Waiting for the other shoe....

I haven't really posted about the whole preschool transition thing for two reasons:  as usual, I am totally swamped with work & life AND it has gone so smoothly that I'm waiting for it to suddenly be more like I expected.  (I am furiously knocking on wood, throwing salt over my shoulder and biting my tongue as I type this, by the way.)

The first drop-off, I kind of hovered for 5 minutes, but Charlotte was totally nonchalant.  When I kissed her and said that I was going she was like, "Uh-huh," and kept investigating the kitchen/real life play area.  Whatever that's called.  I explained to her that I'd be back soon, and that her little pony was in her backpack if she needed something from home to cuddle.  "Bye, Mom," she said.

It's been like that every day.  She's not into transitions, which took me by surprise, but shouldn't have.  I'm the same way.  I lament and worry and freak-out into the lead up to a big change.  (And so did Charlotte.)  And then when the time comes, rip off that damn band-aid!  So while I was sort of surprised that Charlotte was shoving me out the door, I probably shouldn't have been.

First day of preschool!

September 7, 2011

Twas the Night Before Preschool...

preschool supplies - tiny buddy from home, extra clothes, a million papers, snack money

Charlotte and I were talking at bedtime, and she said she's a little scared about starting preschool tomorrow.  "Why?" I asked.  "What are you scared about?"

"Well," she said.  "I'm scared that what if I am dressing up and I dress up like a scary monster and all the kids run away and I'm a scary pirate and I say 'Argh!' and all the kids hide?"

"You could try not dressing up like a scary monster.  Like, maybe try to think if what you are going to do or say might be scary to kids, so then don't do it," I suggested unhelpfully.

"What if I go to the dress up clothes and put on a scary bear costume and growl at kids?  And then they all run away and get in their cars and go home and then the teacher comes and it's just one kid, and I push back my bear hood and she says, 'Where is my class? Where are all the kids?' and I just say, 'I don't know?'"

Ummm.....I think someone is a little nervous about making friends tomorrow.

QOTD - Mama's a good cooker

"This burger is SUPER AWESOME!"

burger = crispy tofu, with cheddar cheese and bacon on a hamburger roll, with a little honey mustard.  She asked for it again today.

One of my earlierst memories is of waiting out a tornado in a basement....

So, this happened today.  Earthquake 5.9 in Virginia, felt all the way up and down the East Coast.

Here's what I posted on Facebook:

I felt that! Charlotte was "napping" and said, "What just happened?"

True story: At first I thought that I might have been passing out because the couch was shaking, and I thought it was me. Then I noticed the light fixture swaying and heard the bedroom door rattling in its frame and wondered if the upstairs neighbors were having a party. THEN I realized it was an earthquake.

And then Charlotte dragged out one of her books and opened it up to the page that said, "...the whole house began to shake..." and pointed that line out to me & Michelle. 

Charlotte, meet the Atlantic Ocean. Atlantic Ocean, meet Charlotte.

cell phone picture dump

evening walk

making a "nest" from clay & pine needles

as a family, we suck at skee ball

not really playing - she can't reach the pedals

taking bitty for a walk

Charlotte of Green Gables

waiting for hot dogs at Tom's Long Dog

making spider webs

making pizza

QOTD: Frustration

"But WHY is it raining?  Everyone wants to hula hoop!"

QOTD: Charlotte on wearing dresses

"This one had two big pockets.  I do not prefer to wear pants."

The other side of almost 4.

A lot of people talk about "the halfs" being the worst - for example, it's not the terrible twos, it's the terrible two-and-a-halfs.  Three is great, but three-and-a-half is hard.  Charlotte loosely follows that, but I would go so far as to say that it's not really every six months, but just every now and then we go through a really rough patch.  The benefit of having an almost 4 year old, and a blog, is that I can remind myself of how it happens and how we come through on the other side.

