When I was a girl, I would get so frustrated that adults never seemed to understand what it was like to be a kid. I wondered how come, if adults had been children also at one time, did they not remember how it feels to be a child? I promised myself that when I had children I would be different that I would remember how hard it was to be a kid and treat my own kids the way I would want to have been treated.
Well what happened??? Please someone tell me where I left my memory because I have lost it somewhere along the way...
I find myself with the desire to see things from Madison's perspective but I can't fathom dropping my parenting standards in order for her to always get what she wants. As a (step)mother of course you want your child to have what they wish for and to be happy, but somewhere along the line from being a child yourself to becoming an adult you realise just how unrealistic your childhood wishes were! You realise that for your child to be truly happy you have to sacrifice their immediate happiness for long term happiness. You can't just give your child whatever they want because after all it will never truly satisfy their desire for more and more and more, and ultimately they will end up unhappy when they realise life isn't going to always be served to you on a silver platter. My desire is for Madison to grow up to be self sufficient, confident and satisfied with her life. I would be terribly sad if she grew up to be the opposite, because the opposite of those things is unhappiness.
I realised again on Friday (very firm believer that you can fall in love with your kids over and over every day!), when I picked Madison up from school, as she approached the car and our eyes met, she gave me the warmest smile and my heart melted. As hard as being a step mum is (loving someone else's child who will never truly appreciate the sacrifices you make for them and still only be second best in their eyes) its moments like that that really reaffirm that you are doing the right thing, you are heading in the right direction, that she loves me even if she doesn't (if that makes sense - to any stepmum it would).
I didn't have to give her anything material or do anything for her to get that smile. It was a genuine "happy to see you" smile. It was worth the investment.
Saturday, 30 July 2011
Wednesday, 20 July 2011
Emilie's drawing/writing abilities at 18 months
Emilie and I have read books together since she came home from the hospital. She absolutely loves me reading to her and I love it too. She sits on my lap while I read and my cheek against hers as we look at the book together and point out different things happening in the pictures.
Her favourite books at the moment are Cars, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Dear Zoo and My First Prayer. She will sit for ages looking and "reading" a book. We go to the library every Wednesday morning for Story Time (a librarian reads a story book, then the kids do a craft activity relating to the story). Emilie is the youngest there but she LOVES it!
Emilie has enjoyed "drawing" since she was able to hold the pencil to the paper. At first she would scribble back and forth unintelligibly. Then a few months ago she started "writing" where she would draw little tiny scribbles that look like W or M (letters) and she would recite "A, E, A, A, E, E" as she wrote them (like she was spelling out her words as she went along).
Emilie and I practise writing her name - I hold the pencil over the top of her hand and write each letter and spell it out as we go. E, m, i, l, i, e - EMILIE! "Emilie!" we exclaim when her name is written! She can spell out her name as we go along (but only if I am spelling it out with her, otherwise she says something like, E, M, I, M, E, M etc).
She can recognise a capital E and if she sees an E on a sign she will point it out to me and say "EEEEE!"
She has recently learnt to say her own name and she uses it a lot to describe something that is hers, or to indicate something about herself
"Emmie ouch", "Emmie car" or just pointing at any word and proclaiming that it says "Emmie" LOL
Just the other day, as I was watching her draw, it struck me that Emilie can draw faces! We have been drawing faces together for a while now (my hand ontop of hers and saying the facial features as we go - for example, "A biiiiiig round circle for a head, one eye, two eyes, a nose, a mouth, one ear, two ears and some spiky hair!"
Of course the faces that she draws on her own are very abstract at this stage, but each face has a big circle for a head, facial features and sometimes they have hair or ears (or both!) Sometimes when she is drawing her faces, she will say what she is drawing at the time - "Eyes, Ears, mouth, hair, nose" which is so cute to watch and surprising at how much she knows where features of the face belong from her own recall - for example when she draws ears she always draws one on each side of the head, right where they belong. Other features can be a bit of hit and miss though, sometimes the mouth is above the eyes, or there can be three eyes etc.
Here are a few of her masterpieces:
Here is today's video of her drawing faces (she is not narrating this one - I'm yet to video her doing this but everytime I turn the camera on she stops!!!)
Hope you enjoyed watching!
Her favourite books at the moment are Cars, The Very Hungry Caterpillar, Dear Zoo and My First Prayer. She will sit for ages looking and "reading" a book. We go to the library every Wednesday morning for Story Time (a librarian reads a story book, then the kids do a craft activity relating to the story). Emilie is the youngest there but she LOVES it!
Emilie has enjoyed "drawing" since she was able to hold the pencil to the paper. At first she would scribble back and forth unintelligibly. Then a few months ago she started "writing" where she would draw little tiny scribbles that look like W or M (letters) and she would recite "A, E, A, A, E, E" as she wrote them (like she was spelling out her words as she went along).
Emilie and I practise writing her name - I hold the pencil over the top of her hand and write each letter and spell it out as we go. E, m, i, l, i, e - EMILIE! "Emilie!" we exclaim when her name is written! She can spell out her name as we go along (but only if I am spelling it out with her, otherwise she says something like, E, M, I, M, E, M etc).
She can recognise a capital E and if she sees an E on a sign she will point it out to me and say "EEEEE!"
She has recently learnt to say her own name and she uses it a lot to describe something that is hers, or to indicate something about herself
"Emmie ouch", "Emmie car" or just pointing at any word and proclaiming that it says "Emmie" LOL
Just the other day, as I was watching her draw, it struck me that Emilie can draw faces! We have been drawing faces together for a while now (my hand ontop of hers and saying the facial features as we go - for example, "A biiiiiig round circle for a head, one eye, two eyes, a nose, a mouth, one ear, two ears and some spiky hair!"
Of course the faces that she draws on her own are very abstract at this stage, but each face has a big circle for a head, facial features and sometimes they have hair or ears (or both!) Sometimes when she is drawing her faces, she will say what she is drawing at the time - "Eyes, Ears, mouth, hair, nose" which is so cute to watch and surprising at how much she knows where features of the face belong from her own recall - for example when she draws ears she always draws one on each side of the head, right where they belong. Other features can be a bit of hit and miss though, sometimes the mouth is above the eyes, or there can be three eyes etc.
Here are a few of her masterpieces:
Here is today's video of her drawing faces (she is not narrating this one - I'm yet to video her doing this but everytime I turn the camera on she stops!!!)
Hope you enjoyed watching!
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