Finding A New School

No wordless Wednesday for me today.  Instead I want to take a moment to properly address the thought provoking comment/question I received in response to yesterday’s post which you can read here.

The short of it is I was venting about my potty training frustrations as it pertains to Liv’s current school, and someone anonymously commented with the following...

“If you are so unhappy why don't you just leave now. No hate here, but it seems like you have been unhappy for awhile...”

This made me realize that I haven’t done what I set out to do with this blog. Which is to be 100% open and honest about matters of my external heartbeat. As anonymous stated I’ve been very open about my discontent with Liv’s existing school for some time. And, though I’ve insinuated that a change in schools is coming I haven’t quite shared the details. The crazy part about it is I feel like I did since all our family and friends have the inside scoop, and are looking forward to September 2^nd when she starts her new school.

Now! Before I proceed I’d like to apologize for taking you all for granted. By not sharing the details of the new school search. Anonymous made me realize that as much as I complain about Liv’s existing school, sharing the details of her new school is a post that’s long overdue.  So anonymous whoever you are thanks so much for the comment.

Now, without further ado here’s the long answer to the comment above.

It was sometime around April when I truly came to my breaking point with Liv’s current school. I can’t remember the exact straw that broke the camel’s back (it honestly may have been the whole potty or fundraiser thing) but, I knew it was time to leave. And if both my husband and I didn’t work full time or had family in our area willing to care for her, I would have snatched her out immediately. No ifs, ands, or butts about it, as mad as I was I would have made what I’d now consider to be a selfish decision and left the school without notice. Yes! I said selfish because in my opinion acting solely on my discontent (which in the moment I would have been), and not thinking about the best quality of care for her would have been selfish. In any case, I didn’t take her out immediately because our family dynamics didn’t support such a decision.

Instead after a year of her being in her current school, and receiving what I’d consider to be excellent care as an infant. I found myself back at the drawing board and in search of a new school once she became a toddler. Honestly, although I was starting to have my share of issues with the administration, my husband and I were also noticing how she had simply out grown their level of care. What worked for her as an infant just wasn’t going to work for her as a toddler. So, in early April I begin diligently looking for new schools in my area. By now you all know enough of my personality to know I don’t make decisions like this lightly, and I’m not about uprooting my child to leave her in the care of just anyone. I attended multiple open houses, randomly popped up at several schools, spent countless hours reading reviews, talking to administrators, and other parents of my top choice schools. Before we decided that this time around we’d give Montessori a try. Outside of the very docile environment that I’m hoping my little rambunctious diva will fit into we just loved the school philosophy. I loved the responsiveness and communication with the director and teachers. I also lved how even their so called “play” activities have a purpose behind them.

However, our decision to try Montessori came with a pretty steep contractual obligation. That further delayed us moving her out of the current school. The Montessori school we choose only accepts 10 or 12 month contracts which can only start in June or September and on top of that they are only accredited to take students as young as 18 months old. This is why our start date is September and wasn’t sooner. Through my search I found that even if I moved her somewhere else temporarily the quality of care would be equal or less than the care she is receiving today. So the hubs and I decided we’ll let her finish out the summer around her tiny friends and continue to deal with the environment that we know until her first day at the new school. Exactly, two weeks ago I gave her current school a little over 30 days’ notice that she will not be returning in the fall. And, I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that the last few months of dealing with their shenanigans have been a serious struggle but, I’ve learned to keep calm and look forward to brighter days.

I’m pretty sure the new school won’t solve all my problems but, this mom is totally looking forward to a new set of experiences J

Somebody Is Obsessed With The Potty

And this mom can't do ISH about it...:-(

Yes! I'm over here pouting and my face is bright red.

If you read this blog on a regular basis you can probably tell that this is a very sensitive subject for me as mom. Since, I've known my child has been ready to be potty trained for awhile but, her daycare doesn't support it until she is 2 (part of the reason she's out of there in September). You can read all about that here

Any who, as of late Liv (peep the new nickname) has been obsessed with the potty.

• Like anytime she see's one she wants to stop sit, sit, and sit lol. 
• She loves coming into the restroom with me.
• She clearly responds to questions like did you just poo poo, or do you have to pee pee.
• She recognizes the potty

Just by those few examples you get the point but here's the kicker...

