The one that got away....

Museum #3 Bust. -Li Tien-lu Hand Puppet Historical Museum

 Let’s just say, each day when I open my eyes to start the day, it all begins with good intentions. I intend to be cheerful without coffee. I intend to not snap at Wyatt for not doing his morning routine that he has done  380 days consecutively, prior to this 381st day, and that this 381st day is no different than the past 380. I intend to pluck my bike keys out of the drawer on our way out….oops. I had intended  to put said keys in drawer the night before…..you catch my drift. My intentions are good, whether the end result is or not.

That is why on this particular Friday, the puppet museum trip with my girlfriend and her two kids was intended to be SO much fun. How could an adventure to Danshui and a quick cab ride from there not be fun? The website for this museum looked intriguing, with promises of DIY,making your own puppets,an exhibition area, musical area, puppet drama, computer zone…I mean- HOW FUN!!!!!

The MRT ride was fairly uneventful and the kids were just grateful we didn’t make them walk given the temperature outside. When we showed the cabbie our destination, he seemed to know where it was. What seemed like 30 minutes later, I repeated the address and he nodded affirmatively that we were indeed going in the right direction. Fearful that we were moments away from hearing Banjo music (which I believe can happen continents away from the US as well) we chose to have faith in our driver. Finally he pulled up in front of what I thought was the place. As we all peered outside of the cab it looked…….well, it looked closed.

Perfect.

The cab driver, ever the gentlemen, called the number posted outside and spoke to the owner. After some discussion, he began speaking to us in Chinese. I picked out a few words and realized fake it til you make it doesn’t apply to the need for a Chinese response. As my friend and I looked at each other, we ascertained that the guy was coming up to the museum. Great! The trip was not a waste! Our adventure panned out! Yes, we nodded to the cabbie, him coming to the museum would be great! The cab driver spoke to the owner, then proceeded to drive.

Wait. What? Why are we not waiting? Why were we moving? Where the crap were we going? After another interesting discussion, it was our NEW understanding that the cab driver was driving to pick up the owner of the museum. BAHAHAHAHA. WHAT?!

Yes. That is true. I have no idea how the guy would have gotten back but, uh, no. ix-nay on the free cab-bay ride dude.

We had the cab driver, who totally scored in the NT department with our ride, bring us back to the MRT.

We pacified the children for the lack of puppetry by feeding them  ice cream. They seemed to get over their disappointment.

I too will live through not having seen a puppet, though my disappointment is palpable. Yeah. Not really. 

So......Let's talk about disasters. Museum trip #2

Just when you have in the back of your mind that you are indeed an awesome, crafty and overall just spectacular mother because you’ve actually planned a day of fun outside of the apartment instead of staying “physically fit” by playing an interactive Wii game (which totally counts as an outdoor activity when it’s over 100 outside), God brings you back down to where you once again belong…AKA reality, and I am confronted with another Mom Fail. *sigh.

Enter Museum #2- The Fire Safety Museum.

It’s Earthquake week and I had been totally jacked up about visiting this museum. I mean, this place simulates natural disasters and how a person needs to handle and maneuver their way through them. Outstanding and Educational. What could possible go wrong..Right?!?!?!? Right!

Clearly sharing my excitement, Wyatt and I cab over to aforementioned museum and the lobby greets us with cool old fire trucks and a friendly Taiwanese guide who speaks pretty much 0 English. No biggie. Right?!?!?!? Right!

He brings Wyatt and I up to our first simulated disaster. Fire. Yes! This is going to be awesome!!!! I am putting all these exclamations into my sentences so you can feel the enthusiasm that I was trying to breathe into Wyatt throughout this experience. Why? Because in my gut, my mom gut, (where you just know the outcome of stuff, but then ignore it, because of overriding selfish desires and the belief that you must have indigestion), I knew that this was going to be an epic fail.

Soooooo- Fire- Yes! We watched the video first. It was a lighthearted film of how smoke inhalation is the leading killer and how you’re supposed to crouch down really low on the floor and stuff if you want to live. So naturally the first simulated experience was a narrow hallway filled with what appeared to be smoke but what I’m pretty sure was a fog machine?! I DID know it was not real smoke. (Mom Win!)

C’mon Wyatt!!! Why are you not on your hands and knees with mom crawling through this super creepy hallway filled with fake smoke?????

Um, maybe because he just watched that video where everyone about died and he’s 6?

Crap. Worst mom ever.

C’mon Wyatt!!!! (The door is closed…we need to get out…..) he’s not budging - he’s no fool. Yeah, so I basically carried him out, though I was having some anxiety about not crawling since I knew that's what we were supposed to be doing, all while the poor tour guide is pointing to the arrows near the floorboard showing us the exit.  We dutifully followed the arrows out and he pointed to the stairwell. The man kept trying to go through the tour and let’s just say things did not get better from this point on. Upon entering the earthquake floor I knew we were dunzo. Capital D. 

