Luna's Baublebilities

"Maxx, what are you doing in there?"

"What does it look like to you?" (shouted through the open bathroom door)

"I don't know, Maxx, I don't like to watch people when they are in the bathroom."

silence. . . .  more silence.

"Maxx, I'm thinking you had better wipe your butt."

"How do you know I need to wipe my butt?"  (closes door, begins making sounds of frustration and annoyance)

Boy continues to make strange and incoherent noises for 5 minutes, refusing to answer questions seeking to diagnose the problem from behind the door.  Mom enters, discovers that a bum definitely needs to be wiped, that no attempts to self-wipe have been made and that at this point she must resort to using wet TP to clean the problem area.

This is not unusual.  Maxx was very slow to potty train.  He still does not stay dry at night and often needs to be reminded to pee during the day.  Research shows that FAS kids, especially boys, have problems with toileting issues well into late adolescence because the neural pathway that the bladder and bowel use to tell the frontal cortex that a potty stop is urgent is fried before birth.  We see that all the time - the boy will dance around holding his parts but insist that he DOES NOT need to pee until you physically place him in front of the toilet.  Lo and behold - it WAS urgent!  He occasionally has very unfortunate accidents because his bowel can only give him a few brief moments of warning before he needs to get to the toilet.

Now we are struggling with wiping the bum.  He was doing fairly well for a little while after I pronounced that I was Done wiping his bum this summer.  His bum is now (supposed to be) his responsibility.  Sometimes he is successful.  Lately, he actually seems to be using the butt wipe problem to raise my irritation level.  He will get to the bathroom on time but then sit there for a long time - until wiping is um. . .  more difficult than it needs to be. This might be a good sign.  He may be processing a cause and effect and be experimenting with the outcomes of different actions.  He may be consciously resisting one more inevitable step toward independence.  He may be seeking to prolong his dependence on me for the sake of attachment.

He may just be trying to make me furious.

My sister-in-law suggests a funky green frog shaped container of wet wipes. 

It's on the shopping list.

Speaking of potty talk - I started reading Gaiman's American Gods a few days ago. 

He's playing with some very interesting concepts in the book but . . .  I'm finding that I frequently need to skip several pages at a time.  I'm not sure I will be able to justify finishing the book. Call me a prude, but I don't read R and X rated stuff.  It frustrates me that so much of that seems to be here.  I love Gaiman's writing.  His imagination is brilliant and his voice and characterization are rich and satisfying.  There are some aspects of  imagination that I think should be kept private.  I don't like to read about explicit sex or violence.  It's getting harder and harder to find fiction that avoids graphic descriptions, especially in fantasy. 

Sigh.  I've included links throughout this post for some other Gaiman books that I've read that I feel confident about keeping in my house.  (Someday Maxx will be interested in reading the sort of stuff Gaiman writes - he doesn't need to have that sort of graphic stuff inserted into his imagination, either.)

Since I'm obviously feeling confessional this week, having posted a photo of my epic cake FAIL of last week over at the Beorningstead blog , I thought I would let you all take a look at my latest bead fail.

Pretty weird, right?











The latest Beadwork magazine has a short tutorial on making sparkly beaded rings so I played around with the project a bit yesterday. 

I made a sort of fun little orange spiky flower ring.


And I beaded a setting for a scintillating rivoli and then decided to see if the duck bills I bought with the latest mega box of beads would work with this  design.





Ummm....






I was shooting for something floral but it certainly didn't turn out that way.  I think it looks like some bizarre sea creature gone horribly wrong.  Molly says it looks like a butt.  (If you have a large, short haired dog, you will instantly see what she means.  It is rather sphincter-ish.)

If only I had made it in pink.






Speaking of butts.  I'm so disgusted with Etsy.   They had full frontal female nudity on their front page a couple of weeks ago.  Oh - the artist's photographer had airbrushed out some specific anatomical details on top and the models hands were covering her groin area but it was still nudity on the Front Page.  The item in question was a hoop skirt support made to be worn under period costumes or alone as a "futuristic design statement".  The seller makes latex clothing.  Most of the images for the clothing available in this shop border on or qualify as soft p*rn.

You know what?  That's FINE.  If someone is having fun making a living selling titillating little costumes - go ahead.  I have no problem with that.  I don't even have a problem with them using racy images in their shop to sell their wares.  It's their shop.  I do not believe in trying to censor other artists and I think that there should be a place on Etsy and other venues for all kinds of  art - whether that art contain happy unicorn, Christian iconography or images designed for a mature audience.

I DO have a HUGE problem with Etsy putting those soft p*rn images on their Front Page and I'll tell you why.   

For those of you who don't know much about FAS/FAE, one of the major challenges kids with this disorder have is a more than average level of difficulty making good sexual choices.  These kids are at a higher risk for STD's, teen pregnancy, date rape - etc. because they have an overwhelming curiosity about sex and intimacy, very little to no impulse control and very poor decision making skills.   I thought that we would be dealing with this issue in - oh about 10 years or so, during puberty.  But no.  It is here NOW. 