Another thing that gets talked about is how there's always a backslide before a growth spurt or intellectual leap.  Again, that's something we've seen for ourselves, too.  (I don't know what to call this "people say" thing - it's not quite an old wives' tale, or common knowledge, or whatever, but it's just a thing.  As the Dothraki would say, it's just "It is known.")  I'm hoping that Charlotte is building up to something, because here's what the last week has been like:

• At Gavin's birthday party this weekend, she had a really hard time understanding "No" and "Those are Gavin's presents."  She did fine with this at the last few birthday parties we went to, so it could be party fatigue, or something different.
• Charlotte has fallen on her face more in the last week than in the last 6 months.  
• Sleep issues.  She was up for 4 hours in the middle of the night last night, and up at 8:30 am this morning.
• Increased arguing and "talking back."

This is all a phase, this too shall pass, etc, etc.  It makes me feel better, though, to find a pattern and reassure myself that this is all going on with a purpose.  Charlotte's impulses are wacky because her body is changing or her brain is processing, and our girl will come out on the other end, in a month or so, and blow us away with what it means to be the parents of a four year old in pre-school.

almost 4

Drama-rama

Miss Drama is off at her grandparents for the weekend, but I'd like to note this from the other day.  One of the things our very wordy daughter does is to make up stories almost constantly, and narrate herself.  Some of it is cooking show type stuff when she's playing in the kitchen.  "And now you add the carrots and the ginger.  Smell that ginger!"  And some of it is trying to talk her way out of something.  "I was just blowing bubbles in my milk.  Boys and girls like to blow bubbles in their milk."  The other night was particularly hilarious.  Well, the overall situation was not hilarious; Charlotte was pushing every single button she knows how to push with her Daddy, and that is saying a lot.  Stubbornly refusing to listen or clean up, she ended up getting all sorts of things taken away - no stories at bed time, no extra toys in bed, no outside play time.  When it was finally bed time and her room was clean, Matt rocked her in the rocking chair for a few minutes, and she narrated the whole thing to herself, out loud.

"And tears were rolling down her cheeks....because she would never have her toys, ever again."

A few more pictures from June.

Sometimes Charlotte still naps.
But not without creating catastrophe first.

A Cars tableau.  Complete with Lightning McQueen in the top bunk.

Charlotte's nursery.

The Girlie-fication of my daughter

art

C wearing her "friendship necklace" from J & B

Packed for Grammy's.  All those bags are full of blocks.

Midsummer Update

Charlotte facts:

In an effort to sound authoritative, she sometimes says, "Boys & girls need X," or "Boys and girls want more Y."

 

She tells Matt, "cut it out" when he sings along with things.

 

She has an invisible imaginary herd of "brothers & sisters"

 

She cries when it's time to leave the pool.

 

She can spell STOP and GO with her alphabet magnets

 

She is *so* into the hobbit right now.

 

Every time we go to the library we get a book on the ocean/seashore/shells/creatures

 

She loves books on tape, we think she's trying to teach herself how to read

 

Finally started playing with "babies"

 

Can (mostly) get herself dressed & put on her velcro shoes. (Matt got her the right socks, ankle socks, instead of her regular Old Navy & Carters crew socks.)

 

Copied from my Facebook status:

 

6/28 - Things that happened today: I made a tutu for a barbie and my kid pirouetted to Tchaikovsky.

 

6/28 - ...and we just had our first instance of barbie alteration. I caught Charlotte coloring Barbie's hair with a marker. She's in trouble because we only color on paper, but I can't fault her argument. "I didn't want her hair to be golden like Rapunzel anymore. I wanted it to be red or purple."

 

6/26 - I heard Charlotte's door open this morning and went over and said, "Good morning, baby, how are you?" 

The first words out of Charlotte's mouth this morning were, "You speak very well."

 

6/26 - Charlotte, on watching a tiny bit of a football movie - "Football is like Angry Birds. They crash into people like Angry Birds. And pigs. And they are mad."

 

 

6/25 - Nice morning running errands together, along with an imaginary, invisible Rapunzel. At one point, Charlotte was trying to hold my hand, hang on to her teddy bear, and hold Rapunzel's hand, too. I pointed out that Rapunzel is 18 years old and capable of crossing a parking lot by herself.