Over the weekend I took off her diaper in preparation to put her in the tub and got distracted with picking out her clothes for the week so she got to enjoy a little naked time (as my co-peep likes to call it).  Everything was going fine until she came running in  her closet and started grabbing my leg. When I looked down at her she points and says "pee pee mommy". At first I didn't see the pee so she grabbed as if she was going to lead me to a spot. But soon as I turned my body I instantly found it sitting just a foot or two behind where I was standing.  Can you say shocked? Because, I sure can. I couldn't believe it however, I calmly gathered myself and proceeded to take her to the potty and let her know that is where her pee pee belongs. If that's not a sure sign her tale needs to be using someone potty I'm not sure what is and I honestly can't wait until she starts her new school on September 2nd because even  if it doesn't solve all the problems I had with her previous daycare I know potty training won't be an issue. From day one kids are placed on the potty and is encouraged to be independent in that area.

But wait I'm not done. Let me add a little insult to injury by sharing a story from yesterday. 

In preparation for my upcoming vacation I'm working late hours so I got to Liv's daycare later than normal so when I got there her she was down visiting the little ones in the 2 year old class.  When I walked into this much larger classroom I couldn't see my baby but I heard her teachers voice so I followed the voices.  Only to find the two teachers standing near in the restroom. One teacher was changing another little girl and Liv's teacher was watching her sit on the potty (fully clothed). When they spotted me her teacher looks directly in my face and says "She's Obsessed With The Potty". To which the other teacher proceeds chimes in with "Have you considered potty training her? She ready and fits in this classroom really well." We had a brief discussion about the challenges I've faced as a parent with regards to potty training and having my child moved up and needless to say I left the staff speechless. DON'T PLAY WITH ME lol

However, as a parent I can't help but pray that because this school isn't supportive of potty training at Liv's age we aren't missing our window of opportunity. At her 18 month appointment last month her pediatrician informed me that if a child shows interest in the potty between 15 and 18 months its best to capitalize on their interest. As the peek ages for potty training otherwise, she may not be trained until two and half  or three. As we all know a month can make a drastic difference in a growing child's life so I let's hope my baby doesn't miss out because they'll be the ones I blame and send my diaper bills too lol.

O The Clothes

First and foremost I apologize for being a bit MIA there has been many changes in the mom home front or any exciting stories to share so I’ve been letting other life event take consume me.

On another note I’m here to ask you all where in the world do you purchase your kids daycare/school only clothes from because, I swear Baby O’s school ruins everything. Regardless of what I send her there in she comes home a mess and I feel like they serve spaghetti daily although my menu tells me otherwise lol.

It sucks because she totally doesn’t get them as dirty when hanging with us. However, it’s to the point where I’m strongly sending her to her new school this fall in uniforms. Can any of you help me out? And yes I’ve tried Wal mart the cute little grannamials ripped on the first wear L

Somebody Can't Count

As I sit here completing the paperwork for Baby O to transfers schools in September I thought it would only be fitting to share another THAT MOM post. Reagrding her current school so, here’s a another one for ya...

Back in March Baby O’s school announced that they were doing an optional fundraiser which I totally decided I’d ignore. Because, in my mind there was no way they expected my tiny tot to go out and raise money for the school. I honestly assumed that although the email went out to everyone it was only applicable to the older kids at the school.  Whelp, I wrong, I arrived at the school and found a crisp white folder, with Baby O’s full name on it, and all the fundraiser information inside.

Being the parent I am I politely went to the front desk to determine exactly what they were raising funds for since that little detail was missing. The director informed me the funds raised would go towards having technology in the classrooms.  I thought it over for a few days and decided it was a good enough cause to support even though I didn’t agree with how the school was enticing parents to compete (I say parents because we all know the kids weren’t actually doing the solicitations).

However, I’m very competitive and when I decided to support I knew I had to give it 100% so, I begin my solicitation efforts. Thankfully the items were very easy to sale so Baby O sold a ton of stuff; I turned the packet in, and just knew my baby was the schools winner. 

Wrong Again! After all the submissions were handed in the school sent the following email (Names have been changed to protect the innocent)...

The results are in for our Claire's fundraiser from last month. We are thrilled to report that our participating families sold $5,379.40 worth of items, which resulted in ...... $2,156.75 in funds raised to improve technology for our classrooms! We also have some private donations that have not yet been accounted for in that total.

