eccentricity

My 2 year old, Scout, just gave me an insight into how others might see me. He brought me over my new box of cotton buds and said yours Mummy! and proceeded to get me some out. I realised I am the only person in the house that uses them. And I use them fairly frequently - I don't like the feeling of dirty waxy ears. And then realised it is probably odd to keep them in the living room. Which I seem to have got into the habit of recently- I hasten to add we have a small bathroom without much storage room. I had an image of myself as an elderly lady with my economy sized pack of cotton buds, a house littered with used buds scattered everywhere, and trying to give them away to any visitors.

And I realised this was a possible eccentricity. And started to wonder what other eccentricities I had. There is the not liking socks thing, as it feels my feet can't breathe, just for starters.

Btw, Scout has been sick the last 2 days but seems to be on the mend. And I have been very busy, hence only 4 posts for August!

ditto

Do you keep buying the same item of clothing over and over? I do. Sometimes intentionally, but often unintentionally. I get it home and think, hmmm, I've bought that before.

Pictured is the black turtleneck I bought from Saba recently with birthday money (under the cardi). I seem to always have a black turtleneck on the go. And then there are the other colour turtlenecks....I also have a thing for cardis, especially grey ones ("what? another cardi???" is a frequent refrain of Bhaer's). Talking about which, that cardi in the picture is quite nice...

Very high back heels, black knee high boots also figure in my repertoire. I like to think of it as refining my style ;)

How do they do it?

Also from Mim - a blog analyser to pick Myers Brigg from your blog.

Keen readers of my blog will know I am an INFP - well here they guessed me as an ISFP. Pretty close.

The analysis indicates that the author ofhttp://eventhesmallest.blogspot.comis of the type:
ISFP - The Artists
The gentle and compassionate type. They are especially attuned their inner values and what other people need. They are not friends of many words and tend to take the worries of the world on their shoulders. They tend to follow the path of least resistance and have to look out not to be taken advantage of. They often prefer working quietly, behind the scene as a part of a team. They tend to value their friends and family above what they do for a living.

(How can they tell? a vocab analysis?)

The complexity of children

One of the engrossing activities we parents like to indulge in is defining and categorising our kids. And yet my experience so far, particularly after no 2, is that while this is an enjoyable and even necessary activity, as it helps us to understand and appreciate them, they do defy our neat descriptions of them. At 19 months and almost 4, my two boys are already individuals of sometimes alarming complexity.

Sparky has recently learnt to read by himself. This kind of feat, typical of him, has confirmed my description of him as very verbal. (and by the way, shows that we have to be careful of applying general statements about gender, such as that boys arent as verbally gifted, to specific children). And yet, I was recently reminded that I can't ignore the other abilities and interests he might have. Sure, he will be probably be a bookish kid. But that doesn't mean I won't have to be dragged along to Saturday morning sport (you can see how excited I am about the prospect of that...). He doesn't seem particularly sporty to me as yet, but even if he has no huge talent in that area, he might still really enjoy it. What reminded me is that he suddenly came out with a mathematical statement he had worked out (5 + 5 = 10, he worked it out from hands and feet he tells me, and wasn't told by anyone). I had been so focussed on his reading I hadn't been talking to him about numbers or really doing anything about his numeracy recently.

Well, on to Scout (hehehe yes, finally owl is renamed, and all your suggestions helped guide my thinking ). Scout is what is often called a typical boy - though I am a little wary of saying this about him, as if his brother isn't therefore as masculine. Anyway, Scout is adventurous and rebellious. A typical stunt of his is when he learnt how to climb on to the dining table and spent the first day doing that continually, looking at me knowing he was about to get in trouble, and clapping himself. He is the kind of kid who does something daring, hurts himself, and just has to try again immediately to see if it will still hurt this time. He loves cars and trains. Yet to just define him that way limits him. He is also far more interested in nurturing play than his brother at the same age. He loves cuddly toys and dolls, and is already pretending they are babies and looking after them. If he sees a baby in the supermarket he spends the rest of the time looking for them.

