Guest Post: Kristi Ashcroft: “These things they go away; Replaced by Everyday” — R.E.M., Nightswimming

To my three boys,

It’s hard to believe that tomorrow it’s over. When the school bell rang on June 27, and we were staring ahead at 65 days of unscheduled, unstructured time at our rustic cottage on somewhat remote Manitoulin Island, it seemed both daunting and exhilarating. We all claimed this was what we wanted. But, with no camps booked for any of you this summer, with Dad’s work schedule requiring him in Toronto more than at the cottage, and with few good friends nearby, I felt like I was embarking on a tight rope across a wide chasm. With just the right balance, it could be great. Or it could go another way.

I admit, the bickering almost undid me. “Stop it”, “Owwwwww”, “Mommmmmmmmmm”, “He started it”, “Stop copying me”, “He pinched (kicked, punched, scratched, poked) me”, “He cheated”, “That’s mine”, “I hate you”, “You don’t even know what 45 plus 56 is”, “You suck at hockey,” “You’re an idiot”, “What?”, “What did I do?”.

And that was before breakfast.

I vacillated between refereeing, cajoling, bribing, punishing, peace-brokering, distracting, and out and out losing my mind. None of those strategies seemed to be particularly or consistently effective. One morning, out of fury over some territorial conflict involving a pillow fort, you my littlest one, managed to strip off your pull-up from the night before and bonk your eldest brother over the head with it, thereby causing the diaper to explode and sending pee-soaked polymers across the room where they settled like a yellow-tinged snow. We were only about two weeks into summer and my coffee hadn’t even finished brewing. I promptly declared summer cancelled, and in a further fit of hyperbole, threatened to sell the cottage and use the proceeds to send each of you to summer camp, separately, in perpetuity. Because clearly we couldn’t survive summer together.

But we plodded on. The memories of the fighting do eventually fade to white noise. We can all now laugh at the diaper snow story, and you each delight in regaling others with your part in it. And thank goodness I didn’t throw in the towel. There is so much I would have missed.

First, I would have missed our talks: talks that don’t get cut short or interrupted because there’s a brother to pick up or a practice to get to; talks that stem from your questions, fears or curiosities. We talked about wolves and tornadoes and cancer and dying a lot this summer, though I can’t really explain why those themes recurred. Our “where did I come from” talk started after you learned about an initiative to repopulate the Great Lakes with sturgeon, and I found myself in the somewhat awkward position of having to compare and contrast fish procreation with the human variety. You were captivated by stories of when you were young, and of when we were young, creating a trove of family lore that I hope will stay with you and eventually be retold by you.

We had time to focus on things that often get swept aside during the busy seasons, like manners. You had the chance to hone your skills of being a good guest, a good host and a good neighbour. I don’t want to jinx it, but this summer may have paved the way for 2014 to be declared “The Year Everyone Started Holding Their Fork Correctly,” although I’m guessing you guys won’t remember it that way.

You had more freedom and I got to give it to you. You could ride way ahead on your bike, wander the woods with your brothers, or burst outside on a whim without a corresponding admonition from your mother to “stop at the stop sign”, or “slow down”. I loved observing how you handled the mutually reinforcing responsibility and independence. I also loved that I almost never heard myself say “Hurry up”, “Time to go” or “We’re late.”

I had a chance to shed my roles as chauffeur, guidance counsellor, tutor, nag-in-chief and disciplinarian, and to have the opportunity to just DO things with you. Do things WITH you. The nights we kayaked out past the point so we could see the sun set. The quiet mornings when we felt like we were the first ones to make ripples in the water with our paddles. The bike rides that we’d finish with sprints, pretending we were chasing down a hockey player from the other team who was on a breakaway. The walks where we noticed all the things we miss when we drive that same stretch of country lane. The swims, the saunas and then more swims. The time I got up on water skis for the first time and saw you all cheering me on from the boat. Moms don’t get cheers very often, and we don’t necessarily expect or need them. But when we do get woo-hoos and high fives from our kids, it is incredibly special.

