Lullabies

I ran into you drinking a glass of water in the bathroom. You said you were having trouble falling asleep. I jokingly asked if You needed me to come sing you a lullaby. There was a quiet, “yes”.

Once in your room, you said you had Mr. Rogers theme song stuck In your head. I sang that. And You Are My Sunshine. And Skidamarink. Your body relaxed.

I asked if that was good and got a sleepy, “uh huh”.

My heart is full tonight, sweet one. I love you.

14 Christmases

That's how long we made it before an Amazon notification on my phone for a present she got from Santa today confirmed her hunch. Not a bad run. I explained that nothing would change, but that she now got to help look out for ways to make Christmas magical for other people. She seemed ok with that, but a little sad to have the confirmation for herself.

Getting old

We had ice cream for dinner tonight. Turns out, it was too much sweet so you ate a chicken pattie instead. When dad asked what you wanted with it, you got excited about bread. When pushed for anything else, you requested...a tomato. 

"Do you think we have any tomatoes around here?"

Then you gestured at your head, "Who am I kidding? Of course we have tomatoes!"

There are about 10 pounds of them sitting on the counter. Fresh, from the garden. 

Given the choice between ice cream sundaes and chicken patties on bread with a tomato. I guess this shouldn't surprise me for the girl who once picked spinach over tater tots. I love you, kid. 

If wishes were horses

She ponders...I start to explain and she declares that she gets it. 

"Beggars have lots of wishes so if wishes were horses then beggars would have lots of horses to ride."

Yeah pretty much...

"And then the beggars could sell some of their horses and get money to get other things."

Annnnnnddddd not so much. 

Growing up

We've had lots of changes lately.

You got hit in the chest during gym last year. It made a knot. It went away. When you noticed it again, you were really upset because nothing had happened to cause it. Then we noticed it was on both sides. You cried in my lap for the longest time about how you weren't ready. Neither am I, sweet girl.

A couple of weeks ago, you ditched your booster in my car. You were tired of hitting your head on the roof of the car. The belt fits you with nothing under you.

You start middle school tomorrow (well, later today). I'm not ready. You haven't wanted to talk about it. You don't want to grow up. I don't want you to, either.

At the same time, I marvel at the person you are. You are witty, confident (with just the right amount of self-deprecating humor to balance it out). You are kind. You are loving. You still love to cuddle. You love Minecraft, and green, and Tinkerbell.

You are growing, and aren't. You're 'tween. And all of the reasons we call it that become clearer to me as we stay in this middling period. 

So many things and the thing I want you to remember most, always, is that I love you.

Molars

Lost her first baby molar tonight. It surprised her. She said it kind of scared her because it's been so long since she lost one. 

Empowered

We have talked about opting out of testing since you were little. You probably don't remember when it began. We talked about it in abstract terms - the Bartleby Project - and the changes to testing since Chrys and I were kids. 

When you hit 3rd grade, we began being more pointed about it. You were a bit nervous so we talked about how it wasn't about you, it was to evaluate the teachers and make sure that kids weren't falling too far behind. We discussed opting out of you were too nervous. You didn't. 

In 4th grade, we discussed it again. You had scored really well in 3rd so you were confident and decided to take them. The politics were changing a bit and we discussed that. You still thought it was the best thing to do. 

This year, we discussed it yet again. We talked about how ugly the politics behind it were getting. We talked about how we didn't know the right answer. We talked about how there was benefit to these tests because you are so much more confident about testing, in general. We talked about how you will see these kids of tests before college. We talked about how the teachers were slated to be impacted by these tests, how ugly the politics have gotten. You said you liked taking them. They are fun (such your mother's child - I loved them as a kid.) 

Then, as you prepared to get on the bus the morning of, you said you weren't sure any more. I told you, as always, that you were not obligated to take them. That you could change your mind up until you wrote the first answer. However, once you start, you must finish. I sent a quick email to the teacher hat you were undecided. He wrote back later that you had opted out. 

I had a flurry of emotions. I hoped you opted out for the right reasons, but I was worried about peer pressure. I wanted this to be your choice. 

You said you heard me saying that I wasn't sure I wanted you to take them. That's really about it. I wasn't sure. If you enjoy them, there is a lot tied to them. You score well and that helps the district. However, the climate around these tests has changed. There's more at stake, not necessarily for you, but for the teachers and the district. You were, notably, confident in your decision. 

