Sunday, February 01, 2015

Meg and Kate updates

Meg is five years and one month old, and she can read on her own. She knew letters and sounds at two, so I was confident it would come eventually, and for the past year or more she has been putting the sounds together laboriously. I am pleased to report the skill is here. No printed matter is safe - she'll sound out chalkboards, packaging, web pages, yarn labels. "What does that say? Wool----spun."  She can follow along the song overheads at church, which coincidentally makes her more likely to sing and less wiggly. (YES!) She is reading the species names on all her animal puzzles and books. (Yes!) She reads the Dick and Jane books to herself, because she likes them and I don't. (Yay!) She reads board books to Kate. (Yahoo!) So basically this development is thrilling to me.

Jonathan read Meg the first chapter of The Phantom Tollbooth and distressed her by shutting it without putting in a bookmark. She was astonished when he opened it right back to the correct place.
"Daddy, how did you do that? Are you MAGICAL?"

Meanwhile, while Meg reads everything that will hold still, Kate has started moving. All. the. time. She goes everywhere, grabs everything. She pushes dolls around in the doll stroller (she loves dolls), pulls all the books off shelves (she loves books), drags things off tabletops (Mommy's toys are so interesting, and is that coffee?). She climbed up onto the couch by herself (she loves the couch!). She brought me a whole pile of craft paper (because paper is so cool), having located the drawer, opened it, and helped herself. She's learned to wipe her nose with a Kleenex and trot over to throw the dirty one in the trash, which is adorable, and also I keep the Kleenex up high now.

This afternoon Kate mysteriously appeared all wet, and we thought perhaps she'd gotten Meg's water bottle? The dampness just smelled like water, so we weren't too worried until I went to take off her wet things and discovered squelchy toilet paper and splashed water all around the toilet. The toilet had not been flushed. It was disgusting. That girl got a bath so fast she didn't know what was happening and everyone, especially Meg, has been informed that the toilet MUST be flushed, I'm not even kidding, and also SHUT THE BATHROOM DOOR. ALWAYS. The Nodwick blogger, about three years ago, ran a post about the sirens who live in dishwashers and toilets, and sing a song only toddlers can hear. We don't have a dishwasher, but apparently we have an especially alluring cadre of them in our toilet.

In the "just cute" file...

Me to Kate: "Can I interest you in a mouse and a maraca?"
Kate took them and started shaking both.

No comments: