Friday Back To Self Entertainment

After three days of having my attention so much during the day as we played together watched movies and talked a lot on Friday I just needed a day to sit back and take it all in. Selena had a difficult time understanding that I wasn’t going to sit and play with her throughout the morning. It was kind of a rough start, but pretty soon she figured it out and Friday actually ended up being a very good day. She played effortlessly by herself. Even into the evening she was still very content to play by herself. This is not to say that I didn’t stop sit down and talk with her, we did read a couple of books together, and we laughed over our silly little jokes and times of teasing each other.

I have used these past few days to truly reevaluate what we are doing, how we are doing it and asking the hard question where do I see us going from here? I have a bright 4 year old who loves to learn, and learning seems to be come so natural to her. I do want to continue to educate her, but I also want to savor these years that she is young. Does she need me to be giving her formal math lessons, writing lessons, and all the other subjects one can think of? No, she truly needs to be having fun. She needs to be learning as she grows, at her natural pace. This is not to say that when she wants to know something, shows interest in learning about something that I am not going to be here to direct her and help her find the resources she needs to learn about these things. We will do art when Selena wants to do art, she will continue to draw, color, write, cut, paste, what ever her heart desires.

What does Selena need from us right now? Plain and simple she needs to know we are here for her, enjoying almost every minute of the day with her, rather it be through play, talking, watching a movie or cuddling on the couch together. The rest will all fall into place in its own time. She needs to know that we respect her and that we expect her to respect us. She needs to know that our house rules are not there just to argue about everyday, that they are there for her own safety, as well as to train her to be the fine young lady she will become.

She did very well this week picking up her toys when she was done playing with them without being asked more then twice. She over all was happier this week. We were too. Yes, we had our moments, but don’t we all? Selena deserves to have harmony in her home, even during the rough times. That is our job as parents to provide her with a home that is peaceful, loving, fun, all the while training and teaching as we go along. For right now I am dropping all thoughts on curriculums, formal education, and just getting back to enjoying my granddaughter. I know she will still learn, ask to know more about the world around her, where we will sneak the little bit of math, reading, spelling, geography, history, and any other lesson we can, but in more of a relaxed setting. Selena still loves to have her spelling game, and counts her numbers everyday, to her these are just games, she loves to show us all the new words she is learning to read, and discovering how to sound out and what they mean. She loves in her doodles to suddenly point out a new letter she has discovered that she can form or a number.

It is so easy to get so caught up in the blog world, see what everyone else is doing and think wow that would be so neat to do here, but unless it is something that Selena is truly interested in it becomes more of a task, then even a learning experience. I will continue to blog, share what we are doing, be keeping the Geography/History linky going. I will still share what we are reading in our home. As for the rest of the carnivals that are floating out there, if we truly have something to share we will link up, but I am no longer going to push in order to have something to link up. I admit I got caught up in trying to make sure that we had that post that was worthy to link up in many of the carnivals, I got caught up in the desire to try all the cool things I seen on the blogs. While I love to come around and see what all of you are doing, I know trying to keep up was not working, what does work is to just allow our home to flow. For Selena to truly initiate what she wants to learn, what she is truly interested in and for me to be here for her, tending to her needs, training her as we go along but mostly enjoying her as she continues to grow and learn. The day will come soon enough when we are pushing more formal education, but until then she needs to be the bright happy 4 year old that she is.