It is good to recognise their distinct personalities and to therefore being looking to cater to their special interests and needs. But in doing so, I am trying not to at the same time close off doors they might want to explore. God makes them more wonderful than we can imagine or describe

what we don't know

I have just started mentoring someone, and so I picked up John Mallison's book on mentoring which I had lying round the house. I opened it at a page which spoke about the qualities of a mentor. One thing that really struck me was that it spoke about the openness of a person, how we all have things about ourselves that are hidden from either ourselves or other people. It used a quadrant, where 1. known by all 2. known by us but hidden from others 3. known by others but hidden from ourselves 4. unknown by all. It was good if mentors had larger 1 quads and smaller 3 quads.

3 really got to me, and then a couple of days later a friend brought up this idea again, that we are often unaware of how we come across.

I've been wondering ever since what I am hiding from myself. Do I want to know or not? I guess it would be good ultimately to know, but kinda scary in the short term. Maybe I need to ask God to show me.

One experience like this I had when I was younger (though not strictly 3 - more how I was being misunderstood) - was that I came across to people as snobbish on first meeting when in reality I was very shy and was afraid that they wouldn't like me - and then they wouldn't because they thought I was judging them. It was very helpful to find this out!

internalising

Sparky is having one of those developmental change periods...we had a difficult morning this morning, because Bhaer and I were both busy and Sparky likes lots of attention - anyway he followed me around most of the time talking non stop (NOT an exaggeration) and it was wearing, and so I got irritable with him. Eventually he went off to do something by himself, and proudly showed me what he had done - create an interesting pattern on his playdough ------with his jumper. I didn't get him in trouble, since he didn't know he shouldn't do this, but told him not to do it again. I changed his jumper, because he was just about to go out. I came back and he was now creating patterns with something I had said was Ok, but still making a huge mess, including on the new jumper, and we were less than 5 mins off going out, so I said it was time to put the playdough away. He was very upset, and I explained he wasnt in trouble but that no he couldnt have it back, and why. Next thing I know, I find him standing face against a wall, and he says mum I'm here. I'm like yes I can see that... and then he says "I'm having time out". He had put himself into time out! So then I gave him lots of cuddles and tried to explain again that he wasn't in trouble. Then I had very mixed feelings about this: 1) was very impressed that he seemed to be internalising discipline. Becuase of course our hope is that he develops internal values and self control, rather than being reliant on being externally controlled. There have been other signs of this lately, and I'm really pleased about that.
2) I did feel that this was the result of a whole morning of me being irritable with him - after all talking non stop isn't exactly naughty (though I did tell him to be quieter a couple of times when I was on the phone), just tiring. So it isn't good that at the end of the morning he feels like a bad boy. This links into my previous post about needing to be aware of the interplay of his extraversion with my intraversion.

So, so pleased that he is developing a moral sense, but wondering how to teach him the fine balance between being himself in all his chatty, friendly gorgeousness, whilst respecting other's boundaries and need for space - we had this issue a while ago with him hugging people too much, and he finally learnt that not everybody wants a hug all the time, especially not 20 in a row.

In other Sparky news, he came up with his first joke (very proud parents!)
When does a truck run over your toe? when it is a tow truck!
and today managed to kiss several little girls at Koorong (Christian book store) - most of whom looked pleased, but the girls' mums looked even more charmed.

childrearing and personality

Bhaer and I have been thinking a lot about how our parenting methods need to take account of personality. We are both very aware, for instance, that as introverts, we shouldn't see Sparky's extraversion as naughtiness just because it is different (and sometimes annoying...).

Just the other day, Sparky told me he liked squiggly things - like worms and drawing squiggles. This made me think of the very basic personality test of what shape you like. There are 5 shapes and one is a squiggle. I wondered whether it worked for him. Well, not completely - for a 3 year old he isn't messy and disorganised. But he is "creative, flamboyant, dramatic, and witty" and "very easily bored, requiring constant stimulation". See here. You can check out yourself - I'm a circle, with a little squiggliness.

