Oriel's House of Fluffy Pancakes

Too Fast

She's getting too "big" and yet she's still too small. Some of my favorite moments are way too few and far between. She says and does some of the cutest things, but most can't be caught on film or even retold. But for my own memory's sake I'm putting them here in hopes that later I'll remember more details.

Analeasa is extremely helpful. At least she wants to be. This summer in prep for the reunion we made tons of food. I often hear, "mother, what can I do to be helping?" And if I'm doing ANYTHING that isn't ON the stove, she's immediately there with the stool and her abron on (yes, I know how to spell and she knows how to talk, but it's one of the many words that we've forced on her after her first mispronounced attempt--in order to keep her young) asking me "can I PLEASE help you?" even if she doesn't know what I'm doing. I love it. This was one of the only times I got any of it on film. She's rolling out tortillas ("torteejzjzas" in case anyone may not know just how that's pronounced.) I guess she just wants to be doing what I'm doing.

Which brings me to the next thing. She has this basket of "frabrics" which are swatches of some fleece I aquired and she plays with them all the time. Well, one morning I turned around from the dishes and she had been narrating under her breath what she was doing, but I wasn't paying any attention. The whole kitchen had been adorned with little "towels" from the frabric box. Each one perfectly centered in the drawer handle and leveled from front and back. It was classic Analeasa and it made me smile all morning. She's trying to create order and beauty and imitating what I've done with the dish towel. And if one is good, why not have one on EVERY drawer?

She doesn't just love to help with mother's tasks either. Whenever Levi has anything going, she's right there at his elbows asking if she can help. She even has her own hardware box in her closet. It's not very often that he brings home the shelves from work, but when he does, she's jumping up and down. "Can I please help you put the big puzzles together?" Analeasa is destined to be on some sort of Smart Furniture marketing, because she's been helping put them together for over a year and it's just that simple. If a 3 year old can do it.... And of course when it's all put together we have to get inside of it and make sure that it can withstand some abuse as a jungle gym.

OK. Here's where I get all kinds of flack for pushing my kid before she's ready, but I assure you that she's the one doing the pushing. Analeasa loves school. I can't imagine if she had an older sibling or even just regular daytime contact with kids two years older. She'd never let me rest. She already says, "Mother, can we do school again? Please?" I figure that whatever she's that excited about, I'll use to expand her attention span and sharpen her skills in following directions, and then there's the opportunity to pratice follow through and clean up.

She's been writing for quite a while, but she's just now getting to where she can read a bit of what she has written. It's good for me to see just how inept I am in the whole teaching bit and to raise my respect for those who have the patience to do it well. I'm glad for yet another opportunity to attempt to be creative in finding things that work to accomplish those goals and that I can call school for her. We've done plenty of birthday cards and such, and recently she's written her memory verse for the Christmas play and is working on gift tags. Levi got a couple shots of her practicing o's a while back. She does have good form when she tries.

Ok. Enough of the Mother ga ga stuff.

Posted by oriel at November 13, 2006 10:10 PM | TrackBack