My sister-in-law posted something on Facebook today indicating that it would be nice to have soft-spoken kids. That would be particularly nice right now, as her husband just started on the graveyard shift at a new job and three of her very loud kids are home all day. I don't have that specific (and, I'm sure, somewhat pressing) concern, but to some degree I feel her pain. My older kids get home from school at about 3:30, and once they get home, I never make any real attempt to listen to music, make phone calls, watch TV or videos, or anything else of that matter, because I can't hear any of it. Just their conversation-level voices are kind of absurdly loud, and the conversations are regularly pierced by yelling, shrieking, stomping, and, in Dylan's case, random high-volume bird calls or dinosaur impressions: "Hey Mom! I can sound like a peregrine falcon!! Reeeeeeeeh! Reeeeeeeh!"
And I'm thinking, "Why are you saying that loud enough to give a presentation to the outdoor group at the zoo? We're in a tiny livingroom and I'm less than 3 ft from you." I always knew they were loud, but I tried not to get too uptight about it, because, well, kids are loud, right? And since said sister-in-laws kids are my nieces and nephews (and other sisters-in-law have kids with this same traits), these little cousins were kids I spent a lot of time around, so the average got skewed in my head, I guess. A few years ago, people regularly started saying to me (other people who had large families and lots of cousins and ran daycares and all kinds of things like that), "Becky, your kids are really loud." Mind you, this was never said in a snarky or rude way, usually be said when kids were running around outside, and being loud was perfectly acceptable--it was always stated more as an observation than an expression of irritation or any other such things.
And its true. There will be 15-20 other kids running around, and mine will be the ones you hear above everybody else. There are days (living in a small house during a cold winter) when it makes me crazy, but for the most part I've learned to tolerate it on the worst days and embrace it on the good days. Their loudness is often just a part of the tremendous enthusiasm they have for most things that they do in life, and I love that about them, even if it is a little overwhelming sometimes.
I figure as long as they learn to be quiet when they need to be, when loudness is in appropriate, (and as long as nobody at our house needs to work graveyard) its nothing to be real concerned with. During Sacrament Meeting, they rarely make any noise at all (the exception being the occasional Keira or Kylie moment--they're still learning), because they know its a reverent place. During school, Keilana only talks or makes noise when it is appropriate to do, and though Dylan's visiting occasionally gets him a warning, he usually only talks when its his turn, and then at a sane volume. So if they sound like crazy Banshees at home and any time they're outside, so be it.
(P.S. Any time that Keilana is gone, the volume drops dramatically. If she's gone all day, the other three will play together all day, rarely getting louder than a dull roar, and even that loud is uncommon. This does not hold true when Keilana is at home and any one of the other children is removed. What can I say? The kid came wriggling, writhing and screaming, and she never got a lot quieter or calmer.)
And I'm thinking, "Why are you saying that loud enough to give a presentation to the outdoor group at the zoo? We're in a tiny livingroom and I'm less than 3 ft from you." I always knew they were loud, but I tried not to get too uptight about it, because, well, kids are loud, right? And since said sister-in-laws kids are my nieces and nephews (and other sisters-in-law have kids with this same traits), these little cousins were kids I spent a lot of time around, so the average got skewed in my head, I guess. A few years ago, people regularly started saying to me (other people who had large families and lots of cousins and ran daycares and all kinds of things like that), "Becky, your kids are really loud." Mind you, this was never said in a snarky or rude way, usually be said when kids were running around outside, and being loud was perfectly acceptable--it was always stated more as an observation than an expression of irritation or any other such things.
And its true. There will be 15-20 other kids running around, and mine will be the ones you hear above everybody else. There are days (living in a small house during a cold winter) when it makes me crazy, but for the most part I've learned to tolerate it on the worst days and embrace it on the good days. Their loudness is often just a part of the tremendous enthusiasm they have for most things that they do in life, and I love that about them, even if it is a little overwhelming sometimes.
I figure as long as they learn to be quiet when they need to be, when loudness is in appropriate, (and as long as nobody at our house needs to work graveyard) its nothing to be real concerned with. During Sacrament Meeting, they rarely make any noise at all (the exception being the occasional Keira or Kylie moment--they're still learning), because they know its a reverent place. During school, Keilana only talks or makes noise when it is appropriate to do, and though Dylan's visiting occasionally gets him a warning, he usually only talks when its his turn, and then at a sane volume. So if they sound like crazy Banshees at home and any time they're outside, so be it.
(P.S. Any time that Keilana is gone, the volume drops dramatically. If she's gone all day, the other three will play together all day, rarely getting louder than a dull roar, and even that loud is uncommon. This does not hold true when Keilana is at home and any one of the other children is removed. What can I say? The kid came wriggling, writhing and screaming, and she never got a lot quieter or calmer.)
1 comment:
funny, my kids are quieter when keith isn't around too. although, taking alexa out helps too being that she's ridiculously dramatic. it's not even that they're so LOUD, it's more that their voices carry. which will serve them well later in life. paul said he got sleep today, so hopefully we'll make it through this.
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