Sania School Visit

I was so proud of Sania today, visiting her in the classroom for the first time. Well, not the first time. As we were easing her integration into Montessori, I tried all sorts of things to get her to transition from the hallway to the classroom. Without screaming bloody murder, that is. I would go with her into the classroom, sit with her while she wrote me or her mother some nonsensical note, have her show me one thing before I left. Anything to get her to go smoothly.

Of course the secret turned out to be not have either of her parents drop her off at school. Counterintuitive, yes, but it worked.

So I didn't know what to expect when I went to Sania's classroom today. She's only two months after her third birthday, and she has been here for six months. Reid started at this Montessori two months after his third birthday.

Sania was amazing. She was self-assured in the classroom, confident walking around getting the work from different places and going through the paces carefully, like a good Montessori student. She has learned well in this environment. Reid took to Montessori well, and we see he is less interested in kindergarten than he was in Montessori. Sania seems to have even more intensely taken on the lessons of Montessori. She's careful and diligent about her work. When we met with her teacher a few months back -- Sania was still having freak-outs at drop-off at this point -- Ms. Casey tried to convince us that despite the morning episodes, Sania is a good student and concentrates on her work the way a four-year-old might.

So I swelled with pride as Sania did the work in the classroom. Tracing and recognizing letters, carefully making a little gesture -- every time -- with her fingers before following the shape of letter tiles with her fingers, building puzzles and cleaning up after herself without being prompted. Really something. (And something completely different from home.)

Reid wasn't like this on days I visited his Montessori classroom. My presence there was a distraction, somehow, and he easily lost the focus on the thing he was supposed to show me he was excellent at doing. He seemed to misinterpret the purpose of the day, somehow and wanted to show me how he did something instead of just letting me watch him do something. He was never as confident in the classroom as I saw Sania be today. They're two different kids, with different strengths and emphases. Reid is simply the most tender, nicest human being I've ever met. He's kind to people, and does the things that we wish we would do without thinking about it. K told the story of one of Reid's friends from his funny little drama class who lives with a disability. I remember the kid from their final play; he uses a walker to self-propel and gets into a wheelchair at times, too. Reid and K saw him at the pool, and Reid, without prompting (K didn't know that Reid knew the kid), went over and said hi, and asked if the kid had a good time in the pool, just regular stuff. And K says that the kids mom, well, you can imagine, she lives her life thinking about the way kids are treating her son -- she has to and no one blames her for it. And here's Reid, doing the thing that I wish I was a good enough person to do. Just because of the sweet soul he is.

Sania may not be like Reid in that way. She's more no-nonsense, and has a picture of what she wants to see happen more fully articulated in her head that I think Reid does, about pretty much anything. They are two unique, amazing little people who live in our house. They are about as distinct as two siblings can be. Today's school visit reminded me of that.

***

After the classroom visits, we had the trike-a-thon, which was eh. Even Sania thought it was silly, and all the kids were smashing into each other with more than the average abandon. There were kids who insisted -- for the entire half-hour -- to grind it out counter-clockwise, recklessly hooking passing tricycles with their two-wheeler training wheels and taking them down to tears and fresh trepidation about biking. I wore a hat this time, after two years of sweltering trike-a-thons with Reid, who usually faded before they were finished as well. Sania retired to the playground, still on the kick from the classroom of doing whatever she would normally do and demanding I see it. Their playground is lame, though, and Sania put it through its paces and then seemed ready to go back to class, have a snack, get on with things. That's my girl.

Happy Birthday Grandpa Jim

Friday was Grandpa Jim's birthday. Despite reminders from all corners, I managed to forget to have the kids call him. They are sentimental and considerate, however, and when they heard we forgot, they suggested they make cards for him. I thought it was a great idea, and we taped the results. Happy Birthday, Grandpa Jim:

Happy Birthday Grandpa Jim! (1 of 2) from Rizkerson on Vimeo.

Happy Birthday Grandpa Jim (2 of 2) from Rizkerson on Vimeo.

Reid's first t-ball game

Okay, so no video of explosions, but we do have video of Reid's first t-ball game which is pretty impressive. Check it out:

Reid hits a single at his first t-ball game. from Rizkerson on Vimeo.

What a busy few months...

