Two quick stories....
Apr. 3rd, 2010 05:55 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
conuly
The other day I was putting Evangeline down for her nap. She's started taking one again as she's growing and she URGENTLY NEEDS ONE every day. She doesn't always like it (the first few times I managed to trick her into sleep, but she's caught on), but she goes down anyway.
And as I'm snuggling her prior to the nap itself I call her "ducky".
Evangeline: I don't like when you call me ducky. It's too much like an animal.
Me: Oh, sorry honey.
Evangeline: I don't like when you call me honey.
Me: Sorry, sugar.
Evangeline: No, not sugar. And not hon-
Me: Sorry, pumpkin?
Evangeline: No!
Me: Sorry, cookie?
Evangeline: No, no foods. No cookie, no pumpkin, no sugar.
Me: Muffin?
Evangeline: That's a food, Connie.
Me: You're right. I'm sorry, pookie.
Evangeline: That's too silly!
Me: I'm sorry, shnuggly shnookums.
Evangeline: What? NO!
Me: I'm sorry darling.
Evangeline: That's okay. Just call me darling.
Me: Sweetie?
Evangeline: No, just darling.
Me: Angel?
Evangeline: No. That's too much... it's already in my name!
Which it is. Evangeline. So I just snuggled her and sang to her a bit and she nodded off and fell asleep.
Edit: She just came down. I told her I was typing about how "you're cute as a bug". "Connie. Bugs aren't cute."
So, now, this is awesome. But, some backstory.
Waaaaay back a few weeks ago at Parent Teacher Night, Ana's teacher revealed that she's below par when it comes to writing. This is because she won't write, not necessarily because she can't at all. And what came of this that concerns me is that she's now doing her journal first thing, and writing five sentences instead of three (and longer ones too if I can make her).
I'm a little annoyed that the teacher never told us that the expectation for the daily journal had changed. And I'm more than a little annoyed that we haven't been able to convince her to cave on the "write about school" concept. Ana doesn't want to write about school. And I agree - it's boring day after day! But she still has to, you know, do it.
So every day we've been doing her journal first thing instead of putting it off (which sometimes resulted in no journal getting done - it's such a fight!) and I've been sitting down with her and writing out an outline (with her input) before she even starts to write. And this has been helping. There's less fighting (although there's still a lot of "my stomach hurts, I need to pee, I need to eat, I need to read, I need to sharpen my pencil, find my pencil, eat my pencil...." every day).
Well, she has to write in her journal during the break too, of course. Thursday she had to write in her journal (five sentences) and also two or three sentences about the famous woman of her choice. (She picked Wilma Randolph.)
I'd pranked them on April Fool's Day, you know. Nothing major - I taped up their door with paper and stuck balloons behind it so they fell out when they opened the door, and I let them have cereal but I dyed the milk purple in the carton. So she wrote about that.
And managed eight sentences without whining, fussing, fighting, or even erasing very often! She was surprised! She'd had no idea she'd written that much!
And me, I was just that proud :)
Well, we're off to dye eggs.
Tell me - when I dyed the frosting for the cupcakes for the bake sale, and when I dyed the milk, I mixed red and blue food dye. That should make purple, but it made a kinda grayish purple. Not too appetizing. How can you mix up a real, purply purple with food dye? Is it possible? Do you have to use better dyes?
And as I'm snuggling her prior to the nap itself I call her "ducky".
Evangeline: I don't like when you call me ducky. It's too much like an animal.
Me: Oh, sorry honey.
Evangeline: I don't like when you call me honey.
Me: Sorry, sugar.
Evangeline: No, not sugar. And not hon-
Me: Sorry, pumpkin?
Evangeline: No!
Me: Sorry, cookie?
Evangeline: No, no foods. No cookie, no pumpkin, no sugar.
Me: Muffin?
Evangeline: That's a food, Connie.
Me: You're right. I'm sorry, pookie.
Evangeline: That's too silly!
Me: I'm sorry, shnuggly shnookums.
Evangeline: What? NO!
Me: I'm sorry darling.
Evangeline: That's okay. Just call me darling.
Me: Sweetie?
Evangeline: No, just darling.
Me: Angel?
Evangeline: No. That's too much... it's already in my name!
Which it is. Evangeline. So I just snuggled her and sang to her a bit and she nodded off and fell asleep.
Edit: She just came down. I told her I was typing about how "you're cute as a bug". "Connie. Bugs aren't cute."
So, now, this is awesome. But, some backstory.
Waaaaay back a few weeks ago at Parent Teacher Night, Ana's teacher revealed that she's below par when it comes to writing. This is because she won't write, not necessarily because she can't at all. And what came of this that concerns me is that she's now doing her journal first thing, and writing five sentences instead of three (and longer ones too if I can make her).
I'm a little annoyed that the teacher never told us that the expectation for the daily journal had changed. And I'm more than a little annoyed that we haven't been able to convince her to cave on the "write about school" concept. Ana doesn't want to write about school. And I agree - it's boring day after day! But she still has to, you know, do it.
So every day we've been doing her journal first thing instead of putting it off (which sometimes resulted in no journal getting done - it's such a fight!) and I've been sitting down with her and writing out an outline (with her input) before she even starts to write. And this has been helping. There's less fighting (although there's still a lot of "my stomach hurts, I need to pee, I need to eat, I need to read, I need to sharpen my pencil, find my pencil, eat my pencil...." every day).
Well, she has to write in her journal during the break too, of course. Thursday she had to write in her journal (five sentences) and also two or three sentences about the famous woman of her choice. (She picked Wilma Randolph.)
I'd pranked them on April Fool's Day, you know. Nothing major - I taped up their door with paper and stuck balloons behind it so they fell out when they opened the door, and I let them have cereal but I dyed the milk purple in the carton. So she wrote about that.
And managed eight sentences without whining, fussing, fighting, or even erasing very often! She was surprised! She'd had no idea she'd written that much!
And me, I was just that proud :)
Well, we're off to dye eggs.
Tell me - when I dyed the frosting for the cupcakes for the bake sale, and when I dyed the milk, I mixed red and blue food dye. That should make purple, but it made a kinda grayish purple. Not too appetizing. How can you mix up a real, purply purple with food dye? Is it possible? Do you have to use better dyes?
