Mamas Tell All: How to Keep Your Marriage Alive After Children [Blog linkup]

hanging out while our boys were playing with friends

There are so many lists of ways to have a strong marriage with kids. I must see one posted online every month in one parenting magazine or another. I think they take turns. "Let's see, Parenting.com, you publish the list January. Parents.com take February. Parenthood.com will be March..." [I'm joking.]

Clearly it's a topic that's important to a lot of families. I think in a lot of ways, marriage maintenance after having kids is a lot like marriage maintenance before having kids, in that you have to do it on purpose, you have to pay attention, you have to put forth effort. It's just that after having kids, we are totally distracted by our needy offspring. I say "I think" because our first child was born 10 months (and 1 day, if you want to be specific) after our wedding. We don't really know much about marriage without kids.

The magazine lists always include these in some way: keep dating, flirt, have sex, share kid-related tasks, and something about dads pitching in around the house. I'm going to focus on the first one because it is a particular challenge for us. Even when were "dating," it was a long-distance relationship (and for a year an extremely long-distance relationship), so we didn't go on dates much. Now we have to find a babysitter, and our kids hate babysitters, and Ben isn't used to being away from me and screams the whole time until he passes out on my pillow... We average about one real babysitter date per year right now. We find ways to date without a babysitter.

1. Post-bedtime dessert date. We wait until the boys are asleep, then sit on the couch and have dessert together in peace and quiet. Sometimes we talk about grown-up things; sometimes we are so exhausted we say nothing at all.

2. Restaurant with a playground. One of our favorite Saturday lunch spots has a playground. There are tables right next to the slide. The boys play with minimal supervision, Rodgers and I sip Malindi macchiatos, and none of us minds if it takes them too long to cook our lunch.

3. Use naptime. Our boys still nap most days. Once they're asleep, we have one-and-a-half to three hours to ourselves, to do whatever we want.

4. Lunch dates (when kids are in school). This is one I intend to implement when Ben starts school next year!

Ben 20 questions, age 3

The interview itself took place over the course of several days. He would only answer a few questions before saying, "I don't want to talk to you anymore!" My words; Ben's words.

1. What is your favorite color? orange and green
2. What is your favorite toy? Zuma. You don't have a Zuma toy. Marshall that's stuck in his truck [like this], Rubble that's stuck in his digger [like this], Chase that's stuck in his truck [like this].
3. What is your favorite fruit? apple 
4. What is your favorite tv show? Teenage Muni Turtles [that's TMNT] and Paw Patrol 
5. What is your favorite thing to eat for lunch? Well, it's pizza
6. What is your favorite outfit? Ice cream shirt [from the Blue Bell Creamery]. I can make ice cream by my own self!! And jeans.
7. What is your favorite game? My favorite game is the hotel game that we used to swim in the hotel. [He's talking about Pictureka (just the cards, not the board game), which we bought while staying in a hotel with a pool.]
8. What is your favorite snack? goldfish snack
9. What is your favorite animal? CAAATS!
10. What is your favorite song? [singing "Do Something" by Matthew West] I'm sick and tired of life with no desire. I don't want a flame. I want a fire! [but lately he's more likely to request "Low Down the Chariot" by the Gaither Vocal Band. Like father, like son.]
11. What is your favorite book? My favorite book is...is...Toy Story! [a Toy Story 3 book]
12. Who is your best friend? Daddy and Nate and Mama and Mikey [TMNT]
13. What is your favorite cereal? Oatmeal
14. What is your favorite thing to do outside? I can play in the dirt with cars
15. What is your favorite drink? My favorite drink is milk only.
16. What is your favorite holiday? A holiday from school with drinking milk. Do we have milk in this house?
17. What do you like to take to bed with you at night? my blankie and my animals and books and my flashlight
18. What is your favorite thing to eat for breakfast? I like omelette!
19. What do you want for dinner on your birthday? pizza
20. What do you want to be when you grow up? When I'm growned up, I can wear my ice cream shirt and make ice cream!

felt TMNT masks

Last year the boys started watching Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. It wasn't long before they chose their favorite Turtles and started acting out their favorite scenes. I made them masks out of some old jersey fabric I had. It didn't look right, but they have good imaginations.

When my parents came in January, my mom brought me some felt. The first thing I did was let the boys choose a color and make quick masks out of them. Nate had red for Raphael. There was no orange for Ben's Michelangelo, so he went with anonymous green. Of course, the felt stretched out. By now they need to be thrown away. 

For Ben's birthday, I decided to make a set of better felt masks. I didn't have all the right colors for the Turtles, but Ben said he wanted one of every color I had.

I made the pattern by trial and error: cut, hold it up to his face, cut some more, and repeat. I back-stitched around all the edges for reinforcement, hopefully preventing too much stretching. 

I also reinforced the ends before sewing the elastic on, as illustrated below (that stitching didn't show up well in the pictures). I didn't have enough elastic for all six, so the last one ended up with ribbons to tie it on instead.

