October 27

This weekend we had Becky Blake come for our second outreach and it has gone wonderfully. It is lovely to see how much the girls both love Becky and enjoy learning the new things she teaches us. We are adding in new activities and expanding the routines we have been doing. I'm excited to have more tools to help Sarah continue to flourish. This is probably perfect timing since just this week Sarah was starting to take over doing the bodywork routine, telling me she wanted to do it herself.

Last week we had a few play dates. For the first one Sarah was very interested in the girl who was visiting. Sarah said "hi" and "hey" to her repeatedly. The repetition was a bit like a newborn fawn getting it's social legs - not quite right but oh so very exciting and earnest.

Twice within the week Sarah apologized for hurting someone without being prompted. The first time was with Sonia and the second was with me. She was in her play car and accidentally backed up into me (in her defense I had come in quietly to clean up so I don't think she knew I was there). She immediately said "I sorry" and then followed it with "'scuse me." If you saw a pair of socks flying past you they were probably mine. :)

Sarah loves snuzzles. A snuzzle is when I rub the top of my head into her chest. I think it must tickle. I've been doing it as a way of celebrating her efforts probably since the beginning of our program and this is the first time she has been asking for it by name (I don't think I gave it a name until a few weeks ago). When I ask her for a snuzzle in return she usually rubs her hand on my forehead. Adorable.

We made pumpkin pie custard and she did almost all of the stirring. I thanked her for being so helpful and as she stirred she chirped, "helpful. so helpful" repeatedly.

We had a new sitter on Saturday and when I told Sarah that we had a babysitter coming she said "need a baby." Indeed! Usually I say the person's name or "sitter" and that makes more sense (we are not in need of a baby!).

Sarah has been starting to play outside by herself. It's not that she couldn't do this before but I usually go out too. Lately when Amy wants to stay in then I stay in and just watch Sarah through the windows. I love that she is independent and careful enough to do this. It was among our dream visions when we found our house that I could be inside fixing dinner and the girls could be out in the yard. 

One night the girls put pretend lemon on Carl's broccoli. He playfully paused saying maybe he would wait till later to eat it. Sarah responded, "Try it."

One morning this week I was not at my finest in terms of parenting. I came downstairs to fix breakfast feeling like pond scum and hearing internal mean voices suggesting the family would be better off without me, what good am I, etc. I checked my email and had the quotation below in an email from my mom. I instantly saw that I was heading down a path of finding all the things wrong with me and that that wouldn't actually help the day go any better. So I shifted to thinking of at least a few things I did well. By the time everyone else came down for breakfast I felt like I had had a reset and the day was a good one. Whew! Since the quotation was so helpful and timely for me I thought I would share it.

Nothing needs to be fixed. Everything is unfolding perfectly. So when you stand in your now accepting that all is well, then from that vibration, you become surrounded by more and more evidence that all is well. But when you're convinced that things are broken, that there is pollution, or that things have gone wrong, or that the government is doing conspiracies... then what happens is you get caught up in that vibration, and you begin to manifest that kind of stuff, and then you say, "See, I told you that things were going wrong." ---Abraham