I have found it’s difficult to keep up with your child’s learning progress after they hit the major milestones. For awhile there, it was one after the other but now Emma is almost five and not so much to report on. The questions are endless and we have conversations more like this one today:
E: Can S go to the Y with us?
Me: No, she doesn’t belong to the Y.
E (very confused): She doesn’t belong??
Me: Right. You have to pay to go to the Y. Her mommy and daddy don’t pay to go but me and Daddy do.
E (thoughtfully): Ohh…that’s what it means to belong?
Me: Yes, we are members of the Y. We pay them money to go and they give us a code so we can go exercise. Have you ever seen my type in my code?
E: No. Well, how do you pay? Does the bank pay?
Me: Yes, the bank pays them every month for me so we can be members.
E: Oh.
Things are really clicking with her. We’re not getting away with too much anymore. It used to be I could come up with lame excuses to not do things and get away with it but not so much anymore. Silly things like, “Can we go to the park?” I answer “No, it rained today.” At some point in her life she would have been like ok. But now it’s like, “Well, it rained earlier but the sun is out now and it’s probably dry.” Stuff like that. She made me and Scott laugh yesterday after church. I asked her what she learned about in Sunday School. She has excellent teachers that really work on a story every week but I wasn’t expecting this.
Me: What’d you learn about in Sunday School?
E: Paul
Me (sort of shocked–that’s no Noah’s Ark story): Really? What did you learn about Paul?
E: He wrote a letter to the church.
Me (that made me giggle, but I thought I’d press on): Do you remember what church? Was it Corinth?
E (shrugging her shoulders): I don’t know, just a church.
Whew, I thought she was going to surpass me in Bible knowledge by age 5 if she had answered that question.
And while I’m at it, I’ll give a few more “Emma updates”. She continues to improve on her writing. We haven’t worked much on her reading lately although she was asking to last night…note to self–need to do that tonight. She is STILL having potty issues. She has been out of her medicine now for a few weeks and I’ve been a bad mommy and not refilled it. I honestly don’t think she needs it. I think she knows when to go, just will not do it. If we catch her, we make her go but otherwise, she still uses pull-ups for #2. I KNOW she’s almost 5. Trust me. I plan to talk to the dr about it again at her checkup. She is the most tender-hearted child I’ve ever met. She gives up toys for her sister in a heartbeat and always makes sure everyone has what they need. She’s concerned about where people are and what they’re doing and of course why. She has a fabulous imagination, most often playing with small people/animals and making them interact. She is still loving computer games and does everything by herself. She even got Scott to spell noggin so she could go to noggin.com by herself since it wasn’t in the favorites yesterday. She’s still quite the cuddler. She always wants someone near her. Especially at bed time. Lately she has requested I sing “Agnus Dei” when she goes to sleep and likes to “just talk” before she goes to sleep. She’s definitely a people person when you get to know her but is still extremely shy around strangers. She reminds me of me and my dad a lot in that regard. Not sure what else to report on, as I said, the milestones are harder to quantify and report on. She’s my big girl and I’m still trying to prepare myself for her being 5 in a few months.