Welcome to Our Jungle – Kindergarten part III

Kindergarten part III

Part 3? You know it. The “fun” never stops!

So where to start? Approximately 2 weeks before Christmas. I will start there.

I was in line for my lady’s first Christmas concert. I was with my Dad for the matinée performance. We were super excited. I couldn’t wait. I happened to glance over at where my daughter and her class were lined up to go inside after lunch had ended. I could see some commotion. I couldn’t tell what was happening until it became clear. There was a boy that had her and he had her by the neck of her jacket and was trying to drag her around or drag her down. I called out for them to stop. It wasn’t stopping. It seemed to be going on and getting worse. At this point I started to walk very quickly to them yelling for them to stop. As I got closer the boy was getting more aggressive and I started to run. Umbrella and purse in hand and screaming at this point for him to let go of her. As I got to where they were he backed her up to a parked car and had his arm drawn back and fist ready to punch her. I yelled firmly and loudly to STOP. He had a grip on her jacket still and I reached down and I ripped him off of her.

About 30 minutes later the concert started. I was a mess inside. I couldn’t focus at all on the beauty of what was my child singing in her first concert. She wasn’t herself up on the stage. I sat and replayed what I had just witnessed in my head over and over. It was devastating to say the least. That 90 minutes or so of the concert was one of the longest moments of my life. I just wanted to see my child and hug her and take her home. When I picked her up she got in the car and she cried so hard. Needless to say we missed the night concert. She said she didn’t feel safe.

That, by the way, was a concert I had waited 10 years to see. Our little boy never made it to school and this “1st” was a special one for me. Ruined by the events before it.

So this was our first physical experience at school.

It obviously made me think a lot about how we go about this with our daughter. We are not advocating more violence. We talked to some parents and probably more than half said we should tell her to hit him back. We didn’t. I don’t judge advice like that or if other parents teach their children that. We just won’t. It does really make you think as a parent what you want to talk to your child about should another incident happen like this.

I thought for sure that I would be the first person to teach my own children to hit back. Push back. Yet I don’t feel that way which is odd for me because I am very much an action first and talk about it later person. My husband is the complete opposite. Calm cool composed. Think first and act after. Ironically in this instance I am on the same page. Now if my daughter was older I may think about it a little different but at 5 years old I feel (for myself and not judging any others) that giving a child permission to hit back could back fire. At 5 they sometimes think that if they bump into someone it’s a license to hit. I don’t want to put that pressure on my daughter and I don’t want to give her that golden ticket to fight just because someone bumped into her or might have stepped on her foot accidentally. It may sound hokey but I really want her to use her words. They can be loud and screaming words but I would rather her use her words than get physical. I know at this age it isn’t easy but this is how she will learn.

Some parents thought it wasn’t really a big deal but more did. Again, no judging. We don’t feel it is not a big deal. This was a really big one to us. It has many branches of problems attached to it. This is potentially how bullying starts, the physical outcome of this incident could have been far worse if I wasn’t there to stop it, if it happens again when we don’t make a big deal out of it and for the child hitting who knows if there could be any issues that they need help with. Branches. Lots of branches.

Heading back to school last week after Christmas break my daughter was really anxious about going back and seeing this boy again. She was worried he would put his hands on her again. I assured her that he had to have learned his lesson and he wouldn’t. If he did to yell very loudly for an adult to help her. I was confident that he wouldn’t do this again. But guess what. He did. Another student. My daughter witnessed it and came home and the fears were now worse. I told her that she could push back. I didn’t want her to hit anyone but she could push someone away. She cried and said she didn’t want to put her hands on anyone and she didn’t want to get in trouble. Thinking about it, I thought I should at least teach her how to try to get out of holds if someone grabs her again so we went over holds and how she could get out of them. It would at least give her some confidence going to school each day. She had almost nightly bad dreams about facing him. She was cranky every morning not wanting to go. This isn’t how she normally is. She loves school. She looked forward to it every day. 2 days last week she cried asking me not to send her to school. When she got home I would ask her “what was the best part of your day?”. She would say “recess”. I then asked why etc. and she said she played all by herself. That she needed peace and a break. That usually would hurt my heart since she has had a bit of a hard time at school since September with kids leaving her out. It didn’t hurt my heart this time. I thought she probably needed it and quite frankly she was probably trying to stay away from any possible incidents. The last 2 days of school last week were better during the breaks.

