Reading the news about Somer Thompson’s death drives me a little nuts. It’s not so much the coverage; such a death is rare enough that the media tends to go wild with coverage on it. The scare tactics they use on parents along with it are somewhat annoying, of course.

But what drives me most nuts are the comments people are aiming at her mother, criticizing her for working outside the home. Like there’s much of a choice for a single mom. We can’t all work at home, even when we want to.

These critics of the mother have this attitude that the mother’s place is in the home.

A mother’s place is not in the home. A mother’s place is where she can do the best job for her family.

For single moms, that most often means working outside the home. That’s also often true for married moms. Being at home with the kids, whether we have a job or a business or are home for the kids, is a luxury we can’t all manage.

I also do not believe she was foolish for letting her children walk home from school. I don’t know about anyone else, but I was walking home without parents much younger than that. Most children who walk home from school, even without parents or other children will be just fine.

No, the world is not a safe place. More children die in car accidents than from abductions every year. Children even get abducted from their own homes with their parents at home. It’s tragic, but not every tragedy can be prevented. It’s called life!

My heart aches for her entire family. It’s a nightmare that no family should have to live through. Let’s save the blame for the one who killed her, not the people who loved her.

We had a little reminder the other morning about being ready for disasters around here – specifically, earthquakes. That reminder was in the form of a teeny tiny 3.5 quake at 3 in the morning. Only reason we noticed it was because the baby started crying just before, and so we were awake already. We had another small one yesterday morning, a 3.3.

Living in southern California, that’s not much of a quake. But it’s a good reminder to be prepared for disasters in general. Which kind you should prepare for depends on where you live.

One of the big things we did was have a quake talk with the kids. Basic stuff like what to do in a quake, places of the house to avoid (that would be shelves and other furniture that might tip), where to go if they needed to get out of the house and getting help if 911 isn’t available.

All stuff we hope they never need, but should know.

We still need to rebuild our earthquake supplies. We had a good stash in the Poway house, and a good place to keep it. Haven’t quite figured out the storage problem here. Inside the house is good for the most part, but if the quake’s bad enough to render the house uninhabitable, how do you get your supplies?

It’s a relatively new house so that’s not too likely to be a problem even in a bad quake, but you never know.

I’m not big on going wild with preparations for all kinds of disasters, but I do believe in having water and food available for at least a few days for all members of the family, some medical supplies and so forth. It’s been proven that you cannot assume the government will be able to help out everyone in the event of a disaster within a reasonable time frame. Better to have something to take care of your own family.

Never let it be said my daughter isn’t imaginative. She’s working on her Christmas wish list already, and it was really hard keeping a straight face as she asked me how to spell various things.

Here’s what she wants so far:

1. Goldfish with everything I need to take care of it.
2. Harp
3. Baby Alive Girl
4. Cat
5. Dog
6. Lizard
7. Dress
8. Swing set
9. 2 mice in a cage
10. 2 bunnies
11. Horse
12. 200 pearls
13. Candy
14. Fairies

There’s a story behind that last one, and she means she wants real fairies, not dolls. At a Renaissance Faire back when my daughter was 4 a troll gave her an iridescent marble and told her it was a fairy egg, and to take good care of it so that it would hatch.

Obviously, it never has.

My daughter has decided that she needs some real fairies to come help her with it, so that maybe it will finally hatch. Since she can’t find any on her own, she wants them for Christmas.

Some nights getting the kids to bed isn’t easy. They’re bright eyed and bushy tailed when you’re ready for them to get to bed. This has lead to me and my husband joking about a drinking game for getting the kids to bed.

Standard drinking game rules, except you can’t take a drink until the kids are actually asleep.

Child gets up for drink – Take one drink.

Asks for other parent – Take one drink.

Gets up to go potty – Take one drink.

Gets up to go potty but doesn’t do anything there – Take 2 drinks.

Asks for an extra story – Take one drink.

Asks for same story as the night before – Take 2 drinks.

Complains: “I’m too hot!” – Take one drink.

Complains: “I’m too cold!” – Take one drink.

One child is too hot and the other is too cold – Take 2 drinks.

Wants to watch television with you – Take one drink.

The show you’re watching isn’t age appropriate – Take one drink.

The show you’re watching isn’t age appropriate and your child wakes you with nightmares that night – Take 2 drinks.

Mysterious owie appears. It hurts a lot. Needs kisses – Take one drink.

Mysterious owie must, must I say, have a bandage put on it – Take 2 drinks.

Child throws up – Take 2 drinks.

Gets up crying that favorite bedtime toy is missing – Take one drink.

Missing toy is at foot of the bed – Take one drink.

Missing toy is right by pillow, where it had been when you put child to bed – Take 2 drinks.

And of course, kids go to bed with no trouble at all… take a drink if you feel like it. You probably deserve it.

It seems to be pretty popular right now for moms to talk about how “bad” they are, basically making light of their mistakes and trumpeting that they’re not the perfect moms that there’s so much pressure to be.

All in all, that’s not a bad thing. We shouldn’t hold ourselves to such excessively high standards. But it’s a far cry from being a really bad mom.

Making a parenting mistake doesn’t make you a bad mom.

Taking time for yourself doesn’t make you a bad mom.

Forgetting a promise you made to your kids doesn’t make you a bad mom.

