Galloping Cats

Chartiable Giving, Redux November 8, 2009

Filed under: Gatito — gallopingcats @ 8:30 pm

But first, a couple of funny things:

Gatito climbed into our bed at some point during the night last night. (Don’t even get me started on this problem.) A little while later, when I’m practically falling off the bed, I say, “Gatito, move over. I’m edge of bed!” (This is the way he used to say it when he was little. And he said, sleepily, “I love you too, Mommy.” Heh.

On Friday, I took Gatito into NYC to go to the planetarium. Whoopi Goldberg, for some reason, narrates a show about the Big Bang, which happens to be a topic that’s gotten a lot of discussions lately. Gatito climbed onto my lap and a few minutes in, he asked me to cover his ears for him. I looked down and realized he couldn’t cover his own ears because he was using his hands to cover his eyes. I guess it was a little too much for poor Gatito. Not only is it (obviously) pitch black in there– much darker than in a movie, and not only are the visuals sudden and the volume loud, but also the seats rumble. (I took pity on him and we left right away!)

***

I loved all of your comments on the birthday party gifts and giving to charity. Thank you!

I think I felt a little guilty for how much we have, and the plans for his classmate’s birthday party next weekend only enhanced that and made me feel wrong for not doing the same. And yet, it didn’t really feel right to ask Gatito to give up his birthday gifts. And then it seemed wrong that that didn’t feel right. But I’d feel pretty badly if someone told me I had to give up my birthday gifts! So I liked all of the comments that gave me “permission” to let him just enjoy his gifts. I also really appreciated robinj’s point about teaching children how to receive graciously and, separately, to teach them about giving.

We did end up telling Gatito that if he received gifts that he didn’t think he’d play with, we would give those to kids who didn’t have many toys. The fact is, though, that unlike last year, almost everything he got was right up his alley and mostly educational. Box sets of Ramona and the Mouse and the Motorcycle books, a number of crafty/construction-type projects, and some space-related toys and books. He also received a world atlas with stickers of all the flags that were meant to be placed on the appropriate countries, which he and A spent a good deal of  time working on right away.

So nothing went to charity, he enjoyed his party and his gifts very much, and we are planning a trip to the toy store, where he will help me pick out something new specifically for Toys for Tots.

 

Happy Halloween October 31, 2009

Filed under: Ella — gallopingcats @ 3:04 pm

From my crabby lobster to yours…

 

Teaching your kids about charity October 29, 2009

Filed under: Gatito — gallopingcats @ 7:27 pm

Gatito turns four on Monday. He’s having a birthday party the following Saturday and we expect about fifteen kids. Last year, I squirreled away all the toys in which I knew he would not be interested (that is, anything that wasn’t cars related, books, or art supplies) and delivered them to Toys for Tots. He never noticed. I planned to do the same this year.

Then we got a party invitation for a classmate for the following week. “In lieu of gifts,” it read, “please bring gently used toys or baby gear which [birthday boy] can deliver to local center for families in crisis.”

I assume that, like most of our kids, this boy has more toys than he can use and that his parents are trying to teach him how fortunate he is and how important charitable giving is. I also assume he will get at least one gift from his family. It got me thinking.

I did think, both last year and this year, of saying “no gifts” on Gatito’s invitation, since he already has so much, but somehow it seemed like it would be such a disappointment or somehow unfair to him. All the other kids get presents at their birthday parties. Does that matter? Should it? It occurs to me that a good compromise might be to let him keep the gifts he receives that are in his sweet spot of interest (still cars, books, and art supplies and after all, it’s not as though his classmate’s parents are torturing him by waving toys he likes under his nose and then giving them away) and, rather than secretly give the rest to Toys for Tots, explaining and engaging him in that. Obviously I’d have to discuss/prepare him in advance, not wait till he opens them. Then there is the side issue of how to stop him from telling his school friends that he is planning to give/gave away their gifts.

How do you guys handle this kind of thing? Any thoughts?

 

Gatito October 19, 2009

Filed under: Gatito — gallopingcats @ 7:50 pm

As I was leaving Gatito in his classroom this morning, he said, “I’m hungry.”
“Of course you are,” I realized. “I never gave you breakfast.”

Parent of the year! Woot!

His teacher went to look in the kitchen, but all they had was ice cream sandwiches. I wouldn’t have even minded giving him one of those, except that we’d probably have had to hide from the rest of the kids while he ate it. I managed to find a small granola bar in my bag, but judging by his mood when I picked him up, it wasn’t one of his best days. Probably should have given him the ice cream.

