Luthienisms

Pajammies = pajamas

"I hear patter feets" = I hear the pitter-patter of little feet

crackaroni and cheese = macaroni and cheese

candy game = candyland

pohpol = purple

lellow = yellow

"It's my favorite." = she wants it right now.

"juice couch" = juice pouch

"princel" = pretzel

pullum = poem

Luthien's vocabularly is developing by leaps and bounds. As detailed above, pronunciation is still a bit of a challenge sometimes, though.

I suspect by the end of summer we're going to be slipping into a routine justifiably resembling homeschooling. As it is, we have a daily story time and together with Maggie, the girl I watch during the day, she's started memorizing little poems. The first three we did, she just listened, but with this latest she's repeating them right along with Maggie. Being around Maggie, who is just 7 months older, has been really good for her in a lot of ways. Maggie encourages more creative play in her, and is a great model for speech most of the time. Mind you, Maggie is also not a little angel, and prior to being in my care was in a prek program where she was the youngest kid and she picked up some bad behavioral habits. "When she was good, she was very, very good; and when she was bad, she was horrid." She's modeled some of those for Luthien as well, but she still mostly does them in imitation, not on her own. Mostly.

But, just like a certain niece of mine at that age, she responds pretty well to firm boundaries when paired with a gentle attitude. And she's learning that I'm not the Queen of Second Chances her mother is. I'm the Countess of Consequences. Luthien has either been quicker to learn this than Maggie, or the lack of another style in her care has speeded up her learning it, or she's just not as stubborn as Maggie. Maggie can be stubborn and bossy, but Luthien tends to either ignore her or stand her ground, so it's all good. I wish she had siblings, she's much happier when she has someone else to play with.

TOO MANY BUNNIES

The current bunny count is 3. Why must certain grandparents send a stuffed bunny every easter. If each that's done this did it every easter, Lu would have like 20 stuffed bunnies by age 10. It's ridiculous.

The bunnies are officially seasonal. They will go into hibernation on May 1, and remain there until next spring!