Our awesome kids

A couple of things have happened today that I feel like I need to write down to make sure that I remember them.

Lately, I've been trying to teach Kendra appropriate responses in a sort of schooling-your-emotions kinda way.  One of the things we've been working on is handling disappointment.  "It's okay to get disappointed, but it's not okay to throw a fit."  And recently she's made a habit of growling aloud fairly fiercely when she gets an answer she doesn't like to a request, which isn't a problem in and of itself except that I noticed that she holds onto the angry feeling of that expression--sometimes only for a moment but sometimes for quite a while.  So, we've been working on finding other responses that aren't so angry--we usually go with snapping our fingers and saying, "Oh, man!" like Swiper the Fox because that's something that says she's disappointed but accepts it, which I tend to think is a healthier response than getting mad about everything that doesn't go your way.  It's a work in progress.

This morning, as I was strapping her into the car she asked me if she could do something and I told her that she wouldn't be able to and in the first split second, she started her growl.  But then she stopped herself, took a breath and switched to a disappointed but much more calm, "Oh, man!"

Maybe I'm overreacting, but I thought that was pretty impressive.  To be in the middle of an engrained bad habit, stop yourself and make a better choice is a skill even I (and I would guess many grown-ups) often lack.  I told her so and made a pretty big deal out of her accomplishment.

Later in the day, she was not handling her emotions quite as well and while she wasn't throwing a full-blown fit, she was crying a little when her time was up with the tablet.  I knew she was tired, so I was trying to find the balance between going easy on her and encouraging her to pull it together.  I was sitting with Elliot and playing with him at the other end of the hallway.  We were missing a piece in the toy he'd pulled out to play with and I was rummaging through the box by us to find it but when I did and looked up to tell him, he wasn't by me anymore.

He was down at the end of the hallway, hugging his sister and comforting her tears.

I was speechless and too wrapped up in the moment to go grab the camera.  It probably would have been over before I could do so, anyway and this way at least I got to soak it up while it lasted.

I feel pretty blessed that I get to spend every day with these spectacular people and totally blown away that I get to call them mine.