I honestly thought Kindergarten would be easy. I think it should be. I don’t think it should be this hard. I don’t recall any of this when I was 5 or even when my sister was 5. It’s just been one thing after another and I am so hoping for peace and a break my daughter, myself and my husband. That’s a pretty decent request I think.

Here’s to hoping week 2 of being back is better.

Kindergarten Part III … let’s toast to Part IV being unicorns and rainbows!

Tiffani

tiffani_warnick@yahoo.com

 

 

Welcome to Our Jungle – Kindergarten part II

Kindergarten part II

So there was a part I to this Kindergarten saga so I had to follow-up with a part II.

I kind of laugh every time I think of the topic and what I’m about to talk about.

When our daughter was born and my husband went back to work he left me. That’s how I looked at it. Abandoned. Just left me to fend for myself and navigate this terrifying world of having a new baby! From what I can remember one of the things I dreaded and stressed about the most was the first time I would have to get my baby into the carrier and OMG actually put it in the car on my own. I dragged my feet on that for as long as I could. I was in a Mommy group and we all talked about the horrifying experience we all had to try to get the guts to do; getting the baby into the car ourselves.

Now from memory I remember besides the anxiety attack before, during and after was that it was fine. Not only was it fine, it was as if I had accomplished the impossible. I did it. Damn it, I conquered the car seat! YAH I DID!

Now fast forward to Kindergarten. Wait, of course there were in between worries. I mean these kids do not come with manuals. So there were “horrifying” firsts for so many things and here I am alive to tell the tales 😉

Ok back to Kindergarten. Again, this involved more Mom groups. Online chats, in person chats, lots of anxiety and worries. WHAT would we pack for lunches? What would we pack their lunches in? What time should I get up in the morning to make the lunch? What do we pack their snacks in? Would they eat their lunches? (I’ve always been on the side of, if she doesn’t eat her lunch she’ll figure out the hard way that hunger isn’t fun). HOT lunches. OMG the hot lunches. When I went to elementary school my parents’ biggest worry was a hot dog day lunch. Plain or mustard. Plain milk or chocolate. They had it easy AND hot dog day was maybe once every month? I think. It was easy. Sports Day we had the luxury of McDonalds and again, a plain hamburger or a cheeseburger. My parents didn’t know what stress was about. We have hot lunches a lot. Ordering snacks too. This whole food issue for Kindergarten had me up at night!

Guess what? It all worked out. It’s amazing but once the stress clears the answers are right there in front of you. It’s quite something. I am sure there will be more things to worry and over think about. For now, I have conquered the lunch. YAH I DID!

So what got me thinking about this topic was the other day I got up and I wasn’t in a hurry, I took my time and wasn’t worried or rushed to make the lunch. As I was making it I had a little chuckle to myself of what a FREAK I was about it and how I stressed over all of it. It brought me back to the new baby stage of stressing myself out about the carrier (and other things). I thought, I should really write about this.

It got me thinking to how Kindergarten was the new birth of a new chapter in all of our lives here.

Kindergarten part II … don’t get me started on abduction scenarios and how about the search for the perfect rain gear 😉

Tiffani

tiffani_warnick@yahoo.com

Welcome to Our Jungle – Moms Night Out

Moms Night Out

I have a variety of topics to write about but this one just happened so thought this goes first!

As I’ve said in a previous blog, I wasn’t really sure making friends in Mom circles was going to be my thing. After getting to know quite a few Moms in the community my mind was quickly changed. Mostly, after getting to know parents in my daughter’s class (and another Kindergarten class) I started to think it would be fun to get us all together!

In all honesty I have to admit my brain works over time. You throw me out a scenario and I can tell you easily about 10 different ways it can go wrong. So my only reservation (besides showing people that I am a 20 yr old college binge drinking student in a 46 yr old body!) was what if anything was to go side ways as in a friendship that might go sour or something like that and our children are in the same class. AWKWARD and ikes.

Thankfully I let the brain take a rest from the over thinking and proceeded with my idea.

This all actually started at a birthday party where I started to field the question of “would you want to get together for a drink” to other Moms and mostly got positive reactions to a get together.  It took off from there. All from a 5th birthday party!

My idea on getting the ladies together was beneficial in a few ways. I thought it was a great opportunity to get to know one another as individuals. Not just as the Moms to the babes in school! We could ask questions and be able to actually sit and listen to the answers! Also I thought it was a really good opportunity to get to know our children outside of school. Hear different stories of where we grew up, music we like, hobbies, husbands etc. Talk about things happening in the class and find out how we can be supportive to one another. We were able to hear how maybe we could support the children as well which I think is so important.

For me, I had the best time. I am not biased, we really do have the most amazing Moms (and parents) in our K class. It’s a really special bunch of children. I am looking forward to more evenings/lunches/brunches etc. I walked away from that night feeling so content with how the evening went and feeling so positive about the our class.

Moms Night Out … thank you ladies and let’s start planning the next!

Tiffani

tiffani_warnick@yahoo.com

 

Welcome to Our Jungle – thankful

thankful

I am thankful every day for what I’ve been blessed with in my life. I don’t always realize  or think about it, especially when I’m having an off day though. Last Friday was my daughter’s very first assembly at school. I was very thankful and it was that event that  made me think I wanted to blog about it. About being thankful.

Let me rewind briefly. This blog is mostly to be about the every day family life we live but I have thought about it and obviously I have to combine both of my children into one blog. If you aren’t familiar with our story, I gave birth to my first-born; a son in 2008. Sadly and tragically our son passed away 25 days after he was born. His name is Kenneth. After we lost Kenneth we tried for 4+ years via fertility treatments to conceive another child. During this time I didn’t lose hope that we would have another child; a living child but there were many many times my hopes diminished and it was a lot over the years. I never thought I would hear someone call me “Mommy”. I would be out and hear children call out for Mommy and it would bring me to my knees. Whatever we were doing had to be stopped and I needed out of there immediately. There were times I never thought I’d see my child in a costume at Halloween or hoping to see Santa at Christmas. I didn’t think there would be birthday cakes and I questioned if we’d ever see a child go to school.

Then we had our daughter 5 years + 5 months after we had lost our beloved little boy.

And so I was saying about last Friday …

My Dad comes with me to a lot of events. I usually don’t mention to him how lucky I feel or that I may be feeling emotional because as lucky as I feel to watch my daughter I can’t help but think of my son and wish so badly that he was there too. I mostly keep this kind of stuff to myself. I try to keep focus for my daughter because she deserves the full attention. It’s about her but as Mommy to 2 my heart fills and it aches for both.

Ok yes, last Friday. Getting to it! As my Dad and I drove to the school to attend the Rememberance Day Assembly I felt I needed to mention to him how important this was. The assembly. I said that this was an important day. He questioned why (besides the obvious of the occasion) and I said because I never thought I would attend anything like this for a child of mine. That it meant so much to me to be there. I needed to be thankful for every single moment I can attend something that my child is a part of. He said he hadn’t thought of it that way. That it’s so easy to take it for granted and sometimes you don’t realize how special it is.

After the assembly I started really thinking about the thankfulness I felt that morning and should feel so much more.

Like Halloween of this year. My daughter started Kindergarten and there are so many firsts besides the big one of having a child in school. This Halloween there was a parade at my little girl’s school. I knew before she even set foot in that gym I would lose it. As soon as I saw her walk through the doors my eyes were completely filled with tears. I thanked every single lucky star I could imagine that I was watching my little girl dressed up as Wonder Woman so proudly and shyly walking in the parade.

