my kid's delightful qualities

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Trends and Fads and Their Enduring Allure

If you have a middle schooler, you are probably well aware that dumpling squishies are the toy trend du jour. I cannot stand squishies; I do not enjoy squishing them, not to mention they strike me as portable petri dishes. But my kid loves squishies and had some spending money in her pocket last week… just as I happened to have an errand at a business right next door to a toy store. The store only had “knock off” dumplings, according to Carla. But she did find a mini ice cube that she liked. (Needoh ice cubes are also So Hot Right Now.) Shall we take bets on how quickly a totally clear cube of goo disappears among the chaos of her bedroom or backpack?

Carla had some money left over, so we went to Five Below after school Friday, just to check out their squishy selection. (By the way, Five Below is now a wild misnomer; it seemed like most things in the store were seven dollars and up.) Carla assessed the situation and determined there were no good squishies. The store was planning a “dumpling drop” for Saturday morning, and already had signage indicating where people should line up on the sidewalk. I recall some news stories from my own childhood about parents stampeding stores on Black Friday to get the latest It Toy, but… now we are lining up for squishies? I am not judging, I am just observing with mild bafflement.

We did not leave empty handed. Carla found a (seven-dollar) hamster-in-a-ball toy that she insisted Lenny would love. He does love it.

You know what else is apparently a big thing among the seventh grade set? Hacky sacks. (Carla informed me yesterday that they are actually called footbags, and that Hacky Sack is a brand name.) (FOOTBAGS? No wonder “hacky sack” became a proprietary eponym for that kind of toy. “Footbag” sounds like an old-timey insult.) Kids in my middle school and high school played hacky sack, and that was back in the 1900s! And by the time my classmates got to them, they’d been around for decades! I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that they are experiencing a renaissance; I saw a bunch of Lisa Frank paraphernalia in Five Below, and hoo boy did I love Lisa Frank in the 80s. I wish it had been this prevalent back when I did Carla’s rainbow leopard birthday party, but I guess we were ahead of the trend.

Anyway, hacky sacks. They’re back. Did you play hacky sack in school? I did not. There was a particular category of kids who played hacky sack, and I was not one of them. I did date one of them though. He was not a good guy, although that had nothing to do with his hacky sack appreciation or his social group.

My parents, though generous and thoughtful gift givers, were not the type to run out and buy the latest toy just because we were foaming at the mouth for it. Not that it was anywhere near as easy to access trends back in the twentieth century, especially in a small, rural town. Some kids managed it, though. One trend I really remember wanting was jelly sandals. Everyone had jelly sandals except me. I wanted them so fervidly.

One friend – one of those who seemed to always be on top of the current trends, and whose parents seemed happy to ensure that she was always on the cutting edge when it came to fashion and toys; did you have That Kid in your class? – grudgingly allowed me to borrow a pair of her jellies. They were not comfortable. My toes got stuck in the holes. The backs of the shoes pinched my heels. Pebbles and grass got trapped between my feet and the soles of the shoes. How could anyone walk around in those things?! Why were they so popular?!

I also remember longing for a Slip ‘N Slide. My friend J’s parents would set up the Slip ‘N Slide at birthday parties and sleepovers, and it was so fun. I have vivid memories of standing in a giggly line of swimsuit-clad girls, digging our toes into J’s lush green lawn, waiting for our turn to slide on the yellow runway amid a spray of cool water.

My family lived out in the country with no access to city water, and the well water was bad for the grass. (My dad literally pumped water out of the river to water our lawn and trees.) So my parents put the kibosh on a Slip ‘N Slide, dashing my childhood dreams to bits. Obviously, the instant Carla was old enough to understand how a Slip ‘N Slide works, I got one for her. I was so excited to be able to provide this childhood joy that I had been so painfully denied to my own child. She… did not like it. I tried it and also did not like it. It kind of… hurt. It wasn’t as slippery as it should have been, and the material kind of stuck to my skin. After a few experiments – more water? more speed? – the thing ripped and that was that.

This is all to say that I am not immune to the siren song of The It Thing. The desire to be part of something is powerful, even now. (So far I have resisted weighted vests and vibration plates, but I am as susceptible to the pull of viral trends as much as the next guy.) I also understand the simple need to know what all the hype is about.

On the other side of the scale sits the haunting image of my high school friend’s mom, who amassed a massive number of Beanie Babies because she was sure – sure – that their value would skyrocket. Was her plan to fund her retirement with their eventual sale? I’m not sure. But I see her Beanie Babies display in my nightmares, a soft-bodied glassy-eyed red-labeled expenditure of hundreds and hundreds of dollars.

Even though Five Below was a miss, squishy-wise, Carla is still positive. We have another toy store to visit, and in the car she was cheerfully imagining that this third establishment would have a whole selection of dumplings and ice cubes for her to choose from.

