re-engergized parenting: practicing deliberateness

salt lake temple east doors

as the mother of a brood, spread out over a lot of years, i'm worried about parental burn-out.

i'm such a different mother to moses and cecily than i was to eva and ingrid.  for instance, we didn't own a t.v. when eva and ingrid were little.  and there was no internet, really, unless you count dial-up.  this means they spent the majority of their free time reading and in imaginative play.

also, they spent most of their elementary years in oakland and seattle, whereas mo and cec were born and raised in utah.

the east doors of the temple have never been opened.  they will only be opened by jesus during the second coming.

on monday, we took the kids on an outing to salt lake city, and it hit me how few outings we've done with the littles as compared with the number of cool things we used to do with the bigs.  in seattle, we had a zoo pass, we went to carkeek almost weekly, and lake washington on walks and bike rides almost daily.  we went to concerts and events, museums and parties, plays, lessons, the science center, the children's museum, and the aquarium.

now we simply spend too much time indoors, too much time with individual screens.

the view from the joseph smith building, tenth floor. this is a must-see if you're touristing in salt lake.

i'm older now.  i have less energy, and more demands on my time, so i have to be deliberate. i have to practice to keep my quality of parenting up.  being tired has it's upside, however.  i'm mellower, i don't try to micro-manage my younger kids like i did with the older ones, i'm not as critical, i enjoy the kids more and worry less, and i have a good sense of what's important and what's not.

keep start quit (ksq) is a mid-semester evaluation i sometimes do with my students if i think a class isn't going as well as it could be.  it helps me figure out what the problems are.  so here's my attempt at a mid-life parenting evaluation:


keep

--having family dinner every night
--teaching the kids to cook
--kids' daily checklists
--one on one dates with the kids
--family home evening
--reading out loud together
--playing the favorites game
--date night for parents

start 

--turning off the internet for a few hours a day
--attending international cinema at byu together
--planning holidays and vacations more carefully--prioritizing this
--a family mission statment
--involving the kids more in problem solving
--group reading time (we all read our own books together)
--more day trips

quit

--lazy or thoughtless parenting
--criticizing
--too much screen time
--spending time and money on anything that doesn't fit with our family's values
--being distracted during family time

moses loved the austrian-made hand-crafted furniture in the joseph smith building

mission statement

i know it's gross and corporate-y, but i like the idea of having a firm vision in mind of my purpose in this life, and what i want to seed in my children before they leave my home.  i'll try to come up with a better title for this than 'mission statement' (candland asplund family articles?  statement of purpose?) but in the mean time, here's what i want to start with:

Our family cultivates and values curiosity.

dear readers, i want to know your thoughts on rejuvenating yourself when you start to get parental burn out (when i do this, my kids moan and say, "mom's doing her new-leaf-ish thing again.")

i'm also curious about words, phrases, etc. that you would put into a family mission statement.

festive frocks

it's party season, and i'm ready for some celebration.

this weekend is a hanukkah party at anna's.  my first hanukkah event ever.

anna will be in full glitz, and wants me to do the same.

well, okay,

i guess i kinda want to go full glitz, too.

what is everyone wearing this season?

julie picked out this dress for me at h & m.

anna meanwhile is checking out the sugarhouse d.i. for something vintage for me.

and i, meanwhile, wonder if i can get just a teensy little $4,000.00 mortgage on my house for this

valentino cocktail dress.  it's just a solid investment, really:

so,

here's my  inspiration,  to you from me,  for the season:

go all out!

don't neglect the glitter & shine this year.

even if it's cheap and tawdry, come on!

it's dark out there!

you do anything you need in order to get a little more twinkle into it!



legwear:  black tights (when i wear black tights day after day, it means things are busy and tight.)

looking forward to:  hanukkah.

inspiration:  what julie said today about eva and anna--to paraphrase--that she was really touched by

how much effort they put into making life beautiful and fun even in difficult circumstances.  i concur.

What I Was Doing When You Were in Your Leopard-Skin Print Dress

After school, S and I attended the opening day of this new croissant cafe!  Another place to write and grade.  

L, the fact that we have only two computers (one near death) and four people is a real prob.  (Also, no TV, so one of the computers serves as that.)

