Breaking the Rules

I like to push boundaries and bend rules.  Not completely...Just enough to tell myself that regardless of the situation I still have some semblance of control.  Yes.  I am one of "those people."  I enjoy being just a little contrary.  And sometimes I go against the grain - just a little - simply to add excitement to life. 

Usually, however, when I work with kids I tend to stay within the guidelines.  Not everything in the field of Child Development has stood the test of time.  There is a lot of "pop psychology" that briefly finds its way into the field, only to be forgotten a few years after the thousands of books get published.  I figure that if I combine the theories of Piaget, Vygostky, Bronfenbrenner, and other big shot Child Developmentalists I figure I'm pretty good.  And ultimately, I feel that if I go into a house with a dedication to love (the child and their family) I am going to do some good.

A few weeks ago I decided to break the rules a bit.  In school I was taught to pretty much keep food out of the equation when working with kids.  Never use food as a reward.  Food is for eating and keeping the body healthy - not playing with.  If you absolutely must use food with kids, make sure it's healthy food, to teach good habits.

Right.

I made Christmas graham cracker trains with a few kids.  And how do you make a graham cracker train without frosting and candy?  Just call me the Rule-Breaker. 

Officially these are the areas we worked on while making the Christmas graham cracker trains:
     - Fine Motor Skills
     - Hand/Eye Coordination
     - Problem Solving
     - Abstract Reasoning
     - Spatial Relations
     - Expressive Language Skills
     - Receptive Language Skills
     - Number Sense
     - Self-Control (let's be honest here: I was incredibly impressed that the 2-year-olds were able to do this and only eat the candies they were given permission to eat)

A lot of great areas of work.  But really, the main reason I did this activity was because it was Christmas time. 

 And it was just fun.

"Cat! It's So Fat!"

Last night I fell in love.  It wasn't with a person.  It wasn't with a pair of shoes or amazing sweater.  It was with a Christmas tree. 

Last night Cat and I decided we needed to get a Christmas tree.  Now, we don't have enough space in our apartment to get a normal-sized tree, and we really don't have the money to buy anything bigger than a few feet tall.  So we made our way to the Home Depot to find a little, Charlie Brown Christmas tree.  We walked in and looked around for a second or two before I saw the sign that said, Noble Firs, 3-5 ft, $19.99.

"That's us, Cat," I said.  "Right within our price range."  We walked over to the small trees and I started laughing.  "They're so little!"  There were only a few, and I picked up the one closest to me while Cat poked around the others.  "Oh. My. Gosh. Cat!  It's so fat!!"  She looked up and started laughing.  "What?" 

"Your face," she laughed.  "You're just so excited!"

It was true.  My jaw had dropped and my eyes were huge.  Even though I was holding the tree up I was bouncing up and down in excitement.  "I love it!  It's so fat!"

The clerk came over to us.  "You guys want to look at it?  I can hold it if you want me to." 

I handed it to her and started skipping around the tree.  "I love it!"

Now the clerk started laughing.  "You're so excited!  You're making me excited!"

I laughed.  "I'm sorry!  I just love Christmas so much!  And I love this tree.  It's so fat!!" 

Both Cat and the clerk laughed.  I looked at Cat and clasped my hands under my chin.  "Please can we get it?  It's so fat!"

She nodded.  "I guess so, if you really want it." 

"Cat?  How can I not want it?  It's so fat!" 

We paid (the clerk was still laughing at me) and took the little, fat tree to the get a fresh cut on it's trunk.  The tree was so short and light that the guy who was cutting the trunk had to keep stopping and resetting the tree.  (The tree ended up with a very lopsided trunk as a result.)  I was so excited.  The whole time he was cutting the tree I was jumping up and down and yelling, "Cat!  It's so fat!"  I was doing a little dance, and as I glanced over toward the first clerk who helped us, I saw her laughing again.  At that moment the little tree almost fell off the table.  I lurched toward it and Cat laughed as I reached my hand out, as if to catch it.  Luckily the tree didn't fall, and I began dancing again.  I turned to Cat.  "It is a bad thing that I've already named it 'Norbert'?" I asked. 