My son's terror aside, I was kind of disappointed and will definitely be returning by myself to complete the tour. I found it fascinating really. Wyatt said that perhaps when he’s 7 or 8 he’ll be able to handle this museum. I'm glad he knows himself well enough to figure out when he can mentally and emotionally handle it, since clearly I can't. The tour guide was exceptionally gracious and gave us 3 safety DVD’s, 1 of which was a cartoon that they showed before our early departure. I wasn’t sure how Wyatt was going to like it, but ironically he’s completely comfortable watching a cartoon man pass out from carbon monoxide poisoning and a cartoon family of 4 be schooled by Doo-Doo the elephant on how to make their home safe from electrical fires and earthquakes. 

NOW I have my very own Doo-Doo (read into that sentence as you may……) telling me how to make OUR home safe. (i.e. don’t bundle those cords mom! Don’t put that exhaust fan on! Are those outlets dusty?!) And for that I am oh so grateful. SOOO…mom win? Mom fail? Yes and Yes.

Museums across Taipei ...Take 1

Taipei Children's Art Museum

 

I have lived here about 2 1/2 years give or take some math, and I have never been to this museum. I kid you not when I tell you this place is like a 10 minute bike ride from my apartment. 10 minutes!!!! What a travesty. Ugh. Enough of the dramatics. We went, we toured, we liked, we will go again. In all fairness our guide (who was a newbie) said that the exhibits slowly change and transform over the course of the year. That makes me feel a tad better. I mean how much could we have missed?.....Anyway, one of the first sculptures we saw is the one pictured above. It was awesome. The sculpture if you look closely, (though some may be looking til the end of time and not see it).....is a baboon. Yeah. I had my suspicions as well,  but that's what the guy said and we believe what random art museum guys tell us right? Yeah. So Mr. Newbie says to Wyatt , "Can you pick out the objects that make up the baboon?" He asks this while pointing towards the head. For Pete's sake. The head is a $%&% tape deck. Holy Crap. My son has no idea what a tape deck is, and even worse, I had no idea how to explain it. Newbie( who was.... what? no more than 19 tops??) was like, yeah, they're pretty old..blah blah bah.....Shut UP!!!! Oh man. rough start to the afternoon. Eh Hem....BUT Moving right along..........This museum, this childrens’ museum was really cool. Wyatt was digging it, as many of the exhibits revolved around creating new sculptures, figures, objects out of re purposed items. Floor fans turned into rib cages, spoons transformed into mums….it was all incredibly innovative .To my junk sculpture king…well, he was transfixed. Mr. Newbie Tour Guide was fantastic with Wyatt- interactive, talking to him as if he were a smart, talented young man (which he of course is, how did that guy know that?)…Wyatt was engaged and interacting quite a bit. I was duly impressed to say the least. The guy had Wyatt looking critically at paintings and sculptures to see what he could find, decipher what the artist may have had in mind…and Wyatt responded with thought provoking answers. Again….color me impressed. 

Paper flowers

Almost like a play therapy room- All about colors. Wyatt had to pick where he wanted to put the furniture- in the cool, medium or warmer colored houses. Wyatt felt compelled to put the corresponding colored furniture in the same home- We have a man who is a rule follower.

More paper flowers

It was my understanding that children came up with the design, which was then executed by museum staff

It was my understanding that children came up with the design, which was then executed by museum staff

All paper!

The mirrors made this handmade forest look expansive!

Weekend trip to Kaohsiung

Great friendships are rare and to be treasured. As an adult, I know this to be true. At age six, factors of a great and meaningful friendship consist of compromise and if that friend will wield a pretend light saber in said six year olds' direction on demand. Hence, Wyatt has numerous great and meaningful friendships. We were lucky enough to spend Saturday-Sunday with one such friend and family in Kaohsiung. As a family, we had been here a couple times before and each time we have been lucky enough to see and do something slightly different. This trip consisted of a refreshing boat ride on the Love River and a trip to E-DA Amusement Park on Sunday. Hotter than Hades(being as we live on a tropical island, and it IS the beginning of summer) but doable seeing as a great deal of the rides were inside (read *smart). We hit up local food and a local coffee shop (a must!) along with taking a dip in the hotel pool (assumed obligation!) A great time was had by all...as evidenced by the pics below....

AAAAAAND......he's out. 

Let the Games Begin!

Here we go baby. HERE. WE. GO.

Wyatt actually said to me yesterday- Mom, do the days seem really long to you?

Really Wyatt? Then I thought-Crap. Did he hear me? Is he like reading my thoughts now? So yeah. I totally agree with him. And it’s only Tuesday.

Let me put this into perspective…school ended Friday.

Yup. That’s it.

The "schedule" oooohhhh.......