I have often wondered what his Myers Brigg type is - it is hard to know for a young child, but we are guessing an ENFJ (though not as sure about middle letters).

Owl is still a baby, so hard to guess at him, but he is generally quieter (not always), and more self directed.

I'm thinking I might like to look into books like the one pictured above - which I found here on Amazon.

What about your kids? How do their personality types shape how you parent?

quizzy

A friend (Hi MIM) had this little badge on her blog, so I couldn't resist and did the tests. regular readers would know I am INFP, though this shows the relative strengths of each scale. The multi intelligences though is interesting - I wasn't too surprised, though musical came a little higher than I would think. Have lately though been keen to get back into my singing.

Enneagram

I mentioned the enneagram last blog without explaining - I have found this a lot less useful than the MB, - it is not as well based - but still it was of some interest - I found it interesting as it did seem to pinpoint how my husband and I though same MBT were different -I will wait for him to respond and tell you what he is , but I either come out -depending on which test - as a helper type 2 or individualist type 4. I suspect this is - as they say on the site below - that women are taught to be 2s - I suspect my mum is one too, but my natural preference may be more 4 - though I dont find either type entirely accurate.

if you want to take it go to:
http://www.enneagraminstitute.com/dis_sample_36.asp

help needed

I am currently working on a post about my fave books. As a P (perceptive type, see blogs on Myers Brigg) making decisions about what to put in the list is taking time, so in the meanwhile here is a boring blog for you, but good for me...

Please help me on a debate I am in at church on tithing on friday - I am meant to be pro. As a very non legalistic person, this is hard - I keep thinking of anti arguments. I am thinking of defining tithing not as a tenth but more generally as a systematic practice of giving - is this legit? and any arguments for me????

btw, as a P, taking sides in such a definite way as you do in debating is quite hard!

myers brigg and blogging type

2 months ago I blogged about personality -i asked readers to volunteer their myers brigg type - alas no takers. then today finally andrew says he is ENTJ - which so fits his blog style - informative, thoughtful, external focus - see http://www.jubileeman.blogspot.com/. so I ask - can you assess personality from blog?

which lotr character are you

a response to kris. ok so i came up as elinor dashwood. bu much more romantically as legolas on this - i was expecting frodo. http://www.selectsmart.com/FREE/select.php?client=lotrpesonality

earliest experience

further to last post. I was thinking about my experience as a newborn, that while I was used to sharing the womb, when I came out due to being very small, I was put in a humidicrib and then stayed in hospital til 7.5 weeks old. So my twin was taken away at birth - how did this affect me? And they now know that children need touch from day one - so the humidicrib I was in, which had no holes for touching - has been replaced with touch friendly ones these days. This explains quite a bit about me (if you know me you might be able to work that out). Watching my 2 children, I can see the birth order influence already shaping their personalities. My eldest, who was an only child only 3 m onths ago, is now suddenly displaying eldest characteristics. My youngest is developing more pateince, as he is forced to wait more than my first. How much of who we are is determined pre memory even?

personality and first impressions

Here I am responding again to the same friend's blog! (see my post below on christians and culture - this shows that stuck at home with kids, reading blogs is now my community!) - she is reading about friendship at the moment and the effect that conversational style has on our judgment of each other. This really made me think back over past relationships. I thought this also related into personality - say for instance introversion/extraversion. Introverts such as myself often show a different public face to private one. I know for myself I tend to not show my serious side until I know someone well - as I keep what really matters to me private. I also tend to show this serious heart more in what I write than in what I say. I wonder how many people have not become friends because I do this? Do I miss out then on becoming friends with those people who would share my most deeply held views and ideals?
this is related also to my mysers brigg type - INFP see http://users.knoware.nl/users/veldman/frans/dutch/infp.htm or http://www.personalitypage.com/INFP.html
what are you?