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Wendi DeGrandpr
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| Posted: Nov 13 2008 at 7:31am | IP Logged
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OK - so this is probably going to sound a little silly but I am at my wits end and I don't want to lose it w/ my ds. I have 3 girls and then my little guy who is 6 1/2. He is adopted which only comes into play in regard to developmental age which is about 4.
First let me say he is a wonderful, loving little boy. I am so clueless as to what to do w/ him and all of his energy, his total lack of ability to focus on basics like eating and dressing and his attention for school is nil but that worries me less than anything due to his age (actual and esp. developmental). He tends to be destructive - how much of this is "normal" boy stuff? When I speak to him he always looks dejected and while I am not yelling or using harsh words I know that I am not doing a good job of building him up and helping him to become more capable and confident.
DH travels extensively (no complaints here as I have so much admiration for all of you military wives and mothers who have dh's gone for long periods of time) but I know he misses his dad.
What do you do w/ an only boy in a house full of girls (8 1/2 - 18) and mom? I want to help him but it seems very foreign to me as girls are so happy to color and craft and not destroy everything around them. One challenge I have is that his older sister (8) hates to be outside so I try to balance time inside and outside - he loves to be outside but not alone and I certainly cannot leave dd in the house unsupervised. We have a great yard for him to play in and I can readily watch him but like I said he doesn't last long if he is alone or even with the dogs.
Any good book recommendations on raising boys specifically would be a huge help.
Thanks in advance.
Wendi
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Wendi
Mom to four blessings
"We can do no great things - only small things with great love." Blessed Mother Teresa
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Maryan
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| Posted: Nov 13 2008 at 9:37am | IP Logged
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I can't claim to be a developmental expert... but mother of boys I am! We love to be outside and we live a very, very active life. I don't have advice, but I'll tell you activities that work for us.
We have short attention spans. We do ten - fifteen minutes and then switch to something else. We rotate activity, outside, snack... over and over and over again. It takes a lot of work. I have the hardest time with the fact that until my children all become avid readers (I hope they become avid readers!)... I am the activity coordinator. If I don't rotate activities, then we resolve to throwing Lincoln logs everywhere.
So random stuff we like:
- finger painting right on my formica table
making our own creations (not a set craft)
- playdough
- Coloring? Not as much. But we like to take crayons and put their shavings on wax paper and iron it.
- books on tape! Especially Jim Weiss as we do playdough
- Lincoln Logs -- we build houses all the time... and then we destroy them. But we keep them all in a basket and have to clean them up. 
- Trucks and sand. Do you have a really big sandbox, so that cities and mountains can be built? My mil across the street has this -- and the boys love it.
- We have a basketball hoop in our basement that keeps score. We got it for Christmas for the four boys and it has been a HUGE hit. But we're basketball people.
- Bikes
- Puzzles of trucks, dinosaurs and countries
- pillow fights with the living room pillows. Not *really* allowed... but we love it.
I have the benefit of the boys being able to play with each other. However, my little boys aren't at the level of my 7 year old. So he plays football with himself. He He is the quarterback and the receiver. It's hysterical.
And my 7 year old now loves to read. And will sit and read for half an hour or more at a time!! It's a first in our house. But we have a lot more people to go before ALL of us are sitting still at one time.
Our life can be hectic and I usually lose my temper at some point with the destruction (like beanie baby stuffed animals inevitably become footballs in the living room and peg lamps). So constant reminders of "Don't play ball in the house with a ball, with a stuffed animal, with a wad of aluminum foil, with..." have to be repeated a lot. 
Hope something in any of that sparks an idea for what might work with your little guy!!
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Maryan
Mom to 6 boys & 1 girl: JP('01), B ('03), M('05), L('06), Ph ('08), M ('10), James born 5/1/12
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Bridget
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| Posted: Nov 13 2008 at 10:53am | IP Logged
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Maryan, what a great post!
Wendi, I am probably missing specific to your 8 year old, but I would leave my 8 year olds alone in the house while we are in the yard.
Boys are a shock when you have girls first. 
