Kindergarten Hunting

Stella starts kindergarten in 340 days.  This seems like more than ample amounts of time to worry about registration and applications.  Apparently not.  Kindergarten admissions is more rigid than college.

We decided to check out a few before we committed to one or the other.  So far we have seen one.  The BIG one, the one that most people send their kids to, the one that people clamor to get to this post so their kids can go to that school.  

We expected it to be amazing, I guess I just didn't know how amazing it could get.

Of course the grounds are phenomenal.  The school is like a castle surrounded by a forest.  The elementary school playgrounds are levels and levels of fun.  The cafeteria has a pastry chef.  The library made me tear a little at the thought of my public school eduction.  The classroom is clean, bright, and each child is issued a laptop.  Yes, a laptop, in kindergarten, at school.  

I think I was officially over my head impressed  when I found out the psychomotor area (gym) was sponsored by Nike.

We still haven't decided what school cause there are still a few more to check out but I am impressed and perhaps a bit jealous of what my children get to have.  

In other news Tiger is playing the Benjamin Button card and has reverted to infantile wake-ups every two hours.  This made the very gorgeous summer-like September day not so fun.  I felt like a new mom sans neonate.  I think part of his wake up is coming from his new found ability to be quite the savvy conversationalist.  He just wants to chat in the middle of the night and screams for me until I come.  Last night he screamed for two hours.  We were both a bit cranky today despite my mom of the year efforts to take him to not one but two jaw dropping fantastic parks.  Yeah, I am that good.

Babble Babel Babal Blah Blah

Stella has been in French preschool for less than a month now.  My mother calls me daily and asks if she is fluent yet.  And really if all you do is read the literature on how young children pick up language it is no wonder.  Everything you read makes it seem like they will go to school ignorant and monolingual and then by the time you pick them up they will be happy as lark chirping away their newly aquired foreign languge.

So here is the reality about full immersion (and that means no other children speak English), yes, they do pick it up at a mach speed unknown to adults, but they are quite miserable in the interim.  Stella has felt lonely at her new school and has really not made any friends yet.  If you know her it isn't like her, she is a super fun and friendly kid.  I pray it gets better before I loose patience and pull the plug on this grand experiment.

The funny thing about kids is how they learn language.  Both my babies, like most babies who are able to grow into talking adults, babbled a lot.  This is part of the language learning process.  It was the first step before they started making real words.

Stella is babbling.  There is no other way to describe it.  Yes, she is a bright articulate four year old in English but she comes home every day from her French preschool making all sorts of crazy French noises. Not words, and not anything that makes sense (like an infant) but still you can tell she is practicing the noises she is hearing.  

She does this all. day. long.  All weekend in her quiet time she is mumbling these sounds to herself.

Here is a video I took in the car:

It is totally happening.

Exorcism of Clothing Demons

Parents of the world take note! I have figured out how to avoid the daily morning tantrums we have been having when Stella gets dressed: dress the night befrore. 

Now, I wouldn't want to wear my clothes for the next day to bed but I am not four and my clothes are not made of the softest cottons and snuggliest cottons known to man.  

It was actually her idea.  We pick out her clothes for the next day every night at bedtime.  She is in a very good mood every night.  There is something magical about the night, maybe it's the stories, maybe it's the snuggle time, maybe it's because Seth is around.  Whatever it is, she is at her best right before bed.  A few nights ago she tried on this darling dress I got from Gymboree that she has refused to wear in the morning.  She loved it at night.  Then asks, "Can I sleep in it?"  My mind instantly flashed to the mornings' tears, the screaming, the spitting, the kicking, I was more than happy to have her sleep in whatever she wanted if it would put an end to that scene.

So now she doesn't have a fit in the morning before school.  She leaves happy.  She comes home happy.  

The night before jammies and outfit.

Last night's pyjamas, today's outfit.  You can tell we lived in Asia.  She is convinced that if she puts her hand like that it is cute.  

