Pretty Maria

Ooh she is a busy thing! She ran up to that teacher today, YELLING from way down the hallway, MISS STAAAAACEY! MISS STAAAAACEY! IT'S ME, MARIAAAAAA!". Her teacher seems to like her, I hope she's good. She seems like fun anyway, enthusiastic. I know how I feel about it but maybe it's different for just 8 hours a week.

Here's our latest fight with Maria. She wears a diaper to bed - she is in no way ready for night training, she wakes up soaking wet, I'm just not too pushed about it BUT she waits all day for that diaper to poop in, sometimes SECONDS after I've put her in it. So we're working on it, I tell her no, she can't do that,, I make her wait, I make her sit, blah blah blah nothing works. This week I started to put her RIGHT to bed after she poops, like I change her but that's it, no tv, right to bed. She cries and cries but up she goes. So tonight, she comes RACING to the toilet, yelling "I have to poooooop!", goes in, does it, all's good right? Well. She told Mike "I ALMOST pooped on the floor", which made Mike go check but he found nothing. So we're all happy, everyone's good, she gets to watch her Max & Ruby, all's well.

Cut to later, we all go up and all three kids go in the room and Mike tells a story, I put the girls in their beds and realize V left her blanket downstairs while she was playing. I tried to give her another one but she wanted hers so Mike went downstairs and got it. I covered her up and left. Later, I heard V crying so I went in and Maria told me that there was POOP on V's blanket. I was all, whose poop? and Maria was all "Anthony's! Veevsy's! Mommy's!". I'm slow, so I was like, what are you talking about? She said look at the blanket! and I did. And there was poop on it. I said, Maria - did you poop on it before when it was in the livingroom? She said "ummmm, no?". LIAR. I said, look it's okay if you did, but you have to TELL us before I put a blanket on Veronica that is covered in POO! She said, well yes, it's my poop. I said I KNOW NOW! Sheesh. So everyone is cleaned up and Veronica, who is no dummy, took the clean blanket and allowed me to clean hers overnight. Lord, lord, lord. We are getting there but it is a damned bumpy road.

Star of the Week

This was Maria's first full week of school and she was the Star of the Week, so that was a good way to start.  They do it alphabetically - I can remember being in school with kids whose last names started with A or B and being hella jella that they always lined up first.  Then sometimes, to be fair, the teacher would start with the names at the END of the alphabet, but as I recall, the teachers at Catherine A. Dwyer grade school never started in the, say, MIDDLE, for those of us with a last name that started with K.  Anyway, enough about ME!, ha!

When you are the Star of the Week, you get this painted coffee can to bring home and you bring one of your favorite things to put in the can.  It has to start with the same letter as your first name.  We kept thinking and thinking, what the hell are we going to do?  What starts with M?  Then one of my parents, I can't remember who, or maybe it was my sister Laura, said Monkey George!  I still think of him as Curious George, but Maria thinks of him as Monkey George and he is, in fact, a monkey, so it all worked out.  I had to make him hug his own neck and put his feet up by his ears to get him to fit in the coffee can, but he did so off he went on Monday and Maria let her classmates guess some things about him and then POOF! brought him out of the can and showed him off.

Also when you are Star of the Week, you get to bring the snack on Monday and Tuesday, so Maria brought strawberries and grapes for Monday and cheese cubes for Tuesday.  Not to brag, but her teacher said I was a good snack parent.  I was grateful and relieved because I had no idea what to do.

Lastly, Maria granted Miss Stacy an interview today, and when asked what she wanted to be when she grew up, the answer was "a kitty cat".  That's super cute and funny on it's own, but I think it's funnier that that is the answer that Maria has for "what do you want for your birthday?" that Dora asks in one of her library books.  I think she just has the one answer, regardless of the question.

She is doing very well in school and I am thrilled. I think it's a good fit.  I think she'd be fine if she went on a longer day on Monday, or another day of the week, but this is what we started with and what I'd like to continue with if it's possible.  We'll see - maybe I'll have the baby and Maria will go insane, in which case I will put her in boarding preschool.  Kidding!

She loves her teacher and her teacher, of course, loves her.  And she is so smart - because it is such a small world, there is a boy in her preschool class who is also in Anthony's school - that's crazy, right?  I saw one of the case managers from Anthony's school there on the first day and she mentioned that she had a therapist there with one of the kids.  Then Maria's teacher said to me, does Maria have a brother named Anthony? and I told her yes.  She said that the kid's therapist said to her, "that has to be Anthony's sister, it looks just like him!".  Miss Stacy said she told her, "I only know about Veevsy Voo!".  Ha!  Anyways, back to the genius of Maria - today we were picking up Anthony, and the little boy came out with his ... grandmother, I think, and she said "heeeeey Mooooom!  That little boy  - that boy - I know that boy from my class and my school!".  This was only her third day!

I told Laura today - I am a wreck.  Thank God I have preschool to send Maria to, and speech therapy for Veronica, because I don't know what kids are capable of, and I fear I'd hold them back if it was just me.  I am so used to NOT pushing them and NOT expecting too much that I don't even know what they can do.  I'm learning, but it's lucky that there are other, professional people involved.

So she is doing well.  Tomorrow we are going to a story hour at the Library and Friday we start ballet again, so we are moving along on our fall schedule.  Things are going to be so different four weeks from yesterday, I can't even imagine it, and I bet our sweet Maria can't either.

Sunday

Ooh wee she has been insane today.  We got up late, SUPER late for us, which is 7:30.  I heard her knocking on the door so I went in.  Maria and Veronica were lying on Maria's bed together, which just never gets old to me, they look so cute.  I sat down, or went to sit down, and I felt that her bed was wet.  I asked her about it and she said "oh, yes, Mommy, it's wet from PEEEE!".  So proud.  So we got up and stripped them and started our day, as we have to leave for church at 8:30.

We got it all together and offed to church.  We all went in at the start, but then Mike took Anthony out once he got too noisy.  Maria said "WHERE IS DADDY GOING?" and I told her, he is taking Anthony out because Anthony is getting noisy and she said 'I NOISY TOOOO!  I NEED TO GO OUT!".  I kept them in there for a while longer but then we had to go out and regroup because Veronica was losing her MIND and so was I.  Maria and I ended up going back in and she was fine, adorable even, but still.  It's hard.  I think Veronica is going to have to skip it for a while and I think that means the others will too because it's too hard to take Maria and Anthony because they have to be in two different places and ... it's just too hard.  We'll try again in a few months, I guess, and in the meantime I will take the baby by myself and Mike can either take just Maria or just Anthony or go alone.  We'll see.

Maria and I went to meet her teacher last week.  Her teacher seems lovely and like she is going to be a great fit for Maria.  She seemed to really like Maria, but who wouldn't?  She is great, at first.  :)  But like today - we went to church, we got pancakes and potatoes to bring home, we went to a friend of mine's house to get some baby stuff that she was gifting me, we went and GOT DOWN and got lunch afterward, we watched Snow White in the van, we got ice cream., I mean, big day right?  We got home for two minutes and she was all 'WHERE WE GOING NOW?  WE GOING TO GRANDMA AND GRANDPAS?  WHO'S COMING OVER?  WHAT'S A HOLIDAY?  I WANT TO GO PLAY IN THE DRIVE THROUGH!".  And this was like seriously the first five minutes after we got home.

But now she is all bathed and sweet and ready for bed, and Mike is off from work tomorrow, and I am not as HORRIBLE as I usually am on Sunday nights.  I can make no promises for tomorrow, ha!