I really love to listen to The Piano Guys' mash up of "Fight Song" and "Amazing Grace." Claire does, too, so I'll pull it up occasionally for us to listen to. This fall, we were listening to it while I was taking care of some household-y tasks. Partway through the song, Claire was twirling to the music, so I picked Lily up and twirled with her, which thrilled Claire. She looked up at me, smiling SO big, and said, "Mommy, we're princesses!"
Claire has a few sets of the magnetic dolls that are basically like modern paper dolls. She really enjoys playing with them, and over the past few months, her imagination and creativity has really expanded while she plays. One day, she was playing with them, and I couldn't quite tell what the conversation between the dolls was about. After I asked, she said, "Oh, I'm just being the Good Samaritan."
Back before the semester began, Brad's program hosted a dinner up on campus. We went, even though it was a rough afternoon for the Boswell girls. There were some cranky attitudes, and the weather was HOT, so on our walk from the car to our destination, we were sweaty and hungry...just not ideal situations with little people. In the midst of this sweaty, hungry walk, I realized that Lily was also unhappy because she had pooped. And then I realized that she had POOPED. It was so bad. No wonder she was upset. It was everywhere. EVERYWHERE. Brad and I found a shady spot on the sidewalk and proceeded to do all the things necessary for dealing with a blowout (all the diapers/wipes/clothing changes/etc). It took forever and was gross and there was a yellow jacket hovering the whole time. Bleh. When we finished up that two-man undertaking, Claire said, ever-so-casually, "Lily tooted."
At the same Duke dinner, Claire was struggling to be happy with the food or the lack of other children or with the amount of attention she was getting. It was just not a terribly pleasant meal (which was especially unfortunate, as it's the kind of meal where you have to talk to people you see once a year/make lots of small talk/fielding frustrated 3-year-olds is particularly difficult). Eventually, she was so frustrated with how I was handling the situation that she looked right in my face and roared. Like a lion. In my face.
What??
Yep. Roared in my face. I had to discipline her, obviously, but I really just wanted to laugh. Because honestly? I felt a bit like roaring myself.
Brad labeled this interaction as a "near miss," given it could have gone so badly, had we not investigated her true meaning. Claire was playing one day, and out of, seemingly, the clear blue, she came up to us and said (oh-so-dramatically), "Get rid of Lily, please!" We were stunned. And horrified. Until we questioned her a bit and realized that she had been playing "Madeline" and quoting parts of Madeline's Rescue, during which Lord Cuckooface tells (asks?) Miss Clavel to get rid of Genevieve (the dog). From there, she had expanded her imagination and substituted "Lily" instead. WHEW. This was such a relief.
We were playing with Claire's Disney princess dolls one day when Claire started thinking and talking to me about the various characters from Tangled. I found it so fascinating to listen to how her mind processed various qualities that she had identified in the characters, determining whether their behavior was good or bad and why that was the case. For example, Mother Gothel ("that lady") was not very nice to Rapunzel. "Is she bad, Mommy, because she's not very nice?" "Is Flynn Rider good or bad?" This is a tricky one, given his evolution over the course of the story. "Rapunzel is a good girl because she takes care of Pascal and works at her house." It's nice to see that she's taking time to be thoughtful and reflective, even as a little girl.
I know that I've mentioned Superbook before. It's a favorite around here and introduces lots of wonderful conversations about the Bible. At the end of each episode, there's is a video montage recapping the story, and there's a song (called "The Salvation Poem") that goes along with it. It's a song about the gospel/salvation. Frequently, when Claire is falling asleep at naptime and bedtime, we'll hear her singing it in her little voice over the monitor, and it is so very precious: "Jesus who died upon the cross/ and rose again to save the lost/ forgive me now of all my sin/ come be my Savior, Lord, and Friend/ Take my heart and make it new/ Help me, Lord, to live for you!" I pray she always sings this.
This past year has brought such an awareness of Jesus and His importance in the life of our family. So, whenever she sees a cross (or anything that looks remotely like a cross), she asks, "Is this the cross of Jesus?"
Barbara has been building Claire's collection of Otis books over the past 6 months or so. Otis is a little tractor who has adventures and is a kind soul with excellent character qualities, and we love him. One of the books is Otis and the Tornado. I'd never talked to Claire about Union's tornado before or shared any of my tornado anxiety with her (although there was a tornado warning back in the spring last year, and she was impressed with how fast I whisked us and a tornado bag into the closet), but she picked up from the story that tornadoes are very dangerous. She started asking me if a tornado was going to come through her room and was a little anxious about going to bed because of this concern. After a day or two of answering these kinds of questions, I decided to pass on to her one of my coping mechanisms for anxiety-inducing situations: make a plan. So, we sat down and talked about tornadoes and, more specifically, how we prepare for and act during a tornado. We talked about how to stay calm, put on shoes, get a quick "tornado bag" put together, go potty very fast, grab our pillows, and go to our safe place (the coat closet). And we also pray. It definitely stuck with her, because she continued to talk about tornadoes for the next couple of days, but she would talk about them in terms of how we act if one is coming. She sounded confident and calm, and I could not have asked for a better response!
