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Year Round Swim League

September 10, 2012 By 1 Comment

As I sat on the pool deck watching swim practices last week, I could clearly hear the coach yell AJ’s name a few times from the other side of the pool. She abruptly corrects form, and then sends the kids off with a vigorous push. A drill Sergeant would not envy her position as she corrals about 20 kids under 10 on deck and across 4 swim lanes. She has them all orchestrated according to skill. She projects her voice like a drill sergeant too, but that’s just necessary in a big loud (humid) room. Ultimately, I wondered if AJ was enjoying the endless laps.

After summer swim team we talked to AJ about swimming year round.  I had mixed feelings about this.  His first instructor cautioned joining unless he really liked it.  It’s also a big time commitment and would pretty much nix the ability for him to participate in other sports.

But AJ actually did seem to enjoy the summer swim league a lot.  By the end of soccer season in the Spring, it was not only a drag to get him to practice, he frequently came off the field complaining at the end of practice. But with swimming, he was happy within moments of getting to the pool even if he was grumpy about going.

Plus swimming seemed to fit his style of learning better than soccer.  The coaches frequently commented how diligent he was about working on whatever they targeted each lap.  As his endurance and speed built over the summer, AJ’s confidence also grew.

If I have to list a single reason for doing a sport,  I would want AJ to enjoy it. So far AJ loves swimming.

Bonus points to swimming for actually wearing AJ down. Soccer wasn’t doing it yet. AJ needs a way to regularly blow off energy for at least an hour a day. Since the start of school, he has rushed through his homework, so he could play outside with his friends and ride his bike until bedtime.

Year round swim team started last week. Practice is every week Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Though how often we attend is up to us. To be honest, I was probably more nervous than AJ. It takes a bit of extra effort to get him from school to swim practice and then ready for dinner and/or evening activities. Luckily we had a lot of leftovers stockpiled last week.

Tuesday, AJ was excited. Could not get back in the pool fast enough.

Wednesday, AJ was happy to see the swim bag and ready to go.

Thursday, AJ’s excitement had not faltered. No whining. No stalling.

When I told him that swim team would mean that he couldn’t play other sports, especially lacrosse which he wanted to try again. He was okay with it. “I know, Mom. But I want to swim. I really like swimming.”

Then he proceeded to tell me he swam 16 laps. And he was happy about it.

To top it all off, he’s happy the rest of the evening, even though I know he’s tired. He’s still seven and has his moments, but between focus on the reward system and happiness with his choice to swim, he seems pretty darn content to deal with the new complexities of his schedule.

God, thank you for helping to hook AJ up with a sport that makes him happy and motivated. (Please help him stick with it for at least a few years before he changes his mind.) Amen

(I am not intentionally building a future triathlete. I will not live vicariously through my kid. I hope. I try. Hopefully….)

Filed Under: Loved Ones Tagged With:

Grace Filled Moments

September 7, 2012 By 1 Comment

Today, I met with some friends to review the materials for a mom’s formation group we are leading this Fall. As we discussed the materials, we came to the discussion of a grace filled moments.

Being that my comfort level of talking about how God works in my life is high – NOT – I immediately veered off in another direction with a side story. (I seem to think I can talk my way out of anything. I blame my father.)

“So, this is wildly off topic, but I can’t get it out of my head. All summer my mom and her friend and Jeff have been trying to get me to read this book. I don’t know why I stalled. They gave it to Jeff for Father’s Day, and he said it was good. But I just kept putting it off.

It’s about this Navy SEAL from Hot Springs who had all sorts of issues but ultimately found purpose and became a elite special forces guy after  he was saved by Jesus Christ. It’s called ‘Fearless’.

Anyway, we went to seem Mom on Labor Day, and she asked once again when I was going to read it. I shrugged and couldn’t give her a good answer. I just kept forgetting it was on my Kindle.

Then we came home and later that same day I was talking to my neighbor about random shit – lawns, trash cans, chores, mowing, etc. Then out of the blue Alan says, “I have a great book you should read. It’s called ‘Fearless’.

