New Skillz and Crazy Dayz
Lucas learned to skip with both legs today at my parents’ house while my mother was babysitting. For about 6 months prior, he could only skip on one side, which was sort of a skip-clomp-clomp pattern. He is thrilled with his new locomotion skillz.
Lucas alternates between being totally out of bounds and sweet as can be. The mood/behavior swings are wild and rather exhausting. The book says we should either ignore the obnoxious stuff (boasting, name calling, spastic body motions and wild words) or go with the creative flow as far as possible—perhaps farther than we would naturally be inclined to go. This can sometimes mean countering each exaggeration with an equally far-out exaggeration. In some ways, doing so feels manic and inconsistent, especially when all I really want him to do is to shut up. But the truth is matching wacky with wacky is sometimes doing the trick and allowing Lucas to complete a whole bizarre cycle: Then he can sort of back himself down off the ledge before he gets into major trouble. It’s hard to explain. It’s definitely a case of choosing our battles around here these days.
June 20, 2006 at 2:28 pm
You’re a brave woman and I applaud you. Keep up the good work. XOXO