Perhaps too specific

Me (as Corin tries to jam his fork into my hand): "Corin, we don't stab people with our forks"
Ryanne: "Mommy, what do we stab people with?"

No vegans here

Today we were in the car driving along. Ryanne announces that we need to go catch a rabbit. I looked, understandably, a bit confused.

"Why do we need to catch a rabbit?"
"So we can cut it up into small pieces and cook it and eat it."
"..."
"We need a big net so we can catch lots of rabbits to cut up and cook and eat."
"... Ryanne, do you know where beef comes from?"

Yeah...now she wants to know why we don't have a cow so we can have more beef.

Five years

This one seems so momentous. She's 5. She's so independent.

She had her 5 year well check today. She's 43 inches tall and 41.6 pounds. She's just above 50% on both height and weight, but still tracking well. Definitely no risk of being overweight on that one. The doctor asked her a bunch of questions and she answered them all without issue.

They had a bit of miscommunication about the slides at the park, though. The doctor asked if they had a slide that swirled around. Ryanne said they had one that was a circle and one that was part of a circle. I think the doctor was talking about the top down appearance. Ryanne was discussing cross-section. I don't think the doctor got it.

While we were there, Ryanne started gnawing on her knee. The doctor didn't notice because we were talking about other things. I pointed it out. Chrys and I mentioned that she still bites and chews on just about everything. The doctor said she probably has some sensory issues. She'll prescribe occupational therapy as soon as I figure out which of her recommendations takes our insurance. Honestly, I've seen this coming for a long while. It's kind of nice to have the opportunity to work on it.

She did her first urine test. We got to answer lots of questions about what on earth they were going to do with her pee. Oy.

Four was more. She was more everything. I'm curious to see what five has in store for us. I can see we've still got some work to do on listening and human interactions so she's not going to hurt others. All in all, though, she's more sympathetic, more attentive, more aware of her surroundings.

Oh, and did I mention she could read? We're most of the way through the first BOB collection - short vowel sounds and consonants. She's into longer sentences without issue. Crazy.

She's still at the Y in their Mother's Day Out. She seems happy. They're working on doing more things, more complicated things, because they have some older kids this year. There haven't been any fights. I just don't think we can do summers there again. The academic year with continuity and curriculum is fine. The more open play of the summers is just hard on her. Lesson learned.

On the body

Recent statements regarding the human anatomy:
(Pointing at her wrist) My blue vines need more batteries.
(Pointing at her neck, concerned) My heart is in my neck!
(After daddy talked to her and calmed her down) Everyone has lots of hearts in their necks, fingers and ankles.

Apparently daddy had explained that oxygen in the blood was like batteries and that blue blood meant it needed more oxygen. She simplified.

As for the heart, she discovered her pulse on her own. Daddy explained that it was a pulse and told her about the other pulse points. More simplification.

She rocks!

Fail...

After 2 days of how well she was doing, how it seems to be working, how they love her...they had an email complaint this morning that Ryanne had bitten someone during recess yesterday. Ryanne says she didn't, but I watched her almost bite another kid at pickup so I just don't know. She admits to trying to scratch someone because he pushed her. They say he bumped into her and she did scratch.

That reminded me that we had problems when she transitioned to the Y 2 years ago. She bit someone the first week and then stopped. I told them that. I didn't remember it before because it was so long ago and not a continuing problem. She bites at home all the time, but she doesn't do it at school.

After 10 minutes of what a doll, we've loved having her, what does she think, they explained that they didn't think it was working because of the outbreaks and the fact that she's fidgety at the end of circle time. She's right on target for her developmental age, but that age isn't 5. They invited us to try again in January, but I don't know that I will and Chrys absolutely doesn't want to, at least not there. We've already dealt with the Little Gym that labeled her as a problem at the outset and we don't want to risk that again. I took her with me, early, much to their surprise - which I don't get because I would think it would be harder for her to finish out the day with the rest of the class and *then* learn she's not coming back.

I, embarrassingly, cried. She's so, so disappointed. So much for working to fix a problem as it says in their materials. And they kept saying how they don't like surprising people with things, but this was a hell of a shock after the feedback for the rest of the week. Damn "trial week" getting her and my hopes up because, no matter how much I tell her it's a test, she doesn't get that they're testing her, too. This week has been so wonderful with her waking up, eager to go to school.

I don't know what to do. She needs something. *I* need something. The Y doesn't cut it for us anymore because I can't fight her to go everyday. I don't know if our pocketbook can take Montessori. I don't know if I want to send her every day. I guess I need to find some of the part time Montessori schools and see if any of them still have a spot.

Most of all, I'm totally pissed at a school's ability to make me question my knowledge of my daughter. I *know* she's ready for this, but in 15 minutes they made me think I was wrong. Damn them. Damn biting.

First day

Today, Ryanne started Kindergarten.

I had spent the summer wrapping my head around the fact that I couldn't find a good way to get her into K early. That would leave me with trying to entertain her in other ways this year while she stuck it out at MDO. It wasn't easy to do. I had tried many avenues and my best bet was a school that might take her after a mock day in the second week.