In even better news (for me) I got special permssion to have Stella go to school afternoon only on some days.  This means that three days a week when Tiger is asleep Stella is at school.  Get ready blogging world, Sunny just found nine extra hours for herself!  Oh, what will I do with it?  Nap, get dinner ready, clean, put away the laundry that has been staring at me since last Friday, think about painting my house like I promised I would in July, kill the snails and slugs that plague my garden, make lists of things to do.  Oh, I will do something.  

This also means that I now have a few mornings a week to do some things to earn my yearly hand crafted picture frame for Mother's Day.  Today we went to Technopolis.  We were the ONLY people in the 4-8 year old section of the museum.  My kids had a blast.  

Tiger conquers Mount Lego

The best news is Stella will be somehow osmosively learning French while I have this time to tell myself I am being productive when I blog.  Yay for time.  

Spinach Blueberry Chocolate Chocolate Chip Muffins

Remember when I reported how my children are terribly terribly picky eaters.  I tried out the whole Sneaky Chef and Deceptively Delicious thing out and found both of them involved waaaay too much work.  My beef with the system was I had to do this massive quasi-canning vegetable puree system.  And while I may have pioneer heritage I am no canning domestic diva.

But that hasn't really fixed the problem.  Stella is still picky (although she has expanded her veggie pallet she is still sans fruits) and now Tiger is starting to stick his nose at pretty much everything except peanut butter which he daily requests in a bowl just plain (and on sad weak nights sometimes he gets his way...shame).

So, I have these children that I am repsonsible for.  Children who should be eating their spinach, brocolli, peas, caulflower and they just don't.

I haven't given up I just take opprotunities when I see it.

For dessert tonight we are having chocolate chocolate chip muffins, except really it is spinach blueberry chocolate chip muffins.  It is not a healthy recipe it is full of delcious butter, sugar, and even (gasp) Belgian chocolate melted down.  But here is the thing: it is super yummy and it is dessert but they are secretly being fed massive quantities of spinach and blueberries.  I found a recipe on allrecipes.com and modified it.  It is super chocolately and super yummy.

Here is my recipe:

Sunny's Belgian Spinach Blueberry Chocolate Chocolate Chip Muffins

Ingredients

• 170 grams melted chocolate (about 1 1/2 candy bars or 6 oz)
• 1 Tablespoon cocoa powder
• 1/3 cup unsalted butter
• 3/4 cup buttermilk
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup mini semi-sweet chocolate chips
• 1 cup frozen spinach
• 1 cup blueberries (washed

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F (205 degrees C). Line 12 muffin cups with papers.
2. In a small saucepan over low heat, melt the semisweet chocolate together with the butter. Let stand until cooled, about 10 minutes.
3. Cook the spinach in the microwave with about a tablespoon of water for two minutes.  
4. Blend the spinach and frozen or fresh blueberries
5. Lightly beat the egg. In a small bowl, stir together the chocolate-butter mixture with the spinach blueberry mix, buttermilk, sugar, egg, and vanilla, until blended well. 
6. In a large bowl, stir together flour, soda, and salt. Make a hole in the center of the dry ingredients, pour in the chocolate mixture, and stir until just combined. Stir in the mini chocolate chips. Spoon the batter into the lined muffin cups.
7. Bake at 400 degrees F (205 degrees C) for 18-20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center of a muffin comes out clean. Remove muffin tin from oven and let stand at least 5 minutes, before removing the muffins and letting them cool on a wire rack. Serve warm or cooled; can be frozen as well.

Kids 0 Sunny 1

Missing Manila

I finally got smart and hired someone to come and clean my home one day a week.  Oh, oh, oh why didn't I do this three months ago?

I love my house but it is four levels, four very steep levels and each level has dust and clutter and other things that need to be taken care.  Depsite my efforts I feel like I can never get the entire house clean.  The other day we had friends over for a Back to School potluck, I spent the entire day cleaning and still had to hide all of my junk in my toilet-less master bathroom.  Sigh.

So we hired someone to come and clean our home.  She is from the Philippines but unlike any Filipino helper I ever employed when we lived in Manila.  She is college educated, a former professional in Manila and making tons more cleaning homes and nannying for diplomatic families than a top job in the Philippines.  My heart cries a little bit every time I think about this, that country has a special place in my heart.  I would love to see it develop economically.

