4 years + 3 months

This is a picture of Emily in one of her favorite outfits.  I confess to actually hiding it on a few occasions so she was forced to wear something else.  I try to limit it to not wearing it both preschool days in the same week.  In other clothing news, Emily figured out how to zip zippers all by herself on New Year's Day, much to our delight and the delight of her preschool teachers!

Emily also practiced counting to 100 this month.  She's usually pretty close.  We've done a LOT of counting!  She has a funny "video game" she plays on the basic calculator we have on the desk.  She types in numbers and then says, "Look, when I press the AC button it eats all the numbers!"  Kids can be quite creative!

Besides the letters and scrapbook (see previous posts), Emily has been quite preoccupied with all kinds of "projects" involving writing.  At the beginning of the month she was all about rules, probably because they talked about resolutions (which were more like rules), at preschool.  The picture on the right is one of her rule lists with interpretations. 

Next came the sign phase.  She made signs for everything.  It was okay when she was using free sticky pad paper Austin brought home from hotels.  Then she started using her glue stick to attach the signs to things.  Now we limit the number of signs and use parent-controlled tape to hang them up.  There are currently two signs hanging on our back door.  One says "No dogs and no cats" and the other (in Emily's own spelling version) says "You can play in my garden".  Not sure where either of those came from.  There is also a sign on her bedroom door that says "This is my room not Lincoln." :o) 

The latest craze is to-do lists, probably inspired by the short story "The List" from Frog and Toad Together.  She wants to make a list of things to do every day that she can cross off.  The lists include things like wake up, eat breakfast, make bed, etc.  I finally took my mom's suggestion and found a free font online that is dashed letters perfect for practicing handwriting.  With Emily's help, I typed up a basic list of 18 things that we can easily modify based on the day and print off for her to write (i.e. trace) and cross off.  It has inspired her to clean her room on more than one occasion.  However, we found out that you need to be very specific.  The last time she "cleaned" her room, most of the stuff ended up in the closet.  Then she said, "Next time we should put 'Clean closet,' too."

We have been very blessed with extremely healthy kids who rarely get sick, and then only have a runny nose for a few days.  Emily hasn't even had a runny nose for months.  However, there is usually at least one "friend" from her preschool class missing because they are sick.  Emily keeps careful tabs on this and reports to us every day who was gone.  She also prays for them just like they do at preschool, although she usually embellishes the number to 5 or 6 friends who are gone.  She also talks about being sick herself and tries to tell us that she is sometimes.  I just tell her that it's not fun to be sick and that means she'll have to spend the day in her bed.  That usually produces a miraculous cure! ;o)

Emily also is hung up on losing teeth.  She often says she really wants a loose tooth or she thinks she has a loose tooth.  Then she tells me what she's going to do with her loose tooth.  Then she asks if Lincoln has a loose tooth.  All in good time...

The last funny note about Emily involves food.  She likes her food cold.  Especially leftovers.  This is not limited to pizza.  She also prefers things like scalloped potatoes and ham, noodle casseroles and cooked vegetables straight from the fridge.  If she asks for oatmeal for breakfast she usually doesn't actually eat it until it has been sitting on the table for over an hour.  It seems really gross to me, but it makes leftover lunches a little easier to prepare.  However, just yesterday she apparently changed her mind and declared that she liked hot food and wanted things warmed up.  Whatever.  She also still likes slices of bread plain and straight from the bag, although once in awhile she asks for toast (still plain).  They learned about rectangles in preschool this month, so she likes to make "rectangle sandwiches," which just means folding her plain bread in half so it is shaped like a rectangle.  :o)