You say you will opt out this week and not next week. That lets you take a stand and still lets you have fun. I think it's an amazing compromise. So much of what I see has become black and white and I marvel, sometimes, at the reminder of the shades of gray. This is a good solution. I applaud you for your actions. I am proud, every day, to bear witness as you come into your personhood. 

On body image and clothes not fitting

Today, she came to tell me that her shorts are all giving her wedgies. There was no shame. No mention of her body not being right. Nothing. It was all that the clothes are just too small because she's growing. 

I'm ready to cry because the conversation when I was that age was already shame riddled. 

Whew. 

The clue

Apparently I gave you a clue about the existence of Santa last year. I told you that we could take something back to Target if you didn't like it. You said this clue led to a question that led to a big conclusion. 

Tonight, we discussed and I had some arguments about how that wasn't a clue that you found acceptable. Nevertheless, the jig may be up after 10 years. I just hope you don't spoil it for your brothers. 

Specifics

Conversation with daddy about how lungs get oxygen. He decides to compare them to food on a table. 

Chrys: "You breathe in oxygen and other stuff."

RC: "and your lungs sort it out and put the other stuff back?"

Chrys: "No. Imagine you put 50 hot dogs and 20 cookies on the table. You don't want any hot dogs. How many hot dogs do you have to pick up?"

RC: "50 because you didn't eat any."

Me: "No no no. Not at the end. While you're eating. How many hot dogs do you have to move or pick up to get your cookies."

RC: "Oohhhhhhhhh. Zero"

Literal. For $1000 please. 

Feedback

"The butterscotch ice cream told me to tell you that you should bring it to the store"

That was her comment on the Ben and Jerry's Factory Tour sample. "Beam Me Up Scotchy" is a Waterbury exclusive flavor, but so yummy! Butterscotch ice cream with chocolate chunks. Amazing!


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Dream home

In class, they are working on building a city. This week's assignment was to draw their dream home

Chrys: "What are those things on top?"
R: "It's a castle."

He processes that those are the decorative turrets at the top. Understandable.

C: Points at the bottom. "What's that?"
R: "Well, it's not a basement. It's not really a dungeon. But there are prisoners. And here is a FUN slide down. The prisoners cannot get out once they have slided (sic) down."

At that point, he stopped asking questions.



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Routines

She has really latched on to the routine at the new house.  She has some specific times that things need to happen and I give her countdowns to those times.  It works really well most days.  Today we were running a couple of minutes late, or the bus was a minute or two early, and we had to separate at the middle of the driveway instead of the end (because I couldn't keep up).

She gives me three kisses and hugs every day when the bus gets here.  One for me, one for Corin and one (with the kiss on my belly) for Thing 3.  Every morning.  It's really sweet.

She has developed more patience and maturity lately.  One day, she asked for a pencil for her backpack so she could start doing her homework on the bus.  She finishes it every afternoon during the 45 minute bus ride.  She was mad at me on Wednesday for picking her up because her homework would have to be done at home.  We compromised and did it in the car in the driveway and she still finished 15 minutes before she would have been home on the bus.

Discussing the experiment to see which was faster was enough to calm her down.  She didn't need to keep fighting because she knew she could prove she was right or be wrong and still come out ahead.

We forgot to do her book report this weekend.  I suggested she take it on the bus this morning and she loved that idea so it's in her backpack.

The level of maturity and responsibility that comes with aging is remarkable to watch unfold.  Now, if I could just get her to clean her room...

Big sister skills

Ryanne was outside playing with Corin and their friend Marshall today.  Corin was swinging a stick at her.  It was 5 or 6 feet long.  One of the times the end hit the ground, she stood on it.  Corin couldn't make her budge.  He was dragging the stick along with her standing on one end.  Eventually, he got frustrated and dropped it.

At that point, Marshall threw a ball in her direction.  She picked it up and threw it off the deck over the railing, away from both boys.  They ran to get it back.

She bought herself 5-10 minutes to stand in the sun and write notes on her pad without starting a single fight.  I think her big sister skills are coming along just fine.

On the other hand...

Math apparently sucks.  She is having such a hard time with the degree of addition and subtraction they are requiring at school.  It has not clicked for her.  She's not seeing the short cuts.  She's not seeing the self-checks.  Tonight there were tears over finishing a worksheet that she didn't get through at school.

