Monday, December 16, 2013

Weekened Happenings

We cooked, we cleaned, we braved the snowy, blowy roads for a trip to Grams (she’s only three miles away, remember.) Some of us even shovel the driveway and sidewalk. Take a guess which one of us did not…

I finally, FINALLY, finished cleaning the toy room. I think I started that room in July when I decided to paint the closets. That toy room has been cleaned many, many times in the three years we’ve lived in our current house.

But see, this time around was different. I didn’t just pack the toys in boxes and stack the boxes nicely in the corners. No, this time, I went through every single box/toy box/bin in the room, keeping only what the girls actually play with, tossing random toys that no longer go with anything else.

I also boxed up a lot of toys the girls have outgrown. These boxes will either be donated, passed on to others or sold at some later garage sale Tom insists we’re someday going to have.

What was left was organized into the bins and closets and now we have a room that allows the kids to actually see what toys they have, so they can actually play with those toys.

Olivia found an ancient LeapPad, we put in new batteries and she played with that thing for hours last night, pausing only long enough for me to read some books to her, one of which was called I Can Button. It is a tiny little cardboard book with a couple of straps of fabric that lace through holes in the pages and each page has a different character that needs something buttoned such as a belt, a coat, a seat strap.

O worked so hard buttoning that button on each page. I showed her a few tricks at first but she wanted to do it herself each time. I was so proud of her tenacity. She was determined to do it and she did.

Watching her work so hard, giving her small tips on how to make it easier reminded me of something a chiropractor told me during the months I was taking Olivia before she started walking. She’d just started crawling at that point and during one of the appointments, he was showing her how to crawl a little more easily. He put her on the floor, moved her hands and knees for her and then he stepped back and let her do it herself.

She did exactly what he’d shown her. He smiled and said, “She’s got great muscle memory, she just doesn’t have any instinct for doing these things on her own.”

She can learn. She wants to learn. And she remembers what she learns. But my girl’s muscles have no instincts of their own.

Knowing this makes it easier for us to teacher her things she needs to know. I knew she could master that button but I also knew she needed help right at the start.

She took that book to Gram’s this morning to keep practicing.

Alyssa did a lot of reading this weekend because we declared Saturday to be a No Computer Day. Which meant none of us logged on for the entire day. Alyssa balked at first but then picked up a book and quickly forgot that she was mad.

We baked some sugar cookies (store-bought dough, I know, I know) on Saturday and then made frosting for them on Sunday.

Laundry was finished by 6pm yesterday. All is well.

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