45 months old

Emily is now three and three quarters years old.  Her favorite activity in the last month has been coloring.  Markers are her medium of choice.  She spends hours meticulously coloring every square inch of white space on pictures.  Luckily, markers are cheap for back-to-school, so we have several boxes on top of the fridge available for replacements when necessary. :o)

Thomas & Friends is a thing of the past and Emily's new favorite show is Super Why! on PBS Kids.  She especially loves Princess Presto.  Watching the show and playing the computer games on PBS KIDS Island has really sparked an interest in letters, phonics and reading.  Emily is continually trying to figure out what letter different words start with based on the beginning sound.  /C/ and /K/ and /S/ are always tricky.  We've had a few arguments over some of the non-conforming ones.  The funniest one is that Emily insists that "truck" starts with /j/.  I see her point.

Emily has also become extremely interested in the days of the week.  She always asks what day it is tomorrow (along with "Where are we going?" and "What are we going to do?").  I don't think she has a firm grasp on judging the passage of actual time, but it's a step.

Another concept Emily has been wrestling with this month is last names and the fact that Lincoln, Austin & I all have Lorenzen as our last name, too.  She sometimes insists that we can't be "renzens" because she's "Emily 'renzen".

Something we (okay, I) have been wrestling with is getting Emily to eat a balanced diet.  She's in a phase where the only thing she really wants is chicken nuggets & french fries (she insists she doesn't like any other form of chicken), frozen burritos or bagels with cream cheese at meal times.  We have a rule where she always has to take at least one bite of the meat/main dish.  She does pretty well with some fruits and most vegetables and will always eat bread.  It's that protein that's a little elusive.  We laughed the other night because we've learned that sometimes it's just a matter of labeling.  We were having a chicken & rice casserole with pimentos.  Emily thought it was eggs and strawberries.  She actually ate 3-4 bites.  Whatever works!