He will not watch TV all day. He.. will ….not…… watch TV all day. He…will….not……… Seriously though. He will NOT watch TV and play video games all day. Just a little bit of the day.  Momma needs a plan.

Last year Wyatt was in summer camp ½ the day and they had these themes each week, which he would get pretty pumped up about. I decided to snag this idea and had Wyatt come up with 7-10 different topics that he wanted to go over. Based upon his ideas, I fleshed out some craft, snack and museum opportunities, coupled with library time to check out books on the topic of choice. (FYI- Do you even KNOW how many museums Taiwan has? It’s crazy town. Ca-Razy). To put all this into context-let me share some of Wyatt’s ideas.

Venomous spiders, Earthquakes, Snakes, Earth, The Future , Mars,…….The Human Body- you get the idea. Having a theme gives me a bit of structure to build my days around.  Type A much? And to think all those years I fancied myself a B. Delusions of grandeur indeed……

I’m just saying- To wake up, flail around not knowing what we’re going to do just seems painful to me. Oh yeah- Did I mention that he has class from 8-12 A.M. for 4 weeks? So what’s your problem you ask? Um….I love my son, but he and I being like, the same person, we start to grate on each other a little. And by a little I mean a lot. 12-8:30 is still a decent chunk o’ time. It’s all good though. All moms out there- you are NOT a bad mom if you don’t entertain your kid 12 straight hours of a full day. I don’t just say that because I don’t and I want to make myself feel better. Kids need to self-entertain at times and not every minute needs to be packed with an activity. Whew! I feel better. …Even though I wasn’t writing that for me. I’ll keep you posted on how our weeks progress. As of now it’s raining, so the Dragon Boat festival is a bust which I’m simultaneously excited and bummed about. Rain wasn’t a part of the plan, but apparently I need to be flexible? Hmmmmm. Should I write that on the calendar?

ALSO- just in case you’re wondering- a craft spider with Styrofoam and pipe cleaners takes approximately 2.3 minutes to make and I’m currently pursuing my robotics engineering degree to build a mobile R2D2 from scratch. Yup. Happy Summer people. 

Yeah...so we fill the gaps in our day with a lot of this. I guess I'll have to increase my run time.....

Reading is Sew Hard.

I have kept a dark and dirty secret from many of you. In this case, I didn't say anything for a number of reasons. I am now, however, ready to let the proverbial cat out of my handmade bag. Yeah. You read that right. My handmade bag... Lost? Confused? Let me clarify. I took a sewing class with two of my girlfriends for five weeks. Yes. Feel free to re-read that because those of you who know me are scrolling up to ensure you're on the right blog, and those of you who don't know me may slowly be getting the wrong impression.

Let me break it down.

1. I love a challenge but I'm easily frustrated.
2. I'm not a quitter but I have no patience.
3. Sewing is no joke and my class was in Chinese.
Our laoshi (teacher) was lovely..and collectively we struggled to find the correct English/Mandarin to make three finished products.

At times the teacher and her assistant (probably for fear that my finished products would be attached to the quality of their shop) would just run the stitch or cut/measure the material for me themselves. While elated (am I really using this word in relation to sewing??) that I got out of measuring, the victory did not taste as sweet as when I sewed the stitches myself. Sure they were crooked and loose, but they were mine. A product of my hard work; not to mention sweat, a little blood and definitely a couple tears. I thought of this illustration multiple times as I watched poor Wyatt struggle with reading, writing and a number of other academic concepts this year.
Perhaps it's because he and I spend so much time together- or maybe it's the unfortunate result of being an only child. Regardless of the reason, at times I treat Wyatt as if he were a decade older. My expectation of his maturity level is met with the disparity of his six year old behaviors. With his natural charm, wit, sarcasm and charisma (not to mention his big ol' attitude), it's simple. I forget.
My kid is only six.

Let me break it down.

While a product of myself and Will- Wyatt's attitude? Mine. False confidence and big talk? Mine. Propensity to overcompensate with this big talk and cover up discomfort with sarcasm? Guilty again. Quick to frustration with a severe lack of patience? Yeah. It's humbling to say the least- and it's never pretty to see yourself in a six year old light. Lack of filters replete with LOTS of whining. Ga-Ross.

SO when my frustration begins to match his as he's making up 5 Ba-Jillion words that begin with the letter J instead of sounding out the rest of the $&%* word...I just need to take a minute. I embarrassingly can't tell you of the countless times our evening has been riddled with apologies for outbursts of anger that I've had at his lack of genuine effort. 

And then my mind flashes to sewing. @#*@! I get it. I totally get it- It sucks. The process totally sucks. The reward? The silver lining you ask?  The recognition in Wyatt's eyes the moment he finishes a book himself. It's the same feeling I had with that stupid bag. Thirty years later- bags, books, it's all the same. While it doesn't necessarily get any easier, it's worth it in the end. Seriously. It is.