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Bridget, happily married to Kevin, mom to 8 on earth and a small army in heaven
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Bookswithtea
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| Posted: Nov 13 2008 at 10:58am | IP Logged
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Bridget wrote:
Boys are a shock when you have girls first. |
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I could say the opposite too.  My girls all seemed so easy after having a boy first!
We had a boy and then three girls before the Lord gave us boys again. We have gone the extra mile to make sure that our boy had outside activities that involve very active, boy only crowds, like boy scouts or community sports. We found this to be very important so that ds didn't get the feeling that there was something wrong with him for not being like his sisters.
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mothering ds'93 dd'97 dd'99 dd'02 ds'05 ds'07 and  due 9/10
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Wendi DeGrandpr
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| Posted: Nov 13 2008 at 2:47pm | IP Logged
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Maryan -thanks for all the suggestions. I do know that if the day is well planned and executed on my part it goes much better than if there is too much free play time. He tends to get into trouble if left to play w/ blocks etc on his own for too long - they tend to fly etc. 
Bridget - I didn't elaborate on my 8 year old but there are definate reasons she cannot be left. My older dd's would have been fine at 8 but the youngest has attatchment issues and lies/breaks things etc just for fun so she needs pretty constant supervision.
Anyhow - I think I just need to take the outside time - and take dd with us.
Books - we have started with some outside "boy" activities - he played soccer this fall and loved it and we are planning to sign him up for basketball this winter. He is very excited about this.
I have to be careful with just playtime with other boys as he is very sensitive ie too much "spiderman" or "pirate" play and he is up with nightmares, even veggie tales has caused us many nights of nightmares.
I guess this is another question - do they outgrow this? Should I just let him play and help him through the scarey times? I don't want to be "overprotective" of him but he just seems to get so scared.
Thanks - Wendi
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Wendi
Mom to four blessings
"We can do no great things - only small things with great love." Blessed Mother Teresa
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happymama
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the Dangerous Book for Boys would be a good gift for your husband, full of ideas of things he can do with your son. Many of the ideas are for somewhat older boys, but it's fun just looking forward to these types of things...
you mentioned "pirates" and "spiderman" type play, but my boys really like to play knights/king arthur. Through this I encourage them to be strong, manly, protectors of the weak, courageous, etc. Courage lingo can get them through the scariness of things.
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SallyT
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Knights and swords are big at our house, too, as is as much kinetic play as I can make them have. My older son adores The Dangerous Book for Boys, and he has also liked The American Boys' Handy Book, even though he hasn't done many of the projects.
King Arthur stories are wonderful for the reasons Happymama just mentioned - courage and chivalry.
Sciency stuff, too, seems to go over well with my boys -- experiments with results are good, and the more dramatic the results, the better. They like to cook, but not as much as the girls do. My younger son, who's 6 and REALLY kinetic and headstrong, adores to be read to, but can't be sitting still while I read -- he has to be doing (usually what he does is run up and down the room, "thinking," and I've learned to be okay with that). Both my boys like to do things with their hands -- legos, train sets, anything that needs to be put together. That's far preferable to them than coloring. We don't do blocks so much as things that REALLY need putting together, like lego, magnetix, K-nex, etc.
I had a girl first, and my first son, who came next, was a shock in terms of energy level and need to get into things -- but then our next son came along, and HE was an even bigger shock. I love the boys, and in many ways clash with them less than I clash with the girls, but they can be wearing, just in terms of sheer energy and motion. (and my youngest daughter plays almost exclusively with her brothers, so at times, pinky-girly as she is, she's exhausting in the same way).
Sally
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Bookswithtea
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| Posted: Nov 14 2008 at 7:11am | IP Logged
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My oldest boy was super sensitive to stuff like this. He grew out of it in time. I didn't show him stuff that scared him until he was ready for it. I don't regret that at all.
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mothering ds'93 dd'97 dd'99 dd'02 ds'05 ds'07 and due 9/10
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juststartn
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Wow..what I have to look forward to...
Three girls, and then twin boys...eek.
Rachel
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4Real Forums : Mothering and Family Life
Topic: Mothering Boys