Oh hey everybody. Sorry about that uncomfortable silence. We just had a busy February. And March. But we're back. And I did the Twitter thing, which is all the rage, right?



But let's see, Reid went to the White House for the first time. That was thanks to our friends in the Grannis family, who flowed him a ticket to the Obama's first White House Easter Egg Roll. (See stone-faced shot above.)

Reid joined a soccer team, scored some goals, got some sweet gear to go with it.

Sania has finally stopped screaming and crying non-stop through the first hour of the day (most days).

Sania actually really enjoys school now. Her teacher swears she's the smartest thing on two legs, just miles beyond the other not-even-three-year-olds in her class. Still, there was a lot of screaming and crying for a while there. We were sincerely thinking about drastic action. Thank goodness that's over. I hope.

From March and April

Click that soccer photo for lots more fun pictures.

Sania's Third Birthday

Whoop! How did that happen? Sania's 3?

From Sania's Third Birthday

Check out the photos from the party. And I've got a bunch more photos coming up soon.

Preschool Postcards

This week, finally, Sania has begun to settle into her new school. My fingers remain crossed, but I believe we may have turned a corner. Sania has been a total disaster at drop off all but one day since starting this new school on 1/5. That is, on the days she's been there.

In the 5 weeks, she has attended school sporadically at best, besieged by illness, holidays and all-manner of disruptions. I think today marks her first five-day week at school.

So the drop-offs are agonizing affairs, up to now, with wailing, bawling, high-pitched screeching, nose-running tirades, coat-gripping, air-gasping and general mayhem. Leading up to the actual drop-off, every obstacle is posed from fatigue and nausea to starvation, illness and the possibility it may rain.

We kept on powering through (we went through same with Reid) but it didn't seem to get better. We knew it was supposed to get better, and helpful people would helpfully note it would get better, but it wasn't getting better.

So we decided to change the game. The typical approach is to make it seem like a normal, natural separation, which will pave the way for it becoming a normal, natural separation. That wasn't working. So this week, I decided against my own better judgment to ease into the drop-off, engaging Sania in a little show and tell in the classroom, to get her comfortable in there. Of course, she's comfortable there all day, even on her worst drop-off days, according to all involved. She does fine, they say, and she surely is fine after a few minutes. I've lingered on the side of the one-way glass long enough to determine she would be fine.

So it's not, actually, to get her comfortable in the classroom, but rather just to get her engaged with that stuff and disengaged with her previously-established viewpoint that she should not be here. Therefore, I have her show me some work, I find some stuff in her cubbie that I think is wonderful and I ask her to autograph it for me (she has no idea what this means) and she dutifully writes a lower-case "l" (the only letter she knows how to write) and says, "it's an el," to which I respond "for Sania LEIGH." Then I slowly ease out of the room after telling her I love her, as she puts her pen away, and I let her know I have to take these valuable pieces of now-authenticated with her signature art to my office and hang them on my wall.

And that's how she stopped crying.

Pre-Inaugural Ball Pix

The rarely-seen non-kid photo session, from last night's Huffington Post pre-inaugural ball at the Newseum. Click for a couple more photos:

From The Huffington Post Pre-Inaugural Ball

Sania in Pre-School

It's pretty amazing that I'm writing this post. I know we don't update that much, but life's funny that way. This is the 301st post on the Hardly Born/Rizkerson.com website. That's not counting the posts in the K's pregnant with Sania blog I did for a while. And this is the 6th year of blogging, since the first post in May, 2003.

So that's a long intro to tell you that Sania, our beautiful little girl, started pre-school today. You'll recall, of course, that Reid's pre-pre-school tenure was somewhat rocky. He was with a wonderfully kind-hearted lady for his first two years, but she had some health issues, and possible was taking on more than she could handle. But he was very attached to her, and transitioning him hastily was a mistake we regretted soon after. He was prone to fits of weeping and it felt like slowly removing a thousand band-aids.

Eventually, everything worked out. By the time he was three, Reid started in a Montessori school he loved, and we loved for the most part, too. He met friends who have become like part of our family and he began the path to his current incarnation as a Star Wars-obsessed kindergartener with a Spiderman lunchbox who refuses to wear long-sleeved shirts even on the coldest days.

