5 years + 10 months

Emily now has two weeks of school under her belt, and we're still making some adjustments.  The novelty and newness has worn off a bit.  Things got thrown for a loop when her teacher missed 2 1/2 days with an inner ear infection and there were two days of early dismissal at 12:40pm for heat.  Add in Labor Day and it has been hard to establish a real routine.  We've also been dealing with some issues related to lunch time.  First of all, some of Emily's picky eating habits are starting to haunt her (and me).  She might be one of the few kids who always eats her cooked vegetables but rarely eats the main dish.  And don't even get me started on all of Michelle Obama's "healthy eating" initiatives/federal regulations.  Let's just say we're going to start packing cold lunch more often.  In addition, Emily has never liked a loud/noisy/chaotic atmosphere.  Therefore, she is quite bothered and distracted while in the lunch room.  Unfortunately, that's just something she's going to have to deal with for the next 13 years of her life!

Reading continues to be a favorite activity.  The week before school started, I began reading the Junie B. Jones series by Barbara Park out loud at bedtime.  I had been holding out on it because of some of the content, but found out they read it aloud in Kindergarten.  Plus, it was a good way to transition and talk about some of the things she'll encounter at school that have not been part of her world/vocabulary up until this point.  After getting past some of the "shock" in the first couple books, Emily absolutely loves the books and begs me to read them day and night.  Note: There's nothing really "bad" about the books.  In fact, they are utterly hilarious.  Junie B. Jones just uses bad grammer (which I naturally correct 75% of the time when I read), uses words like "dumb" and "stupid" (but less often after the first few books), and is loud, mischievious and sometimes disrespectful and/or disobedient.  We talk about those incidents and what would be better ways to speak and act.  As expected, it only took a week before I heard Emily starting to repeat phrases and talk like Junie B.  I'm glad I was able to nip that in the bud since I knew exactly where it was coming from rather than it unknowingly coming home from school or the playground.

Another book series Emily really enjoyed this month was Mrs. Piggle Wiggle by Betty MacDonald.  I loved these books growing up.  Emily even put together a dress-up costume of Mrs. Piggle Wiggle, but I failed to get a picture of it.  She also really got into drawing mazes with sidewalk chalk on the driveway.  Oftentimes the mazes had themes to go along with Mrs. Piggle Wiggle stories.  At one point Emily told me she was going to come up with a whining cure.  I'm still waiting for that one. ;o)

In addition to books, Emily has taken to reading the newspaper--or at least glancing through the headlines.  For a while she reported each day of there was any "missing news" (i.e. articles about the two girls who disappeared from Evansdale in July).  She also likes reading the Sunday comics.  This means I actually have to read them so I know what she's talking about if she asks questions or tries to reuse a joke she may or may not exactly "get" in the first place.

In the imaginary world of Hollonden it has been all about canals and colonists this month.  Emily has been fascinated by the Suez Canal and has told me all about how the Hollondeners traveled from some place in Australia, around India, through the Suez Canal and Mediterranean Sea and eventually ended up in either Massachusetts or Louisiana.  Oh, and for a while the Chinese ruled over the Hollondeners, as did Wisconsin.  But both times the Hollondeners fought a war and got free again.

Emily has talked all summer of running a store when she grows up called "Package Way" where she makes and ships packages.  Not sure what's in the packages.  With the start of school, she has also decided she wants to try to be a teacher for a month and maybe a principal for a day.  Better start saving for college now!

One last note: Emily had her school physical this month and checked in at 46" and 46 lbs.  That's a nice "square" number to remember and a super healthy place to be.  It's also not that big of a change from the 43.5" and 43 lbs. she was last year.  No wonder most of her clothes still fit!  We're so thankful for the creative, curious, beautiful girl God has blessed us with!