M is growing up / Finding Fairies in Days of My Destiny

Lol. We got an invite to Dave and Ang's boxing day bash. Ohhh nothing could be funnier. WHY WOULD WE GO?!?!?!? You choose to treat my husband like shit all year and expect us to show up with a smile on our face? Darlings we've been there and done that. We've grown up now, so... NO THANK YOU.

Anyway, the days have been lovely lately. This school term was busy. I was helping the students read on a Tuesday morning and the girls were swimming on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday afternoons. So my only day with absolutely nothing planed each week was Friday. Then the last couple of weeks got even busier with school-and-Christmas-related events. This week is busy with preparing for M's birthday party this afternoon. She is SO excited, she just can't wait! She's also excited because it's her last day of school today. Ahhh my little girl. There are so many moments in life that show you that hey, time is moving on, time waits for no-one, and your baby is growing up! Today provides one of those moments. I reflect on how she has grown this year and developed. Socially she has made some really wonderful friends. Her best friend is Claire, who was friends with her last year, but this year their connection has really strengthened and I can see how they draw all the positive things from each other - strength, fun, laughter. Their eyes sparkle when they are together. Academically she's flourished. She already had a headstart at the beginning of the year compared to others, seeing as she could easily spell her name and recognise grammatical technicalities (such as "ph" making the "f" sound, for example). Now she reads like an 8 year old and really enjoys reading books that tell a good story - stories that describe feelings and stories that ponder or have some sort of suspense in them. Her writing is steady and (mostly) neat. She really enjoys doing her homework and I can see that she is academically orientated just like I was. (One more thing we have in common!) She really likes doing "experiments" at home - they are simple things that really any kid would do out of curiosity, but we call them experiments and she loves that, lol. (I was never into science but I enjoy sharing these experiments together!) She's fantastic at Maths, she just gets things. Because I was helping out in the classroom, I really got to see the range of abilities there. One week, each student had to read a list of 100 words to me. Lisa knew 100 words, M knew 99. Then a few knew 85, then 60, then 55, 45, 30, 15............ and 0. One child knew ZERO WORDS. It really made me sad, as I wondered what on earth the parents are doing with their children at home. Especially considering reading is PART of homework! What consoled me most was the fact that perhaps this child started school too early and simply is not ready for it all yet and that maybe next year he will click. (and then there was the quiet judgment in the back of my mind anyway, because if that child was not ready for school, he should not have been sent in the first place. But anyway, it's just not my business.) I'm just really glad that I have always read to M and it is something we have enjoyed together - to this day. She reads with enthusiasm and clarity, and I can sincerely say it is because I began to read to her even while she was still in my womb and have never stopped. It is just SO important to me that children know how to read. I have really enjoyed reading with the kids this year - I especially loved it because I got to know them as well, I'd always ask what they'd been up to and I'd find out little bits of their lives (eg they saw a snake - or in Kaiden's case, a dragon, lololol.) Other than these areas of M's life, her passions are swimming and dancing. She also loves to sing. She doesn't sing in tune, which I secretly find amusing because my side of the family is very musical, but because of this very reason, it just doesn't matter that she's out of tune, what matters most is that she SINGS!!!!!! She wrote her first song this year, which goes, "Ohhh! I'm so cold! But I don't care! I'm just so cold!" I recorded it :) Mentally I see how M is growing up. Especially lately, she has been needing her own sense of space. She decided that the room next to her bedroom is The Big Sister Room, and she has organized the room to suit her sense of self. I have totally allowed this of course, as I can completely understand that she needs this. She's also getting into music a little bit, in a way that is beyond the nursery rhymes. I've always sung my songs and other songs that aren't just KID songs over the years, and she's sung random songs over the years, but I can see lately that in her mind, she is connecting a whole lot more to the songs that are targeted for older people. At bedtime, I always sing 2 songs (it used to be an endless amount of songs but they began mucking around to no end with that - jumping on the bed, talking over me, laughing, kicking etc - so I diminished it to 5 songs, to no avail, so it's now TWO, lol.). Lately I've included a song that I think has a nice message to it but is for older children/people. For example the other night I sang Corinne Bailey Rae's Put Your Records On. Even in the dark, I could see that she was extra quiet, paying attention and connecting. Spiritually, I don't know that she has grown to love God any deeper or anything, but I do see how she has this understanding that He loves her no matter WHAT. I've always made sure to teach her this. We grew up with the teaching of a very judgmental God, and yeah the Bible does speak of God's wrath and judgment, but what people always forget to include is God's FORGIVENESS and His GRACE. And that to me is so important. And anyway at her level, I see that what she needs to know is that she is LOVED. She doesn't always feel like praying and I don't MAKE her the way we were made to pray. I usually don't pray if there is tension or anger, because I remember feeling that it was hypocritical. I do ask God in the middle of situations sometimes to calm us all down and so on. I suppose I do the whole "believing in God" thing in my own way and I just hope that it has its own positive influence. I am sure it will, I know God will bless my efforts. M and I have grown closer this year and I put it down to the fact that she is growing up. Even though there are still elements to her character that I just do not connect to or want to put up with, the thing is that these elements have ALWAYS been there. It's just better now because she's that little bit older and can reason a little bit better, or at least tell me what's going on. She might even tell me that she actually DOESN'T want to tell me what's going on, and that is better than nothing! And I always respect that and wait until she's ready. She almost always comes around. She's told me that she hates me, that she wants to kick me and that she wishes she was part of Claire's family. These three things are the biggest reasons for me to have sought professional help. They are not isolated - I know the emotional and mental journey I have had with my daughter in her short (almost) 6 years, and I was finally open and ready to seek help. So next year will be interesting in this sense. Part of me hopes that this book 1-2-3 Magic is all we need. I am really hoping that we don't actually need to go through any major sessions or anything with her, FOR HER SAKE. Imagine what a memory that would be. I've read many books, and hey, even though I felt the other day that we weren't taken seriously, I am way more willing now to just read the damn thing. After all, there are SO MANY hundreds of books out there - maybe this is the one that makes the difference. Besides, L and I prayed together before the meeting with the social worker and asked Him to guide this whole thing. Maybe He's gone, "Yep, look all you need is this book." So.. you know.... gotta have a little faith!

