Welcome to the Commenting Pixie Party!
I love your blog - YEAH!
My goodness, thank you, Shining Love Pig. I love yours, too.
Another great Baby Blue saying: "Mama gaht shock-wat ship."
That's chocolate chip, baby. Glad I stayed up!
Enjoy your ice cream!
I think you should definitely get the new iPod. Then I will come over and watch it with you!
When you download music from eMusic, can you put that on your iPod? I thought you could only use your iPod with iTunes (or is that like wearing white after Labor Day?).
Splurge! Disturb the universe!
Hooray for ice cream. That's a great coupla kiddoes you got there. And they have a great mommy.
Speaking as one who has to hem petite pants, and who spent many years being a personal leaning post to my taller friends, LG will probably be fine.
My suggestions are: encourage baseball and other sports where height and length of leg are not really factors. Wrestling is a good example as is jujitsu. Also diving, gymnastics and some track and field.
And of course, jockeying, the sport of kings (and queens). Dick Francis rode for the Queen Mum.
And outside of sports encourage his humor and his artistry. Talent like his speaks for itself.
Aww LG. I'm so glad he is finding fun in baseball!
And I TOTALLY hear you on the petite pants. I'm at that really awkward in between leg length too, and it's much better to swish.
Yeah yeah yeah, Suzan. eMusic is totally compatible with the iPod. Thus the coolness of it.
Oooohhhh, very cool ipod...yes, you should definitely treat yourself (and none of that "I don't deserve it" stuff, either!!) I am thinking about getting one...I'm starting to feel like the last person in the universe without one.
The teasing thing sucks, but it is great that LG has a good attitude about it. Our experience is that it can shift from year to year. The first year of middle school was hell for the Kid b/c he was teased all the time. But the next year he wasn't teased at all.
I would definitely say that LG is not doomed to perpetual teasing. Childhood is so fluid-things change all the time. Before long, everyone will realize how cool and brilliant he is.
And baby blue...the cuteness...the two-ness of her! Can't wait.
I have the 40gig video iPod, and I love it! I don't think I'll ever need the 60 gig one, though.
Like shining pig, I love your blog! I always smile when I see you've updated!
do I dare disturb the universe?
hell, yes! You should also eat a peach (embedded in icecream if need be), and if it comes to that, give yourself permission to wear the bottoms of your trousers rolled.
Phantom, can I join you in the NO PETITE PANTS pact? I do the same thing, and then wonder why I have all these pairs of pants that look just slightly absurd. Why do I never learn???
Love random bullets! Love that Friday nights are something to look foward to! Love the traditions! Glad that LG has friends and sorry that he has to endure teasing at such a young age. Sounds like he's handling it well though.
So glad you stayed up! (Selfishly, because then I got an extra blog post. But more importantly, because you got
"shock-wat ship." Mmmmm....)
My mother-in-law got me the 30-gig video iPod for Christmas (they asked what I wanted, I said "iPod," thinking I might get a shuffle or Nano. Boy, was I pleasantly surprised!).
You want one. YOu can download Dora videos from iTunes to it. Love the Lovely iPod.
And your description of LG being teased and laughing along with them makes me want to cry. And want to help you string up the perpetrators. The prospect that my sensitive, slightly dorky son was going to face that kind of stuff was my biggest fear in sending him off to preschool, and then Kindergarten.
Has the teacher intervened and talked to these boys? Sometimes these teachers has gentle talking to's and can totally change behavior.
I would also sit LG down and let him know it's okay to not like the names, and to ask people to stop. Being able to converse with these damn baby hooligans in a calm way might make the name calling stop, but allow him to remain their friends. Could you talk to one or two of their moms?
What you tolerate, you teach. So if LG starts allowing this stuff now, he is telling kids it's okay to call him names. Even if he is claiming it's no big whoop and he thinks it's funny, it may pave the way for bullies later on.
Scruffy is just below average in height. His projected height is 5'5" or 5'6". He will not be tall. He is fast though, he is doing little kid's soccer.
Sorry, this is so strong. I just know that if were on the playground at our school this would be an issue. We wouldn't allow it.
Re: iPod - I have the black 30-gig version, and it's really enough for me - I couldn't justify the extra money for the 60 gig because it will probably take me so.incredibly.long. to fill up even the 30 gig. My husband on the other hand, is a different story, and really needs a new iPod.
