I’ve written drafts of this in my head for months now, and nothing sounds right. I’m honestly not sure what “right” is. Here goes nothing.
My babies started kindergarten this week.
Well. It hasn’t truly started because their school starts kindergarten on staggered days – small groups of kids run through a full day with their teacher and see the ropes, meet their teachers and see the various rooms for art/P.E./music/computers/Spanish/library and generally get to test out what kindergarten will be like, minus the full-blown chaos of herding 23 5(ish)-year-olds.
Kindergarten teachers, you are saints. Let’s just get that out of the way right now.
I digress.
Tomorrow will be their first day with the full class, then we have three days off for Labor Day weekend, then they’ll really start kindergarten.
I have Feelings about this.
I probably-maybe-most-likely have some Feelings left over from my weeks as a NICU mom, too.
Sigh.
When my babies were born 12 weeks early, I had no choice but to blindly trust a hospital full of strangers to keep them alive, help them grow and develop as they would had I stayed pregnant.
I was forced to trust strangers to keep my babies alive because my body couldn’t do it anymore.
(It should be noted that I paused here to simmer on that last sentence. Oof.)
No one is forcing me to send my kids to kindergarten – don’t get me wrong. This is a choice Rob and I have made after discussing the decision from every possible angle for more years than we have been parents. Ultimately, we decided this school was the best for everyone involved.
Still, in my ideal world, I would homeschool, keep my babies close in our simple, family-centered lives, and all would turn out like magic and sparkles.
My ideal world and reality don’t exactly match, and like a mature adult, I am mentally pouting because that just sucks.
Alas.
I find myself once again trusting a building full of (experienced, educated, trained, remarkable), strangers to keep my babies alive, help them grow and develop as they would – had I been able to homeschool and do the job myself.
And like I still carry (maybe) unrealistic guilt from not having a full-term pregnancy, I am packing on (maybe) unrealistic guilt from not being able to educate my kids on my own.
I know the two aren’t even close to being the same thing. I know this. Knowing doesn’t change how I feel, though, no matter how much I try to force my brain to snap into reality.
Nearly six years and three beautifully healthy, strong, happy kids later, I am still working through what my emotions went through because of premature birth. My brain manages to live on parallel planes, remembering all the fears I had back then while seeing in real life that most of those fears never came to fruition. Maybe the reality of healthy, strong, happy kids will someday snap straight the memory of fearing every possible What If that raced through my mind nonstop during the first year or so of their lives. Maybe it never will.
I can only hope to have three kids who love going to school (most of the time, at least), be a reality that helps snap straight the fears and guilt I am connecting with choosing this path for them.
I am a mess, but as a friend pointed out the other night, this thing we call life is just like going on a bear hunt. You can’t go under it. You can’t go over it. You need to go through it.
I’ll see you at school, friends.
Whoever decided to use Beatles songs to tell children’s stories is a freaking GENIUS.
Toby, Eleanor and Callista have loved the Beatles since they were babies, but they’re getting to experience the music in a way that makes so much more sense to them thanks to Netflix and Beat Bugs, an adorable show about five insect friends whose lives are shockingly similar to Beatles songs.
I love having the show playing for my kids on the couch while I’m making dinner in the evenings because they’re still, resting and completely entertained, and I get to cook and listen to Beatles songs.
What’s not to love?
Between high-risk pregnancy bedrest, pumping for 30 minutes 4-12 times a day, keeping unusual hours with newborn triplets (now triplets who still. don’t. all. sleep. through. the night.), I have worked hard to find the end of Netflix, but in 6 years, it hasn’t happened yet. I suspect it never will.
Not only do I keep finding new movies and shows to fall in love with (currently blazing through my first experience with The West Wing), I become more and more impressed by the number of things my family has learned just from watching what’s on Netflix.
- Eleanor makes special requests using “pretty please with cherries on top,” thanks to Lalaloopsy.
- Toby knows that Mario and Luigi work as plumbers (“People who work with a wrench!”), and love spaghetti.
- I can first-impression-hate a show based on its theme music and realize I’m right after suffering through an episode at the request of a persuasive 4-year-old (and declare that the show is something I don’t want to watch but am happy she finds it entertaining).
- Shows like Yo Gabba Gabba (no longer on Netflix, RIP Nickelodeon contract), and Daniel Tiger have songs so catchy and so helpful that you’ll still sing them during “teachable moments” 4 years after first learning them. “Try new things ’cause they might taste goo-ood!”
- Jem is truly outrageous and other vocabulary words that come up on different shows.
- Jed Bartlet for President 2016.
As a Netflix Stream Team member, I was provided with a Sharp Roku television, and I receive free Netflix instant streaming service in exchange for sharing relevant topics and messages with you and your family. All opinions expressed on ActualJenny.com are 100 percent my own – those cannot be bought!
The last two days have been a whirlwind of activity. Tomorrow won’t be any better.
But tonight, there was stillness. Me, a bubble bath, and Gilmore Girls season two streaming on my iPad.
Most of my house sounds like a wind tunnel thanks to the giant fans drying out a replacement-roof incident, so even that blessed post-bedtime quiet was contaminated with noise. So. Much. Noise.
But not my bathroom. I found my quiet, and I enjoyed it in Stars Hollow.
As a Netflix Stream Team member, I was provided with a Sharp Roku television, and I receive free Netflix instant streaming service in exchange for sharing relevant topics and messages with you and your family. All opinions expressed on ActualJenny.com are 100 percent my own – those cannot be bought!
I have explained why we can’t be “cool bad guys” like Gru from the Despicable Me movies, how Phoebe on Friends was having triplets that weren’t going to be her babies and how even though the old man we were talking to looked like a character from Goosebumps, there was definitely nothing scary about him, but I haven’t had any good, helpful teachable moments from Netflix viewing lately. Not like I wrote about here, at least:
The mini conversations we’ve had lately are still helpful. No, it isn’t cool to be a bad guy. Surrogacy is an amazing gift that’s one way people can expand their families. The Goosebumps thing? Well. The observation was kind of accurate, but let’s just be kind to old folks, OK? They have earned those wrinkles, spots and concession with gravity.
As a Netflix Stream Team member, I was provided with a Sharp Roku television, and I receive free Netflix instant streaming service in exchange for sharing relevant topics and messages with you and your family. All opinions expressed on ActualJenny.com are 100 percent my own – those cannot be bought!
