Quality Time
This month has been a filled with moments of quality time between me and my little ones. It’s Spring and we needed to find each other again. I’ve been a mother to two for 6 months and am finally finding myself again. We’ve been so busy these past months that it has been great to spend time together for two weeks. It’s been a bit different because during school weeks I often try to spend time with J in the day and a bit more with A in the evening.
Here, I tried to spend time with both of them and continue to positively reinforce their bond.
We’ve also been to Pairi Daiza again to make the most of it before A turned 3 years old! He not only loves to see the animals; we couldn’t pull him away from the little train station! The park has two steam trains and it was *the* attraction of our visit this month!
Our Adventures
Big Milestones!
This month, J turned 6 months and A turned 3 years old! As they’re born exactly 2.5 years apart, every April and October are big half-year milestones!
On A’s birthday we went to buy some balloons and cupcakes, and went for a little picnic. It was a beautiful sunny day and we enjoyed the time outside. He then wanted to go to the playground to go on the swing to end the day.
The following day, like the past two years, we invited some family members to celebrate A’s birthday.
The theme of the party was “fire trucks and firefighters”! Arthur’s big passion. So I managed to get a “Happy Birthday” banner decorated in the theme, Arthur chose a big red “3” balloon, some firetruck balloons and I baked a fire truck cake. To make it look like a “real” fire truck I made it as a red velvet cake (which I’ve never made before in my life!). I love reading recipes and dreaming of baking things. But I often default to the recipes I’m comfortable with. But you know what? I am so proud of my fire truck cake! It turned out looking great and I’ve never used a piping bag in my life, yet I managed to make it all work! Arthur really liked how it looked as well. But I’ve realised this month that perhaps Arthur prefers baking cake over eating it (unless it’s chocolate cake, of course).
What about the taste? Well, as far as reed velvet cakes go, it tasted good! The thing is, and let me be fully honest: I’m not much of a red velvet person. I always had trouble figuring out what the hype was about (I still don’t fully get it: is it just about the texture? If you’re a red velvet connoisseur, please enlighten me!). But for this particular cake, red velvet was just the obvious choice.
Return to Work
This month also marked the end of my maternity and parental leave, and thus also my return to work. This was a bittersweet: I enjoy what I do but I miss my little ones and always feel like I’m missing out on seeing them grow. And I have to be honnest that it’s been tricky to reconcile the fact that as a teacher, I go teach other children while I trust my own to the care of other people (whether it be my family or other teachers). That said I am very fortunate with the fact that I have family taking care of J and A is in a school with a pedagogy and teachers that I fully trust, which makes it much easier. But not seeing them for the entire day and just getting to see one another at the end of the day when we are tired can be quite difficult.
Although I walked out crying because I was leaving my baby J, my little A was overjoyed that I was bringing him to school and that we were taking the bus together. In addition to this, the evening before, A and I had made some mini-cakes for his classmates to celebrate his birthday, so he was quite excited to celebrate. His excitement helped to make the departure more bearable.
Reflections of a Parent
This month has really brought me a lot of valuable time with my little ones. Having two weeks of Easter holidays has really been healing. I go to spend proper quality time with both my little ones. It makes a world of a difference to spend time with them both when they and I are well rested vs. at the end of a long day when we’re all tired and going though the motions. Everything is more relaxed, everyone feels less pressure (no places to rush to), we get to enjoy the best of each other (not just our exhausted selves).
Many of us, for some reason, believe that children need to be constantly entertained. But it really isn’t so. Yes, of course they want to – and should – spend time with us. But they aren’t looking for entertainment. Sometimes all they need is our presence or to take part in the task we’re undertaking ourselves. So, let’s include our little ones in our daily lives without overcomplicating things. Are you doing laundry and they want your time? Include them in your task (in an age-appropriate manner). They will have the best time with you, feeling helpful and valued, they’ll perhaps acquire a new skill, you will get your task done (possibly a bit more slowly than planned) and all this without having to go out of your way to plan an activity that will entertain them for 10 minutes. Wins all around!
Concluding Thoughts
I think one big take-away from this month is that although we all love going out on adventures, we should also enjoy the slower days, and perhaps build in more slow days into our lives, when possible.
Don’t forget to follow us on Instagram at @littlemontessoribears, where you’ll get to have a continuous peek of our adventures!
Would you like more out of this blog series? I’m inviting you to join “The Audio Diary“, a private podcast, in which you can have an exclusive look, week-by-week for an entire year, into how a Montessori expert and mother navigates creating intentional spaces for baby, integrating Maria Montessori’s philosophy, while experiencing normal parenting challenges.
