Birthdays and sass and school!

Happy Birthday Rick!

Last Saturday was a big day at our house - RICK'S BIRTHDAY!  Rick had to work the overnight before and came home early on Saturday morning.  Dashiell had decided that daddy needed a surprise party, but we had to wait until he was napping before we could go out to get our party supplies.  D was a little confused and thought we were going to wait until Rick woke up so we could all do a "family errand" to get the requisite birthday swag, and kept telling Rick about it so, well, it wasn't much of a surprise!  But it was nice anyway - we bought a cake, a balloon and some flowers and Dashiell drew a couple of pictures for him.  And we had cake for breakfast - yum!  Happy birthday, Rick!  I hope you had a great day!

Little Miss Sassy

Aurelia is so plum-full of personality these days that all I want to do is take pictures of her!  While trying to get a good picture of her in a Slim's t-shirt (Slim's in a bar in Bemidji that was owned by a friend of mine who recently passed away), she kept on giving me this funny "duck face" look.  Should I be worried?  Already so sassy at such a young age? 

She is also turning into an accessory fiend!  Always has to have a hat, and LOVES putting on her shoes.  Possibly because she knows that hats and shoes usually mean going outside, which is always more fun than inside.  But it could just be that she looks good in a hat.  Who knows what her motivation is!

She also learned a good knock-knock joke from her older brother:

Knock knock?
Who's there
MOOOO!

(for those who don't have a 5-year-old, that's the "interrupting cow" joke, with the "interrupting cow" part of it removed for brevity).  She tells this joke over and over and over again.  Hilarious!

School adjustments
I think Dashiell is finally adjusting to this whole kindergarten thing.  Last week, after a day or two of the new school, you could tell something was just off with him.  He's a sensitive kid to begin with, but he had become even more sensitive, crying at nearly nothing, more tired than usual, complained of stomach aches every night, etc.  He did come down with a little, low-level virus over the weekend, so that could have been part of it, but the bigger issue seemed to be school.  When trying to suss out what the problem was, a few things came to light:  First, school breakfast (free for all Lowell Public School kids) never serves anything he likes, and he was feeling pressure from his teacher to eat something every day.  I think he was feeling like it was a rule.  That he had to eat something every morning (fyi, he already eats breakfast at home).  I had to explain to him that they want him to try to eat something so he doesn't get too hungry before lunch, but if he doesn't want to eat no one will force him to eat!  I suggested taking something every day, trying it, and if he doesn't like it he doesn't have to eat it.  I suspect that since the school system is receiving a grant to provide these breakfasts, they want to be able to show that the program is being used, therefore just by taking the food he's "helping" to keep the program going.  So now that's what he does, and I think it's less stressful for him.  He is a bit bummed that the muffins that they serve aren't "safe" (no one can verify that they are always nut/peanut free and they don't want to take any chances).  My boy does love a good muffin.
The second problem that came out was the drop-off.  Dashiell was so nervous about the drop-off that it was making him sad every time.  That problem has worked itself out, now that he's been in school for almost 2 weeks.  He's more comfortable with it and we haven't had any tears for a few days now.  Whew!
The third problem is all about the "rules".  He told me last night that he was having a hard time remembering all the rules (sit up straight in your chair, sit cross-legged on the rug, play on the blacktop outside, etc.) and that his teachers had to remind him of the rules all the time.  Now, for my little rule-follower, that's a big deal.  He wants to follow the rules.  I think he thinks he's being judged harshly for not following the rules.  So we had a good talk about it.  I assured him that he's teachers don't think he's a bad kid, and they know that it sometimes takes kids a long time to remember all these new rules every year.  When they are reminding him of the rules, that's all they are doing - reminding him.  At some point he'll remember the rules and they won't need to remind him, but until then they will help him out by letting him know what they are.  He seemed relieved to hear that, so hopefully he's now a bit less stressed out about that, too!
Glad my kiddo is feeling better about school!  I know he'll love it once he's really in the swing of things, and it seems like he's finally getting there!