I loved all the games we played together. (OK, except Junior Monopoly. I actually hated Junior Monopoly, with its skewed economics where you’re either enjoying an immediate 100% return on investment, or suffering expropriation of your properties with the mere draw of a Chance card, thereby leaving all participants somewhere on the spectrum between indifferent and incensed by the end of the game). But matching wits with you in Connect Four or Qwirkle, playing series after series of Crazy Eights and Uno, and watching your logical minds at work cracking codes in Mastermind were some of my favourite indoor moments of the summer.

I relished the opportunity to watch you be you. Your true natures reveal themselves when you are responsible for combatting your own boredom. I noticed, without judgment, who was more likely to reach for his hockey stick and who was more likely to work a puzzle. I watched as you would spend hours in character as imaginary brothers who are 12- and 11-years-old, respectively, undertaking no end of wild adventures, Stanley Cup quests, and other complicated plot lines. I was intrigued to hear your takes on the books you read, and was sometimes surprised at which ones you loved and which were just OK. I noticed which friends from school you mentioned and which issues from home permeated our summer bubble. I made a mental note of these for when we return home and other factors sometimes muddy our priorities.

I stopped myself on more than one occasion this summer and wished I could bottle these moments, or that I could hit the pause button and keep you at ages 4, 6 and 8, picking raspberries, catching frogs, chasing sea gulls, digging in mud, jumping on trampolines and letting me read stories to you. The summer felt fleeting, perhaps because I don’t know if conditions will ever permit us to have another 65-day spell like this one.

But now it’s time. Tomorrow I send you back to your real worlds of school and sports and social lives. You’re blonder, taller and tanner than when you left. But I think you’re changed in less visible albeit more permanent ways as well. I know I am. I hope we get to do this again sometime.

Love, Mom

Kristi has a degree in Economics from Princeton University and worked for eight years at a Wall Street firm in New York and London.  She and her husband settled in Toronto, and she is now a stay-at-home mom to three busy boys ages 4, 6 and 8.

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Guest Post: Kristi Ashcroft: “These things they go away; Replaced by Everyday” — R.E.M., Nightswimming

To my three boys,

It’s hard to believe that tomorrow it’s over. When the school bell rang on June 27, and we were staring ahead at 65 days of unscheduled, unstructured time at our rustic cottage on somewhat remote Manitoulin Island, it seemed both daunting and exhilarating. We all claimed this was what we wanted. But, with no camps booked for any of you this summer, with Dad’s work schedule requiring him in Toronto more than at the cottage, and with few good friends nearby, I felt like I was embarking on a tight rope across a wide chasm. With just the right balance, it could be great. Or it could go another way.

I admit, the bickering almost undid me. “Stop it”, “Owwwwww”, “Mommmmmmmmmm”, “He started it”, “Stop copying me”, “He pinched (kicked, punched, scratched, poked) me”, “He cheated”, “That’s mine”, “I hate you”, “You don’t even know what 45 plus 56 is”, “You suck at hockey,” “You’re an idiot”, “What?”, “What did I do?”.

And that was before breakfast.

I vacillated between refereeing, cajoling, bribing, punishing, peace-brokering, distracting, and out and out losing my mind. None of those strategies seemed to be particularly or consistently effective. One morning, out of fury over some territorial conflict involving a pillow fort, you my littlest one, managed to strip off your pull-up from the night before and bonk your eldest brother over the head with it, thereby causing the diaper to explode and sending pee-soaked polymers across the room where they settled like a yellow-tinged snow. We were only about two weeks into summer and my coffee hadn’t even finished brewing. I promptly declared summer cancelled, and in a further fit of hyperbole, threatened to sell the cottage and use the proceeds to send each of you to summer camp, separately, in perpetuity. Because clearly we couldn’t survive summer together.

But we plodded on. The memories of the fighting do eventually fade to white noise. We can all now laugh at the diaper snow story, and you each delight in regaling others with your part in it. And thank goodness I didn’t throw in the towel. There is so much I would have missed.