I tried to explain that reading wasn't always easy for her, either.  She worked at it and one day it clicked.  I told her math would do that eventually, but she has to keep working on it.

I don't think she believes me.

Reading awe

To top off the school's difficulty in finding her 'perfect book,' she finished the last book of the Harry Potter series a few days ago.  She has now moved on to some of Gail Carson Levine's books.

I am in awe of her desire and ability to read.

Principal's office

She gets in the car on Thursday and I, as usual, ask how her day was.

"I went to the principal's office twice."

Turns out, this is horrifying to hear.  Even when it's rather unceremoniously announced.  It wasn't a big deal to her.  I didn't think it could be for something bad.  At the same time, she wasn't exactly volunteering information.

"...uh...for what?"
"For reading"
"...uh...What were you reading?"
"My perfect book"

At this point, it clicked a little bit.  The teacher had said something about them getting their 'perfect book' this week.  Something that they don't totally understand, but understand most of and can learn from.  They were having her read to find her perfect book.  Apparently this involves the teacher and the principal listening to her read and asking her questions.  I guess it's a nice way to get them comfortable with the principal and take the negative connotation I have out of the principal's office.

She is the only one in her class that she's aware of that had to go twice.  Apparently the first time she understood all of the books they gave her.  The second time, they found one that she didn't completely comprehend.

She wasn't very willing to talk about it (nothing new), but I got bits of information out of her by just continuing to talk about it as we discussed other things.  Chrys wonders if she finally got bored with it.  It doesn't sound like she did.  She is proud that they finally stumped her.  I am *very* curious to see what that means.

Texas policy was that they couldn't test them beyond a maximum for their grade level so I have truly had no idea what level she actually understands.  She has maybe 50 pages to go in book 7 of Harry Potter at this point so it's not that she has trouble reading things.*  She can explain things in the movies based on data from the books when Chrys asks her questions so she seems to grasp most of what she's reading.  Nevertheless, it will be nice to have a better understanding of where we should be pointing her.

*Even if her pronunciation of some of the words is wrong, she understands what they mean.  The best example was 'conjure' which she understood to mean creates, but she pronounced 'con - jhoor'.  It's been impressive to see her progress.

On another brother

We had our 'big' ultrasound for Thing 3 on Wednesday.  It's a boy.  There were many tears shed by the girl that has wanted a sister for 5 long years.

Thursday morning, she walks in and throws herself down on my bed.

R: "Mommy, what happened to all of the girl sperm?"
M: "I have no idea, sweetie.  No idea."
R: "Why couldn't they get the directions right?  Why didn't they beat the boy sperm?  Are they lost somewhere inside your body?"  (The stream of related questions was seemingly endless.)
M: "I don't know, sweetie.  Nobody knows what makes some sperm get to the egg better than other sperm."

She keeps going with the questions until I advise her to take it up with her daddy.  Then she walked away, defeated and sighing.  Poor kid.  Too much knowledge of human reproduction can be a bad thing...

On safety and television

Ryanne was up making her bed this morning.  Corin wanted to turn on the fan.  We discussed how it wasn't safe right now because she was sitting up.  She listed quite a few things that could get hurt by the fan with her sitting there.  I added a few more.

Corin then asked if we could do it when she was laying down.  I said no because she didn't always lay perfectly flat and we didn't want her to accidentally sit up and get hurt.  She said wiggled down to the end of the bed and looked over the rail out her door, "Yeah, and sometimes I get distracted by Chuck."

Looking at the angle...that requires some impressive acrobatics.

Slow down, little one

Ryanne decided she wanted egg salad for breakfast today.  I told her there were four hard boiled eggs in the fridge.  She got them out, peeled them, sliced them (with the egg slicer) and then came to ask for help getting spices.  I put salt and dill in it because she still has some trouble controlling the flow of those and I didn't want to have to throw it out because it was too salty.  She grabbed a spoon and the mayo and put some in the bowl.  She didn't want to stir it up so I got to do that.

Now, she's happily eating her creation.  One of her major comfort foods.  It took me a while to realize that it was a comfort food for her.  I guess all of those Fridays eating it in Japan really stuck.

I'm still not sure I'm ready for her to be that self-sufficient, though.