good for my family and my general sanity and bad for my blog. Oh well. But this week there seemed to be a bit more time in the car.

My roadmap was…..successful. He was late for school one day-late enough to get a late slip, but he missed it by mere minutes. I’m not just going on whether or not he gets a pink slip from school – in the end I could really care less about his school attendance record right now. The other two days we got out on time. He successfully got ready the night before school every day, now it’s just the getting out the door without getting into play in the morning. Now that I’ve had my ah-ha about me & distracto-boy, I can start to help him with that. Moving forward we  have to keep on target and I have to stay calm & patient. I will admit that on Friday, with Thor all ready to go to school, we both sat in the car waiting for Talula and I felt my blood pressure rising. I gave into my racing heart and went back to the house and got short with Talula and ushered her out the door so that she didn’t cause Thor to be late. Patience, patience, patience. Keep calm and carry on. So for the next two weeks until the roadmap is done I have to keep it together and Thor has to get out the door ready for his day on time, most of the time. And I have to keep training for the next step.

Contributions have gone from ‘Oy!’ to ‘Yeah!’ in the blink of an attitude change. The first morning after our family meeting I was hunkered down for a fit from Thor. His contribution was the compost and it’s was miserably wet and cold outside. Nothing. No complaints, he just saw an adventure I think. Seems I’m a little guilty of anthropomorphism when it comes to my monkey, because the thought of having to go outside in that whether before I had my coffee made ME cringe, not so for Thor. And the next day Talula went to join Thor in the adventure and then went on to do her own. The third day Thor came down, still in pj’s on stepped into his rubber boots and asked for the compost. There was none since he had asked to do it a second time the previous evening. I can’t explain the change in attitude from TnT – the contributions were same, us adults weren’t doing anything exceptionally different, maybe it was just a vibe. I have decided to make some changes based on this week with Vicki on MomTV – we’ll see how that goes at this weeks meeting.

I have to say that overall I have been amazed by this week. Something clicked and it is such a good feeling. In doing PonT again I see that in previous go-rounds with the program I have taken bits and pieces of the program that worked for us at the time and used them. Now I feel as though we have fully immersed ourselves in it for the first time and I see the difference. I am OK with the baby steps that it took to get to this point, because I’m not sure we had the gumption to immerse ourselves fully the first time round and come out smiling on the other side.

Short term memory Mum & Thor March 25, 2010

I have been chewing this distraction/short term memory thing for a couple of days and I’m trying to figure out how I can help Thor. After this ah-ha I realized how important lists are to me – I have a weekly list and I check my calendar on my iPod to transfer stuff to my written list so I don’t have to remember to check my iPod regularly. What a colossal ding-bat, I am exactly the same as him – but I am old enough to have figured out how to handle it all. Seriously, how does ones mind get so irritated by a personality trait that same mind has? Seriously. Mr. Freud, Mr. Jung, Mr. Adler, please speak up.

So, I can do the following;

1. Notice/Re-direct: hey buddy I see you been distracted by that cool Lego – can’t blame you for that – what were you working on before? (somehow that seems accusatory, and I need to work on it).
2. Consequence: let him run out of time because of distraction and now doesn’t have time for….whatever fun thing was planned.
3. Remembery board – it’s getting better.
4. Encourage: I see your a distracto just like me, it’ll get better (OK, so not those words exactly- haven’t figured that one out yet).
5. oooOOOooohhh. Connect with him about getting distracted, let him know how I deal with my mind wandering.
6. Notice improvements without turning it into praise.
7. Capable….uhhh…how do I show him this one?
8. Roadmap??? Ya, probably a good idea.

Ya know what’s perfect about this post? I have been writing this while Thor makes himself toast. He asked about making it 25 minutes or so ago, and he’s still in the kitchen. What’s he been doing? Not entirely sure; I do know that he’s been singing “the Lady with the alligator purse” song and looking at every tiny thing he can reach. And then Talula joined in so that she could peel herself and apple to eat and well, here I am waiting in the car.

Roadmap, end of 1st week March 21, 2010

It’s coming on dinner time (breakfast for dinner – yum!). So I asked TnT “do you guys want to look at remembery boards now or leave it all until after dinner?”, Thor responded “I don’t know” there was silence from the other. OK, enough said, consider my mouth shut.

Last week was, I believe, a success. Thor only had 2 days of school because of parent-teacher conferences. One day he was 5 minutes late and the second he was not late – well, a couple or few minutes – but that’s not late, even by my fussy timely standards. Heck, five minutes is barely late. So it was  good week. Now, my plan is to anchor that with Thor, and tell him what I noticed about his mornings when he gets a lot done the night before.

Next week, the roadmap says we need to get out the door 2 times on time. If this week is any indication – this week should be gravy for Thor.

Oh, Talula just asked her Dad for something and she got the “yes, as soon as you look at your remembery board” (nice work Dad, oh damn, that was praise)  -  then came to me and asked for help, which I gave her, and then Thor followed suit and asked for my help with his board. So cool. We are off and running, AND we get to have waffles for dinner!!

Roadmap, day 2 March 17, 2010

Day two for my roadmap means training. Haven’t done any yet. Grrr…

Ok, so now it’s day 3 – life has been busy.

My goal for off school days with Thor for the next month (which is the length of my roadmap) is to train him on the NEXT steps of getting himself ready and out the door in the morning – right now my list of those things is short: make his own breakfast – I know there are other responsibilities, just haven’t thought of them yet. My goal is to have trained him in enough things that he can choose what he wants to take on next and then voilà: next roadmap. Thankfully I’m only on day 2 (or 3…), so I’m not too far astray on my directions.

I learned on MomTV from Monday night that it appears that I have been needlessly beating myself up when it comes to the transition between training and doing on their own without reminders – because my kids are still young. So this changes my roadmap a bit – makes it a tad easier. On Monday he left the house 5 minutes late; the strategy on my road map was to give a choice: pack backpack tonight or tomorrow morning. He chose that night – and once he gets that boost he’s good to go 80% of the time.

Right now I’m waiting in the car on day 3. Oh and here he comes…less than five minutes late.

Later on…He really can rock out the morning when he doesn’t have to scramble and run around like a chicken with his head cut off in the morning, right now the night before is key for him.

Ok, I’m off. This sad little post has taken 2 days to write. I think it’s time to put it to bed.

I HAD a plan… March 12, 2010

But I have crumpled it up and thrown it in the garbage.

I had intended to do a roadmap WITH Thor for remembering his remembery board. After some thought on how that would look and some chatting on the PonT forum with Vicki I have decided instead, to do my own roadmap for getting out the door in the morning.

Thor is capable of doing everything we’ve trained him on with respect to mornings – waking up, getting dressed, making lunch, packing his backpack, brushing teeth – but he is not capable of remembering on his own in a fashion that gets him out the door on time. When placed in the moment he gets it all done and gets out the door, usually 10 to 15 minutes late. Unless I remind him the night before to look at his board, which then, in turn, reminds him to make his lunch and pack his back pack the night before, then he gets out the door right on time. I started working on the map last night – and it’s not done – but just the starting of it had it at the front of my brain and I was thinking about ALL sorts of things I can put on my roadmap as he was getting ready for school this morning.

So, my goal is to finish the map this weekend and give it a go starting Monday.