December 30

At 11:45pm pm on Christmas Eve, Sarah started asking if it was time to get up and open presents. This continued every hour or so until 5:15am on Christmas when we all got up to begin the day. We had a wonderful day filled with Amy’s new favorite game: Cat Crimes. It involves logic problems that can be solved as a group or individually. You have cardboard cats to place based on the given constraints and you have to determine who ate the fish or knocked over the coffee, etc. Sarah got a large cardboard castle that she and Amy enjoyed. We all had fun with new books, including one of my new favorites, P is for Pterodactyl. Grandpa visited for a bit, which was lovely. We also packed and packed and packed for our trip to MN and WI to visit lots of Carl’s family. 

Overall things have been going very well with travel and seeing relatives. The girls love love love playing with their cousins. There has been hotel pool time (just us), snow time, hot tub time, movies, chasing each other around the house, Pictionary, bowling, a carousel, and a trip to a wonderful Children’s Museum. For many activities Sarah was the driving force and activity director. 

The struggly moments: Amy was very upset about Sarah’s drawing ability or lack thereof during Pictionary. I thought it was amazing that Sarah did it at all. Amy sulked mightily after Sarah drew a frog that Amy thought looked nothing like a frog. Amy is usually so supportive of Sarah’s attempts at things, but Amy also has passionate opinions when it comes to art. Unfortunately this also means that she gets into a funk if her own creations don’t match her vision. Mom-Mom gave us some books that are aimed at helping her be easier on herself about moments when she deems herself not perfect. She is my child though so this may be tough. Yet, if anyone has experience parenting a child with some

rigid perfectionism, it is my mom!

The struggle with Sarah of late is that she yells many sentences just out of the blue or when right next to our ear or at 6am in a hotel. We ask her to be quieter. She asks why. We explain. And around and around we go. This feels extremely frustrating. 

I have had tiny glimmers of insight. One is that if I can remember to stay with myself and not tighten my neck then I get less mad. It is hard to be mad with a free neck. I have also noticed that if I can remember to praise Sarah for something she did well recently, before her behavior went downhill, then she sometimes reverses course back to being amenable.