Day 82 and 83

Last Friday, and today, Wednesday, have been really great. Friday morning I had the idea that a) Zak should start helping a bit more consistently with chores and b) we should spend some time on reading, writing and/or math each morning. So Friday morning, I asked him to help me with unloading the dishwasher and doing the laundry. He loved doing both (and really did help)...so we'll see how long that lasts.

Then I opened up a Thomas the Train activity book, and told him we need to get through 5 pages of it before we could go do anything else. He shocked me! I had him circle all of certain letters (ie. circle all the Bs)...and he did, albeit the circles were a bit to be desired. Then, for every letter, he told me the sound it made. He's known words that start with the sounds for a long time...but it's the first time I heard him say "B"..."Bbbbbb"...and so then we sounded out some words. After B, I asked what sound "U" makes...he knew....and then "what sound does S make"...he knew...and so eventually we sounded out BUS. It took a lot to get him to put them together, but he got all the individual sounds. So we did the same for several words, and then he did some other activities in the book...finding the one that didn't belong, matching things on the left to things on the right. I guess I didn't realize how much he has learned.

Anyway, after that, we ran some errands together, came home for lunch, and then went up to the park to enjoy the beautiful weather. We stayed at the park again for an hour or more. He made friends with a little boy there, probably around 5 years old....they played cars together. Then, a little girl, around 2 years old, came and stole Zak's newest car. All of a sudden I saw Zak and the other little boy chasing this little girl, looking extremely distraught. Everytime they caught up to the girl, Zak would say something, and the girl would take off again. I happened to be talking to the girl's father...and we realized it was our kids that were involved in something. The dad laughed saying his daughter always got the boys chasing her. I thought I had heard Zak shout something about his car...so said I think they way she's done it is by taking his car. He said, no, no...they are just having fun. We both came to look, and sure enough, she had the car...I asked Zak why he couldn't share it. He said "Not that one!" and ran and got another one and gave it to her. The dad said, wow, I guess she knows how to get their attention. After that they played pretty well together. I could tell Zak didn't know what to do when he caught up to the girl and she wasn't responding to his plea for the car! Anyway, kind of fun to see the interactions...I was glad he didn't resort to any physically pushing or pulling.

When Tato got home, we all played "Snakes" together. It was so much fun. Zak made each of us take a car, and use the car to select the cards.

This morning Zak asked if he was going to school....I said no, we are staying home, is that ok? He said, very excitedly "YEAHN, I LOVE staying home!" :-) Great! We had our breakfast, then did the 2nd day of our morning chore routine...dishes and laundry. Thsi time, I had him take Kuba's clean clothes to his closet. I figured he'd just put them on the floor or something. 10 minutes later, I came to check what he did with them, and I couldn't find them! I was looking, and looking...and then finally found them in Kuba's dirty clothes hamper! That could be a never ending cycle :-)

Then we did our writing activities again, and went up to the rec center for our standard workout. We came home, ate lunch...and then we had a bit of a standoff. Babcia made Zak a sandwich, and I asked him to say "Dziekuje" to Babcia. He said "Thanks" instead. I told him I at least wanted him to try to say it in Polish..he said "No, I can't." I've been hearing that word can't a bit too often lately. I told him again, I wanted him to at least try. He became almost hysterical, saying no, he can't say it. We fought for about 10 minutes, and finally I told him to either give Babcia a thank you hug, or say Dziekuje. He chose the thank you hug. It's a shame.

Anyway, by then, he was emotionally exhausted, and seemed physically tired too. I figured we'd get in the car and he'd fall asleep while I ran some chores (car wash, etc)...of course he wouldn't sleep. After an hour of chores and driving, I decided we should do something active...so we went ice skating! Once again, going during the week is SO much different than during the weekend. On the weekend, you can barely move on the rink...today there was a total of 7 people there! He had so much fun! He didn't want to go, and I've noticed lately that he never wants to try anything new...so I forced the issue and asked him to at least try. At the end he was crying that he didn't want to leave. And as this was only my 2nd time on the ice myself...I must admit I felt much more confident at the end too!

Then we came home, and he fell asleep for 3 hours! I guess I finally wore him out:-)

Oh, one more interesting thing...we drove up to the outlet mall on Monday, since we had a day off...on the way, as we were passing the exit to get to Ann and Dave's...he said "Ethan lives here!" This is crazy to me...its not like we go there that often.

Anyway, it's been a good personal couple of weeks, and work is going really well too. I'm getting a better handle on the new type of stress that comes with this role and how to manage it...and I think getting into a good ryhthm now that I'm back to Mon, Tues and Thursday. I also think I've got my new network of people built up, so the relationships and trust are there that are imperative to making this work. I'm by no means caught up or feel completely in control...but I'm a broken record in that regard!

I continue to feel very lucky and happy.