As promised, our 2 top-selling families will receive a $100 credit on their tuition. Congratulations to the Wrong and Doe families on raising a combined total of $1438.75 between them! Also, every family who participated received 1 entry for every 10 items ordered into a lottery drawing for $100 cash. Congratulations to the Right and Doe families- you can pick up your winnings today!

Again, thank you SO MUCH to everyone who participated. We are blessed to have such wonderful families invested in their children's education!

Upon receiving this email my first thought was...Hmmm that’s very interesting but, I totally wish they would have broken the totals out so I’d know exactly how much we lost by. But, that’s awesome the school raised so much.

Then pick up day came and things got interesting.

When I arrived at the school to pick up the items everything was sorted nice and neat. My lovely order form was printed for me so I could confirm my order. So I did and it was accurate however, the total amount raised was off. They had totally miscalculated Baby O’s web orders.

I Informed the front desk because, at this point I wasn’t sure if they school had even got the credit for those orders. I was instructed that the person I needed to speak with was gone for the day so I’d have to send a follow up email. The next morning I sent the following;

Good Morning Ashley,

As promised I logged into my Claire's account to get the names of everyone who purchased in support of Olivia and the school.  I've provided the details below for your review.  Once again I would like to make note that everyone did receive their order either direct shipment to their homes or via my school pick up yesterday. However, I'm not sure the school received credit for all of Olivia's orders because based on the totals I received in my packet yesterday Olivia didn't receive credit for all of them. Please let me know if there is anything I else I can provide to assist in your research in this matter.

Basically... Based on my calculations your fundraising total is incorrect and we actually raised the most funds lol.

To which I received a follow-up phone call saying... Hi Sheena! We totally received credit for your web orders and it looks like we owe you $100 credit on your tuition so, we will be putting that on your account today.

Ummmm thanks I guess. I’m grateful for the credit that I worked hard for but, totally don’t appreciate the way they handled the situation. Like...

• Sure we can go ahead and disregard the fact that you can’t count. So you got the credit but didn’t think enough to give it to the correct family...shady boots
• No you don’t owe us an apology or at least a thank you.                              
• No the school community doesn’t need to know that my infant raised the MOST money for the school.
• After all, our family and friends only helped raised a little under $1,000.00 for your school. The least you can do is pretend you care.

Momma Drama: Mystery Scratches

Hey luvs!

I want to take a moment circle back on Monday’s article about being THAT Mom. Although I’m shamelessly proud of the title I still would like to go into further detail regarding the bullets I posted. Not for validation, simply because the stories behind them are important. Starting today I will be doing a series called (Momma Drama) which goes into further details regarding each of these incidents and future ones like it.This honestly should be good because as my co-peeps put it I have the most bizarre conversations lol.

Oh so no one knows where this scratch on my infant came from?

This was the start of my THAT Mom life with Baby O’s school so it’s the most fitting place to start.  One day I went to pick my lovebug up (she had to be about 7 months) and as I was gathering her things I glanced over and noticed a scratch on her neck. This was no little scratch. It actually looked more like someone had been digging into her skin, and I could tell it hurt and from the dried blood. Of course, I immediately stopped what I was doing to get closer look at it. After my inspection I ask the teacher what happened to which she informed me that this was her first time seeing it.

SAY WHAT? 

                                              

Apparently, Baby O had been shuttled from class to class that day so her primary teacher was just seeing her. I was too alarmed by the change in classrooms as it this happened a lot on the school infant unit. I was surprised that I visited every infant class and NO ONE knew where the mark on my baby had come from.

WHAT THE F*&%?

Internally PISSED yet visibly calm, I proceed to pack up the rest of Baby O’s belongings, picked her up, and marched down to the director’s office. When I got to her office I politely requested a moment of her and time during which I pointed out the marks on Baby O, and let her know that while I understand that accidents will happen while my child is in their care I was very disturbed. As I had spoken to her staff and none of the infant teachers knew where the marks came from. She informed me that they the team keeps a very close eye on the children, and couldn’t believe that no one on her staff had seen this if it happened on their watch.

To which I responded with the following...

It has become a daily tradition in our household that my husband and Baby O take a morning photo so something like this would have been noticed prior to her arrival had it happen at home. Not to mention I watch her like a HAWK at home, since she is my only I actually don’t have anything else better to do. Not to mention I bath her nightly and I can promise this was not there. This means it happened in your care, so now that we know where this happened let me tell you my issue once again. My issue is that NO ONE on your staff seen this and I had to walk in a place of “care” to discover a mark on my child. My issue is that I was not identified of this issue prior to arriving at your facility. That shows negligence on the schools behalf in my opinion. I don’t ever want to walk in this facility in find a mark on my child that you all aren’t aware of...Like NEVER. I pay you all to educate and protect my child while she is here and that is not something you feel your staff is capable of please let me know immediately.