Anyway, what I meant to say orignally was that you might want to consider ordering any new iPod from apple directly - it worked out great for me, and I didn't have to actually go to a store or anything, which is really my primary goal in my never-ending quest to have the intarwebs bring me everything.
Now, if WebVan hadn't gone under, I'd be in business.
It is so sucky, the whole kids getting teased. I got teased for being too tall (aside from the-male- teacher I was the tallest in my 5th grade class) and for having a funny name. I let it bother me. I think it would have been better if I ignored it or laughed because as it was I let them know they had all the power. Some kids are just cruel and then you get the ones who join in for fear of being targets themselves. But LG will survive and be a more empathetic person, I think. He's already pretty great! The sqvirrel got teased for being a sensitive person and had to toughen up a bit but that sensitive part of him is still there and is part of what I love about him. And as people have said, these things seem to change from year to year- I was never popular per se, but I found my niche (with the smart kids, natch) and was happy.
Speaking of being tall, I have a similar issue with pants but on the other end. I'm somewhere between regular pants and "tall" so most of my jeans get turned up and ultimately get ripped where they are folded. But otherwise I look like a goofball with the slightly short pants (and can I just say, glad someone else out there has the same state of unshaven legs!)
Yay for baseball (and Teeball in the interim)! The sqvirrel and I already argue about what sports our children would play (because we need to talk about non-existent children). I love football but the sqvirrel has decreed that no child of his will play football (too dangerous). Of course, I don't react well to such decrees. We agree on basketball (we've got the tall thing, the sqvirrel is 6'4" and I'm 5'9") and baseball and swimming (the last being what I did but the sqvirrel is more or less afraid of the water). Of course, I don't know why we think our kids will be sports types, neither of us is particularly coordinated (the most vast understatement of this post!) but we love to watch sports and it would be fun to watch them play. Course I'll have to be physically restrained from punching out other parents who are too competitive on behalf of their kids....I'll worry about that later!
I first read this post as saying that LG shares his name with a sports car. I've been going crazy for the past couple of hours trying to figure out what it could possibly be. Now I keep thinking of LG as Ferrari Scribbler-Blue.
Nah, Lisa V. The teacher has talked to the kids, but they keep on doing it. And LG says that he really does think it's funny, and it doesn't hurt his feelings. I can't really make it a problem for him if he doesn't want to see it that way, but I do totally get your point about letting behavior escalate into bullying by tolerating it at lower levels. We just gotta keep an eye on it, I guess. I know his elementary school really emphasizes giving kids the tools to strategize working through their problems. I'll speak to his teacher before the year begins so that she can watch for it.
You know, I was always a swimmer, Turtlebella, and my husband is afraid of the water. Wouldn't you know that the kids took after him? Sigh.
Ferrari Scribbler-Blue? I like it!
...as long as the school doesn't believe the onus is on the victim to cope with the problems while the school ignores the perpetrators. Nursery school and early ed. settings are precisely when these behaviors are learned, along with racism, sexism, homophobia, etc.
By the time we get these kids in middle school, the attitudes and behaviors are ingrained. We can work on the behaviors all day, every day - and we can constantly try to create a culture that stresses acceptance and does not tolerate this...but you notice I say try: many teachers have acquired the same philosophical crap when they were kids and are recalcitrant; other teachers do not want to take on the parents as they shriek and foam at the mouth about their kids' right to be full of hate AND act on that. Bottom line: for the most part by the time we get a ten year old kid, it's very hard to change the behaviors, let alone the attitudes.
The nursery school needs to work with these kids, not just tell them no, no. Maybe it would be helpful to direct them to tolerance.org? They have lesson plans, activities, information that's very good - and teachers love stuff that's free and ready to go (*sigh*).
With that I'll go back to creating a package for one discipline area group in my own school to use so they'll be using good material but won't (gasp, shudder) be expected to come up with it themselves.
Again, I hear what you're saying, A. There are one or two kids that encourage the others to tease -- both of them have older brothers, and parents who shrug their shoulders and consider the behavior normal. The head preschool teacher is very good about intervening when she overhears stuff like this, but she can't be everywhere.
I do want to stress, though, that LG really does not seem to be much troubled by it. He's enthusiastic about going to school -- there are no behavior changes like we saw when he was being tormented by another group of kids. Those kids leave him alone these days.
If you ask LG about the ringleader of his current teasers, he'll tell you that the boy is an unhappy kid with no friends. Which strikes me as being singularly insightful for a four year old.
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