My house sparkles and shines right now.   It smells pretty good too.  This is a good things since I will not see my husband until Friday.  He has been working late nights.  I sorta feel like a diplo-widow right now but luckily these things come in ebbs and flows.

In other news, guess who booked travel plans to Paris?  (Moi!)

Francais Maternelle Ecole

Stella has been going to French preschool now for about 2 1/2 weeks.  We took off a few days when Tim and Julie were visiting because when someone flies across a very large ocean to see you and your darling children, you drop everything and hang out, somehow she will be able to catch up, somehow.

My review about this school is mixed but overall I think we are happy with it.  It is a public parochial school although as far as I can tell other than a cute baby Jesus statue it doesn't seem to have a religious curriculum.

Stella has had a hard time.  She has always been that little girl in the classroom that likes to know the rules, follow the rules, and help the teacher out.  Since she cannot understand anything she doesn't know the rules, she doesn't know what is going on, she still doesn't know anybody's name.  It has been hard for her.  She has had a lot more nightmares than usual.  About two or three times a week she wakes up somewhere between three and six a.m. and braves the dark narrow stairs to come into our room.  Seth and I have given up trying to put her back and now have a toddler mattress, blanket, and pillow for such an emergency.  Yet, when pick her up she is always happy and smiling and excited about her day.

The largest manifestation of her stress is usually in the mornings.  She has ALWAYS had issues getting dressed.  My very responsible and surprisngly mature four year old turns into a crazy tantrum possessed child in need of an exorcism.  It is really quite a show.  She spits, screams, kicks, punches she pretty much does anything she can to NOT get dressed.  Truthfully we really don't even know what it is that causes this giant fit.  We used to think it was just pants or shorts, which maybe it was at one point, but now she is doing it purel as a delay tactic.  The girl is smart, she recognizes that if she causes enough grief she MAYBE just MAYBE might not have to go to school.

So far parents are winning but I would be lying if it didn't take an emotional toll on me.  Basically I have to either dress her outside and she quickly realizes that clothes are a necssity when the 50 degree (F) wind cuts to the bone or just force the clothes on her and rush her outside so the neighbors can see her (she does have some sense of what the neighbors will think and never throws public fits, a good thing for me, mostly).  It is ridiculous, I am tired and I hope this fight ends soon.

I would be lying if I didn't admit that I have wanted to pull her out of school a hundred times now.  I miss having her in the morning, I hate having to rush out and get her to school, I miss having Stella play with Tiger in the morning and I am a little sad about her going to full time kindergarten next year.  That being said, I can tell it is good for her.

She is starting to make perfect French noises, noises my mouth is incapable of making.  After two weeks she made a friend and the best news yet they added an aid that specializes in FSL (French as a Second Language).  She now knows the rules and is starting to make sense of her world.

The school is different than American schools in a lot of ways.  The most frustrating part is the lack of parent involvement.  Parents are not part of the day, they are considered a disruption.  It makes me sad.  I had such a positive experience when Stella was in a co-op preschool.  I loved learning from her teacher and seeing her interact with her peers.

The other difference is what they control.  For example they tell me what snacks are allowed on certain days.  Our neighbors send their son to a different school and he can't even bring his own snack.  He is required to eat the sloppy soup they give him and, get this, he is forced to DRINK it.  The horror.

The big difference I found at this school versus other local schools was the grief they did not give me when I expressed my desire to only have Stella attend 15 hours a week instead of 35.  I said it before and I will say it again but I just don't think kids need that much school at four years old.  Not against daycare but for me it is just not what I want to do with my kids so I really resented the schools that pushed that as the only option.

This is still a grand experiment.  Reading this article brought tears to my eyes at parts but it is worth it.

Sending your child away to school is a hard part of parenting.  Sending them to a school that you can't talk to the teacher, its a little harder.

I will update the blog as we go along.  Advice is appreciated, this is all uncharted territory for us.

Lady and Sir Visit

Its official!  Our guest room has now been dubbed Lady Julie and Sir Tim's quarters. 