Matter of fact, most of the mistakes we moms make just mean we’re human. Sometimes they mean we’re tired. But so long as we aren’t doing things that really harm our families, we aren’t likely to really be bad.

Just imperfect. And thank goodness for that.

My mom gave my son a new toy the other day. It’s pretty cute, an inflatable remote control dump truck. He loves it, especially since he can use it in the house and not worry much about bumping into walls.

But one part of it comes with a warning to not let children use it. Care to guess which part?

That’s the truck, remote and foot pump. He’s bumped it into walls enough already that I think it has a small leak somewhere. He doesn’t seem to mind.

So…

Which part is too dangerous for children?

Did you guess:

If so, you’re correct! The foot pump is apparently the most dangerous part of this toy! See?

If you can’t read that, it says:

Warning:
This is not a toy and must only be operated by an adult. Keep out of reach of children.

I’m sitting here trying to figure out the danger. I don’t think the accordion folds of it could give so much as a nasty pinch. I don’t think fingers could get badly stuck in it.

About the only danger I can see is a kid toppling over while stomping on it. Maybe I’m a mean mom, but I don’t see that as a problem.

Moving is hard on children, especially when they’re leaving their friends. It’s been interesting with this move seeing how each of my kids reacts.

My oldest is the most upset. She has the most friends, after all. She finally broke down the other night, crying, and talked about her concerns.

Fortunately, she quickly got to the point where she realized that she might just love our new home. If my husband can get a transfer back to the San Diego area when he’s qualified in a year, we might just do that, and she realized that she would probably be sad to leave her new friends.

My son is insisting that he’s not sad about it, but is decidedly fussier right now. Pretty typical stressed out four year old kind of behaviors.

And of course the baby just knows that she wants Mommy’s attention. She’s too young to know more than that I’m busier than usual and don’t play as much as she’d like.

For the older two, we’ve been talking to them a lot about why we’re moving and what they can expect. It really helped my oldest when we told her about all the kids we saw in the neighborhood just driving around.  Definitely a nice young neighborhood, which will help.

We’re also driving her nuts by giving her just about any detail about the house except whether it’s one or two story. She badly wants a two story home, so we’re keeping that as a surprise for her. It makes her mad, but should make her first sight of the new home very exciting.

We’re lucky to have local, retired grandparents to take the kids. I’m trying to have them gone most of this week, as we have a lot of stuff packed up. They really hate being told “sorry, that toy has been packed already.” Much better for them to be having fun with grandparents than to be underfoot all day.

They have helped with some of the packing, plus some toy sorting for things that they’re willing to get rid of. It’s a great time for getting rid of at least some of the excess toys!

Letting the kids be involved can slow things down tremendously, but it also helps them. It’s not just something that Mommy and Daddy are doing. It’s something the family is doing together.

I got to take a peek at a Kindle today at last. It was during my kids’ swimming lessons. The grandmother next to me was reading a Frog and Toad story to the little girl on her lap, while the girl’s brother was in his lesson.

Pretty nice.

The little girl really appreciated having a story read to her because, let’s face it, watching someone else have a swimming lesson is boring. A Kindle is probably no easier to carry around than a child’s book, but then again you can carry several in it.

One of my sisters bought one recently too. She loves it; her husband doesn’t see the fascination. That pretty much seems to be the reaction I see around. I tend to agree with my brother-in-law more than my sister, although I haven’t actually tried one yet. Peeking over at someone else’s as they read to child and talking about it with them doesn’t make for much of an evaluation.

As for me, I’m most into paperback books. Let me get into a used bookstore with money to spend, and things get interesting. Much more my style, even if they aren’t as portable when you’re taking a bunch along.

But I’m curious what others think, and so…

Here goes. I get to be the sole parent in charge all day. My husband is off at his new job and I get to do it all even more so than usual.

Some ways, it’s not so different from other times. It’s been a while since I’ve consistently been the only one to put the kids to bed, and my oldest in particular is rather emotional about not having Daddy home for a few days. My son says he’s not going to be sad about it, but we’ll see. That’s easy to say at first, after all.

And we’ll see how much the baby notices. They do, after all. If nothing else, there will be cues for her with how everyone else is acting.

But I’m used to being the one in charge all day, so that part isn’t going to be so difficult. I’m planning lots of play time for my kids with their friends that we will be moving away from. Trying to get what work of my own done that I can. Trying to find a home to move into up there.

And sleep. I know there’s time to sleep in there.

Really.

Despite the baby’s best attempts to keep me up some nights.

Sometimes I do my best work when things get crazy in my life. There’s just no time to goof off, and I know it. If I work at things, this might just be a help rather than a complete hindrance.

Kids will catch you off guard sometimes. We were at the store the other day buying toothpaste, when my oldest daughter grabs a pack of colorful flossers off the shelf and starts begging me to buy them.

She’s begging me to buy dental floss? Are you kidding me?

Of course I bought them. I’m not sure someone didn’t switch kids on me for a minute there, though.

These are the Dentek flossers, and they’re… adequate. My kids really haven’t had trouble with them, and it’s nice seeing them want to brush their teeth. I don’t like them for myself, though. They loosen up too easily.

It’s fun seeing them debating which color to use, rather than putting up a fuss over having to floss.

There are some other really nice looking kid’s flossers over on Amazon I think I’ll check out when these run out, though. I want to keep encouraging such a healthy habit.