Pink Polka Dot Thoughts

A Self-less Act

I'm so very proud of my daughter! She's been growing her hair out forever. It started with growing out her bangs and then her hair kept growing and growing. Aside from a few trims here and there, I don't think she's had a real cut for probably at least 2 years.

Last weekend, she came home from college and said she wanted to donate her hair. She'd seen some signs up on campus and she thought she'd do it. I told her it was a great idea, but when she got back to school, she saw that it wasn't happening on campus and since she doesn't have a car, she couldn't get to where the donations were going on.

She asked me to make a hair appointment for her. She did a lot of research and decided to donate to Wigs for Kids because she really wanted a child to get her hair. I left all that up to her.

Today, she went for her cut. She has over 14 inches of hair to donate! They put it in 2 ponytails because her hair is so thick. I just know someone is going to love her hair.

I'm so proud of her! Plus, I think her new cut is adorable!

The picture is from my phone, so not the best, but as usual, she didn't want to pose for pictures and she really didn't even want me to tell people what she'd done. She said she didn't do it for the recognition. Don't you love her? I know I do! She can be so giving and self-less sometimes.

 

My How Time Flies

We were so lucky to have our little Princess Sunshine join our family this year! I can't believe she's almost a year old!

Such a beautiful baby girl!

With her cousin(my daughter)

At Christmas. How she's grown!

College Bound (GULP)

The past week or so has been extremely emotional around here.

The girl started college and I am trying to deal with it as best I can, but it's still scary.

It's hard to let go. I know that this is a great thing for her. She's at a great school and everyone who has visited it and knows her says it is the perfect school for her. We all agree on that.

Still, I'm used to having my kids around. I'm used to being able to fix things for him. I'm used to going to school and helping them if they need it and I have to understand that she has to do all of that on her own now.

Not easy.

Driving away from that dorm on Saturday was one of the hardest things I've ever done.

Amazing Changes

This post is for everyone who listened to me cry, whine, complain and vent last year. If you remember, last school year was awful for The Boy. His school didn't seem to care. They didn't want to give him a chance. They lumped him in with kids who didn't care about being in school and the teachers, to be honest, didn't care about THEM either.

The Boy's grades were awful. At one point, we thought he was going to fail 8th grade. Not because he couldn't do the work, but because we didn't seem to have a school with a "team" attitude. Mr. Polka Dot and I had several meetings with his teachers and they would send us away each time basically making us feel like we were over-reacting and everything was fine--until 3 weeks before school was to end and we were called in to say he was flunking!

An honest discussion with the teachers, vice principal, counselor and finally the principal led to a plan that would allow him to make up and turn in work. Oddly, he ended the year with a 2.5 GPA when 3 weeks before, he wasn't even pulling a 1.0. Funny how voicing your complaints concerns and threatening offering to go higher if necessary to fix things can help get things going. Let's just say that Mr. Polka Dot had my full permission to speak at this meeting and say anything he wanted. And he did.

I knew deep down that once he got out of that school and that atmosphere that he would do better. It wasn't until yesterday though, that I really felt like I could take that big sigh of relief and say "I told you so."

Yesterday, was the end of the 3rd quarter at school. The Boy brought home a report card with a GPA of 3.75!

Yes, I said 3.75!

That's me smiling. That's me happy beyond words. That's me yelling loud enough for his middle school teachers to hear TAKE THAT!

Best of all? He wasn't satisfied. He wants to make a 4.0 for the semester!

I know he can do it, too.

Too Much Too Soon

 
I know that kids are being exposed to technology younger and younger. My own kids were on the computer playing Reader Rabbit games and others at two and three, so I really can't be too critical, but...

Yes, you knew there was a but coming! I have another blog where I do product reviews on occasion. I get lots of emails from lots of PR people who want me to review their products. Generally it includes a sample of the product for myself. That's all good. I take the things I can use and pass on ones I can't. I don't like to be greedy, you know.

The other day, I received an email that just boggled my mind. It was for a holder for a smartphone that you could attach to a carseat or stroller so your BABY could play with the phone.

Call me weird, but my baby is NOT going to be using my expensive phone as a car seat toy! Am I wrong here? Who in their right mind is going to expose a smart phone to slobbers, puke and boogers in the backseat? I have a 14 yr old who has managed to destroy 2 iPod Touches and 2 cell phones in the past year. I can only imagine what he could have done to a smart phone at 10 months!

Get the baby a toy cell phone or better yet, a rattle! A baby doesn't need to play with it. Sure, it might be fun while they're sitting on your lap to entertain them for a few minutes, but to entertain them on their own?

I guess I'm just old fashioned, but who in the world is a baby going to call anyway? Elmo and Big Bird? It just seems ridiculous to me.

(Bracing myself for emails from people who think this is a great idea!)

Bullying

Bullying has been in the news a lot lately. It should be. I know first hand that many schools ignore it, push it aside or flat out deny it happens.

That's the easy thing to do, right?

Even if they have zero tolerance policies in effect, they get away with ignoring the bullying by claiming not to know it's going on. I honestly don't know how any teacher or administrator that's paying attention to what is going on in their schools wouldn't know.

I read this blog post today that really spoke to both sides. I believe that both the bullies and the bullied need to be helped. It needs to start young. The bullying behavior needs to stop actually before it ever starts.

When my daughter was in second grade, one little boy in the class gave her problems. I didn't know what was going on until she came home one day and told me that this little boy had convinced another boy to spit in her ear. Really?!!

As you can imagine, the mama bear in me came out full force and I went to school. I talked to the teacher. Her response? "He's really a good kid and I'm sure he didn't mean it."

HELLO! He and another kid plotted to spit in my daughter's ear.

I tried to explain to this young teacher that while it may not seem like a big deal, if the behavior wasn't stopped now, in the early years, it would continue and escalate in middle school and beyond. It seemed as though my words fell on deaf ears, though.

Much more went on in the classroom--not just bullying concerns--that led to me eventually removing my daughter from school and homeschooling for a while.

Unfortunately, not everyone can homeschool. Not everyone has that option. I was lucky to be a SAHM and able to do it at the time.

I don't know what happened with that boy. We've long since moved, but my daughter still remembers and mentioned it just the other day.

Bullies generally don't stop on their own. Bullies in grade school grow up to be bullies in middle school, high school and beyond. We all know there are those who bully into adulthood. If you think about the bullies you know in your adult life, though, you see that they never really "got it." They never grew up. They are still missing what they were missing at the age of 8 or 10 that made them into bullies.

Hopefully, with the spotlight being placed on bullying right now, something will happen. Maybe schools will have an epiphany and start working on the problem. I'm hopeful. I'm more hopeful that parents will sit down with their kids and find out if they're being bullied or if their children have anything to do with bullying another child.

Life is too short to be lived miserably. None of our children deserve that. None of US deserve it.

I'm not that kind of mom. Or Am I?

I'm not normally the type of mom who stresses and worries continually about my children growing up. I don't cry at every milestone. I didn't have a nervous breakdown or even cry on the first day of Kindergarten. I put them on the bus and waved goodbye. They were happy. I was happy. It was a new world for them and not something I thought was sad.

I never had the urge to document every single milestone. I don't have every single thing they did on video or in print, although we have tons of pictures and boxes full of long outdated VHS tapes of my kids. I'm not the kind of mom to follow along behind the bus to school so I could snap a picture of them getting off the bus for the first time, nor the kind of mom to sneak into the school dance to snap a picture of their first dance. No. I'm definitely not that kind of mom.

As they've grown, I've had few moments of tears. I enjoyed the school year. I wasn't one of those moms who lived for summer so I could spend more time with my kids because while I do love my kids, I also always felt school, their own lives and my sanity was also important.

The past few years though, I've felt the tide turning. Last year, I hated school. I hated sending them off. I liked snow days. I liked Spring Break...and summer...well...it's been enjoyable.

While we haven't done too many things to write home about--or even blog about--it's been nice to be lazy. Nice to sit in our pajamas, eat breakfast when we want, and just hang out.

The reality is, I know that my kids won't want to do that much longer. In fact, I'm surprised they're happy to hang out with their mom now.

Tomorrow, The Girl leaves for a weekend at college. It's a trip to let incoming high school seniors see what college life is like. They live in a real college dorm. They eat college food. They tour the campus and spend time with an advisor who will help them with their personal statements for their college applications.

This is a great experience.

That's what I keep telling myself anyway.

As the hour she leaves inches closer, I keep reminding myself that it's just a few days. This isn't really college. She still has another year to be a kid...

All these reassuring words to myself certainly aren't keeping me from losing it though. I know she'll be fine. The question is, will I?

Happy Birthday to The Boy!

Today was his 14th birthday. He didn't want a party. He didn't want a big celebration. I guess those days are gone.

He wanted a plain cake. (See above)

I was sad until I read his Facebook status a while ago:

 My mom is awesome she got me this awesome phone and Orphan and Final Fantasy XII and she got me a new 360 last month. 

Awwwww...now I can go to bed happy. (Why won't he tell me that to my face? ;))

A Senior Already?

The Girl and I met with her counselor today and scheduled her for her SENIOR year. Mom was freaking out. The Girl was giddy.

Her classes?

• Trig
• Pre-Calc(2nd sem)
• AP Environmental Science
• English
• AP History
• PE(somehow she's missed it every year)
• TV Production

The schedule scares ME. She thinks it's cool.

As I sat there in the counselor's office listening to her tell me how wonderful and brilliant my daughter was, it brought me back to days when I used to dread going to school for conferences and meetings.

Back in the early years, school was SO hard for her. Not because she had trouble with the material. Heck no. She's always been ahead of the game--especially in math--but other things were difficult.

Her learning disability really held her back in so many areas. When you have a language based learning disability, it's hard to show what you can do, but this kid has truly managed to do it.

As we walked into the school, I heard kids calling her name. Two of her teachers stopped to chat with us as we waited and both raved about her. Her counselor talked about her whiz kid math grades and emphasized that she is a hard worker. She offered a ton of tips for college and for moving on.

It truly did my heart good. And if this is a proud mom, annoying post, I really don't care. I am proud of her. She has overcome so many obstacles and I know that she won't stop until she has the exact degree and job that she wants.

That's a meteorology degree. Someday, we may see her on The Weather Channel next to Jim Cantore. (Yes, that's her dream!)

Webcam Spying?

 
Apparently when you have a webcam installed on your computer, you may be vulnerable to other people spying on you. I don't know if you've heard about the case in PA where a family is suing their son's school district for allegedly spying on him via a school issued laptop.

The school, of course, claims they've done nothing wrong. However, the boy's parents received a call from the school stating their son had been caught in some "improper" behavior. The school administrator accused the boy of doing drugs or heck, maybe DEALING drugs, but as it turned out, they'd caught him on camera eating candy. It seems the boy is a big fan of Mike and Ikes!

So what does this mean? Is it easy for someone to spy on you via your webcam even when you think it's off? What if that school captured images of the students changing clothes or in other awkward positions?

As a parent, I'm livid that the school did this. There is an argument that paperwork was provided that stated they could track the computer if lost or stolen, however, apparently it doesn't state that they could turn on the webcam and watch your kids without them knowing.

That's as creepy as some stranger watching your kid without your knowledge. Why would any educational professional need that access? Not only that, but the police can't enter your house without a warrant, so why did the school think they could?

There was also that guy not long ago convicted of hacking into young girls' computers and watching them on their webcams. (I don't feel like digging up the link, but it did happen and it was freaky!)

There's a webcam on the netbook that I use sometimes. I think I'll be covering it up with a piece of paper from now on...I'm just creeped out!