So, last night--no blogging.  Today, I'll blog twice.

So, I hope you read this, L.

Last night, S and I went to Cocoa Bar for the free Internet so she could watch a show on this computer.    (Our Internet was spotty.)  I wrote in the candlelit dark in a notebook.

As I wrote, I wondered if my friends in Salt Lake City were having a good time at Dennis' art show.

Shelley and I texted back and forth.  NYC to PDX.

I also wondered what it may have been like to attend my high school reunion taking place last night in this place.  I've never been to a single reunion.  Have you?

At home, I crawled into my bed.  It had been a long week, but not the longest week I've had recently.  To rest my aching, typing hands I read:  Michael Chabon's new novel about a record store in Berkeley and Jonathan Lethem's novel about a former child stare living on residuals in NYC while his astronaut girlfriend endlessly orbits the earth.

I was not wearing a leopard-skin print dress.  I was not wearing anything worth writing about at all.

old school

mom, bonnie, eva & me--women's conference

tonight i went to lds women's conference in salt lake city with my mom, eva and bonnie.  it's one of those things that never changes.

afterwards we went to little america for dinner, a place i've been eating at for as long as i can remember.  the decor is the same as always--the naugahyde booths, the padded wall treatments, the trellised wall dividers, and the bar you can sit at, reminiscent of the coffee shop-type joint it once was, way back when, as "the hot shoppes," part of marriott's little america.  my dad worked at these joints as a young man, and they played a key role in his life and ultimately, his career.  he knew a lot about the recipes (i don't think their recipes have changed at all since hot shoppe days) and, since he and christian met up with us for dinner after the conference, he told me a lot about the olden days, his family history, the places he visited on his recent visit to the place he grew up, in maryland just across the potomac from d.c.  he's had a pretty fascinating and far-flung life, but since he's quiet, i get more little bits and pieces of his history each year.  things that are amazing, unusual and surprising.

one is never surprised, however, with the open-faced hot turkey sandwich, the liver and onions, the trout amandine, or the roast baron of beef one gets at the little america.  nor the spumoni or burnt almond fudge ice creams, the chocolate malts served in their stainless steel mixing cups, the bread pudding, or the lemon merengue pie.

much as i love something new, i'm an even bigger fan of the things that stay constant, year after year.  i'll be sad when they tear out the peach booths or replace the silk flowers.  i love the floor to ceiling bathroom stalls and the little dressing table you can sit at to reapply your lipstick.  i hope they always serve an open-faced hot roast beef sandwich & if they ever decide to take it off the menu,  i hope they will kindly wait until i'm dead to do so.

saturday night city

i loved ingrid's party outfit, especially the thrifted gold pumps

tonight for our night out, we drove north to the big city of salt lake.

christian was obsessed with the pigeon on the steps.  i was obsessed with my dress, and needed to wear it one more time before summer ends.

1) dropped off ingrid at party.

new slc ethiopian restaurant--we recommend it.

2) ethiopian food at mahider (thumbs up.)

3) farewell my queen at the broadway (another thumbs up.)

the utah state capitol

the beehive state. 

4) checking out the views of salt lake city from the state capitol, where christian quipped "a noble edifice where a lot of un-noble stuff happens."  we do have a bat-sh** crazy state legislature.

a utah classic.

5) hires big H for drinks.

6) fishbone (on cassette tape) for the ride home.  we both love this song.

7) hagen-dazs vanilla swiss almond in bed while blogging.  whoever invented that flavor is a genius.

viva

i don't think we've ever done a girls' day all together before.

today was vivid with girls & colors.  i woke up early to write for several hours in the cool morning on the back patio.  ate breakfast out there, then took all of my daughters to salt lake city to visit eva in her new digs.

here's our day.

1) mani-pedis with my girls. got flak from the manicurist about switching to a "winter color," my very favorite shade of all time, lincoln park after dark by o.p.i.  since when is gothy vamp for winter only?

ingy's feminist mani.

2) saw eva's great new salt lake city apartment.

3) tea in salt lake city with girls.

4) stopped by my department to pick up my desk copies for fall classes.

look what we found at ¡viva!

5) got filmed for a commercial whilst shopping for groceries at ¡viva! market, specifically whilst ordering huaraches at elfos food stand.