There's No Denying It

No matter how late I stay up at night, a new day is coming just as quickly as yesterday passed. I've tried doing nothing all day, playing all day, and even trying to do everything in a day. It never fails, time keeps on ticking. The hours turn into days, the days into weeks, weeks to months, and yes, months to years. Three years to be exact. It's what I've been fretting lately. It seems as hard as I try to delay it, my daughter is turning three. Very soon.

All weekend I racked my brain with the TEN most important sings that Chelsea might use at school that others NEED to understand. You might be asking, since she's not three until January, I have another month right? Well, not exactly. Today began a one week trial period of her new preschool. It's sort of a tease for her, but they say they need to do her evaluations this week so they can put together her IEP (individualized education plan - b/c of her disability). I kind of think this is their way of easing tense mothers into letting go. It's working. I didn't stress too much when I took her this morning, as I knew it's only for four days, and I don't have to hand her over "for real" until January 12.

With much anticipation, Chelsea was walked into the school with an enormous grin on her face. She actually didn't walk into the building, she ran from the car right through the front doors. She was ready. Logan and I had been prepping her all morning. We watched Signing Time, Welcome to School, to get in the mood, and we practiced the signs for school and teacher over and over. Her favorite sign from the video was 'pay attention' ... she was signing it all morning.

Unfortunately when we arrived at school and sat down for circle time, she was having nothing to do with me as I signed, "pay attention" to her. The first thing they do is the leader gets to take attendance and use a drum to beat the syllables in each child's name. It's a quick activity and then the drum is placed back on the shelf until tomorrow morning. Chelsea didn't get the "don't touch the drum" memo, because that was her focus the rest of the day. If it was the last thing she was going to do, she would get that drum! Needless to say, we struggled to keep her sitting on on the rug where her name was. We had trouble keeping her sitting anywhere. She's a mover and a shaker, with a very short attention span. Fortunately the teacher planned for this, and once we thought it was too much for her, she went to another area of the room and played games with one of the para's. (It was good fine motor stuff with functional preschools intertwined ... I was so impressed!) She would play for a little while, and then they would do a song or dance and Chelsea would rejoin the group for a few more minutes. The teacher expects she'll eventually learn and her attention span will grow until she can sit for the entire circle time.

In typical Chelsea fashion, she handed out the hugs (to teachers and children alike), and I dressed her in an appropriate shirt today that read, 'free bear hugs.' I think she "wow"ed them with her cuteness. Her idiosyncrasies can melt even the coldest hearts. She found a tea towel that was rolled up to keep the draft out from the window and she unrolled it, wrapped her bear in it, hugged and rocked the bear back and forth. That's typical for Chelsea. Almost daily I walk into a room and find dolls, or bears lined up and covered up. She's got quite the imagination, and I hope she never loses it. All in all it was a fabulous day, there were no tears, and with the exception of spilling her juice all over the teachers lap, she was very well behaved. I left about halfway through class and I don't even think she noticed. I was a little nervous as the only time I've ever left her in a situation like that was for a few minutes during PT. When I returned she was screaming and from then on she put up quite a fight when it was time for physical therapy. (still sorry about that Kim!) When I came back though I could tell she was exhausted! She ate as soon as we got home, and crashed quickly in my arms at nap time.

So while her third birthday is right around the corner, I try to remember to give thanks for the three extremely memorable and challenging years. While Chelsea has grown, flourished and become an extraordinarily smart little girl, I still believe I have learned more from her than she from I. I know that sending her out into the world is something she's going to have to do, and I'm okay with that. It really helps that she's right down the street, no more than a quarter mile! It might be nice to have a couple of hours to myself!


Just before spilling the juice all over her teacher!


She spent a lot of time over here in the "I'm not ready to focus very long with the group, I need to play" section of the classroom.