First, I would have missed our talks: talks that don’t get cut short or interrupted because there’s a brother to pick up or a practice to get to; talks that stem from your questions, fears or curiosities. We talked about wolves and tornadoes and cancer and dying a lot this summer, though I can’t really explain why those themes recurred. Our “where did I come from” talk started after you learned about an initiative to repopulate the Great Lakes with sturgeon, and I found myself in the somewhat awkward position of having to compare and contrast fish procreation with the human variety. You were captivated by stories of when you were young, and of when we were young, creating a trove of family lore that I hope will stay with you and eventually be retold by you.

We had time to focus on things that often get swept aside during the busy seasons, like manners. You had the chance to hone your skills of being a good guest, a good host and a good neighbour. I don’t want to jinx it, but this summer may have paved the way for 2014 to be declared “The Year Everyone Started Holding Their Fork Correctly,” although I’m guessing you guys won’t remember it that way.

You had more freedom and I got to give it to you. You could ride way ahead on your bike, wander the woods with your brothers, or burst outside on a whim without a corresponding admonition from your mother to “stop at the stop sign”, or “slow down”. I loved observing how you handled the mutually reinforcing responsibility and independence. I also loved that I almost never heard myself say “Hurry up”, “Time to go” or “We’re late.”

I had a chance to shed my roles as chauffeur, guidance counsellor, tutor, nag-in-chief and disciplinarian, and to have the opportunity to just DO things with you. Do things WITH you. The nights we kayaked out past the point so we could see the sun set. The quiet mornings when we felt like we were the first ones to make ripples in the water with our paddles. The bike rides that we’d finish with sprints, pretending we were chasing down a hockey player from the other team who was on a breakaway. The walks where we noticed all the things we miss when we drive that same stretch of country lane. The swims, the saunas and then more swims. The time I got up on water skis for the first time and saw you all cheering me on from the boat. Moms don’t get cheers very often, and we don’t necessarily expect or need them. But when we do get woo-hoos and high fives from our kids, it is incredibly special.

I loved all the games we played together. (OK, except Junior Monopoly. I actually hated Junior Monopoly, with its skewed economics where you’re either enjoying an immediate 100% return on investment, or suffering expropriation of your properties with the mere draw of a Chance card, thereby leaving all participants somewhere on the spectrum between indifferent and incensed by the end of the game). But matching wits with you in Connect Four or Qwirkle, playing series after series of Crazy Eights and Uno, and watching your logical minds at work cracking codes in Mastermind were some of my favourite indoor moments of the summer.

I relished the opportunity to watch you be you. Your true natures reveal themselves when you are responsible for combatting your own boredom. I noticed, without judgment, who was more likely to reach for his hockey stick and who was more likely to work a puzzle. I watched as you would spend hours in character as imaginary brothers who are 12- and 11-years-old, respectively, undertaking no end of wild adventures, Stanley Cup quests, and other complicated plot lines. I was intrigued to hear your takes on the books you read, and was sometimes surprised at which ones you loved and which were just OK. I noticed which friends from school you mentioned and which issues from home permeated our summer bubble. I made a mental note of these for when we return home and other factors sometimes muddy our priorities.

I stopped myself on more than one occasion this summer and wished I could bottle these moments, or that I could hit the pause button and keep you at ages 4, 6 and 8, picking raspberries, catching frogs, chasing sea gulls, digging in mud, jumping on trampolines and letting me read stories to you. The summer felt fleeting, perhaps because I don’t know if conditions will ever permit us to have another 65-day spell like this one.

But now it’s time. Tomorrow I send you back to your real worlds of school and sports and social lives. You’re blonder, taller and tanner than when you left. But I think you’re changed in less visible albeit more permanent ways as well. I know I am. I hope we get to do this again sometime.

Love, Mom

Kristi has a degree in Economics from Princeton University and worked for eight years at a Wall Street firm in New York and London.  She and her husband settled in Toronto, and she is now a stay-at-home mom to three busy boys ages 4, 6 and 8.