Maxx is hyper-interested in breasts and other lady parts.  He has already been exposed to p*rn on the school bus.  He asks inappropriate questions quite frequently and tries to engage in inappropriate touching with me and Molly.  We have had incidents of inappropriate tickling with other female family members that we have had to address with him.  We try to dress him in jeans because if he wears softer pants he runs around all day grabbing his goods.  We have had numerous discussions about biology and male vs. female anatomy, respecting people's privacy and what sort of touching is appropriate and what is not.  He levels off sometimes for weeks at a time until something sets him off - like seeing magazine covers in the grocery store or a scene in a film or on TV that shows a lot of skin and/or cuddling. 

Now some of you might say - "Oh, he's just a boy - boys are just interested in girls!"  Yes.  Boys are interested in girls.  As they should be.  Maxx is Obsessed with female bodies.  There is a difference.  His behavior and manner change when he is obsessing.  It is very troubling.  We work hard to keep questionable images out of our home in order to make at least this space safe for him.  He has enough issues to work through that he shouldn't have to be grappling with that particular obsession right now.

I left work at Creative Spirit because the owner was preparing for a new exhibit containing several "adult" images.  I was fine with that until he made it clear that he intended to hang one of the largest paintings front and center at the bottom of the stairs leading to the only bathroom in the building.  His intention in hanging the piece there was not to draw attention to a particularly masterful painting but in his own words, it was to "shake up the moral foundations of this community a little bit." 

Never mind that we had several parents visit the store with their children and if a potty stop was needed, these kids would have to be brought down through the gallery - right past the 'mature' content.  With no warning whatsoever.  I don't know if this guy ever actually hung that show that way or not.  I left and didn't look back. 

Etsy's front page is on our drop down navigation bar menu for Firefox because I stop into Etsy every day to manage my shops there.  I can no longer trust that opening Etsy with Maxx sitting on my lap or hanging out around the computer is safe.  I'm strongly considering shutting down both of my Etsy shops.  My supply shop has tanked over there.  Either something is STILL broken in the search or I've made some sort of blacklist as a result of speaking too bluntly in the forums about the numerous problems sellers have been having since March.   Either way, that source of income is drying up has dried up.  Pair that with not being able to trust Etsy to follow their TOU/ Dos and Don'ts and NOT put nudity on the front page makes me think that never clicking on that Etsy link again might be a good idea. 

Sigh.  Thinking about Etsy lately makes me depressed.  Thinking about FAS makes me feel overwhelmed.  I've had to think about both of them in one morning - I guess Ziggy and I should go walk off that Nutella on a rice cake I just ate and then try to figure out what on earth to do with these stupid duck bill beads.  Any ideas out there?






.....

We went for a paddle last night for Family Home Evening. 

Getting ready was grueling - go borrow the truck from Mom and Dad, feed the kids FAST, load the canoe, realize that the life jackets are 12 MILES AWAY back at the new house where we just were to borrow the truck, hurry to get the life vests, take two vehicles (because we no longer have an extended cab truck) down to Norwood Pond, keep Maxx from drowning himself or getting run over by other boaters trying to put their bigger boats in or out of the water while we unload the canoe, convince Maxx to put on his life vest and take a pee break BEFORE we get in the boat, haggle over who gets to sit where in the canoe - sheesh.

I was very worried that  it was going to be an entirely unpleasant experience. Last time we took Maxx out in a canoe, he cried the whole time;

"Waaah!  I'm going to get wet!     Waaah!  We're going to tip over!      Waaah!  I don't like that rock/tree/duck/other boat that is half a mile away!  I think we're too far away from the truck, maybe we should go back!      Waah!  I'm scared of everything!"

Not this time.  Look at that grin!

It is wonderful that as Maxx matures and gains more confidence he is less terrified of new things.  It is also nice to know that even though he was terrified of his short first trip on the water last summer (he thrashed all night after that first trip, processing the experience) he was ready and eager to try it again this spring and was NOT afraid.  He's making so much progress!  They are giving him an award at school today for his progress in the Second Step character development program his teacher has been using in her classroom.  I am so happy that the school is starting early to help the kids, especially Maxx, learn how to interact appropriately as that is one of the biggest challenges for FAS kids.



 
Back to the paddle - It had been a hot day (I mean Really Hot for May - 85 degrees!) but the evening was cooling off and the water was warm and placid. 


The surface was smooth as silk and reflective as mercury.   The light was gorgeous, the sky  a rich blue, the sun was setting and a waxing gibbous moon hovered over everything. 

 





It was a good way to celebrate the eve of my Sweet Beorn's 41'st birthday. 

















Maxx even got a chance to try paddling.









And you know what else was fun?  We got to take pictures of it all (thank you, Molly)  because we finally got our family outing camera!  It's a waterproof Olympus Powershot D10.  So far we are liking it.  No one has actually submerged it yet, but it was nice to have it along and know that if it did get splashed or if some small person's exuberance got out of hand and tipped us all over, it wouldn't get ruined.  I'll post more about the camera later on as we learn more about it.

Right now, I have to go figure out how I'm going to cook a ham for dinner tonight.  Can you believe it - almost 20 years in and I've never cooked a ham.  Ham is for big occasions and Bry's mom always cooks them but that's what the man wants for dinner tonight so - I'm off for an adventure in the kitchen.

Here's a link to our camera on Amazon in case you need a handy waterproof family camera.  I did a lot of research on this decision and this seemed like the best possible choice for under 300 bucks.