He went on to describe the book while my jaw dropped, and I stared at him.

So I had to read the book this week, and it’s really good and amazing. But it’s totally inappropriate for a mother’s group, but I really want to talk about it.

Anyway, I’m always weird about ‘grace filled moments’. Can one of you start the examples? Something will come to me eventually.”

At this point they are looking at me a bit oddly, and I’m getting a little self conscious about sidetracking about the military.

A: “I think that story is pretty good.”
Me: “What? The story about the SEAL. Doesn’t seem to fit the group.”
A: “When the guy next door told you about the book is pretty neat.”
Me: “That was a grace filled moment?”
M: “Uh, yeah.”
A: “Pretty amazing.”

Huh. Apparently I don’t recognize a grace filled moment when it kicks me in the ass.

Am I oblivious to God’s work in my life because I’m just not looking for it?

This was a big eye-opener to me. I haven’t re-framed my thoughts to start considering amazing moments to be full of God’s grace. To really see and appreciate His work.

So, I think I need a new Tiny Habit – which would make more sense if I had actually posted the Tiny Habits post…standby for that.

I always try to thank God for all the blessings of the day, but I feel like I need a more conscientious way to approach this in the future.

How do you appreciate God’s grace each day?

Filed Under: Spiritual Growth

Functionally Impossible

September 6, 2012 By Leave a Comment

I’m functionally impossible today. Does that make sense? I don’t really care. After 3 cups of coffee, when I normally drink one and a half, I still can’t string a coherent thought together. Frustrating.

What do you do when these tired days come along? And why do they come more now? I’m approaching 40 but I don’t feel like I should feel older all the sudden especially give the fact that I’m a fairly healthy woman. But then these days come along, and I can’t figure out why I’m not bouncing along the way I want to.

It’s not water. I had a large cup before bed and another first thing this morning. I carry a water bottle with me all the time and drink all the time. I filled it 2-3 times yesterday which is pushing well over 64 ounces a day.

It’s not exercise. For the first time in recent history, I’m successfully tackling moderate exercise. Normally I do too much or not enough. For several weeks, I’ve been exercising at a moderate level 5-6 times a week for 45-60 minutes. I’ve built slowly to this point starting out initially with 2-3 workouts a week. I’ve been fairly consistent most of the summer with something even though tendonitis won’t let me do what I want.

It’s not sleep. I get at least 7 hours a night. Generally 8.

It’s not Crohn’s. I’ve been doing great. No symptoms and no problems eating even my trigger foods (popcorn and watermelon are the flag foods).

It’s not food in general. I’ve been eating healthy. I’m even gaining a bit of weight, although I think that goes back to exercise. Definitely losing body fat but not going hungry. And my diet is light years healthier than the average American fare. No fast food. We haven’t been eating out lately. A ton of fresh fruits and veggies. Less meat lately, but plenty of protein.

And I don’t think it’s stress. While AJ’s schedule has definitely ramped up with school and activities. And suddenly I have more commitments than I intended. I’m not over the top. I still have time to read. I trailed off all my summer projects. And more importantly, while I was tired and grumpy  this morning, I still had reserves to calmly deal with a grumpy AJ without yelling.

I have a new To Do list, and it’s not overwhelming. The rewards system is working great. Things are good. So when I feel like I should be more productive – ticking things off – I’m suddenly physically drained. I haven’t even pushed myself all that hard recently. I’m fully capable of operating at a state much closer to emotionally and physically exhausted (and honestly past that point).

Am I truly clueless about my own limits? Am I supposed to just stop every few weeks and require a complete day (or more) to refuel? Am I not being kind enough to myself?

I truly don’t feel that way. I feel like I’ve been taking care of myself, so why the empty tanks?

