Daddy and Xander are having quality Dora the Explorer time. Daddy has more success than most people getting Xander to interact with the show when they ask questions.
I decided to start teaching Xander "yes, sir," and "yes, ma'am." I think his dad will like it when he starts doing it regularly, and it will probably give him major early-preschool-brownie-points with his teacher. The woman really does work hard with a room full of three-year-olds at various stages of development. Half the time she says Xander did really well, but the other half of the time the reports have been, "had an accident," "moody," "did not want to share," "was upset to stop cleaning up," "holds his crayon wrong," and "I've been trying to keep those shoes of his tied all day long." I'm not making him sound like the little angel I believe he is, am I? Oh well, they are probably all his parents' fault and we do work on them at home. I think of this one morning a week at preschool as a laboratory to see what he needs to work on. Back to the "yes, sir," "yes, ma'am," training: He thought it was fun at first, but the sparkle quickly wore off. So I made up a sign for "sir" and "ma'am" because there are no generally accepted signs for those terms in ASL. I do the "yes" sign and then point to my left eyebrow for "ma'am" and my right eyebrow for "sir." He loves it, and responded correctly when I signed to him to answer "yes, sir," after his dad asked him to do something tonight.
We got Xander's voluntary pre-kindergarten certificate last week (after two trips and about 45 minutes in line) to bring to his preschool on Monday morning. This is our first official school registration for our oldest child and it makes me feel strange and sentimental.
Nick's drool was dropping like water balloon bombs today. You could hear it splat on the floor. I hope he's getting another tooth or two soon because then his different behavior these days can be blamed on teething.
Xander just answered Boots and Dora by calling the red path "rojo." But this morning he told me he was counting in Spanish and then proceeded to count from one to ten in English.
I helped Xander finish some valentines today by gluing pieces of a beautiful watercolor painting he made to the back of pink papers that had his "X" on them. I had laid out the watercolors, his paintbrush, a paper, and a jar of water and went to take my shower. I know, I'm very trusting. I also left out his pencil box that had some markers and colored pencils in it. When I got out, I saw that he had made a couple of magnificent bright paintings by taking the colored pencils and dipping them in the wet watercolors and then "painting" with the pencil tips. I had not told him he could use the pencils, but I had not told him he couldn't, and the pictures were so beautiful I just praised him when I came out and showed him how he could do something similar with a toothpick.
Just one more story from today: I put Nick in his playpen for independent playtime this evening. He is now able to take his toys out of a basket and enjoys doing that very much. So I put one basket of toys in with him as well as his soft ball and car toy. I left to finish up dinner.
Xander came running up to me giggling and talking about one of Nick's books.
"Did you help Nick by giving him some more toys to play with?" I asked on a hunch.
Giggling. "Yes."
"I bet he likes that," I said.
"Yes," said my little giggle-monster.
I went to check out the situation and found Nick lying on his back in the middle of every single toy and book from his room. He was having a wonderful time. It reminded me of Scrooge McDuck diving into his piles of gold, or a dragon lying on its treasure.
Xander is now reading a Bob book to Erik. Almost nothing makes me happier than hearing that.
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