Monthly Archives: January 2016
Destructive forces
I was sorting out my shoes after some gardening and a quick swim, when I suddenly asked myself, “What exactly is Eli doing at that chair?”
What he was doing, was poking holes in the dining room chair with a paint brush. Hmm.
The damage and the weapon
I surprised myself by remaining calm in the light of serious damage to our chair. Normally he would have been shouted at, given a smack and sent to his room. I thought, “How would a Montessori teacher handle this?” I spoke to him calmly, but seriously and told him that I was very upset and explained why, and then sent him to his room to think about what he had done.
He came down and apologised, but seemed to have a bit of a destructive vibe about him, so Donné redirected that into some hammering.
Working the need to bash things
And giving his brother some entertainment
He spent a long time hammering nails into the polystyrene. He eventually hammered an entire bag of nails into it, and then set out trying to pull them out with the back of the hammer. A while later and he seemed to have worked out that destructive streak.
Star Wars and Olaf
We joined Gabriella and Serena to celebrate their birthday – and with twins comes two themes…and two cakes…
Chewbacca and the Darth Vader pinata
Olaf the snowman (melting away on this hot summer day)
Richard prepares the children for the pinata attack
Slip ‘n slides, swimming, good food and friends – a lovely afternoon.
Scroll making
Grace: “Shandre and I were looking in a book today and there was a picture of a scroll and we decided to make one. Chloe gave us paper, and we got sticks from outside, and we painted the paper and glued the sticks onto the paper, and we made a scroll.”
In so many ways that seems to capture some of the essence of junior primary Montessori – pick up a thread of interest, follow it, learn, create, pick up a thread of interest…
Chopping things is dangerous work – requires hard hats
Waking up the children
If you want to wake up children without them being grumpy, just sneak their baby brother in with them
.
The left over baby
Grace was considering her birthday this year, “You know, my birthday party was crazy last year with all those people. Last year I had 15 people, so this year I think I’ll have 14.”
Donné raced Eli up the steps to get him to go to the bathroom to brush his teeth. Being a smart mommy she knows that it is best to let a three year old win. When she comes into the bathroom after Eli, Grace says, “Mommy, you weren’t as fast as Eli…did the left over baby slow you down?” (referring to Donné’s baby belly). She says it with such innocence that you just have to laugh.
Our little basket case
New skills
Grabbing things, bashing skaapie, blowing raspberries and laughing – all new skills that Adam has suddenly developed this week.
Joy!
This is the face of happiness when you manage to pick up a block and bring it to you, all by yourself. This little guy has been picking up all sorts of skills over the last week or so.
Finnbarrrrr
We got to join the lovely van der Zee’s and a wonderful group of people to celebrate Finnbar’s birthday.
Cakes are serious business
Happy birthday Finn!
Barbie washing
Grace spent some time today washing her Barbie’s clothes. First some soap and water, then onto her “washing line.” Eli said he was the banker and collected all the clothes pegs from Grace.
I think I’ll have some of that bacon dad
The curious incident of the cot in the night time
Adam had his first stay in hospital on Thursday night.
I was in my office working late on Wednesday and suddenly there was a loud crash and the sound of crying coming from our room. I jumped up and started running, and by the time I was out of the door Donné was calling.
When I came into the room Donné was in a panic and Adam was lying on the floor crying, with the base of the cot having fallen out from underneath him while he was sleeping. Serious levels of parental panic. That is written calmly now, but with adrenalin pumping and hands shaking we were very concerned.
Adam calmed quite quickly. We checked him over and there was nothing that we could see – no scratches, bumps or bruises. He had a drink and went to sleep, with Donné keeping a close eye on him.
One of the pins that hold the cot base in the higher positions had wiggled out, which caused the base to topple, dropping Adam to the floor. I’m not too sure why it came out, but I think it may have been the combination of replacement pins with some repairs to the cot that caused the problem. The cot is now in its lowest position which does not use the pins.
In the morning he seemed fine, maybe just a little bit cranky, but that can be understood given the fall. Physically he seemed fine.
Then at bath time I noticed his head was looking a bit swollen on the one side. Hmm. He was behaving normally so we decided to watch him closely through the night.
We checked him out later and the bump was bigger. Time to go to hospital. Fortunately our friend Kim was willing to rush over and keep an eye on the other two while they slept.
The ER doctor checked him out and said that if the bump was smaller he would have sent us home, but it would be better to do an ultrasound in the morning and keep him in hospital overnight for observations.
Adam’s first hair gel
The bump was down in the morning, and everything was fine according to the ultrasound. No fractures, no brain issues, just a bruise.
We are very, very grateful that he is fine. It was a bit of a hectic 24 hours.