F’n Thin Mints by Guest Blogger Kristi Ashcroft

Girl Scout Thin Mints

F’n Thin Mints.  I posted this on Facebook a few days ago as I tossed the empty box into the blue bin, and right before I began to jot down a few thoughts for this blog.  I don’t swear in front of my kids.  Really, I don’t.  Ever.  And I have to give props to my husband, who also keeps it clean in front of the family.  That said, when the little ones are out of earshot, we have both been known to add a few four-letter flourishes to our sentences.

In part, the double life has arisen because the “do as I say, not as I do” mantra falls on deaf ears in our household.  If we’re serious about keeping our kids’ language clean, then ours will have to be above reproach as well.  And in my mind, swearing is analogous to eating an entire sleeve of Thin Mints:  I wish I could say I never do it; there really is no justification for it; I don’t do it in front of the kids; and while I’m realistic about the fact that they will have their own vices at some point, there’s no way I’m going to condone them doing it on my watch.

Peter Scowen , in his Globe & Mail article about potty-mouthed parents, cites a variety of empirical and anecdotal data supporting the notion that swearing in front of the kids (and them swearing in turn) is no big deal.  So why does it bother me?

It comes down to two things.  First, I love words.  My left-brained self has always appreciated that the English language – with over ten times the number of words as, for example, French – allows us to describe a feeling, situation or event with almost laser-like precision.  Using a one-size fits all curse word to reflect anger, shock, pain, surprise, thrill, regret, or to merely fill a pause in the conversation might, to some, seem efficient.  To me, it’s like having tunnel vision. Also, I am generally partial to couth.

Last week, I ended up in the unlikely situation of being at a Drake concert, during which Drake implored his audience to “make some motherf—ing noise”.  I couldn’t help but wonder…how loud is motherf—ing noise?  I don’t know a lot of Drake’s music, but I do know a lot of mothers.  And my sense is that mother f—ing noise is actually, often, very very quiet.  As in, “above all else do NOT wake the kids in the next room” quiet.

OK, so Drake clearly wasn’t intending for his adjective to be taken literally, and perhaps I should consider that swear words are highly effective for emphasis.  But really, if I am LMFAO at something, does that mean the joke is significantly more hilarious than if I’m simply (more kid-friendly) LMAO or (G-rated) ROFL?

And I understand that there’s nothing like blood-boiling rage to get the f-bombs flowing.  However, there is also no easier way to be immediately written off as a raving lunatic.  The person on the receiving end of your expletive-laden wrath will zone out, wait for your tirade to be over, and then ask you to either leave or hang up.  I’m fairly certain Rogers customer service has one of my phone calls recorded for “quality assurance” that would illustrate this point beautifully.

As parents, we all pick our priorities.  One of mine is teaching my kids to be effective communicators.  Keeping the language clean and fostering an environment where we all use respectful, thoughtful, varied and appropriate vocabulary is a key component of this.  Swearing in this context would seem to undermine all of our efforts.

And so, in our house, if my kids use an undesirable word (and they are still young enough that we’re primarily dealing with epithets like “stupid” and “idiot”), I make them stop and articulate at least a few other ways they could express what they are thinking or feeling at that moment.  My grand hope is that they become accustomed to expressing themselves using a rich variety of words.  At a bare minimum, I hope it will be such a pain in the neck for my boys to swear in my presence that they hone their little self-censoring filters – something that will serve them well in life.  Sort of like putting the Thin Mints at the back of the top shelf of the pantry, requiring a step stool and a complete kitchen reorganization to reach them.   F’n Thin Mints.

________________

 

Kristi has a degree in Economics from Princeton University and worked for eight years at a Wall Street firm in New York and London.  She and her husband settled in Toronto, and she is now a stay-at-home mom to three busy boys ages 3, 5 and 7.

At Issue: Is It Okay To Curse In Front Of Your Kids?

Kids.  The minute we become parents our world goes topsy-turvy.  Things we may have held near and dear before our little ones arrived instantly seem trivial and a waste of time.  Many of us traded in the 2-door sedan for something with an impressive safety rating, swapped our Saturday nights at Green Day concerts with Sunday morning sing-a-longs and maybe even a few succumbed to wearing the dreaded mom-jeans (if you did, please stop reading this right now, take them off your body, get your kitchen scissors and cut them up.  Right. Now.).