We're pleased to say that Sania is now enrolled in that very same Montessori school. Leaving her daycare was one of the hardest things to do for K and I. While Reid left his daycare at 2, Sania at 2 yrs and 8 months is ready for broader horizons. Libby though was a completely different experience. Her daycare was like a small school, with lessons and learning from a wonderful, engaged care provider. But we felt Sania could really benefit from being in a classroom, with a larger mix of kids in her age group and older (there was only one kid older than her at daycare). We hope she will gain social skills, confidence (like she needs it) and friendships at this school, just as Reid did.

The first three days of drop-off have been difficult, which is to be expected. She is happy to come here and happy to show you her cubby, but right at the door to the classroom, she balks, and cries. It's heartbreaking, obviously, but I have a lot more confidence about this arrangement than in the past. Sania is a smart and strong little person, and I know she'll find her comfort zone at her school soon. I just can't believe she's this old already.

Click the pic above to see 30 awesome photos from the Holiday Season at our house.

Reid Begins His Jedi Training

Reid is completely over the moon about Star Wars. He has never seen the movie, or even the half-hour animated television show, as far as I can figure. He's mostly learning this from other kindergarteners with older siblings who pump out scrambled storylines and jumbled scenarios involving characters from the two different trilogies. This is supplemented by a surprising array of books in the elementary school library about Star Wars. He and his friends compete wildly to get the twenty or so books whenever they have a chance. I volunteered for library parent a couple weeks back and the children march in and sit down for a story. Immediately after the story, 10 boys throng to the movies and shows section and denude the shelves of all Star Wars related publications. Any boys without SW books are forced to check out books about our star system, as opposed to a fictional one far, far away.

So Reid got some pretty fly Star Wars toys for Christmas, including Lego and a Leapster. I'm semi-regretting the Leapster, though he loves it, because of the way it completely occupies him. But we'll just need to manage his intake.

From my mom, however, he received a spring-loaded Lightsaber, which is just insane. However, since he's never seen the movie, is unfamiliar with swordplay and doesn't have other Jedis in training around to spar against, he just waggles the thing around menacingly. I said to K that it almost looks like he's angry at the Lightsaber. From the day he received it, I submit this video:

Training you seek. Train you must from Rizkerson on Vimeo.

Merry Christmas!

From Merry Christmas

Lots of updates

If you've been watching the Twitter feed, there's no doubt you've seen a lot of the exciting changes that have happened in the past few weeks. Sania has taken leaps and bounds through quite a few milestones. As you can see in the photo gallery linked from the picture above, Sania is now sleeping in a (little) big girl bed. She is now also potty-trained, though still sleeping with a princess pull-up, mostly because she likes them.

Reid got his progress report from the old kindergarten, and he did very well. Kindergarten is a strange animal; he's there for all of two hours and forty-five minutes, and there isn't a ton of instructing that can be done in that time. Still, they lay out the kindergarten equivalent of standardized tests to basically create some kind of baseline for his reading, sound-making, and other fundamental skills. The teacher ran through them with us at a crisp pace during our first parent-teacher conference, and although she refrained from declaring Reid a super-genius, his numbers were pretty solid.

Reid is wrapping up his first extracurricular activity. I haven't thought of it as such until just this second, since again "curricular" activities are contained within a half-day of kindergarten, but his K-3 drama class has been lots of fun, it appears. He will perform an un-named role in the finale performance of "The Brave Little Tailor" this Wednesday. Reid has emphasized that he doesn't have a major role because he doesn't have a costume. Apparently, neither astronauts nor Spider-Man have a role in this particular play. Quite a shame.

Emotionally, you know Reid is sometimes a touchy sort. I think, though, that overall he's been more stable, and less likely to burst into tears when signs point to him not getting his own way, which is a nice thing. Unfortunately, Sania has picked up where he let off, throwing hissy fits and demanding an enormous amount of personal freedom, considering she's two and a half. Not, however, a surprising development. Enjoy the photos.

Siblinghood

Since my sister had her twins last week, I've been thinking alot about what siblinghood really means. I don't mean between my sisters and I, but between Reid and Sania, and between my niece Petra and the two girls who will be known for decades as the twins, Ailsa and Quinn.

