Tuesday, March 5, 2013

And then a miracle occurred

My little monster started school this year.  Organisation is not her strong suit and the first couple of weeks have been marked by exhaustion and buckling under the pressure of getting ready to attend.

Many is the day where we have been scrabbling to get out the door, with me slapping on sun screen and brushing hair and ordering her to pick up her shoes and socks and put them on in the car.

The worst days are the ones where she has to empty the dishwasher before getting dressed.  We are talking here about someone who works one fork at a time, pausing between each item to sing a tune and possibly wriggle a little dance.  Occasionally, a full ballet breaks out.

The dear husb. has been working on the dishwasher front.  He spent a week showing her short cuts (say, three forks at a time), and generally gingering her up.

I have been organising the carrot and stick collection.

I have made a poster (with pictures) for the fridge that lists the morning tasks in order.  I have come down hard on either monster getting out toys and playing with things before the list is complete.  I have explained several million times that if she doodles around during getting ready time, she will not have any play time at the end.

I also try  to finish my tasks early enough to be ready to play before we leave.

Slowly, with a number of leaps backwards, we are seeing improvement.  Some days we leave the house 10 minutes before ETD and goof around outside: shooting some hoops; swinging on the swing; and getting the school uniform nice and muddy.  Other days, we leave early and take some of the journey to school on foot, pausing to compare opinions about people's garden plants.

It is like a miracle.

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