Carefully, gently, not trying to burst her happy anticipatory bubble, I asked her if she remembered how popular Stanley tumblers were a couple of years ago. Does anyone still use a Stanley? (Carla doesn’t. She uses an Owala that is spillproof, unlike the Stanley.) (I see that Stanley now makes a spillproof tumbler, but that wasn’t the trend when Carla got hers.)

What about the Lululemon belt bag that she had to have? When was the last time she used that?

“This is different, Mom,” she told me. “Everyone loves squishies.”

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Seven on a Saturday

The weather report SWEARS we will have sunshine this weekend, but so far the only sun I’ve seen was this past Thursday. It’s early yet, but the clouds are not filling my heart with hope. The pervasive grey is inspiring nothing but an intense desire to curl up in bed and read murder mysteries, but let’s try some random bullet points and see what comes of it. 

  • A Little Light Shopping. Speaking of my unending desire to read: I continue to buy new books while simultaneously continuing to reread Sophie Hannah’s Culver Valley mystery series, which I already own. (I am on Book 10, The Next to Die, out of 11 so far.) My husband is baffled by my insistence on reading old books when I have so many shiny new ones to hand. But it makes sense to me. I get to indulge in a series I adore (I am finding that I am enjoying these all on a reread even more than I did the first time, although I do find myself weary of Charlie and Simon’s relationship). Plus, I get to fill my book shelves with happy little treats to look forward to. Best of all worlds! 
  • Light Therapy. I went outside for a walk four days this week, which is more than I’ve been able to muster lately. I KNOW that being outside, in the fresh air, surrounded by birdsong and trees, boosts my mental health. But sometimes it’s just HARD to do the thing. My parents go for a walk outside pretty much every single day, rain or shine or snow or sleet, and that’s deeply inspiring to me. But STILL. Wanting to do the thing, knowing the thing is good for me and will make me feel better, does not always lead to Doing The Thing. 

Thursday, we had actual honest-to-goodness sun and I made sure to take advantage of it. I walked around my neighborhood and came upon an older woman walking ahead of me. She was all bundled up in a winter jacket and gloves, hood pulled up over her hair. I tried to do all the things I could think of to alert her of my presence – scraping my feet on the gravel, coughing – but when she turned around (I was still a good ten feet behind her) she jumped and said “Oh!” in a startled way. I apologized for scaring her and we chatted for a few minutes. During which time she told me I needed to COVER UP. (I was wearing long pants and a long-sleeved sweatshirt; it was nearly 50 degrees.) Turns out she was concerned not about cold but about skin cancer, about which I am not cavalier, I promise. But I also need those sun rays to soak into my skin and stimulate all that yummy vitamin D production (I have no idea what I’m talking about, just to be clear). I assured her I was wearing sunscreen but I probably should be better about wearing a hat to protect my scalp. 

  • Light Switches: My dad and I replaced some faulty light switches this week, which is one of those projects that feels SO thrilling to complete. It was surprisingly easy, once I got past the fear of electrocuting myself. (We turned off the power before we opened things up; I hope that is obvious.) Our next project will be to install some light fixtures in the furnace room, which is bafflingly lightless. To that end, one of my purchases this week was a roll of copper wiring. My future as an electrician grows ever closer.
  • Fake Light. I have been encouraged by a trusted professional to look into buying myself a light therapy lamp. This does not mean I have been diagnosed with Seasonal Affective Disorder – I have not; and when I looked at the reviews of SAD lamps she sent me, I became perhaps overly concerned by the stern warning that only people who have SAD or who are under direction from a medical professional should use one of these lamps. And then a friend, who recently HAS been diagnosed with SAD, said she just started using a light therapy lamp and is having awful side effects – headaches and sleep loss. So now I don’t know what to do. Should I buy this lamp and hope for the best??? Or ramp up my efforts to be outside every day?
  • Lumos! While we’re apparently on the inexhaustible topic of lighting, one of my favorite things are the smart plugs my husband installed on all of our lamps. I can either ask Siri to turn on the lights or use my phone to turn them on, and it’s delightful. So I can be finished reading in bed and just say, sleepily, “Siri, turn off my bedroom lights” and the lamps will extinguish. Or I can be carrying my book and a full mug of tea down the hall and call out to the Echo in the kitchen, “Siri, turn on my office light” and it will be on when I reach my comfy chair. It makes me feel a teeny bit like I live in Hogwarts. 
  • Light of My Life: My husband, daughter, and I went out to dinner recently, and Carla was enamored with the paintings on the wall. She insisted on taking my phone so she could preserve her memory of the paintings for infinity. (She will never look at these photos again.) She is such a delight. 

I am off to meet a friend, which is one of the best ways to illuminate these cloudy days; the prospect of seeing her has been a bright beacon to get me through yet another gloomy week. 

I hope your weekend is full of light in many forms. 

