ILX Parenting 6: "Put Some Goddamn Pants On Before You Go Outside!" is a thing I say now

Speaking as an ecologist with some ecotoxicological insight, I’d handle a False Black Widow any day, but wouldn’t go within 3m of whatever these guys need protective suits for https://t.co/KYrTdRg2fk

— Steve Ormerod (@SteveOrmerod) October 15, 2018

that fear-stoking Sun article tucks this quote away in a sidebar:

A spokesman for the British Arachnological Society said: "The bite of the False Widow is of minor medical significance, comparable to common insect bites and stings."

We've swarms of deadly deadly spiders over here and Ive never seen anyone descend upon schools like that :|

it's the ladybirds you have to watch for

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/jul/07/experience-a-ladybird-nearly-killed-me

(they bite and people have severe allergies)

there've been a lot around recently too:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/harlequin-ladybirds-attack-invasion-ladybug-united-kingdom-infest-houses-native-species-pest-a8571671.html

We've swarms of deadly deadly spiders over here and Ive never seen anyone descend upon schools like that :|

Yeah, to an Australian this just seems bizarre

Yeah, this Bill Bryson quote has always stayed with me since reading it years ago:

"It has more things that will kill you than anywhere else. Of the world's ten most poisonous snakes, all are Australian. Five of its creatures - the funnel web spider, box jellyfish, blue-ringed octopus, paralysis tick, and stonefish - are the most lethal of their type in the world. This is a country where even the fluffiest of caterpillars can lay you out with a toxic nip, where seashells will not just sting you but actually sometimes go for you. ... If you are not stung or pronged to death in some unexpected manner, you may be fatally chomped by sharks or crocodiles, or carried helplessly out to sea by irresistible currents, or left to stagger to an unhappy death in the baking outback. It's a tough place.”

the NOBLE FALSE WIDOW, please call it by its name

i think i just washed one down the sink uh oh

Yeah, this Bill Bryson quote has always stayed with me since reading it years ago

The thing is, though, despite the wild levels of toxicity in everything living here, _almost_ nobody here is actually seriously injured or killed by wildlife.
* less than 40 snake bite deaths in the last 20 years
* there have been only 2 or three deaths from spider bites since 1979
* only 2 people killed by sharks in Australia this year, and one of those was someone provoking the shark

how many deaths by Crocodile Dundee though?

Gah yes, managing child care for school-aged children can be a major headache - even if their school day more or less corresponds to your workday most of the time, there are all kinds of wrinkles.

I literally have to spend 45-60 minutes every workday taking my 3 year old off the bus and through the parking lot to the day care - they drop him off there, but there's no teacher on hand to bring him inside. Was seriously considering just not doing 3-K but that felt selfish. I used to dream of the 'windfall' that you'd get from not having kids in day care anymore, but yeah...its not exactly like that is it

I'm a mom, not on ILX much, and I have very mundane thoughts on work/life balance which are: it's really fucking hard and I generally feel like I don't do either (work or motherhood) as well as I'd like. I work from home 90% of the time, which makes it easier, but it's not easy. Part of the problem is that the entire school/childcare situation presumes there is a non-working parent, but many other smarter people have written about that at length better than I could here.

I'm not sure I'd want to be a SAHM but I would like to take six months off work and just... sleep a lot. And clean everything real good at least once.

"working" at home when your kids are there is one of the most enraging, frustrating activities i can think of

yeah I can't really do it

Yes when I was the only parent home, which I gather is the situation here. But this gets better, once they’re 10 or so.

i've been doing it for the past year. it was ok with a baby baby but it's getting harder now (i am in a coffee shop and have like 8 tabs for coworking spaces open right now)

When I have "worked from home" with kids home, it's more "I will monitor and respond to email, and I will answer the phone if you call me" than "I will do the same level of work as normal, except that I may occasionally hand the kid a snack or iPad or whatever."

This type of "work from home" is really only tenable for occasional times like a sick day or freak show day. It can't be the norm for an elementary-aged kiddo.

My daughter is in middle school now, and can look after herself, but with my special needsy son it would never work. If he's not in school and my wife and I need to work, we get a sitter.

Freak show day should be freak snow day, lol

Yeah Carl isn’t working home with the kid. She’s at school (pre-k) from 7:30 to 5:30. No work would get done otherwise. Problem being with her working from home and close to the school is that it often defaults to her to handle those unexpected events, random stuff they would require a parent during the day, special events, school holidays (that aren’t work holidays), etc.

Carl! I've missed you.
Childcare in the city was pretty good, until school age - I could've left my kid from 8am - 6pm all day every day if I wanted to (paying a hefty price though) from 6 months to 4. Pre-school in my new town is school hours/ term-time only (plus those 'closure for training' days) which is a huge shock to the system, even the fact that we have to drop off and pick up at specified times. You can pay extra for wraparound care which is good but still only til about 5 I think, and not in the holidays, which may change if enough people demand it.