The point is that we do change in many ways when we become parents but in just as many ways we don’t.

We don’t give up reading books that we love, eating our favourite foods or enjoying the same late-night comedies simply because we have to trek someone to hockey practice at 6 am or wash mountains of dirty laundry.

But are there exceptions?  For example, if before you became a parent you peppered your everyday language with expletives do you have put an end to that?  Full stop?

On June 3, 2013 Peter Scowen wrote an article for the Globe and Mail about potty-mouthed parents.  He cited Nicole C. Kear who wrote a post for Salon, an avid (and creative) curser long before becoming a mom.  Kear decided to put an end to her bad-language habit, wanting a more G-rated environment for her children as her little ones reached the ages of 8, 6 and “toddler”.

Naturally, Scowen found another blogger, from the parenting site The Stir, offering the opposite view point.  This writer suggested that swearing in front of your children is not only fine but also possibly good for them.  Five reasons are cited in support of uncensored foul-language vary but include the foremost principle that adults must never swear in front of other people’s children and that children are never, ever cursed at.

So what do you think?  On what side of the coin do you fall?  Do you need your own mouth washed out with soap or could you be a regular on the Disney channel?

This week the 4Mothers are giving their two cents on the issue and Kristi Ashcroft will be our weekly guest.

Kristi has a degree in Economics from Princeton University and work for eight years at a Wall Street firm in New York and London.  She and her husband settled in Toronto, and she is now a stay-at-home mom to three busy boys ages 3,5 and 7.

And as always, we want to know what you think.  Let us know by leaving us a comment or sending us a tweet (@4Mothers1Blog).  Want to know what you friends think?  Like us on Facebook and send them the link!

Don’t forget to “like” us on Facebook!  Help us to hit 150 likes before the end of October.

Guest Post: A Day of Thx by Kristi Ashcroft

Dear dog,

Thank you for going to my husband’s side of the bed and nuzzling your cold, wet nose into his face this morning.  I respect your judgment in these matters, and if you believe he’s the one to take you for your walk today, I’ll happily enjoy my extra few minutes of sleep guilt-free.

Dear October sunshine,

Thank you for showing up so often this year.  We’ve enjoyed many extra picnics, park trips and bike rides as a result of your generosity.

Dear lemon-flavoured fat-free Greek yogurt,

Thank you for your utterly convincing portrayal of dessert, such that my taste buds and tummy come away completely fooled.

Dear Julia Donaldson,

Thank you for writing books that I never tire of reading aloud to my kids.

Dear sons,

Thank you for getting through an entire dinner without complaining about something on your plate.

Dear sons,

Thank you for simply bathing and brushing your teeth and getting on with life/bedtime.

Dear sons,

Thank you for staying in your own comfortable, warm beds ALL night!

Dear sons,

Thank you for being you.  You’ve given me my best job ever.

Dear husband,

Thank you for everything, every day.

Cheers,

Kristi

Theme Week: Giving Thx!

Canadian Thanksgiving is just around the corner and in case you need a refresher on the history of this holiday that should have been called Welcome Home, Martin Frobisher!

If you’re up to speed that the Canadian version of Thanksgiving has absolutely nothing to do with the Mayflower and the pilgrims, than we invite you to take part in our week of thanks.

Inspired by the very astute and often witty Leah Dieterich of the blog thx, thx, thx, and aptly named book (which would make the perfect hostess gift this holiday season) 4Mothers will pay homage to the little things that make our daily life that much better.

Kristi Ashcroft will be our guest this week.  Kristi has a degree in Economics from Princeton University and work for eight years at a Wall Street firm in New York and London.  She and her husband settled in Toronto, and she is now a stay-at-home mom to three busy boys ages 3,5 and 7.

Let us know what you are thankful for by leaving a comment, sending a tweet (@4Mothers1Blog) or posting to our Facebook page (which I hope you have “liked”!).

We want to hear from you!

Don’t forget to “like” us on Facebook!  Help us to hit 150 likes before the end of October.