Frazzle

Time, always my enemy.

There is never enough when I'm with my kids. Too much to do. When they are away, all the time in the world to get things done, until there isn't. That is what life was always like, before my girls. Days would blend, and when did I get old? One day I was 24, then I woke up and I was 30. Now I wake up and every day I see 50 coming closer. A little more than ten years since I met the woman I would marry and have children with. Sadie is seven, Abigail five. Life is a constant battle with time now. How long I have with them, how much can I get done, how much can I spend. Oh how I hate schedules. Summer vacation was great, I took a week off, and it didn't matter if we got up late, no need to be anywhere on time. Okay, we didn't make it to the swimming pool, but the Land of Little Horses, sure, lets stay, why rush off when this is fun.

Last weekend, actually the weekend before,  I built a personality detector for Sadie. It was her idea, and she drew it up. She asked me to draw up a design, like an architect, because I have experience. Then we would compare drawings, and could I build it for her to take to her summer camp when she was with her mom. So I did, and sent it FEDEX because quite frankly, with the tape and the LED lights and the extra buttons, well lets just say I'd hate for Homeland security to get a look at it. Unfortunately Fedex screwed it up and delivered to the wrong house. When Sadie finally got it, we talked about it, and how to make it really work. During the conversation she told me that she wanted this to be our special thing, building things together. She didn't really want m to build things with Abigail, because that would take away from the specialness. She also felt bad saying this. Sadie is a wonderful big sister, and she is always giving in and giving up things to her little sister.

I told Sadie it was okay to want something special, that what I did with Sadie, and what I did with Abigail would always be different, ans as they grew older, what they each wanted to do would be different. I made sure to let her know that it was okay to be want to be first, and it is okay to care about yourself first. So hard to find the balance between being too selfless and being a Veruka Salt.

Jumping ahead, and to another topic, Abigail and last night. As I wrote, Abigail is great at figuring things out. Last night I was reading her a picture book version of Sleeping Beauty. I told Abigail I wanted her to help me read the wfirs workd of every sentence on the first page. Argument, delaying tactics, "I'm too tired", etc. This night, I finally dug in my heels, and calmly refused o let her get away with it. She did what she always does, she jumped ahead, trying to figure out the words based on the pictures. She is good, but we held fast, and sounded out the letters. Spelling, not an issue, but reading that is another matter. I love my daughter but in reading the word "finally" we worked at it, sounding out the letters, and then she went "Final Day" Well it was a picture of a sunset.

Excuse me it's 11:30pm, and I've got to go put the eggs on the stove to make hard boiled eggs for their lunch for tomorrow.

We made it, we struggled through. We did the first word of every sentence of the first page together. Then somewhere along the rest of the book she insisted on doing another word. That is something that has never happened before. I can't explain how obvious it is that she is guessing/compensating when "reading", I hate to be stern and unyielding about things, but the sooner she learns how to read, and how words sound, the easier time of things she will have.

Excuse timer beeped, eggs are done, be right back.

I'll post more about this tomorrow, I'm beat and need to get a few more things done before I can sleep.

Thanks for reading.