I'm not a Soccer Mom or Welcome to Chug Mommy

Eden loves her new gan. On the way home yesterday, she told me, "Mommy, Racheli is nice" (Racheli is her new teacher). The afternoon teacher is also excellent. In the great tradition of gan, we don't hear very many details, aside from "Eden was wonderful today. She played so nicely." Or from Eden, "I had fun today. I played in the sand with Ariel and he went like *that* with the sand (hand going dramatically UP, so much so that you can see the sand flying in the sky) and it was in my eyes and I didn't cry because I'm a big girl and it was fun." Great Eden.

Oh and that she told her teacher that she has a baby brother named Amit at home. Also a winner.

The very fact that she comes home happy, is excited to go the next morning, and even tells me about things that she learns is really all I need.

It really helped that she went with 4 kids that she knew - 3 from her gan last year, and one from the neighborhood and shul. Two of them are her "best friends" - they've been good friends for 2 years of gan now, and it looks like they have at least another 2 years ahead of them. They will probably end up attending the same elementary schools as well. They play a lot at gan and visit after gan as well.

So to bring this post home a bit (I've been wandering) her two friends are taking a ballet chug together. We thought about signing Eden up for a chug (extracurricular class) this year, since this is the year that they start them, and a lot of her friends will be. Granted, I didn't know that her two friends were signing up, or maybe I would have thought differently, but we actually made a concious decision not to sign her up for anything.

I'm starting to get those bad parent feelings - am I depriving her of an early start on English by not signing her up for an English chug? Or on being in touch with her body for not signing her up for dance? Am I stimulating her enough for her age - will she be able to keep up with her peers who are all attending chugim this year? Will she be bored if she wants to play with a friend and we can't find any - because they are all at chugim? Is this really what is best for her?

Honestly, I have to say that I didn't completely have only her interests at heart - I was also thinking of me, and our little family. Its all I can do to come home ~5 ish, cook a decent supper, clean up a bit, have dinner together with Eden and Ben, spend time together and get Eden bathed and to bed before she falls apart. Sometimes I have time for a short errand, but it really depends on how we are all feeling, often we are all tired and hungry and a bit cranky. Sometimes I have to stay late at work and I have Ben or his mom pick Eden up. I really can't see myself to committing to being at a specific spot in the afternoon every week, or see us committing as a family to a weekly lesson after 5.

I don't remember doing anything of the sort when I was little. Granted, when I was Eden's age, I was in a very part time preschool, and was with my mom for the rest of the time. But when I was older, there was no going out after school, unless it was for school. After school was time for homework, supper, family. Time and place and situation have completely changed, but the idea really is foriegn to me.

Eden does often help me with supper - there's a "cooking chug" there. Sometimes we play with arts and crafts - another chug there. And sometimes (ok rarely, at least with me), we turn the music on loudly and dance together - there's her dance chug. Its all completely flexible, up to whatever the two of us feel like doing. We visit with friends. We've gone to the park. Sometimes we go shopping. All in all, we could call it Chug Mommy. Not so bad, I think.