Filed Under: Loosely Related

Chore Chart and Reward System

August 22, 2012 By 3 Comments

With the start of the school year, it is time to get back on track with family routines. You know how the experts recommend consistency and schedules for younger children? AJ needs that TIMES 10.  I also recognize that to succeed with my new habits, I will need supporting systems that make it easier to do the “right thing”. That includes getting AJ setup with a new chore chart  and reward system.

The evolution of his chore charts would be a long post on its own, so here is the brief summary. We started AJ on star charts when he was about four years old. From the beginning, our charts have had an allowance, because we want AJ to have an ingrained sense of money management. There has also been a behavior element for the last several years. We’ve withheld stars for whining about chores and also tried a “3 strikes” system of warnings. The charts evolve as he grows more capable and responsible.

That said, I didn’t like where we ended up last year. It was messy and clunky by the end of the year. Mostly it was messy, and I wanted something clean and new.

Yuck! Dry erase nightmare.

We ditched the white board at the end of school, and AJ just did his chores from memory through the summer.

Last spring, a friend posted her version of the family chore chart. While they have a different chore philosophy, I got some great ideas. I loved the idea of a simple list of chores made from the magnet paper. Before drafting our new chart, I explored several parenting sites and Pinterest. I kept seeing the magnet boards setup with “To do” and “Done” columns. It was clean and simple.

On the flip side, the ToDo/Done lists require a parent to reset the board every day. AJ has been maintaining his chore list for over a year and knows what needs to be done on each day. Plus, we need the weekly record for his allowance accounting. I like that he owns this process and didn’t want to revert, but we have started to add bigger household jobs that only needed to be done weekly. These chores took up too much space on a weekly chart.

We also decided it was time to add a rewards system separate his allowance. This is mostly to address behavior choices and short circuit the whining cycle. We all needed a new paradigm as the simple “3 strikes” were no longer working.

Okay, so I need a board that covers daily and weekly chores. It has to be easy for AJ to maintain. It needs to stay clean. It needs to have a reward system. It needs to be easy to change so it can evolve as he grows.

Right, this took a while to sort out, but here is the finished product:

Ta Da!

I used the magnets to label the board, and I used striping tape to lay it out. I don’t want a dry erase marker to ever come near this board! The magnets and tape still allow me to modify the whole system without having to buy a new board and start over.

The left side is for AJ’s chores. The right side is for ours. I saw this idea somewhere during my research, and really liked the idea of communicating shared family responsibilities. AJ maintains the chart by himself, and it is located in the kitchen near his chair, so it serves as a reminder.

At the bottom are reward cups where AJ earns points (pennies) that tally up each week and month. The numbered cups correspond to weeks in the month. His points accrue to earn weekly and monthly reward tickets. AJ and I worked together on the new rewards system, and he’s pretty excited about this.

Rewards for 10 or 20 points earned in a week. Plus, bigger rewards for 100 points in a month.

It’s pretty amazing that simply shifting the perspective on how we give him treats works so well. None of the rewards are particularly expensive, mostly they are activities we do anyway. It was just a matter of framing them as goals instead of random treats.

I put the reward tickets out where he can explore them and hopefully get excited. I got a lot of kisses and hugs when we first developed the list, and I’ve found him checking the cards out a few times.

Overall, the system is probably more complex than most family systems, but it works for us. Since it evolved gradually, AJ has adjusted and adopted the changes. The complexity gives us a little more flexibility, and while it’s more work, it’s in line with our goals.

I was initially doubtful about a rewards system, but we’ve had the new board up for a few days, and it’s working great! Remember that bedtime whining habit? Well this is the answer to my goal to “Have the responses and warnings clearly written for reference”. His choices are to get a point for good “bedtime manners” (no whining, no stalling, bath/brush teeth, to bed, etc.) or to have tomorrow’s bedtime moved up in 10 minute chunks.

I’m hopeful that the progress will continue, but I will just adjust the system if he loses interest.

Do you have a working chore chart or reward system? I’d love to hear about  it because, if history holds up, we’ll be evolving this to Version 4.2 in about six months.

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