We walk to and from school together every day as we drop Will off and pick him up. So we are often strolling around the neighborhood together. She likes to tell me to NOT step on a crack, or I'll fall and break my back. And then she diligently sidesteps each and every sidewalk line and crack. I'm not sure where she picked this up from, but I did the exact same thing at her age and it brings back vivid memories of taking similar walks with my mom. Its pretty cute!
Another game she loves to play (both Will and she actually), is hot lava. This game must be hard wired into every kid's brain, because they all play it, as did their parents before them. I vividly remember creating more and more challenging hot lava obstacle courses, and spent many hours jumping from bed to step stool, to chair (with my sisters in tow), avoiding the perils of the dreaded hot lava. And now I get to watch my own kids do it too!
Michael always tells the kids all kinds of nonsense all the time. For the most part, both Will and Nora don't believe much of what he says. But there is always an element of doubt there for Nora, especially if Michael is particularly insistent about what he is saying. So she has taken to adamantly denouncing whatever it is that he has said, then quietly turning to me and asking, "right mom?" The other night I was helping the kids dry off after a bath, and was offering them lotion to rub over themselves. Will refused and Nora accepted, and Michael told them that "mom rubs lotion on my butt, every night!" Will didn't believe it for one second, but after Nora had loudly proclaimed that mom doesn't do that, she turned to me and asked, "you don't do that, right mom?" It makes Michael chuckle every time!
We have been experimenting with chores and allowance lately. She is interested in earning money, but seems less interested in the work to do so (surprise surprise!). It took her a while to learn the value of money however. For the first few months, she just collected it, until her whole piggy bank was full and she had like $45. I finally took her to the store and told her she could pretty much pick out whatever she liked. She bought herself a mermaid barbie, and then suddenly seemed to realize that she had this power to buy stuff all along. She went back again and bought another mermaid doll, and after that she was pretty low on funds. However, it wasn't until she started coveting yet another baby doll, and this time didn't immediately have the money for it, that she realized how important the chore aspect of things was. Ever since that point, shes been mostly on board with doing her assigned task when we ask her to. The problem has been finding an appropriate job for her. We tried setting the table, but she was inconsistent with it and always dragged her feet about it. Then we switched to having her unload the dishwasher, but she is still too small to put the large ceramic plates and cups away, so I still end up doing half of it. So I think we've decided to give her Will's job of taking out the compost, and have Will do something else. Hopefully that will be the best job for her! She keeps telling me how shes going to be 'rich, rich rich!' soon!
We've been doing lots of gardening together, and she loves to help water the plants, plant new seeds and sprinkle fertilizer on them. She helped me pick out what to grow in the garden this year: snap peas, carrots, and cucumbers were the things that she really wanted me to grow. So we have plenty of those things out there. I am hoping it will be a great grazing garden for all the kids this year, between the fruit/berries and the veggies!
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