Reid and Sania have a peace, albeit an uneasy one, most of the time. They like to torture each other, but it is over a certain sheen of true sibling affection. I feel absolutely secure in asserting that they would do anything for the other, that when they are truly frightened, either could take comfort in the care of the other. That at this early date, K and I have raised two children who understand so clearly that they are in a family and that these people in the family are their defenders, friends and protectors, makes me proud.

Of course, I don't think we consciously raised our kids this way; which is to say, we didn't make decisions by saying, "what will most focus the children on understanding their relationship to one another?" It's just a good side-effect, I guess, of keeping them close but not too close, giving them opportunities to share in positive outcomes -- nothing high-minded, but rather fun things and tv shows or whatever.

Anyhow, it is one of the things I look forward to for my own kids -- that they will grow up and understand and live in this complicated, marvelous relationship forever. And I look forward to it, too, for my niece Petra and her two new sisters. She will be their leader, protector and elder no matter how interested or not she is in that role. They may run roughshod over her (and my sister, and her husband, and their dog), but the natural order will take over at some point, and Petra will be the one the twins look to when they are concerned, or are interested in solving a problem, or learning a new kid-trick, just as Sania learns so much from Reid now. And that's an exciting thing to think about.

Global Financial and Discipline Meltdown Edition!

From October2008

The news folks, around the globe, is the utter demise of the world's financial system as we know it. Naturally, this takes center stage everywhere but in our house, where the news is actually that Reid is doing pretty well in kindergarten, has started something called drama class for K-3rd graders, and listens to his parents infrequently at best.

In truth, we've had worse goes of things with Reid in the past, but we are experiencing some growing pains around our afternoon schedule. There's a complicated series of events where Reid and Owen come home to Owen's house and play for a while and while the siblings of both boys (Sania with Owen's brother Nathaniel at daycare; Owen's sister at the Montessori school R and O attended last year) are rounded up by K on her way home from work. When a vanload of children from two families rolls up to a house full of other children from the same two families, only one thing can result: TOTAL CHAOS!

Inevitably, Reid and Owen are involved in some complex play that includes elaborate make-believe scenarios, shoelessness and the very real prospect of Reid ordering Owen around like a nervous helpmeet.

Extraction is always a challenge, as Reid sees playtime as without boundaries. Also, he's an effective whiner.

But this is only the first obstacle, as if K can get Reid away from Owen and drag him home, our nearer-neighbors -- fed earlier by their au pair -- circle our house like lions, waiting for the van with their playmate.

Each of these entanglements gives Reid an opportunity to beg, plead and harangue his mom with all the five-year-old weapons in his arsenal: "IT'S NOT FAIR!" and "YOU NEVER LET ME DO ANYTHING!" and "JUST A FEW MORE MINUTES!" and "I DON'T WANT TO EAT DINNER!" and "I'M OBVIOUSLY IRRATIONAL!" et cetera.

In truth, this is all age-appropriate behavior. Unfortunately, Sania is getting a lesson in bad behavior, so she'll be sure to hit these lowlights when she, too, turns five. If not sooner.

Click the photo above for some fun pics from th last few weeks.

First Day of School and Other Distractions

From Random Shots and First Day of School

Hey everybody. The photography has been piling up in here, so I've put a bunch of photos up tonight. These are a batch of random photos from August culminating in Reid's first day of school. The photo above is Reid and Owen, standing on the curb, awaiting the first of potentially 4,600 bus rides they will take in their lives.

Also, there's a video which explains, once and for all, while we don't have spaghetti for dinner at our house very often.

The video is taking a while to encode, so I'll embed it in the morning. in the meantime, you can find it by heading over to our Vimeo page. And of course, click on the photo above to see a bunch of pics.

UPDATE:

Why We Don't Eat Spaghetti with Red Sauce All That Often from Rizkerson on Vimeo.

More Pictures; Lots of Travel

The travel schedule for Rizkerson Industries LTD's sole blogger has been hectic as of late.

Thus little blogging, light activity on the Twitter and lameness in the picture department.

But help is on the way. Well, I'll be done travelling around the end of the month. And to tide you all over, here's a massive batch of photos I will be captioning on airplane rides and waiting in airports during the next week or so. The photo above was taken at Reid's birthday party at our community pool. He's somewhat excited. The picture below is from our vacation in Bald Head Island. Sania has pigtails. That is all. Click on either for a gallery of goodness.