Insomnia Monkey Links

I couldn't sleep Sunday night. I don't even know why I couldn't sleep which made it all the more frustrating. Last week, I had trouble sleeping and I knew why - our power had gone out and I was worried about our city outgrowing its infrastructure which is a fancy way of saying that I was worried about the apocalypse. But Sunday night, I just couldn't sleep which meant that by 5 p.m. yesterday, I was exhausted. In an attempt to address this issue, I made myself a double espresso which meant that I was still awake at 2 a.m. this morning. This is a horrible cycle and one that I have fallen victim to in the past. Yes, I am an innocent victim!

Also, my kids were home again today and I didn't have espresso this afternoon which means that I am tired.

I plan to go to bed as soon as I finish typing this. In fact, I may already be asleep. Yeah. Let's go with that so that I don't have to be accountable for this jumble of words.

When I was up last night, I did write a post for VillageQ about some of the crazy stuff my kids did when they were younger which should not be confused with the crazy stuff they did this month.

From Urban myths of parenting at VQ:

Of course, I also thought my kids wouldn’t do those dumb things you hear about, those things that seem like urban myths of parenting.I had to learn the hard way that, sometimes, urban myths begin in truth.

Good for a laugh and there are a couple of good stories in the comments over there.

And with that, I say goodnight.

*This post was edited by a sleep-deprived monkey wearing a blindfold. All typos and grammar errors should be attributed to the monkey. Address concerns and complaints to Geoffrey the Monkey c/o vikki@uppoppedafox.com

**The picture accompanying this post is a gratuitous cute kid pic that would have been a great photo for the VillageQ post because of Zeca's mischievous four-year-old smirk. However, Geoffrey was not thorough when searching the archives last night. Dammit Geoffrey.

Life Hacks for Kids

It's so boring being a kid (so I hear) and idle hands are the devil's workshop (so they say) which means that life can get pretty interesting around here. The kids were supposed to go back to school tomorrow but school was cancelled because the air temperature will be skin-falling-off-below-zero.

This means we get an extra day of togetherness!

If you have ever wondered what it is really like at the Casa de Fox, I am sharing what can only be called Life Hacks for Kids courtesy of my kids' wacky behavior.

Make a chocolate Lego brick!

Take a piece of aluminum foil and mold it around a Lego brick. Fill the aluminum mold with chocolate chips. Place in microwave until you have your own personal fireworks show in the kitchen! Don't tell your parents. Remove hot metal Lego brick filled with molten chocolate and place in freezer. Forget about it for days. When you finally ask to have it for dessert, plead the fifth when asked how it was made.

Use Pledge as air freshener!

Do you have an inability to tolerate any human smells but you don't have any air freshener? Use "dust stuff" because it smells like lemons and lemons smell so fresh and no one should ever smell anything but lemons ever! Spray Pledge directly into the air so that it falls in a fine mist over everything in the bathroom. Then, watch as your sister and parents slip and slide on the tile in your homemade lemon-scented wonderland!

Play live-action fruit ninja!

Maybe you do martial arts. Maybe you recently won a real katana for selling the most raffle tickets for your dojang. If so, you have everything you need to play real life fruit ninja in your living room! First, make sure that your parents are busy. Second, get your sister to film it so that you can post it on Instagram. Then, take an orange from the pantry and throw it into the air and try to hack it in half with your sword. If at first you don't succeed, try, try again. Eventually, you may have to settle for laying the orange on the living room floor and hacking it in half. Once you are finished, skedaddle back to your room but leave the halved orange on the radiator so that it can leak orange juice all over the place!

I hope that everyone's winter break was as fun-filled as ours! Now, can we all do an anti-snow/warm-up dance so everyone goes back to school on Tuesday?

The Magic of Childhood

I can't remember Miguel at eight. I know it was 2009 and I could easily pull up pictures to help me remember what he looked like but that wouldn't help me remember who he was then. I don't remember what he liked to do or the music that he sang along to or what made him laugh or the books he read over and over again. The details have been lost in the years since then.

I think about this now because Zeca is eight and I find myself searching for some sort of measuring stick. I ask myself what kids her age do but obviously the tick marks and numbers have worn off my ruler some time ago.

She wants to read graphic novels. She needs to be reminded to change her socks and brush her teeth. She wants to show us dance routines when we want her to put on her coat.

I want her to read more challenging books, to be independent, to stop dancing and do what I ask.

I am starting to realize that I have always expected her to be older than she is and I'm starting to see that she just wants and needs to be eight.

She often tells me that it's hard to be the youngest and it's hard for me to hear because the fog of my own guilt moves into the spaces between us. I think of the unfinished baby book in a box in the closet. I think of the hand me down skates and cleats. I think of the fact that I don't feel as playful at this age as I did when Miguel was her age. Sometimes, her words make it through and I listen. Sometimes, I can't hear her and tell her all the great things about being the baby. I disappoint us both in those moments.

Zeca got a set of magic cups for Christmas from her Aunt and Uncle. She spent this morning watching the DVD and learning tricks with cups and balls. She came down to the living room in the suit jacket she wore to our wedding, her wooden wand tucked into an inside pocket. She laid out her cups and balls and showed us the tricks she was learning. Her hands are small and she can't always hide the little red ball completely and I smile when I see it and she laughs and tells me she's practicing.

Later, she invited Miguel into her room to show him her tricks. I heard her begin, "I have here two ordinary cups. Look into the bottom and you'll see they have no holes..." I lost track of the conversation but then heard Miguel say, "Zeca, I can see the ball! You should do it this way..." and then "Zeca! Let me show you! You should put the wand up your sleeve..." and then crying and a door slamming.

I found Miguel sitting on his bed and I explained that she'd been working on those tricks all day, "Why couldn't you just watch? Why do you have to point out all of her mistakes?" He said, "I was just trying to make it better. She didn't have to cry."

"Can you please just let her be eight?"

Maybe that's too much to ask of someone who is just 12 when I am inconsistent myself.

When you are the youngest, the illusions are stripped away sooner and the magic of childhood disappears. There is something about the image of her in her little black suit jacket, looking so earnest that makes me want to do better. I want to believe that ordinary cups can slide through each other, that a red ball can appear from thin air. I want to believe in the magic of a wand tapped three times. But more than anything, I want to believe in the magic of eight. I want it for her.