I also volunteer at the school once a week and also once a week there is a “Family Time” in the morning where you go and spend time with your child and other children in the class for 15 minutes.  These are things I never thought I would do. Again,  how could I turn down opportunities to see and spend time with my daughter during school. I swear she is the most naughty on the mornings I volunteer and/or go to the “Family Time” and I really want to say bye and quickly drop her off but I always stop and think to myself, you have missed out on this for so many years. Why would you let this be the time to make a point? How could you turn this down and miss this? So I go and when I am there and when I leave I feel so incredibly thankful.

I just felt like I really wanted to write about this. We go on with our every day lives and even though I’ve been through tragedy I take things for granted or  I let the busy and the stress get in the way of appreciation. This is my mental note to not forget where it all comes from. To stop and breathe and take it all in.

thankful … cherish the moments

Tiffani

tiffani_warnick@yahoo.com

Welcome to Our Jungle – Kindness

Kindness

I meant to write about this topic a couple of weeks ago but it got nuts around our house and my computer crashed. I finally decided that because today is World Kindness Day I should get back to it!

Originally I wanted to write about kindness because I was finding at school there was a problem with kindness. It wasn’t something I was sharing openly with many but my daughter didn’t have the best start to school. One night in bed on a Friday night she started to cry and said she needed to tell me something. The long story short version is that some children were not being kind to her. It broke my heart. It ruined the entire weekend. This was a first for me.

I always thought if we were faced with something like this my first instinct would be to go “street” (lol) and tell her to hit back when hit or if kids were being mean to be extra mean back. Now that I am a parent to a living child (our son passed away for those fresh to my blog) I don’t feel this way. Maybe if my daughter was older I would be for it but at 5 years old I’m not. I don’t think hitting back is the answer and I don’t think making another child cry more than mine did is the answer either.

This whole situation just made me think about one of our big rules for our daughter. We taught her as soon as she could understand that she doesn’t have to like everyone, she doesn’t have to play with everyone BUT she MUST be kind to everyone. There is no wiggle room on this rule. None.

So if kindness is not happening our daughter chooses to walk away from a situation. I’ve told her to ignore those that aren’t nice to her. It is a work in progress. Children are a work in progress. I get it. Let’s just be sure to teach them the importance of kindness.

Kindness goes a long way. It can make or break a day. It’s a good lesson for us all.

Now with that being said, I wanted to talk about the beautiful kindness shown to me recently.

3 weeks ago my husband was hospitalized. He was in the hospital for 6 nights. It was a rough one for me. As soon as my circle of family/friends and my Mom friends (I cherish you all the same!) found out I had so much support. I leaned on some. Not many because I am terrible with accepting help but I did utilize the help I really needed. I was asked daily how things were going. Genuine caring. I was offered shelter for my little lady should I need to get to the hospital at any time of the day or night. I was offered a lot and I just have to say that the kindness that was offered to me brought me up when I felt really low. Thank you all for your kindness and caring.

See, kindness is pretty amazing. It’s also FREE! haha! It might be slightly underrated because I tell you, it goes a long way.

I offer this. Teach it and use it.

Kindness … helps in more ways than you might think.

Tiffani

tiffani_warnick@yahoo.com

 

 

Welcome to Our Jungle – Kindergarten Part I

Kindergarten Part I

Part I because it’s only the start of the year and I am sure I will have many more thoughts on the topic.

Kindergarten. How did it come to be so quickly? How is my little girl already 5 years old?

My heart. My poor heart and my poor over thinking brain.

It’s not all bad. Good aspects. I promise. haha

I am so sentimental. Damn it. I get that from my Mom. I am mostly sentimental for the innocence before school. It’s not gone yet but boo hiss I can feel it will be a matter of time. I don’t want to sound so pessimistic but I like to keep it real. It’s what I do!

When our daughter had her Kindergarten orientation she was standing in line. She wasn’t nervous or scared. She was eager to get in there and just do her thing. I love that about her. Whatever the situation she is excited to see what it is and get to it. As I watched her I felt the tears. I felt a sinking feeling that this was going to be it. Her beautiful little innocence was going to be tested soon. She would find out that it wasn’t going to be easy, that there could be some hard times and I just felt sad. Could not help it because it really is the truth.