Gatito is FILLED with questions lately. Lots of them have to do with science, which is not my best subject. He comes by it honestly, though, as there is a Nobel prize winning physicist on A’s side of the family. I’ve had to get books to explain the Big Bang, evolution, why the wind blows, etc., etc. “Is the universe getting bigger now?” he asks. “How about now? Now? NOW?” Or the more difficult/annoying, “What if there wasn’t any gravity until a few days ago?” He is going to be an astronaut for Halloween, but last night he told me that he does not want to fly to the moon one day. He feels he would get more done if he stays on earth and studies space from here.

He’s big on “what if it wasn’t” type question.
Why will I get wet if I go outside? Because it’s raining.
What if it wasn’t raining? Then you wouldn’t get wet.
Why wouldn’t it be raining? AGGGHHHH.

This morning he asked about the radio station and I said it’s one that plays no ads on Mondays. The rest of the ride to school I was fielding questions about whether that station had ads on other days and whether other stations had ads on Mondays, what radio waves are anyway, and why I didn’t want to listen to ads. When I told them it was because they were trying to sell me things I didn’t want to buy, he asked, like what? So I tuned to another station, which obliged me with six ads from a phone company, a health plan, a credit card, etc., and pointed out how we didn’t need any of those things. But what if we did? he wanted to know.

It is hard to restrain myself, sometimes, from telling him to stop asking so many questions. I did it once and he fell silent and, of course, I felt immediately guilty.

He’s doing pretty well with Ella. Still never touches her or anything like that, but interacts a bit, pushes her stroller, opens doors for us and, for the most part, manages to not be too jealous of our time with her. He is certainly not aggressive with her, in the way I’ve heard other big siblings can be. He does not like it when she cries, but as I’ve told him, nobody likes to hear a baby cry. I feel worst for him when she is screaming in the car and there is no escape, but when it happened one day last week, I peered in the rearview mirror to find him fast asleep. Go figure.

 

The List October 13, 2009

Filed under: Uncategorized — gallopingcats @ 2:50 pm

Go here and contribute! Great idea!
http://smallanimals.wordpress.com/2009/10/12/the-list/

 

Guilt October 9, 2009

Filed under: Galloping Cats — gallopingcats @ 8:15 pm

I’m not sure if Tiger ate at all the last week of his life.

Aside from being distracted by a newborn baby and child care troubles, we had two cats, so if you’re not specifically paying attention, it’s hard to tell who is eating and who is not. Also, A and I both fed them, and not on any particular schedule, mostly just when they begged, which was often. This is because they would only eat the very freshest food. If we fed them when they weren’t looking, they wouldn’t touch the food (even if they came in 5 minutes later) but would insist on new food. And if we gave them too much at once (say, half a can), it would end up smooshed down on the plate and they wouldn’t eat it. So we’d feed them tiny amounts– a quarter of a can– at a time and often. But this chaotic feeding method, I guess, meant we didn’t notice, but thinking back, I don’t remember Tiger tapping us on the shoulder while we sat at the kitchen table in a while.

The vet keeps leaving messages wanting to review the results of his blood work (incidentally, we incurred $1500 in vet bills on the last day of his life). I don’t really care to hear the details, but I understand that there were huge problems beyond the tumor, that his organs were basically shutting down. I mean, he’s dead, so what is the point of going over just how incredibly sick he was. It will only make me feel worse for not helping him– for not even knowing how incredibly shitty he must have been feeling. The vet once told us that cats hide their illnesses and act normally until they’re really sick.

My only consolation is that he wasn’t acting sick until about a week before he died, by which time it was surely already too late. If I’d taken him in to the vet more promptly, he would have spent the last week of his life in the hospital, being poked and prodded and made even more miserable. This way he was here with us, often curled up with his brother, until the last few hours.

 

I never read these posts when other people write them October 7, 2009

Filed under: Galloping Cats — gallopingcats @ 10:45 pm

I find the posts where people’s pets die unbearably sad. I find them even harder to read, for some reason, than the ones about failed cycles and miscarriages.

Anyway, Hippo, whose real name was Tiger, died tonight. He’d been seeming a little off for about a week. I took him to the vet this afternoon. As soon as the vet weighed him and found him at 17 lbs, down from 23 last December, I knew it wasn’t good. They were running tests but said I could bring him home tonight and back tomorrow.

This evening, he could no longer walk, and A rushed him to the emergency vet. They found a huge tumor in his spleen and were planning all kinds of tests and possible surgery when he arrested and died.

I can’t believe how quickly it happened. Just yesterday I took this picture and complained mildly about how inconvenient it is to have a cat in the bathroom sink all the time. He was a really really good cat and he gave great hugs. I can’t believe I’ll never curl up with him again.

 

Not good October 6, 2009

Filed under: Nanny diaries, Working Mom — gallopingcats @ 12:30 pm

A series of events has transpired that make it very likely we’ll need to find a new nanny. I feel sick about it. For myself– so much of my willingness to return to work is tied up in feeling confident that the kids are with someone who loves them. For Gatito, who loves Tata, and who is currently cared for by someone who really understands him. And for Tata herself, who will be well and truly screwed if she loses this job. What a mess.