Around October, Claire had a bit of a relapse regarding church nursery. It was very stressful for all of us and made doing church things rather frustrating and difficult. We're still working on recovering her comfort level. But, one thing we discovered that helped Claire to cope with being left in nursery was that she would calm down if they would let her go in the "Lambs" room with Lily. It warmed my heart to know that being with her sister brought her comfort and peace in a difficult situation (although I'd prefer that she be ok with her age-appropriate room, generally speaking).
Our whole family sings "Sweet Baby James" to Lily on a regular basis. It's become her song, and she really seems to love it. Claire has learned a lot of the words and will often sing it to Lily when she senses Lily is upset. The last time Lily had a check up and was crying after her shots, Claire jumped up and started singing "Sweet Baby James" immediately. And Lily stopped crying pronto.
Claire has seen quite a few people use their fingers to whistle/cheer folks on. We were at one of Brad's intramural soccer games once, and I looked over to see Claire with her fingers in her mouth, making noises. I told her to take her fingers out of her mouth, and she looked at me so seriously and explained that she was "whistling for Daddy's team."
I have a post about our trip to Universal (back in October! I'm a little behind.), but this story was not included. Our last morning at Universal was a little hectic getting out the door. We had to do some clever arranging of our schedules in order to accommodate naps and check out from the hotel. Sometimes (rarely, but sometimes) we skip naps, but that is just asking for a meltdown when you're at a theme park. So, that morning, I was in quite a hurry trying to get all of our ducks in a row, and I sent Claire to potty before we headed out. She'd been in there for a minute when I heard her frantically calling, "Mommy! MOMMY! I fell in!" I hurried in and, sure enough, Claire's skinny little self was stuck down in the toilet. Now, I didn't stop to take a picture, but I did double up laughing about it. I'm not proud of that moment, but it was just a little funny. I got her unstuck and comforted, and we eventually laughed about it together. A little later that day, we were riding "The Cat in the Hat" ride in Seuss Landing, and at one point, the fish who is advising the children to avoid the Cat, is seen spinning around in a toilet. Claire pipes up with, "I did that today, too! I was trying to get the toilet paper, and daddy didn't want me to fall in!" Not at all sure where Brad figured into the story, but we all laughed at Claire's assessment.
Hope you enjoyed some glimpses into life with Claire. It's always an adventure!
Back before the semester began, Brad's program hosted a dinner up on campus. We went, even though it was a rough afternoon for the Boswell girls. There were some cranky attitudes, and the weather was HOT, so on our walk from the car to our destination, we were sweaty and hungry...just not ideal situations with little people. In the midst of this sweaty, hungry walk, I realized that Lily was also unhappy because she had pooped. And then I realized that she had POOPED. It was so bad. No wonder she was upset. It was everywhere. EVERYWHERE. Brad and I found a shady spot on the sidewalk and proceeded to do all the things necessary for dealing with a blowout (all the diapers/wipes/clothing changes/etc). It took forever and was gross and there was a yellow jacket hovering the whole time. Bleh. When we finished up that two-man undertaking, Claire said, ever-so-casually, "Lily tooted."
At the same Duke dinner, Claire was struggling to be happy with the food or the lack of other children or with the amount of attention she was getting. It was just not a terribly pleasant meal (which was especially unfortunate, as it's the kind of meal where you have to talk to people you see once a year/make lots of small talk/fielding frustrated 3-year-olds is particularly difficult). Eventually, she was so frustrated with how I was handling the situation that she looked right in my face and roared. Like a lion. In my face.
What??
Yep. Roared in my face. I had to discipline her, obviously, but I really just wanted to laugh. Because honestly? I felt a bit like roaring myself.
Brad labeled this interaction as a "near miss," given it could have gone so badly, had we not investigated her true meaning. Claire was playing one day, and out of, seemingly, the clear blue, she came up to us and said (oh-so-dramatically), "Get rid of Lily, please!" We were stunned. And horrified. Until we questioned her a bit and realized that she had been playing "Madeline" and quoting parts of Madeline's Rescue, during which Lord Cuckooface tells (asks?) Miss Clavel to get rid of Genevieve (the dog). From there, she had expanded her imagination and substituted "Lily" instead. WHEW. This was such a relief.
