Smiling Mom

What is it about daugh­ters and their dads? Dad walks in and his daugh­ter goes crazy! God truly gave something spe­cial to Dads when he crea­ted them.

Hubby was able to join us at swim­ming les­sons today, the first time this ses­sion. eClaire, who is usually very quiet in new and uncom­for­ta­ble situa­tions, was about as vocal as I’ve ever seen her! eClaire LOVES the water, and always has. But there is something she loves more, her Daddy. So put those two things together and you get an inc­re­dibly joy­ful little girl. Our swim ins­truc­tor, Joey, just kept laughing. He couldn’t believe the trans­for­ma­tion in eClaire today. She shrie­ked, laughed, boun­ced, and swam for about 50 minu­tes, baf­fling all of us. Just thin­king back on it makes me smile.

There’s just something about Dad­dies… I know mine, still to this day, can tell me anything, give me any bit of advice, make any sug­ges­tion, and I take it more seriously than I take anyone else’s thoughts. Dad­dies hold a very spe­cial spot in their daugh­ters hearts. Dad­dies, the­re­fore, have a very big res­pon­si­bi­lity to guard that love with their life.

More pic­tu­res to come…

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This past week Hubby and I had the oppor­tu­nity of chec­king out three dif­fe­rent preschools in our neigh­borhood. Appa­rently you need to apply in the win­ter in order to get your 3 year old into a ‘good’ preschool for the follo­wing fall. So we, of course, jum­ped on the band wagon. We loo­ked at Cha­llen­ger School, Strat­ford, and St. Stephens.

We weren’t too impres­sed with the pre­sen­ta­tion and school site for Cha­llen­ger. The prin­ci­pal just didn’t sell the school all too well. St. Stephens was a great school, and close to our house. Since BC is sho­wing signs of being an early rea­der, and St. Stephens only focu­ses on one let­ter a week in the 3’s and then again in the 4’s pro­gram, it wasn’t what we were loo­king for either.

Stratford’s web­site, in my opi­nion, left a lot to be desi­red. The pro­gram is not well defi­ned online, the site is dif­fi­cult to navi­gate. It also seems quite imper­so­nal. But, when we went to the school, we were very impres­sed! The curri­cu­lum is well orga­ni­zed, class­rooms clean and new loo­king. Kids see­med happy, focu­sed, and all see­med enga­ged in the acti­vity in which they were doing. We put in our appli­ca­tion and now have to wait until the middle of March to see. Funny, how we are pra­ying that a preschool will accept our appli­ca­tion. Who’d of thought?

Sun­day was such a dif­fi­cult day. eClaire cried for just about the whole. When she wasn’t crying, she was taking unu­sually long naps. I sus­pect that she is either teething, still, or gro­wing. Either way, it was hell. We also had the plea­sure of atten­ding my friend’s daughter’s 4th birth­day party at Chuck E Chee­ses, a fun kid spot. The com­bi­na­tion of eClaire’s dif­fi­cult day and all the exci­te­ment and amount of peo­ple left her tur­ned upside down.

eClaire gene­rally is quite clingy in new situa­tions. I always, now that I’ve figu­red out her per­so­na­lity, hold onto her for at least 10 minu­tes or so before pas­sing her off to anyone else. She gene­rally warms up if I res­pect her time­ta­ble. Well, Sun­day was a dif­fe­rent story. eClaire threw a tan­trum that las­ted 20 minu­tes or so, arched back, head flin­ging back­wards, screams like I was attemp­ting to abduct her… It was awful! She didn’t want up, she didn’t want down, she didn’t want her blan­ket. I was temp­ted to reins­tate the “nur­sing game” right there on the spot! The looks I got from the parents who didn’t know me or eClaire were priceless.

Ove­rall, I think I tried to do too much with eClaire on Sun­day. She, when fee­ling down, simply does not like large loud set­tings. Now I know.

After get­ting the kids to bed, I sat down with sha­king extre­mi­ties overwhel­med and glad the day was over. How do I manage two kids 18 months apart? I pray to God that one of them is obe­ying while the other one melts down. Sun­day I was lucky. BC was being a great hel­per through this whole ordeal. Today was a new day!

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Ok, I know that title is a bit ridi­cu­lous, but don’t you think your chil­dren are the most spec­ta­cu­lar, ama­zing, and won­der­ful things God crea­ted… most days? The last mor­ning Non­nie was here, BC and Non­nie colo­red pic­tu­res and wor­ked on cut­ting with scis­sors. Non­nie was colo­ring her own pic­ture of eClaire, BC, and our dog Kayla, and BC his own pic­ture. BC said, “Look Non­nie, a lady, with a head.” The crazy thing, it was a lady, with a head. See above pic­ture. My 2 years, 8 month son drew exactly what he said he did. Ama­zing! I bore a genius.

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