 

Medical Update and More… September 22, 2009

Filed under: Ella, Gatito, Me Me Me — gallopingcats @ 8:02 pm

You people, with your sensible suggestions to call my doctor. Sheesh. Can you not just reassure me based on fuzzy pictures and vague descriptions?

Ella’s belly button turned out to be normal. The NP we saw said something about some ring or other that hadn’t yet closed but would do so. I don’t know. It was hard to concentrate what with all the screaming she was doing at the moment. It now does, indeed, look normal.

Funny story: Before the cord fell off, when her belly button was all swollen, Gatito asked whether, once the cord fell off, her penis would be smaller.

As for my stomach, I saw Dr. WCS today. He had me come in to check for pools of blood that may have formed. Everything checked out fine and it was declared to be sore muscles. (And they are not separated. AND he complimented me on the strength of my abdominal muscles. AND he said that a lot of my fat clearly had the texture of water and would therefore come off easily.* Great appointment!) The pain is extremely mild and not an inhibitor at all, so good to know it’s normal. He recommended wearing shapewear types of garments, which I am already doing, for support (but not for more than 3-4 months).

* 28 pounds down, 16 to go. Good god, I gained a lot of weight.

***

Last week, on my own without Tata, went shockingly well. I mean, it was exhausting, but everything really came together and I managed to care for two kids by myself just fine. It was a good boost to my confidence. The hardest part was that I could not get a break when A came home from work, since there were still two kids who needed attention and Gatito really needed some one-on-one by then. The best part was that the weekend and the past two days, with Tata back, have been amazingly easy by comparison!

***

Gatito started viola this week. He has a private lesson on Saturdays and a group on Tuesdays, to which Tata will take him when I go back to work. He started with a box viola, which is just what it sounds like (made out of cardboard) but I believe after this Saturday we will be allowed to order his real viola. He was almost asleep when we arrived at the music school for his lesson this afternoon and was grumpily refusing to get out of the car. Finally, sullenly, he said, “I don’t think my viola sounds very good.” I just started to laugh and then he started to laugh and we went in and everything was fine.

There were four boys in the lesson, two on violin and two on viola, and it was rather amusing to watch the poor teacher try to deal with them… not to mention their parents. One four-year-old had to be told not to put his bow in his mouth. “Pizza and apples are food, not bows,” he told him. Another six-year-old simply could not sit still or kept answering questions not addressed to him. Gatito was in his element, particularly because I’d emailed the teacher in advance and told him about Gatito’s anxiety in new situations and suggested ways to help. One of the mothers had her younger child (2ish) in the room with her and the child sang along to Twinkle Twinkle… and then kept singing long after the class had moved on. Another had her four other children there, including a newborn and a two-year-old, neither of whom, obviously, could keep quiet. Suzuki is all about parental involvement, but the teacher had to ask them to wait with the younger kids outside next time.

***

Gatito’s school seems to be going well. After that first day, I did not find him happily playing on the playground, Cow forgotten. I have since found him holding onto Cow and talking to a teacher on the sidelines. I would rather see him playing, of course, but I do feel at least that the school is responsive and dealing with it. When I mentioned it to the director last week, she promised to raise it at the staff meeting that afternoon and assured me that the would never leave a child alone. I can see that they are trying to help him interact (and they reported that he painted with another little boy today) and that it does not seem to make them resent him, as in his other school, and so I will just wait and see what happens. I wish I could understand what are the triggers that sometimes enable him to run around and play like a “normal” preschooler and sometimes not. It’s a process, I guess.

 

Quickie question for you September 21, 2009

Filed under: Pregnancy — gallopingcats @ 3:38 am

Since the birth, I’ve had some abdominal tenderness. I think it’s getting better and is, in any case, fairly mild by now. I feel it when I touch my stomach and when I sit up from lying down. I can’t quite decide whether it’s the skin or the muscles or something else I am feeling. I figured it was normal but my mom freaked me out a little. I don’t want to call Dr. WCS, for a variety of reasons ranging from not wanting to speak to Nurse Idiot to not trusting his answer anyway.

Yesterday I asked a woman who gave birth two months ago whether her abdomen was sore, and she responded, “Oh no. My stomach was flat right away. But it’s normal yours is swollen. Lots of women are still huge when they leave the hospital.”

I tried again to make myself understood but it was loud and English is not her first language and she was too busy congratulating herself on her body.

“Honey,” I thought, annoyed and unkind. “Your stomach isn’t even flat now.”

So I ask you, is a little abdominal tenderness normal 4 weeks postpartum or do I really need to call Dr. WCS?