April 26

This week marks our first exploration of sticker charts. I had resisted them for a long time, feeling like they weren't the way I wanted to parent or weren't Son-Risey. But... neither is yelling the way I want to parent or Son-Risey. Anyway, as an experiment, we are working with sticker charts. I feel like my learning curve is steep in terms of how to do this. For the first couple of days it worked beautifully to have very specific items and then if the girls got stickers for all items in a day then they got to watch an extra episode of a tv show. But... Friday night bedtime did not go easily. That means they didn't get their first sticker for Saturday. That meant, in theory, they already didn't get their extra something. That meant, in theory, I had no power (again) to help get cooperation with items such as leaving an appointment easily. Ack. I decided to add a bonus category so they could still get the reward. But then getting dressed in the morning didn't go very easily and I was getting tight and threatening about not getting stickers. Threatening is not how I want to be or how I want this to work. Carl and I discussed matters. We decided to get rid of specific categories and a specific target number of stickers. Now I just have a piece of paper with two columns, one for each girl. When they do something well, such as leaving the Anat Baniel appointment easily, then they get a sticker. At the end of the day I can decide what bonus item they get because of the stickers. I want all of this to be positive. I really just want more cooperation and less yelling (by me too) and if I can get that and still have a bonus celebration something each day then that sounds good to me. The sneaky part of all of this is that before starting the sticker charts I was already often letting them watch two episodes of whatever they picked (Dora, Daniel Tiger, Caillou,etc). Now the base line is one episode and the bonus is an extra episode. They haven't seemed to notice my trickery. We started stickers on Wednesday and I am already losing my oomph and not sure about if/how to continue. 

Lately I haven't been getting in the SR room much, for varying reasons including needing to get new tires and that taking over twice as long as it normally would due to a bent wheel thanks to a pothole. I want to get in the room more and I am hoping that will be easier once school is over. I am also aware that my energy and enthusiasm while in the room are not as full as they sometimes have been. Thank goodness for my amazing volunteers. Sometimes I feel like I am a dud but at least before I hit dud-dom I trained a super awesome fleet of people to be inspired/inspiring in my stead. And then I think I am being too hard on myself and that I am just too close to see myself accurately and that even on a blah day I still build on Sarah's ideas and am mostly present with her flow of play. Anywho, this is a long winded way of saying I love my team members and think they are forever amazing.

Almost all of our word packs now involve two words on each card. It was so much fun to make new cards, as it always is. I had been uncertain if I would have ideas for two word combinations, but once I started then it was easy and enjoyable. 

I have started buying hummus and guacamole. It is a very weird feeling. I feel like I am cheating with every move towards easier food preparation and not making almost everything myself. Then I realize maybe I was a little tight about Sarah's food, and that maybe I still am.  It is like noticing you have been holding an object so tightly you have to peel open your fingers with your opposite hand, but that you had no prior idea that you were clenching.