Last Thursday, I got a call from Austin Home Base (aforementioned school). They had her teacher evaluations. They thought she looked like a good candidate. They wanted her to start on the first day. She would have a trial week starting immediately and, based on that, a decision would be made about the rest of the year.

Her first day went well. She presented her endangered animal (manatee) to the class. She was on par with her peers.

It is only three days a week. They are longer days than she's used to, though. She was *tired* tonight. She'll have homework to do on the other two days. It's a nice, gradual entry, while we figure out what to do about next year.

I think I'm still shell shocked. I didn't have time to prepare for her to start. On the one hand, I didn't have time to get myself all riled up. On the other, I don't quite have my head wrapped around her being at such a major milestone. *sniff*

Spatial awareness

For Father's Day, Ryanne decided that Chrys wanted Legos. He hasn't played with any Legos in quite some time. She got him a fire boat that floats and has an engine that can be submerged in water. It's all about the cool and unique parts for him so she picked well. They spent Corin's naptime putting it together. Well, Chrys laid out pieces and helped and Ryanne assembled.

She did phenomenally. She needs very little guidance on the simple sets.

I got another one for her at Target on Sunday. It's a fire truck from the City series. I think it and the boat are part of the same set, but I haven't looked it up. We've been working on it for two sessions now (nap and bed time for Corin since he likes to eat pieces).

She's putting it together with only a suggestion or two from me. This is not an easy task. I still struggle with spatial issues to this day so the fact that she can conquer this at 4.5 is amazing to me. She doesn't get frustrated. She studies the picture until it makes sense. She's learning to do the piece closer to her and then match the other side if it's a mirror thing. I am in awe.

I guess I'll be keeping an eye out for more of the younger age Lego sets. She seems great with the 5 and up sets right now. I haven't tried 6 or 7 and probably won't rush it.

Lost in translation...

We got Ryanne the books Pinkalicious and Purplicious.

She likes Pinkalicious. We've talked about how important it is to vary your diet, how you can't eat just one thing, etc. She's got it.

Purplicious, on the other hand, seems to have missed its mark. It talks about how all the other "big" kids liked black and Pinkalicious tried to fit in, but then discovered that she could still like pink because it was special. We loved that it talked about maintaining self-identity. She talked about how much she loved pink.

Now her favorite color is black. Pink is apparently for babies.

Through Ryanne's eyes

For Christmas, Ryanne got a digital camera. It's nothing fancy, but she asked for a camera that takes real pictures and this one does. She loves it. It eats batteries so I'm not totally in love, but it's fun to see what she likes to look at.

Thanks to the love that is iLife '08, I can now share them with you...

Here are her recent shots. I think some of them are actually by daddy, but they were on her camera.

Observations on independence

Ryanne's use of description for words she doesn't know absolutely amazes me. Last night she declared that she saw "the guacamole seeds in the guacamole wrappers." We had avocados. I guess she doesn't eat them plain all that often...

She is also becoming very good at asking for help. At Christmas, she asked someone to help her find Christmas wrapping paper, but she didn't know wrapping paper so she asked for something about the paper that you use to hide presents and the lady figured it out and helped her. Then she went to check out, even though I told her I wasn't ready. It was amusing.

Another store trip, I forgot to get wipes for Corin. I mentioned it and, without asking, she took off looking for them. Turns out, she didn't quite remember, but knew to find someone in a green apron (we were at Whole Foods which is pretty small so I wasn't too worried about her wandering off) and ask for help. She did and he walked her to the wipes and then back to me.

She orders her own food at restaurants and, now, gets pretty upset if someone asks me what she wants. She'll be ready for college next week.

Ladies and Gentlemen...

We have a reader!

Today at Costco, we looked through the books. They happened to have collections of the BOB series from Scholastic for a ridiculously low price. I bought the first boxed set.

Tonight, we opened it up. Ryanne read the first two books and part of the second one to me. By the time we read them to daddy the second time, she was using the picture clues with the words to read instead of having to sound things out.

The third book presented some problems. She didn't know the word rag. She had some trouble with the "r" sound - she wanted to put h in front of it.

Nevertheless...She read! Two books. Simple books, but ... holy crap. I almost cried.

I had told Chrys, a couple of months ago, that I would put money on her reading by summer. He seemed incredulous at the time. That gives her a couple of months still to get some of the sounds ironed out. I think he's glad he didn't take the bet.

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On kids

Ryanne has decided she doesn't want a brother any more. This led to a discussion about how mommy and daddy wanted two kids and she's stuck with him now. She wants to send him back. I assured her he probably felt the same way sometimes.

However, when she grows up she's going to have four kids in her belly. They'll be named Marshall (wonder where she got that), Namma, Colika and Namma. There are two Nammas; she's very specific about that.

Apparently Corin should have the same number because she's decided that there will be 10 kids - her four, his four and then the two of them. I decided not to delve into the whole she better not still be a kid when she's having kids thing just yet.