I've asked other working pre-school mums what they'll do once school starts and they're either doing some horrendous juggling, working fewer hours over more days (so paying for more nursery days for the younger siblings) or several people have admitted they're 'in denial'. I'm just hoping as they get older it'll at least be easier to ask another mum to pick up if needed or send them round to others' houses (reciprocating, of course!) which you can't really do with tiny tots.

Yeah the logistics difference from nursery (7-7, though we didn’t use that full time obv) to school was a shock. There is good after school club provision but only until 5.45 and it’s really not holistic: same building but different people. If they need to cancel activities at short notice, they will.

7 to 7 sounds glorious. I would use every single second.

He was mostly in 9.30 to 6.00 but on days one of us was travelling for work, or when a train was cancelled, it was a life saver. Really, really not cheap though - it was the only nursery in the area with those hours.

I went to my first concert since my kid was born nearly 4 years. Yes, it was Raffi.

Kid is turning four and we're having a birthday party. Is it acceptable to ask attendees to not bring gifts and suggest that if their kid really wants to pick out a present that they could do that and then donate it to something like Toys for Tots? He's got six grandparents and a whole mess of birth family who buy him shit all the time and he wants for nothing, and we don't need more toys in the house.

Or are people going think we're preachy/bragging/pretentious/killjoys/etc and will bring them anyway?

dunno what they will think but ime they will bring gifts anyway

We had a low-key thing last year with just friends so it was easier; this time we're shotgunning the whole preschool class (party is at an indoor bounce house place so easy enough) so potential for people we only see randomly at pick up and drop off to be there.

friend of mine did a 4th birthday party in a village hall that was just 'join us for play and cake, no presents, 10.15-11.45' which was brilliant. toys and games but no faff with party lunch or anything.
I approve of 'no presents' and think it's fine to ask nicely not to bring them but ppl will anyway.

We've had "no presents please" invites, with no trouble. Another non-stuff-centric party idea we've seen is a book exchange (everyone brings a used (or new) book; everyone leaves with a different book.

sigh. Presents at birthday parties just became an issue for us too at 4 years old. I think because we’re now inviting kids from daycare, ie, outside our usual anti-capitalist social circle ;) I said “no presents necessary please” on the invite to A’s party but some people brought presents anyway - I think it’s really important to some people as a way of showing affection, and I’ve noticed that it matters to some kids in that sense too. I don’t want to deny people their means of showing affection but at the same time, well, that does tend to set the norm and presents just become expected by the 5th birthday party.

We went to a 4 year old’s party recently where EVERYONE brought presents and we’d just made a card. I felt kind of sad because I’d inadvertently made my kid the kid who didn’t bring a present :/ (which I realize was me as a kid because we were low-income - I don’t recall it bothering me too much until I was 8 or 9. I also don’t recall kids bday parties being a big deal!) I think I’ve just decided that we’ll give art supplies in future. Though it’s entirely likely that my child will try to convince me otherwise soon enough!

I like the book exchange idea!

My 4 year old is suddenly death obsessed. In the school hallway there's a picture of him with a balloon from an event a year ago. He keeps saying, "That balloon is dead." He told two of his teachers this morning that his grandpa died, which isn't true. He was singing "Rusty Cage" today and said, "Johnny Cash died a little bit so I sing his songs now. My name is Johnny Nash."

He can see clearly now, the Man In Black is gone.

The book exchange idea is gr8

my boy is turning 4 next week. but his party is tomorrow because we got family in town. I'm not even sure if I should buy him a present. he doesn't really know yet. he's got enough toys, obviously

btw - how the hell are you supposed to brush a 4-year old's teeth? he just whips his head around, bites the brush, blocks you from putting it in his mouth, etc etc...then gets mad when I accidentally brush his face instead

Elmo brushing video on YouTube worked pretty well for us. But she has never minded brushing too much.

we tie in teeth brushing with everything else that needs to happen in the morning before we leave the house. we have a checklist on the fridge (with images/icons for the four-year-old), and once they've done everything on the list, they can have screen time until it's time to leave. no screen time until they're all done. it doesn't work every single day but it has improved mornings a lot in the month or so we've been doing it. if she's in the right mood, she does everything (eating breakfast, putting dishes in kitchen, getting dressed, putting on socks and shoes, brushing teeth and hair, picking out a snack, and "having a good attitude") herself, though most days i'm assisting with some of them.

Similar here, there are three jobs that need to get done every morning prior to any media of any type - get dressed, eat, brush teeth. Brushing isn't really that hard as he's never really fought it, and he actually is capable of doing it all by himself if he really wants to.

He turns 4 tomorrow which still flips me out, thinking about how insanely different my life was four years ago. Also flips me out how much he can do now - like yesterday my wife was up and in the kitchen, I was showering, and the kid woke up on his own and appeared in the kitchen with all his clothes for the day that he had picked out for himself. My wife assumed that I had helped him and he was like "papa was in the shower so I got clothes by myself", like no big deal. He gets up and pees in the middle of the night and goes back to bed on his own, etc. which is equally amazing and makes me sad.

Happy birthday Joykid!
Mine turns 4 soon too. He needs a lot of encouragement to do stuff on his own; I suspect he's a bit lazy.