I could tell that my polite yet firm ton surprised the ish out of her because every day prior my demeanor mirrored that of a ball of sunshine lol.  I left our little meeting with feeling accomplished as I believed my point had gotten across and knowing I’d be receiving a follow up call the next day with further clarification of what may have happened. Since, a few teachers had already left for the day I knew she needed to contact them and I thought it was only fair to allow her to do so. Especially, since the bullshit story she initially tried to feed me of this being self-inflicted wasn’t flying past me lol.

In any case I received a call bright and early the next morning to which the truth was revealed, because Baby O led them to it.  Apparently, little miss independent had been snatching her own bibs off her neck and no one cared until...Momma found them scratches.

Fellow HeartBEATS

Do you remember the first time you had to SPEAK UP in the name of your child? If so please share :)

THAT MOM

During a few recent conversations with my co-peeps (coworkers) I discovered that I’m THAT MOM at Baby O’s daycare. You know the mom that everyone tip toes around, The one they have secret conversations about but smiles when they see her. Let's not talk about how they hate to have to call with a problem, but will call for every single thing...

Hi Sheena I’m just calling to tell you that Baby O coughed and although she’s fine I just wanted to inform you.  Yup that’s me and I shamelessly OWN it LOL

I know at this point some of you are probably thinking  I’m only acting in this manner because I’m first time mom and please feel free to think that way, but I’m here to tell you that’s not the case. I wouldn’t care if I had 99 other children and knew everything in this world about raising children. I am very invested in my child’s (and future children) lives, so when things go down while mine is in your care I WILL always properly assess the situation. Need to know who, where, why, and plan going forward, to think about it that’s just how I am naturally (I want all the details so that I determine how I’ll handle things with the person in question going forward). Not to mention, when paying college tuition for my child to be in your care the expectations are HIGH and nothing less so be prepared to do what grown-ups do and communicate.

Needless to say I’ve had more than a few run-ins with Baby O’s school...

1. No one knows where thess scratch came from? (Mystery Scratches)
2. Did she really just say that? (The Teaching Experience)
3. So you won’t potty train her until she’s 2? (More details to come)
4. I referred two people but have yet to receive my referral bonus?
5. Excuse me did you just say my child got bit? Is this that first incident with this child biting?
6. My child isn’t being stimulated enough in her current classroom is it possible for her to move up early?
7. Based on my calculations your fundraising total is incorrect and we actually raised the most funds.

LOL those are the only ones I can think of at the moment, but were all reasons for me to start a conversation then head to the schools director based on the response I received. Since, I’m comfortable in my own skin (in my Beyonce voice) I’m perfectly fine with being that mom. Actually I’m PROUD to be that mom and advocate for mines J. What I didn’t realize is my hubby is THAT DAD as well. Y’all last week he went in on the administration at the school about the ingredients in some Honey Nut Cheerios LMBO. I'll spare you all the details but check out his response to their request that we not send Baby O to school with Honey Nut Cheerios...

Here is the exact label on the box. It was my understanding that pre-2006 Honey Nut cheerios contained actual ground almonds, but now it has a "natural almond flavor" which really isn't almonds at all. Maybe they changed the formula to save money.

However, in the sake of safety we will no longer bring honey nut cheerios to school.

"Honey Nut Cheerios is a variation of Cheerios breakfast cereal, introduced in 1979 by the General Mills cereal company. The second variation from the original Cheerios, it is sweeter than the original, with a honey and almond flavor. While this product used to be made with actual nuts, as of 2006, the nuts were discontinued, and natural flavor is used instead."

"What is, "natural almond flavor"?

Well according to Eric Schlosser's book Fast Food Nation it's benzaldehyde which in turn is generally derived from peach and apricot pits. 

Can't say I blame Cheerios on this one though. Do you think "Honey Benzaldehyde Cheerios" would sell? It just doesn't seem to have the same zing and really, what good are ethics when it comes to sales?"

I was too done yet proud that he too will stand his ground in honor of our lovebug.

Fellow HeartBEATS

Have you ever felt like THAT PARENT?