I also worried about things that my husband thought I should relax on. I was worried she’d get lost, wander off, get abducted. Oh yah, I let my brain go there. That’s also thanks to my Mom who always scared me by telling me there was always a chance of an abduction. So the night before school actually started do you think I slept? Or do you think I stayed up all night thinking of every worst case scenario possible? Most people worried about their kids eating lunch. Let them starve I would say,  but don’t let them get abducted!!

The good news is, she has loved it so far. For the most part. At our parent/teacher interview we were told she loves our daughter’s enthusiasm, willingness, her vibrant personality. All really encouraging things. She really is so enthusiastic about school. It is fantastic. She is loving her music class, loves gym, loves art, is starting to get a love of reading at home. Watching her read books to her Dad is so sweet (she’s not actually reading but she’s mimicking how the teachers read to the class). She tells us about her teachers and other children she plays with. Everything is so new and exciting for her. I love seeing how good she is getting at writing her name. Both she and another boy in the class have the longest names (what was I thinking?!) so seeing the progress is heart warming for me.

For me? I finally stopped crying in the car when driving home last week. Only took a little over a month. I don’t mean to sound very dramatic but I was losing my little side kick. We had been together almost every single day (minus the 2/3 days a week she went to preschool when she was 3 and 4 years old). The adjustment was and still is there for both of us. My heart hurts in the mornings if I feel she didn’t hear me tell her I love her enough. I try to say it at least 2-3 times before she goes into school. Might sound ridiculous to some but I just want her to feel loved and feel secure each and every day she walks into school. I want her to carry that with her to get through anything she might need to feel secure through.

So all in all everything has been going pretty well. There are some bumps in the road and I feel like I’ve left her out to dry leaving her at school at times. 5 is still young. Very young to navigate situations. As her Mom I feel that when she’s upset about something at school I have failed her. This is me. Thanks again to my Mom I inherited her “feel as guilty as you can” gene.

It’s a matter of figuring out for myself how to handle situations that are really new to me with this whole school thing. I really am not a fan of adulting these days.

Kindergarten … watch for lots of sequels on this topic! Maybe and hopefully next time it will have a few more unicorns and rainbows 😉

Tiffani

tiffani_warnick@yahoo.com

 

 

Welcome to Our Jungle – Parent Friends

Parent Friends

I have a variety of topics to talk about. This one keeps coming up for me.

Let me back track and I mean way back to when I was little to really get into this one.

So when I was little my Mom didn’t really engage with other parents at school. She was pleasant and exchanged pleasantries but she didn’t make herself available. Not socially. My Mom was very private. Her inner circle was small. The parents at the school never stood a chance! Play dates involved drop offs and pick ups. No coffees and chit chats with other Moms while we played.

I guess that growing up this way I thought that when I had children I would pretty much stick to my circle of friends I had before any of us had children. I never really thought I would get close to other women or parents. I felt very protective of my life before children and thought I would solely stick to those that I was already close to. I am not as private as my Mom but I am a little guarded and even shy although I’m sure people would say NO WAY you are NOT shy! I promise I am. A little. I get very anxious in social situations that I am not familiar with. Also I had this weird preconceived thinking that if I hung out with Moms then that would be it for me. The end. I would lose myself in being a Mom and not the individual I was previously.

After I gave birth to my daughter in 2013 I had terrible postpartum depression. As I do, I thought I would deal with it on my own but it became too hard to deal with. I called our local health unit and was directed to a post-partum society (who were amazing) and I was also directed to a Mom Group they were running. It was called Baby Daze. I was a month away from it ending (I believe. I’m not super clear on the exact details) but they said I could come and check it out. At that time I was too into the post-partum and I was super shy and anxious to try the group. I wish I would have. The women in it were amazing. Are amazing. But it was something I missed out on because of my anxiety and because of my preconceived thinking about Mom groups. I still thought I would do it on my own and I would stick to my own circle of friends. I have since met many of the Moms in that group and a few are actually really good friends now. I’m still getting to know others but they are amazing women.