After the bottom was cut it was time to wrap Norbert in netting so he would fit in the backseat of my car.  Orion (yeah, that was really the name of the guy who was wielding the chainsaw) grabbed Norbert and went to throw it through the net-wrapping-contraption.  Norbert was so fat he didn't make it through on the first try.  "Norbert!" I yelled as he crashed to the ground.  (Speaking of "ground," Cat was pretty much on the ground laughing at this point.)  Orion looked at me - was that fear I saw in his eyes? - and grabbed Norbert off the ground and shoved him through the contraption.  He came out the other end wrapped tightly and Orion handed it to me.  "Thanks!" I chirped as I grabbed my fat Christmas tree and began to head toward the car. 

"You, uh...You guys need any help taking it to the car?" Orion asked.

Cat and I looked at each other, then shook our heads.  "No thanks," Cat said.  "Our car is just right here."  Orion nodded and heaved a sigh of relief.

I opened the back door of my car and gently heaved Norbert in.  "Oh no!  Cat!  The door won't shut!"

"Can you scoot it in any further?"

I reached my hand in and scooted Norbert as far over as I could.  "Let go of me, Norbert!" I yelled.  My hand had caught on both a tree limb and the netting.  I yanked and finally freed my hand.  I closed the door and skipped over to the driver's seat. 

After we drove home I grabbed Norbert, the Noble Fir, out of the back of my car and hauled him up the stairs.  When I reached the front door I had to stop.  "Cat!  We can't both fit through the door!"  It was true: the tree was too fat to fit through the door with me, even wrapped up.  I had to shove Norbert through the doorway first, and then follow. 




Norbert - Wrapped up and put on my desk.

  After wrestling him into the stand we pulled Norbert inside and put him on the desk in the living room.  After spinning him around a few times we finally decided he was placed just right and cut the netting off.

"Oh my gosh, Steph!" Cat yelled.  "It's so fat!  Norbert is so fat!"

Norbert - Unwrapped

After sitting back and admiring Norbert for a while we pulled out the Christmas lights.  Norbert needed some decking.  So, we wrapped a single strand of lights around him (I was a little afraid it would take 2...he's just so fat!) and laughed together.

Norbert - With lights!



"He's just so fat!" we said. 

It's true...And it makes me happy every time I see it. 

A Jar of Happiness

Today I have the afternoon off.  Being ambitious, I decided to clean my room.  I mean really clean my room.  I pulled out boxes that have moved from house to house to house with me but that have never truly been opened.  I was doing great, going through things and separating them into "keep," "give away," and "throw away" piles when, true to form, I got sidetracked.

I got to a box from 9th grade or so, and pulled out something wrapped in tissue paper.  It was an old jar - probably about 100 years old by now - with "HAPPINESS" taped to the lid.  I opened it up and discovered about 100 slips of paper inside.  On each slip I had written something that made me happy.

Here are just a few things I found written on those slips:

-Hot Cocoa
-That time we went to Disneyland and Jobie made up songs about everything
-Mom and Dad getting remarried
-Camping with Gary and Amanda
-Twins
-That time Cat and I went into Shoney's because we saw the Illinois baseball team had stopped there
-When Mom smooths my hair back
-Guys in football uniforms
-Country songs
-The Harry Potter Series
-Mr. Seal (he was my favorite stuffed animal as a kid...and yes, he was a seal)
-Celebrating Sister Day
-Boiled custard
-Different accents

These are all things I wrote down in 9th and 10th grade, but they still make me happy.  I am going to put this jar on my dresser and add to it.  I think it can do us all good to have a jar of happiness - something to look into when we are a bit down. 

And now I want to know: What's in your jar of happiness?

James 1:17