We were playing with Claire's Disney princess dolls one day when Claire started thinking and talking to me about the various characters from Tangled. I found it so fascinating to listen to how her mind processed various qualities that she had identified in the characters, determining whether their behavior was good or bad and why that was the case. For example, Mother Gothel ("that lady") was not very nice to Rapunzel. "Is she bad, Mommy, because she's not very nice?" "Is Flynn Rider good or bad?" This is a tricky one, given his evolution over the course of the story. "Rapunzel is a good girl because she takes care of Pascal and works at her house." It's nice to see that she's taking time to be thoughtful and reflective, even as a little girl.
I know that I've mentioned Superbook before. It's a favorite around here and introduces lots of wonderful conversations about the Bible. At the end of each episode, there's is a video montage recapping the story, and there's a song (called "The Salvation Poem") that goes along with it. It's a song about the gospel/salvation. Frequently, when Claire is falling asleep at naptime and bedtime, we'll hear her singing it in her little voice over the monitor, and it is so very precious: "Jesus who died upon the cross/ and rose again to save the lost/ forgive me now of all my sin/ come be my Savior, Lord, and Friend/ Take my heart and make it new/ Help me, Lord, to live for you!" I pray she always sings this.
This past year has brought such an awareness of Jesus and His importance in the life of our family. So, whenever she sees a cross (or anything that looks remotely like a cross), she asks, "Is this the cross of Jesus?"
Barbara has been building Claire's collection of Otis books over the past 6 months or so. Otis is a little tractor who has adventures and is a kind soul with excellent character qualities, and we love him. One of the books is Otis and the Tornado. I'd never talked to Claire about Union's tornado before or shared any of my tornado anxiety with her (although there was a tornado warning back in the spring last year, and she was impressed with how fast I whisked us and a tornado bag into the closet), but she picked up from the story that tornadoes are very dangerous. She started asking me if a tornado was going to come through her room and was a little anxious about going to bed because of this concern. After a day or two of answering these kinds of questions, I decided to pass on to her one of my coping mechanisms for anxiety-inducing situations: make a plan. So, we sat down and talked about tornadoes and, more specifically, how we prepare for and act during a tornado. We talked about how to stay calm, put on shoes, get a quick "tornado bag" put together, go potty very fast, grab our pillows, and go to our safe place (the coat closet). And we also pray. It definitely stuck with her, because she continued to talk about tornadoes for the next couple of days, but she would talk about them in terms of how we act if one is coming. She sounded confident and calm, and I could not have asked for a better response!
Around October, Claire had a bit of a relapse regarding church nursery. It was very stressful for all of us and made doing church things rather frustrating and difficult. We're still working on recovering her comfort level. But, one thing we discovered that helped Claire to cope with being left in nursery was that she would calm down if they would let her go in the "Lambs" room with Lily. It warmed my heart to know that being with her sister brought her comfort and peace in a difficult situation (although I'd prefer that she be ok with her age-appropriate room, generally speaking).
Our whole family sings "Sweet Baby James" to Lily on a regular basis. It's become her song, and she really seems to love it. Claire has learned a lot of the words and will often sing it to Lily when she senses Lily is upset. The last time Lily had a check up and was crying after her shots, Claire jumped up and started singing "Sweet Baby James" immediately. And Lily stopped crying pronto.
Claire has seen quite a few people use their fingers to whistle/cheer folks on. We were at one of Brad's intramural soccer games once, and I looked over to see Claire with her fingers in her mouth, making noises. I told her to take her fingers out of her mouth, and she looked at me so seriously and explained that she was "whistling for Daddy's team."
I have a post about our trip to Universal (back in October! I'm a little behind.), but this story was not included. Our last morning at Universal was a little hectic getting out the door. We had to do some clever arranging of our schedules in order to accommodate naps and check out from the hotel. Sometimes (rarely, but sometimes) we skip naps, but that is just asking for a meltdown when you're at a theme park. So, that morning, I was in quite a hurry trying to get all of our ducks in a row, and I sent Claire to potty before we headed out. She'd been in there for a minute when I heard her frantically calling, "Mommy! MOMMY! I fell in!" I hurried in and, sure enough, Claire's skinny little self was stuck down in the toilet. Now, I didn't stop to take a picture, but I did double up laughing about it. I'm not proud of that moment, but it was just a little funny. I got her unstuck and comforted, and we eventually laughed about it together. A little later that day, we were riding "The Cat in the Hat" ride in Seuss Landing, and at one point, the fish who is advising the children to avoid the Cat, is seen spinning around in a toilet. Claire pipes up with, "I did that today, too! I was trying to get the toilet paper, and daddy didn't want me to fall in!" Not at all sure where Brad figured into the story, but we all laughed at Claire's assessment.
Hope you enjoyed some glimpses into life with Claire. It's always an adventure!
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