I went to a few drop in programs locally before any schooling started but I didn’t find other Moms that friendly. At least that’s what I told myself. If I am honest maybe I wasn’t the friendly one. I didn’t make a real effort to go and talk to anyone. I still had this thought that I was there for my daughter to socialize but I wasn’t. Ridiculous!

Fast forward to my daughter going to preschool at age 3. I can tell you that my anxiety was through the roof. My little girl was starting school and I had to start socializing with people who weren’t my friends! Eeks! BUT you know what? I started to meet the most fantastic Moms and Dads. I let my guard down little by little and found myself going to pick ups a little earlier to chat with new friends. Again when she went to preschool at age 4 I met more parents. We met parents in the summer at events. We met parents at activities we enrolled our daughter in.

I have to say thank goodness for social media. It has definitely changed the course of how parents communicate and for that it’s a pretty good thing because not only was I meeting parents at events, activities and school but I joined an amazing local Mom group and it saved my life. I joined it after my postpartum was pretty much under control for the most part and it opened my mind to talking more, asking for advice, and engaging with local Moms. Eventually (and still) I have met Moms from that group in person. Never did I think I would but I did and have and it has been such a positive experience.

Kindergarten was a big one for me. It also has got to be another topic all on its own for another blog! I had big anxiety with Kindergarten for the obvious reason(s) but one was meeting new parents again and being around so many other parents of children in an actual school and not preschool. So far it’s been great. I have met some wonderful ladies and I have also gotten a chance to talk more with Moms that I already knew. It is so nice to meet different people that live in the community.

We had a birthday party for my daughter in September and I can’t explain how special it was to not only have our daughter’s little friends there but we had parents there that we really like. That we think of as friends. We wouldn’t have had it any other way. It was the most amazing feeling to come together like that. I think maybe because I didn’t know of this growing up it is still foreign to me so I really appreciate it. I appreciate the friendships I’m making, I’m appreciating the advice I get. I appreciate the affection people have for my little girl. It fills my heart.

I am so fortunate to have met some really great families. Some are even on our emergency list at school and that is a really big deal for me. Trust and letting people in. Who knew that was a good thing?! LoL

Dare I say that my circle of friends has expanded and keeps expanding? Dare I say that I get the best feeling talking to a lot of parents. I walk away from conversations and say “I have got to write about this”.

Parent Friends … definitely under-rated. Try it!

Tiffani

tiffani_warnick@yahoo.com

Welcome to Our Jungle – intro

intro

I am a Mom to 2 beautiful children. In 2008 I gave birth to my beloved son. Sadly he passed away 25 days after I had him. I suffer from fertility issues and it took 3 years to get pregnant with my son. After he passed away it took 4+ years to conceive my daughter via IVF. 5 years and 6 months after we lost our son I gave birth to my daughter. She is now 5 years old and I’ve finally decided to start blogging about every day life of being a Mom.

I sum up this blog being about the love, the crazy, the amazing, the hard and the fun of being a parent.

It sums up what I will write about in my blogs.

I am not new to blogging. This will be #3 in my blog topics. I have written about fashion/make-up (one of my passions), being a bereaved parent and now this.

There have been many times I wanted to write about something that went on with parenting and never really could get the proper moment to do it. My daughter has incredible hearing and she would wake up and/or being supremely bothered by the sound of keys typing. I kid you not this has been one of my biggest stumbling blocks with writing. So now that she is in Kindergarten I can focus again on my writing. I miss it. I love it. It’s therapeutic in many ways.

I like to try for once a week blogs. I’m still a little fresh here and setting things up. Things have changed a little since I started blogging a while ago. It’s like learning all over again but I will really try once a week. I’m sure I could have 5 topics a day!

Looking forward to sharing my experiences, opinions and views with you. I also love hearing feedback and others stories as well.

Until the first blog …

Tiffani

tiffani_warnick@yahoo.com

 

 

The Journey Begins

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton