A lot going on here! In addition to adjusting to being a big sister, Sadie has made some intellectual leaps recently. A light bulb went on, in terms of phonetics, and Sadie is suddenly beginning to read! I first noticed her new-found understanding on Thanksgiving. I was stuck in the bathroom with Sadie while she was taking her time “reading” Pa’s magazine’s. She was moving her finger from left to right along the text and making a bunch of nonsense sounds interspersed with a few real words. I was just spacing out, getting impatient, UNTIL I took a closer look at what she was doing. She was looking at each word and making up or saying a word that began with the same letter(s) or sounds. In many cases she was trying to incorporate the sounds of the last letters in the word, too! “Sadie, you’re reading!” I exclaimed. This was obviously an exaggeration, and a little bit of a mistake because something she said about wanting to go back to Mossy & Pa’s house a few days later made me realize that she had the impression she could read, but only those magazines at Mossy and Pa’s house. She did get a chance to “read” those magazine again on Saturday. Already she had made remarkable improvement. She read many of the small words, like “for” “me” “on” “and” “the.” She sounded out “live” correctly but had trouble making sense out of it. She tried to sound out “completely.”
Since then we’ve read “I Can Read With My Eyes Shut” together as well as Dr. Seuss’s dictionary. With the words and the pictures, Sadie figured out a whole page of B’s in the dictionary. She figured out the prepositions “behind” and “between.” When she looked at a third one, she said “be-next-to.” (Can you guess what B word it really was?) She’s very proud when she reads a word correctly, but she can sometimes be reluctant to try. It seems she doesn’t like to be tested. We are eager to help her, but she seems to do just as well figuring things out for herself.
Grampy points out that Sadie also shows a new aptitude and affection for games. We play a kid version of Uno several times a day. She has played and enjoyed the adult version of Uno, too. Sadie loves Uno so much that sometimes she makes us imagine a game while we are in the car. We take turns announcing what “card” we are playing – nobody has any real cards, so you just say whatever you want, as long as it is a valid play. Sadie prefers to play the wilds, draw 2’s, skips, and reverses. We’ve also been playing Memory and Sorry. Sadie takes what she has learned about games and makes up her own. She likes to explain the rules and oversee the turn-taking. In rare cases these games actually make sense. Yesterday she and I took turns drawing animal cards and then moving our pawns to the place on the map where the animal lives. This was all her idea. It was fun and sometimes tricky!
Thanksgiving also yielded a nice conversation about what Sadie is thankful for. She tells us they talked about this in school. She is thankful for her Mom, Dad, school, herself, and her “special toys.” When asked what her special toys are, Sadie promptly replied “my bubble gum” – a set of snap-together beads that she pretends are bubble gum. Later we talked about why she loves everybody in our family. She first said she loves herself because she is “pretty and has pretty hair.” I heard her say she loves me (Mom) because I am “fancy, too.” Ransom says she also said she loves “all of Mom.” Sadie loves Dad because “he plays with me when Mom is too busy.” And she loves Frederick because “he is so little and cute and his cheeks are squishy.”
Ransom and Sadie went to the aquarium on Monday. Sadie reported that she saw a “hunormous” lobster! The sharks also made a big impression. Sadie was excited to see them, I think, after reading “Shark in the Park” nightly for the past month.
Unfortunately big sisterhood has lost some of its luster. Sadie sometimes finds she wants a break. “Go away, Frederick,” she orders, “Go away, little guy!” I’m sure it doesn’t help that she’s had a few nights with too little or interrupted sleep!
Sadie and Julia have a nonsense word/game they often talk about: “Oozen-Boozen.” Sadie once told us that oozen boozens are a little bit scary and have triangle heads. There are also oozen kuloozens, which, if I remember correctly, are more scary.
Sadie spends a lot of time doing “projects.” Riding in the car one day, she told us about her plans to make a balloon out of paper. You need, “paper, scissors, markers, tape, string,” (all of her favorite arts & craft supplies), “and … a sewing machine! Okay?” Okay, Sadie, but we’re not promising it will work!
