January 26

It has begun. This past Monday we emptied what used to be the Sarah-Rise room and what used to be the girls’ shared bedroom. Carl spent time each night this week working on wall and ceiling repair. Yesterday we did more wall repair, sanding, vacuuming, wall-cleaning, and taping. Amy loved spackling and Sarah was an expert unscrewer and sander. Today, the actual painting begins. We are eager to be able to put the house back in order. Right now the twin mattresses are in the living room, the girls’ dressers are in the master bedroom, and all of the books are in the family room. Many other things are all over the house in various places. Most notable in this experience is that when the girls change clothes they leave their discards flung willy nilly around our bedroom! This shouldn’t be a surprise given how they treated their bedroom, but somehow it is still a surprise. The actual sleeping arrangement is also different from what we first planned. Plan 1 was that Sarah and Amy would sleep in the living room on their mattresses. Plan 2 was that they would sleep in our bed and Carl and I would sleep downstairs so that we could stay up past their bedtime and I wouldn’t have a light bandit turning out the kitchen lights in the morning. Plan Actuality is that Sarah sleeps upstairs in my bed with Carl. I sleep downstairs in Sarah’s bed next to Amy. This is working out fine, but I do look forward to having the house back in order and sleeping in my own bed in my own bedroom, where I can shut a door when the cat wants breakfast before I want to give it to her.

Overall the week went fairly well, but I was quite glad to have Carl around in the mornings to help get Sarah ready for school. She was fine with getting up and having breakfast but she really dug her heels in about getting dressed. I got to become more aware of my buttons such as if I’m not able to finish speaking, especially to explain something rational. I also took notes on how Carl would redirect her attention completely, such as pausing the fight over getting dressed to go show Sarah progress on wall-repair. Then he asked her which pants she wanted to wear and she got dressed!

Gymnastics went well and Sarah was more open to some of my input regarding backbends and cartwheels. With each thing I think she needs to feel certain movements in her body as separate from the full action. She let me do a little work with her arms when she was just standing and when she was on her back, helping open her shoulders more and get her arms straight. She also copied a bit of my standing leg-body rock that should be the start of a cartwheel, because somehow the original way she learned resulted in her plunking both hands down simultaneously and hopping both legs to one side in tandem. Sometimes the teachers will take time to help her with a specific skill, but they either haven’t noticed her cartwheel attempt or don’t know how to fix it.

Sarah is into tigers at the moment and likes to exchange pleasant roars while snuggling or giving me a chin press. She calls me Mommy Tiger and wants me to call her Baby Tiger. She also likes saying she is a Lefty Loosey and pretending to unscrew things or people. I overheard her telling Sc, “Hi, I’m Mrs. Lefty Loosey, the teacher.” I love how Sarah’s mind works. I love her creativity and humor. 

Amy seemed much more comfortable interacting with Sarah yesterday. It felt more like old times where they could inhabit a space together amicably and even play together. Perhaps it is having a home project or just having all of us at home together for full days. When Carl and I were leaving for the In Bed By Ten dance party last night, Amy had created a swim camp in our family room and was coaching Sarah through jumping off of the sofa arm into the gymnastics pad “water.” Hilariously, Sarah then actually wormed her way for quite a distance, swimming in that water. Of course they were wearing swim suits and caps for this event. Amy had her goggles too. One has to be prepared.