Ben knows about them already because of the trials, and he's very excited to get them. He's always asking if they are ready. We'll have some friends over to celebrate and have cake on Sunday, so he will open his presents from us tomorrow!

Mamas Tell All: The Perfect Mama [Blog linkup]

I was still in high school when I started learning about "The Perfect Mama," via Bible studies on Proverbs 31. During pregnancy and as a new mom, lots of people had advice for me. I've written before about how this advice - even so-called expert advice - doesn't always agree. It's impossible to be absolutely perfect because perfect according to Expert A is harmful according to Expert B. Even if they did agree, we all know that no one will ever achieve perfection. However, an idea of what perfection is will give us a goal to work towards.

At my baby shower for Nate, I was given a small scrapbook. Before they gave it to me, they passed around a few of the pages for the attendees to write parenting advice for me. There were a lot of sweet blessings and "cherish every moment" (which is impossible - some moments aren't cherish-able!). But there was also much more than that. What I see in this advice, and I what I've learned through experience, is that perfection as a mom is not so much in what we do, but in our faith in God, in our sanctification in Christ, in our eternal perspective. The things we do are important, but the good things will flow out from God at work within us when we are disciplined followers of Jesus.

Here is my favorite advice, some which helps me identify what I want to be like, and some which was just very helpful during the infant stage.

Patience is the one thing I learned right off the bat. Patience with labor, crying, husbands, countless diapers.

Never be afraid to hold and rock your baby as much as you want. Many times when a baby cries, he just needs warmth and comfort that only you can provide. You won't spoil him!

Always look to God for guidance. He has wonderful plans for you.

The most important thing I can think of is to love your children. Spoil them with love, and I know you will bring them up to love the Lord Jesus. 

Truly the greatest gift God has given me is the privilege to be a wife and a mother. I have learned so much about the character of God through the lives of my children. One of the things I have learned as a mother is that God loves my children even more than I do...He is trustworthy! He will give us wisdom concerning our children, as well.

Remember that the Scripture says, "Raise up your child in the way he should grow and when he's old he will not go away from it." Because I'm the oldest one at your shower, please let me encourage you to begin early to teach your child the Word and prayer. The Word will get him through life, prayer will help him have a personal relationship with Jesus. These will take him through his entire life no matter what comes.

boy mom tricks: high energy and noise

This may come as a shock: I am not a high-energy person, and I don't like noise. My boys...well, they can't be still, and the only time they are quiet is when they're sleeping. Not only are they loud and rowdy, they also fight. Over anything and everything. Siblings, you know?

We're a single-car family, and I don't currently have a valid driver's license in this country anyway. There is public transportation in this town, but we're a bit far from town center to easily get a tuk tuk to get out of the house. So what do I do with these boys when we're stuck at home during school breaks and Rodgers is at work? Yes, they drive me crazy, but I have a few tricks up my sleeve.

1) Send them outside. When they start getting loud and crazy, my first line of defense is, "Go outside." If it's hot, I tell them to stay in the shade. If it's raining, I send them onto the veranda. Actually, one day last week, they played in the rain. When they're loud and wild, they usually need to move - a lot - and this is the best way.

2) Sunday School. We haven't yet found a church here with a good Sunday School program, so we started using some lessons from Ministry-to-Children, especially on weeks that we couldn't make it to church at all. Then I realized that the singing and dancing (with help from YouTube) burned a lot of their energy, and they were always peaceful for the lesson. We're now working through the lesson series on The Lord's Prayer, not on Sundays, but we still call it "Sunday School."

3) Build a fort. When I build them a fort, suddenly they want to sit still and look at books. I do this if they've played outside, they've been active, but are for whatever reason still too rambunctious for being in the house, and especially if they are fighting a lot. We built this epic fort while Nate was on school break this time. Sheets over the backs of several chairs, connected to the "big couch," which they can crawl under, connected to the washing machine box they have been playing in.

4) (If possible) Get out of the house. These guys seem to get a bit of cabin fever after a few days, which manifests in insanity. By now, we know a couple of restaurants with playgrounds, there's always the beach, and sometimes just going to the supermarket helps them reset. But like I said, getting out is a bit difficult right now. When they're older, we'll be able to walk until we find transport, but they're still too small for that right now. I mean, if they get tired, I can't carry a 4-year old and (almost) 3-year old, together, at the same time.

5) Get out a "special" toy/game/activity. For Christmas last year, the boys got a train set. We have always kept the tracks put away because they turn into weapons when the train play is over. It's special when we get it out, and they play well for a solid chunk of time. There is also bubble-blowing, painting, cutting paper (a new obsession), and sidewalk chalk. We did all of these this school break. During Christmas school break, we'll make tree ornaments and snowflakes and do Christmasy things, which are all very necessary since it's a 9 week break!

6) Give them chores. They are still at the age where chores make them feel important and grown up (rather than enslaved). One day during break, I was trying to clean the bathrooms. Rodgers had just left for work, and the boys could not, would not get along. I gave them each a sponge and something to clean. They were occupied until I was done cleaning bathrooms, and were ready to get along with each other. They also both adore washing dishes, though this requires much more supervision on my part.