Active Imagination

Rosalie took these toy buttons and put them on her eyes and said, "Look, sunglasses!" Naturally, out came the camera. After I took a shot of her, she asked me to be in a picture also, so I turned on the camera timer and she handed me some buttons.


The teachers at Ballard Berry Patch are so great. They wrote a transcript of Rosalie's description of her painting the other day:

"There's a hippo and a choo-choo that comes out! In the tree...It comes out! By a red bus and it goes BUMP. Come back, choo-choo! Close your eyes!" 2/19/1

Stairs

Rosalie's clearly happy to be so safe! This post is really about me, though: I carpeted these basement stairs all by myself (with Stan's guidelines ahead of time, of course).

It was supremely gratifying to save us some money but I also really liked doing it -- especially since I could do it while alone. 'Cause let's face it: I'm sloooow. You wouldn't want to hire me to carpet your stairs, especially at an hourly rate; you might as well remodel your kitchen with that money.

Note to Stan: I wrapped the individual stairsteps and at the last minute made oblong "caps" at the end of the steps. It doesn't look the cleanest; I might trim it a bit to look more like they are part of the same piece. I'll probably also do the triangle parts on the side there, like you mentioned. Now that I see it in this photo, I think that it would look better that way.

Fighting Fires

This morning Rosalie's friend got a "time out." Naturally, he was very upset. Therefore, Rosalie was upset. She was on my lap and requested, "Rosalie get time out too?" She started over to where her friend was sitting and we had to explain that time out is a time for being alone...she was bummed.

Later on, she was playing with two toy dinosaurs, and she put one of the dinosaurs inside a lego structure. "Oh no! Dinosaur in time out! Sleeping!" she said. Then she had the other dinosaur come and bring the time-out dinosaur out of the structure, "saving" him. It was almost enough to make me cry! She continued on with the dinosaurs, working through in her mind other things that had gone on during playtime.

I heard her working through other events in the car the other day. She was saying "Bounce chair. Bounce chair," a whole bunch of times. Then she said, "Not safe bounce chair. Bonk head. Ouchy." I asked Rosalie, "Did you bounce in a chair at school today?" "Yeah. Bonk head," she answered, in a delightful display of toddler honesty. Then she added, "Not safe."

Now, don't get me wrong...it's not like she totally remembers this lesson all the time, but today she was about to do something unsafe on her friend's couch, and I just said, "Rosalie-" and she got down fast and said, "Oops." Oh. So cute.

Final one: out of nowhere she blurted "Hold hands, cross street, George." in a cautionary tone of voice. It sounds like (according to my subsequent interview with her) every single person at school--even George--did hold hands crossing the street...but the teachers must have had a serious talk with the kids about it that day. Or maybe George forgot for a minute. Oops.

I sure wish I could be a fly on the wall at school, but these impromptu glimpses as she recounts her day are pretty great. Imagine that: she actually learns things at school.

Happy Valentine's Day Numero Dos

We had a nice, non-Valentine's-Day kind of day today. Lots of time spent outdoors, lots of playing-in-the-park time. Thanks to a portion of that park time, I had the chance to experiment with empanadas and chocolate-dipped coconut macaroons. The rest of the family got to eat these treats, so it was a happy day all around. After dinner Rosalie got a valentine from her secret admirers! Check it out:

Rainy Day Fun

I'm not sure when Rosalie started knowing the word "crown." Yesterday during a bored moment, I said, "Wanna make some crowns?" and was prepared to translate it by saying, "Wanna make some hats?" (which is what she used to call them).

But she affirmed. "Yes. Crowns." I did the cutting and structural taping, and she did the decorative taping and stickering.

We spent the rest of the afternoon with our crowns on. It lent an air of dignity and ceremonial splendour to the day.

The other evening we were getting ready for bed and Rosalie noted that she had a penguin on her pajamas. She informed us: "Penguins waddle. Like this." She hopped up, straightened all of her limbs, and sure enough did that tell-tale penguiny weeblewobble walk for us. Like I said, this was just before bed, so she decided that she wanted to penguin-waddle up the stairs. This provided some mechanical challenges. How to actually step UP with such short penguin legs? She solved the problem by taking a human step up, doing several quick waddles side to side, stepping to the next stair and giving that some good waddles...

...and this was going great for the first 4 steps. Then she started getting antsy. Her waddles got more slapdash and speedy, till finally she would go up a step, then move only her head wildly side-to-side like a bobblehead, go up, bobblehead, go up, bobblehead. Walking behind her and witnessing this, I barely got up the stairs myself from laughing so hard. I wish you could have seen this.

It Takes a Village

When Michael and I first considered having kids, we decided that it would be ideal if one of us could stay home with them. Now that we have one, I think it was the right thing for us...but recently I've noticed, as I have dropped Rosalie off at a babysitter's house or at a drop-in care facility, that Rosalie thrives and thrills in new situations independent of us. She kisses me goodbye contentedly and makes no fuss at all.

So I've been thinking that we'd be standing in her way if she didn't get at least SOME preschool experience, and soon. Enter Ballard Berry Patch. This is a new preschool daycare that seems like exactly what Rosalie needs right now.
She gets:

2 experienced and kind preschool teachers.
small class size
Curriculum(!!) with weekly themes
her own plot in a garden in the backyard
a beautiful venue (the preschool's in a house setting)
a chance at the end of the day to review the day's activities--with photos taken from the day!
"field trips" to places like the library
varied & organic snacks and meals

In fact, there was a meal waiting for her today when she came in for her first day this morning!

Wow.



These teachers seem organized and passionate about what they do. I am very impressed. I also am impressed by how they talk to the kids. Plus they didn't mind that I came in and took pictures when I dropped her off!

I won't lie: my heart is heavy right now. I miss our little girl already. She was so breezy about saying goodbye--the beads were very compelling, after all. But we can tell that this is one of the best gifts we could give Rosalie. And it is just a couple of days a week at this time. Plus, it gives me a chance to get some much-needed work done. For example, I'm teaching a cooking class this Friday, and there's much left to do.

I sometimes wish that we lived in a society where Rosalie could have this multi-kid and educational experience, and I was nearby doing my own work. I could look up from my cooking and she's over there with other adults and kids and it's just normal. What is up with all the isolation in child-rearing??? It doesn't make any sense to me. Anyway, having her at the Ballard Berry Patch (and having my own mom friends/kids come over to play often) feels like the next-best thing to a village. Okay, off to finish lesson plans for a Spanish menu! I wonder what our cutie pie is doing right now...