I have a problem with screen time/tv in that I don't mind him watching a limited amount (we have some excellent educational kids' tv shows here and my son is like a sponge for this stuff) but even if you emphasise we're only having one/two/three programmes (discuss beforehand what's gonna happen after the first one finishes etc) he gets really cross when it's time to switch it off and is constantly asking for 'one more, I only want one more'. My friend suggested engaging with him about what he's just watched which helps a little but it makes it a real drag to put something on to kill 15 minutes without having a load of whining afterwards.

Anyway, I'm so excited for Christmas this year because of him! Last year he was just turned 3 so had an idea about it all but was sick on the day so was a bit of an anticlimax. He's gonna love it this year (and probably go a bit crazy with it all)

and happy birthday tadpolebs

yea I think mine is behind a little. it's not until we had the 2nd one that we realized that our 1st was probably more difficult than most. though my parenting isn't really the greatest. for example he loves to have the inside lights on in the car, which I dislike (at night at least), but what I dislike more is him kicking and screaming and tossing his shoes or whatever. he still asks for his pacifier at home and sometimes I'm so exhausted I just give it to him. he also has a long and convoluted bedtime routine that I'm not sure how to change. it's just...so hard to deal with these fully fledged meltdowns every day. he's not autistic - he's very in tune with people's feelings, he knows exactly what he should and shouldn't do, but maybe he's got a little touch of it, like I do. I hate yelling at him and he's like 50 lbs now so I can't exactly corral him the way I used to. funny thing is he's apparently very well behaved at school/day care.

ha, mine's similar, his new pre-school was amazed that he would have meltdowns as he's very well behaved there. And in some ways fairly mature for his age. He also likes the lights on in the car. He had a dummy (pacifier) for ages until he was about 2.5? Can't remember. He only had it for naps/sleep but we thought it was going to be a nightmare to get him off it. One day he was in the bath and I noticed a crack in the rubber of the dummy so I showed him 'oh look, it's broken, we have to throw it away and we don't have a new one'. He was surprisingly fine with that (he's quite practically-minded) although it did mess up his going to sleep at night for a couple of weeks.

I know kids change loads every year but from 3 to 4 he's gone from toddler to proper kid; it's quite weird. It's also felt like one of the longest years because we've had loads of life changes. We didn't really have 'terrible twos' but when he hit three (and his sibling came along) he's really been testing everything with us.

It really is an amazing phase in some ways, because you know they're right around that age you were when you first started developing memories. One thing that made me really emotional was a few nights ago when I put him to bed and a half hour later I could hear him in there playing with his trucks, trying to be quiet so I wouldn't hear. And then just falling asleep a bit later. I remember doing that when I was around that age!!

I’m a bit astounded by 4 so far - the imaginative independent play, logical (if never-ending) questions, figuring out emotions in more nuanced ways, genuinely SHARING stuff. And if I visit with friends who have kids the same age or older, they go off and play together and we get to have actual conversations! I’m crossing my fingers and pinching myself. I’m still exhausted and stretched a bit thin but feel generally less frazzled-by-child.

We can have some terrible behaviour after school with emotions all over the place. Reading an article about Restraint Collapse really made sense - basically they have a limited amount to give when it comes to good behaviour and by the time school ends, it’s all used up. And home is their comfort zone where they can let it all out.

But yeah, I agree about four - so many amazing developments (including having uninterrupted grown-up conversations on playdates!)

re: brushing teeth, using the Disney Magic Timer app on the phone helped a lot with my kids. And both stopped needing the app after a dentist visited their preschool for a presentation (though the 4yo has since gone back to the app).

Oh man, restraint collapse. I'd never heard this term, but we have 2.5 year old twins and have been going through this after daycare now pretty much daily with one or the other, sometimes both. Thank you.

Imaginative independent play is kind of amazing - I love hearing him in the other room making up scenarios and having conversations between toys.

He got obsessed with Ghostbusters last week, watched some of the early 90s cartoon (and the insanely bad EXTREME GHOSTBUSTERS from 1997 that I never knew existed) and suddenly four of his star wars figures with guns molded into their hands were the ghostbusters and every green toy or figure was a ghost or monster, and he built elaborate houses out of blocks and magna tiles for all of them and I totally remember doing shit like this when I was younger.

same here, but involves lots of elaborate tying things together with string (his stuffed animals, to a Noah's ark, to a basket of fruit) to act out stories involving sea chases, rescuing from wells, etc.

I've tripped over so many trip wires...

he asks the most impressive questions too.

I have a 3 year age gap, so I rely on a bit of independent play to be able to go off and do endless baby stuff. I don't know how people with smaller age gaps cope.

that said he asks me/ his dad to 'play with meeee' like a million times a day. Just to make us feel guilty!

omg the string traps and the hundreds of “knots” my kid has made whenever string or a shoe string meets his hands! Lol.

He hasn’t watched any Ghostbusters but he’s watched the original movie theme song video and sings “Who are you going to call?? Ghost monsters!!”
(I’ve tried to get him to say “who you gonna call” but he won’t!)