In Which I Reveal More Issues...and other random crap

I'm packing. If you've ever tried to get 4 (in some ways, 5) people ready for a week away from home, you know that I'm pretty much nuts. Which isn't to say that I'm not nuts normally. I have medication for that.

Every year I think I'm over-packing clothing. Every year my son proves I should have packed more. Every year I worry I'm not bringing enough food. Then I remember there is a grocery store not far away. It's more expensive than the stores here, but sometimes it's just better to pay more than to make yourself extra nutty.

Miss M told me she thinks no one pays attention to her, which is funny since she gets compliments from me AND complete strangers daily. She's jealous of her little sister...something I suspected would come up sooner or later. It's hard because I can only relate as having once been an eight-year-old girl with a brother. Though my brother was older. I don't know what it's like to be an oldest child. I don't know what it's like to have younger siblings. I don't know what it's like to have a sister.

I've walked in her shoes in fraction.

She's the child I worry over the most. The oldest. The Practice child. The one I will probably screw up the most. I worry about her image of herself. I worry that kids at school will damage her beautiful heart and spirit. I worry.

She's almost nine and I'm making an effort to treat her as the big girl she is, though she has her little girl moments. (And thank goodness for those or I'd probably be sent to the nut house.) The little girl moments run the gamut from sweet to annoying and perplexing. I try to have exclusive mom and M time as often as I can, but it never seems to be enough. Pretty sure that's the definition of quality time when you have more than one kid.

She makes me laugh. I make her laugh. She has a wonderful sense of humor.

She saw a classmate when we were out shopping the other day. My kids go to a school that is very diverse ethnically. I love that she and K thought nothing about throwing their arms around a classmate that is different from them. Most of the time I think they see no differences...which is much of the goal I had when I chose their school. When your kids automatically point out who they are talking about by their clothes and not their skin color...that's cool.

When I was eight I had just moved to Minnesota from New York. My accent made me weird. Before I moved I was outgoing and my teacher wanted me to shut up. In Minnesota, the teachers said I needed to talk more. Minnesota was intimidating, apparently. My teacher in 3rd grade had a nervous breakdown and told us kids the only reason she taught was for the money. So that was nice.

I misunderstood some teasing as hurtful when, in retrospect, it was probably not at all mean-spirited.

I love that M mostly lets teasing roll off her back. She sees the best in people and expects the best. I pray that she has no reason to change.