Parenting Advice

I am making 100% Whole Wheat bread from my La Leche League cookbook and can't help but remember what now seem like easy days. They are three distinct periods for me - my first baby - so perfect and sweet - my second baby - more challenging and fiesty - my third baby - easy and flexible as I carted him with us to the older kids' activities.

I recall making the decision to quit my job and take a more flexible job. Anna was three at the time and she was in daycare all day. I came home late from work and reheated macaroni and cheese (and seriously, that is the most pathetic meal ever). Anna sang a song to me as I ate and I said, "Where did you learn that song?" She said, "Connie taught it to me," and I did not know who Connie was. I presume it was a new daycare worker - they changed frequently. And I thought, wow, not only is my kid learning songs from people other than me, she is learning songs from people I don't even know.

I made different child care decisions with Mary and Frank. Neither went to daycare before six months. And I worked just part-time so I could be home to nurse them, read books, watch Disney movies, go to the library and bake bread.

The days in those early years mash together. I remember individual events, of course, and I remember traditions that we started together. I made whole wheat bread and it is a general memory, not a specific one because I did it so often. 100% whole wheat bread is hard to make because it takes so much time to get it right. But the time really is in the resting. To make the softest whole wheat bread you need to make a sponge, which is a pre-rising stage which softens the wheat and lets the yeast really go to work. It adds lots of time to the bread making process, but it's flexible time. So if you're at story time at the library, or nursing a baby, or picking someone up at kindergarten, the dough will wait for you through the sponge and several risings.

I don't even remember the last time that I made this bread. It really may be 7 years or more. I make a lot of quick bread these days - cornbread, garlic rolls and biscuits are my kids' favorites these days. But today we are all home and I have time to let dough sit.

"You never hear anyone say that they wish they had spent less time with their children when they were little," a wise, older mother said to me as I had three kids hanging on me. It's the best parenting advice I ever got.

I am thinking back to those days as I make this bread for my now older kids and I smile and feel grateful for the time with them. Children require a sponge stage too.

One Word Commands

Last night I mopped the kitchen floor and ruefully noted that one advantage of the dropping temperatures is that there won't be muddy paw and shoe prints all over the floor, though I will need to make sure that my gloves are in my coat pockets for easy access when we're headed outside. Stella is four months old now and her two biggest issues are house training and jumping. I work on both issues at the instruction of Lincoln's Dog Boy (At my house we call him Lincoln's Dog Whisperer.). ("It sounds like she does better in class than at home," Bill noted as she jumped on him while I tried to keep her in sit stay.) And it's true. Dog Boy makes it all seem really obvious and easy and I try to mimic him ("results are not typical") at home. We're doing ok.

The sit stay is the key to everything. From the sit stay you prevent the dog from jumping on family or guests, you prevent her from chasing the cats, you prepare her to go outside, or get in the car, or eat her dinner - everything requires the sit stay first. It is about preparing the mind to switch gears, and I love that concept. We all have the tendency to jump and chase cats and shove food in our faces willy nilly. I should sit stay more, I think. And walks. I should get taken on more walks.

The key to house training is frequent trips outside (hence the perpetually muddy paws) and a leash at all times, even in the house. I loop the leash under a chair when I cook or my dresser when I am in my bedroom. It apparently creates a den wherever she is so that she won't soil in that area. The leash in the house has the added advantage of allowing easy correction and direction into a sit stay.

Though I don't have house training issues, per se, the concept appeals to me. Don't make a mess where you are.