I made the cake for M's birthday. She chose this cake: http://www.taste.com.au/recipes/9856/fairy+cloud+cake?ref=collections,kids-birthday-cakes. It was difficult finding mega marshmallows, in the shops and online. I would have preferred marshmallows that looked exactly like that, but it seems Pascall doesn't even make them anymore. I settled for big-but-normal-looking marshmallows. They don't give the same result with the look (ie it doesn't look like a cloud), but it'll do. The hardest part was finding the fairy. You would not believe how hard it is to find a small fairy ornament for a cake. I searched on ebay and I searched 5 different shops in the next town. I started at the $2 bargain shops because that's where you'd think they'd be, but no, three bargain shops later and nothing. Unfortunately there are no more than three bargain shops there, lol. They recommended to me to go to the chemist and newsagency, none of them had fairy ornaments. The ones online were way too big or wide. In the end, I chose this little $2 doll from one of the bargain shops and decided I'd just put her in the middle of the cake. She reminds me of one of those toilet paper roll holder dolls, lol, but oh well, M won't know of those, haha. So finally, I came home with SOMETHING to work with. It took me two trips to the next town to finally find something, and the second trip, I searched for two hours before finding it. As soon as M saw it she asked if it was for her and I told her that yes, she could keep it after the party and after washing it. She decided she doesn't want the doll in her cake, she just wants me to wrap it up and give it to her on her birthday and she will pretend she doesn't know what it is. LMAO. I think it's hilarious because of COURSE that would've happened!!!!! LOL. After all the searching and getting frustrated and getting sore feet walking everywhere to find it and L getting restless in the pram and so on.... LOL! I just can't even be annoyed about this, it just is what it is, lolololololololol!