My oldest best-est friend Julie and her husband Tim came and stayed with us.  The children did not like Julie and Tim, they LOVED Julie and Tim.  And I can't blame them, I love Julie and Tim myself. 

Stella was the bell ringer at Tim and Julie's wedding two years ago.  That's right, they entrusted a two year to perform in their wedding procession.  We traveled 20 hours overseas to be in and see the wedding.  It was so worth it.  They hold a special place in our heart, especially for little Stella.

We were able to play tour guide which made us get out and see this beautful country we live in. 

At the Royal Palace.  Stella dressed up as a princess complete with panda hat.  She immediately fell in love with Julie.

Julie and Tim got off the plane and I escorted them directly to Royal Palace which was open for its last day.  Stella was so excited to see Julie and go to the palace that she dressed up as a princess.  And really, when you are four, you should ALWAYS wear a princess dress to visit any castle because you never know when you might meet a royal.  And please remember to wear a panda hat with your dress to make the occasion memorable. 

We wouldn't want them to get over jetlag too easily so the next day after a delightful Stella and Tiger wake up call we went to Brugge.

We took a boat ride to see Brugge

We took a boat tour around Brugge.  It was gorgeous.  Naps were missed but it was worth it.  After Brugge we went to the North Sea and checked out the cold cold beaches of Belgium. 

Stella and her new best friend Julie.  Running around Brugge.

A royal family photo.  Tim and Seth are hilarious when they are together.  Doesn't Seth look a little like Henry VIII

At the North Sea with Julie

At the beach of De Haan

We took a slightly more restful Sunday but still found time to go and see giant puppets.  Rule of thumb: when in Europe ALWAYS see giant puppets if they are nearby.  If you don't they will eat you in the night.

Giant Don Quixote

Sadly on Monday Seth had to be a normal person and go to work so Julie, Tim, the kiddos, and I continued our grand tour of Brussels. 

The former hunting grounds of the royal family made a pretty awesome park.

Grand Place is still pretty grand.

I plan on starring in my own version of Swan Lake this winter.  Buy your tickets now.

Seth and Tim are serious about downtown Belgium.  Serious.

No Belgium visit would be complete without a revived medieval castle visit so on Tuesday we went to a castle.  It was beautiful but the tour was long and impossible to escape.  My emergency boredom pacifier for children (iPod) was single and my children were double.  This led to me being the most adored person in the tour group of the castle. 

Tim and Tiger became pretty tight.  Tiger in his usual dead weight hand holding move. 

Greeting our subjects.

When we went to take Tim and Julie to the train station for the next leg of their European vacation Stella broke down in tears, which led Julie to break down in tears, which led me to break down in tears.  21 years of friendship, two generations, it doesn't get much better than that.

Stella with her new best friend: my best friend Julie

The Beginning of Pre-K

Today Stella started her first day of Pre-K.  The entire schooling system has been nerve wracking from the beginning.  I started my search back in March when we found out where we were going to live.  No one from the schools wanted to talk with me about it then because of my lack of French speakng skills and the fact that we weren't in country.  Once we got to Belgium there was no room so it was waitlist after waitlist.

Here we are today, off a waitlist and in a preschool, a completely French public preschool.  

This school is nice-ish.  The building is new and the classroom has a lot of fun things in it but there are 50 kids and two teachers stuffed into two open classrooms.  It is pretty crazy and I am not happy about the class size.

Stella is the lone English speaker, not expat or non-French speaker, but English speaker.

We dropped her off and she managed to get through the day, learn a few words, eat a small snack but by lunch when I picked her up she had enough.  She broke down in tears and hugged me.  She said it was fine but it just had too much French.  I feel that way every day of my life here in Belgium.  

Tomorrow will be a new day and maybe a few less tears.  This is my grand experiment to see how long it takes my kiddo to have French comprehension and then be able to speak.  Maybe they can translate for me.

WORD OF ADVICE TO THOSE GOING TO BRUSSELS WITH PRESCHOOL AGE KIDS

1.  Find out your address

2.  Get a French Speaker

3.  Call the closest schools to your home and enroll or get on waitlist.