 

6/21 - Charlotte is greatly enjoying Flock of Seagulls "I Ran (So Far Away or Whatver The Hell My Title Is You All Know Which One I Mean)." It has spurred a request for "rock and roll that makes my hair shake." Nice.

 

6/20 - Today's too ambitious for Monday project: Charlotte is making a spider web with Elmer's Glue & yarn

 

6/19 - About to take Charlotte on a firefly hunt! In the car - there are no good fields within walking distance & a sidewalk. (Also, I don't think she has any more room on her wee little body for mosquito bites.)

 

6/14 - Charlotte keeps saying, "I need to get to Paris!" She's also already packed for a weekend at Grammy's - 4 tote bags of blocks and a purse full of woodland creatures. I wonder if she's confused...

 

6/13 - Charlotte wants a CD player that plays records. She just showed me a catalog with the "vintage" Fisher Price record players, and pointed to it. "I want the CD player that plays those CDs, like Lilo."

 

6/13 - Charlotte is *very* into wearing dresses lately. It's not a girlie thing - it's a "no pants" thing. She finally realized there's a workaround.

 

 

 

Easter

This weekend.

Playing with her cousin, G.

Drawing. Note the tongue.

Charlotte, Mama, Daddy

Surprisingly self-aware.

The day we had, copied from Facebook:

* Epic tantrum today. Over an hour of whining, crying, screaming, writhing on the floor, and boogery hiccups. AND she's still in her pajamas. I have a hard time not laughing at her sometimes, is that wrong?


* To Charlotte's credit, she was honest with Matt when he came home and asked her how her day was. She said, "I spitted on the couch, and then when Mom put me in time out I screamed...I did not do a good job today." Matt told her that he thought she should give me a hug and kiss, which she did, and spontaneously added, "I'm sorry I made you upset today."

cell phone pictures

Big kid.

I must post this stuff right now so when the shoe drops next week I will be able to remind myself of how awesome Charlotte did this weekend.

It started on Friday; even though Charlotte got very little sleep on Thursday night (let's not talk about that while we're in a good mood) she rocked it at physical therapy.  She did everything Arlene asked her to do, even the stuff that was tricky or exhausting.

Saturday morning we went out to Troy to see my stepsister, her husband & their daughter.  He's in the military, and is being stationed in North Carolina.  They move later this month from New York to North Carolina, so we wanted to get the girls together before that.  We went to the Childrens' Museum of Science & Technology in Troy, continuing our theme of science museums, I guess.  Charlotte handled the car ride out and back like a pro, and has really gotten this using public restrooms thing down pat.  She does hate the air dryers, though, especially the automatic ones.  Charlotte was so excited to see her cousin, B.  B just turned two back in February, and she was adorable and pretty well behaved also.

One of the things that impressed me the most about my kid is that there was a little wildlife presentation where a museum employee had different wild animals that the kids could touch.  Despite never having been to pre-school or day care or church school, Charlotte understood the whole "circle time" concept.  She picked up a carpet square to sit on, put it away afterwards, and even raised her hand and said "Excuse me!" to get the adult's attention.  AMAZING.  Plus, she sat with her legs out straight and her toes pointing at the ceiling, which must have seemed weird to the museum staff, but that's the way Arlene is always asking Charlotte to sit.

Today we had a major cooking day, cooking a bunch of new recipes to make a crazy elaborate (for us) dinner.  It was Matt's idea & project, and he made sure to get Charlotte involved nearly every step of the way.  She was with him grocery shopping, she prepped all the herbs, and even used the chopper attachment to make the herb paste.  She tried every single thing on her plate, even stinky cheese and mashed potatoes!  (Charlotte is weirdly opposed to mashed potatoes, I can't figure it out.)

I seriously had such a blast with her this weekend.  Three and a half years old seems like such a huge difference from three, and I'm enjoying the ride.