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Crafting a Craft Room Part 2

One of Carla’s favorite pastimes is crafting. This is a blanket term that, for her, includes without being limited to:

  • Drawing
  • Painting
  • Making things with yarn
  • Using hot glue to make shapes/structures
  • Using a 3-D pen to make shapes/structures
  • Building things out of paper or foam
  • Cutting up paper into tiny confetti bits for unknown purposes
  • Diamond painting
  • Coloring
  • Gluing pieces of cardboard together
  • Transforming pens, paper towel rolls, dowels and other items with string, gems, glitter, foam, etc.
  • Making Barbie furniture
  • Making clothing for various stuffed animals
  • Cutting paper into snowflake shapes
  • Origami
  • Sculpting animals out of playdough or clay
  • Making things out of yarn
  • Sewing scraps of fabric together, to make clothing or purses or stuffed animals

She is extremely creative and derives a lot of joy from crafting. While I might prefer that she were to make things that had some utility, I certainly don’t want to restrict her creative mind. The big problem is that her creations tend to take up a huge amount of space. 

So our solution was to create a craft space just for her in the basement. (Slide the image below to see the before and after.)

Based on wonderful suggestions from you, my husband and I went to Home Depot and found a door to use as a craft table. Home Depot has a surprising (to me) variety of doors, and we went with one that was flat, unstained, unfinished, and unadorned in any way. It didn’t even have a hole for a doorknob. Just a flat slab of wood. Best of all, it was fairly inexpensive – around $85. (We are comparing the cost of the door to the cost of an actual table.)

We allowed Carla to choose a paint color for the door, and then the three of us painted it. 

We already owned a six-cube organizer shelving unit, so we bought a second one. Then we bought fabric bins to put inside some of the cubes. Once the paint was dry, we set the door horizontally across the shelving units.

My favorite thing is this spinning desktop organizer, which holds a bunch of pens and scissors and paperclips.

The “table” is nice and tall, and big enough to hold A LOT of crafts. We set up Carla’s Cricut machine on one side, put the spinning desktop organizer on the other side, and filled the shelving unit bins with construction paper and foam and painting supplies.

Over time, we have added additional shelving units and fabric bins, and lots of plastic bins and smaller shelving units.

It is a very well-used space. 

Two things that I think we still need, but haven’t yet figured out:

  1. Some sort of plastic floor mat. I would love to protect the carpet. But we have only hit roadblocks when trying to find solutions. We originally thought we could get one of those stiff plastic mats that you can put under a desk so that your chair wheels don’t get stuck in the carpet. But to find one that is large enough is prohibitively expensive. We considered finding some heavy plastic sheeting, like the kind you put down when you paint… but I’m not sure that would be sturdy enough for daily use, or how we would affix it well enough to the carpet. We then looked into buying a cheap rug that we could put under the desk… but my main concern about that is that it might create a tripping hazard in the basement. Plus, the cheapest rugs at Home Depot have raw edges, and I think they would fray and fall apart pretty quickly… but I have no idea how to resolve that. So for now, we deal with occasional paint and perpetual glitter on the carpet.
  • A chair. I think Carla would benefit from having a drafting stool of some sort. She says it’s tiring for her to have to stand when she’s drawing, and I get that. Sometimes, this means that she moves the crafting onto the floor, which I do not like. Maybe a stool of some sort would make using the actual table all the time more appealing. I don’t think she would use a stool all the time… but that’s fine. Then again, the need isn’t so pressing that I’ve done more than idle googling. 

The space is usable and Carla loves it and uses it regularly. Overall, it is a success.

My primary complaint about this space is that it is a craftastrophe 95% of the time. It is a horrific mess that encompasses the top of the table and the space underneath and bleeds into the surrounding areas. (Toggle for the mess if you dare.)

The problem is that no matter how many organizational bins and shelves and baskets you buy, they only work if you use them. And my kid doesn’t use them. I have no idea how to help her with this. One of our family mantras is that everything should have a space, and when you are done with something, it needs to return to its space. But that… doesn’t happen. 

Either Carla is in the middle of a project and doesn’t want to put it away…

Or she forgets to put it away…

Or she doesn’t know where the item’s “home” is (or, worse, it doesn’t really HAVE a “home”)…

Or she has used the storage bin for some alternate purpose… (This one really annoys me. For instance, we have this little case that has a bunch of separate spaces for small items, like pom poms or gems or paper clips or whatever, and she had removed everything that should be in it and replaced those things with individual small chunks of clay that had since dried out. This kind of “using a storage unit as a toy” is frequent and drives me NUTS.)

I am not sure how to reframe things for Carla so that she understands the how and the why of putting things away… or so that she sees the bins and shelves as Storage Only and not props in her elaborate imaginary scenarios.

If we ever buy another house, my dream is that we dedicate an entire room to Carla’s crafting. A room with our makeshift table, and tons of built-in shelving units that are all labeled and stocked with everything she needs. A room that has a door behind which we can shut the mess. 

But this is a dream, not reality.