The non-emergency emergency room visit due to the not-so-safety glass mishap

Well, I have to say all of this mechanical malfunctioning around here is growing a bit tiresome. It would almost be laughable... if it were happening to someone else.

The next installment in the saga of When Machines Hate You...

The day had been going fine. People were playing happily, I had made it to the grocery store, and next on my list was to put everyone in the van and return the Harris loan box to the museum, stopping by the Vietnamese market on the way. (Now what happens next may have been God's way of saving me from my own stupidity of thinking I could run these two errands with 9 children in tow with four of them under 5 years of age including one infant.) Before we could head out, we needed to install two more car seats, bring the total of car seats to five, with every bench having a five-point harness seat in it. Since M. was home and she is good at this type of thing, she moved and installed them all for me while I did things like make sure everyone was dressed and had gone to the potty and combed hair. I was finishing up and she was finishing up and so she slams the side van door closed. And the safety glass on that window completely shatters. There was glass everywhere, including all over M.'s hands and forearms. They glistened in the sun because of the amount of glass. Her first reaction was to brush it off, but when she did so, it embedded the glass a bit and it started to bleed.

Now, here is where we come to the day's logic puzzle.

1. I have one vehicle available to me, but it is now surrounded by broken glass and an empty window frame, so it's not really drive-able at the moment. 
2. We check with a neighbor, who also happens to be a pediatrician, and she thinks we should really take M. to the ER to have the glass removed. 
3. Even if I had a car I couldn't go because everyone else in the house is below the age of 13 and I would have to bring them with me. See #1.

What to do?

Well, you call your good friend to see what she is doing and she comes over with a car. I secretly (or not so secretly) hope that she thinks it would be more interesting to sit in the ER waiting room rather than stay home with a herd of children. She chooses the children, so I take M. to the ER. It is now about 3:30 and because of the lack of possibility of death from her injuries, we are figuring we'll be lucky to get home before bedtime.

I'll spare you the details of the 2 1/2 hours we spent in the ER, except to save you a similar wait if you ever happen to find yourself in the same situation. (Though since these things seem to only happen to me, that shouldn't really be a worry for you.) The solution to the glass problem was actually fairly simple. Once we were called back, the ER tech had M. hold her arms under running water for a half hour while the bits of glass were slowly washed away. That's it. Why oh why couldn't they have just sent us back home when they saw what was wrong and tell us to do that there? I really just needed the information. Sigh.

The only funny part of the afternoon was when the ER doctor (at least that is what he was supposed to be, we have our suspicions) made his very brief (and no doubt very expensive) visit to the room. All the time we had been there, everyone had been telling us that M. shouldn't rub her hands or arms because they didn't want the glass to be rubbed in any more than it was. Well, when Mr. Dr. comes in, his instructions are to rub vigorously, a lot, to get all that glass out. If hands weren't doing it, then use a washcloth and scrub, scrub, scrub. All done in a sort of stand-up comedy routine manner. He then leaves. M. and I look at each other, probably with our jaws hanging open it was so odd. M. then says, "Do you remember that Psych episode where Shawn Spencer is at a hospital and he dresses up in a doctor's coat and puts a stethoscope around his neck and starts to walk into rooms and dispense whatever medical wisdom he can make up?" Yeah.

So where do we stand at the moment? I am van-less. We need to call the insurance company and see what we need to do to get the window fixed. I can't vacuum the glass out of the van because the outlet where I would plug the vacuum in is in the garage whose door broke a week or so ago and it won't open. (Need to get someone here to look at that.) There is glass all over the grass and I have no idea how to clean that up. You can't exactly vacuum the ground (and I can't vacuum anything anyway, so it doesn't matter... let's just not talk about the whole vacuum situation in general, shall we?) The Harris loan box will be late because I have no car and no time to return it today. And there are no prawn chips in the house.

It all could have been worse. M. could have been injured to a far greater extent had she been standing any closer to the van. There were no children on that side when the glass shattered. I have good friends who are willing to drop everything and loan me vehicles.

Oh, and I don't think I ever gave you an update on the roof and the hole in the ceiling. Well, the good news is it wasn't the roof. There seems to be a leak in the air conditioner compressor which is in the attic. Is that better or worse? I have no idea. I do know that our air conditioning has been off since we discovered it and that's been OK since we have been having a very mild summer. At least we had been, the forecast for the weekend is not filling me with joy. 

You know, it's not really the children who are the problem. When people say, "I don't know how you do it?" I'm not sure what they think I'm doing, but it's really not that difficult. The machines, though... The machines which are supposed to make my life easier... they are the things which very well may positively push me over the brink of sanity.

Mixing it up

Well, last night wasn't too bad. The baby went to sleep at 11, woke up at 2 am (conveniently timed with one of the little girls needing to be covered up), went back to sleep until 5 am, and slept through my alarm going off. (That would be the baby sleeping through it, not me.) I'll probably make it through the day.

On Sunday we all drove up to church camp and dropped off D., our sole camper this week. B. and A. are counselors this year, but they had gone up the day before. I have discovered that even one person being gone changes the family dynamics a bit, and three being gone changes them a whole lot. It is always interesting to see the new combinations of interaction that happen which are often very different from when everyone is home.

So the people at home this week are M., P., TM, H., K., G., and L., plus the two temporary little ones. Not much has changed for H. and the three littles. They often all play together and that has continued, adding in the little three year old. It is watching M., P., and TM that I have found interesting. (There's a link on my sidebar to a 'cast of characters' for everyone who is muttering under their breath that they can't keep my whole initial system straight.)

M. has been buried in her room for a couple of weeks under piles of cardboard, wire, and hot glue furiously making very large dinosaur puppets. This is for the same theater that put on a stage version of Jurassic Park last year. They are remounting it at the end of the month and M. was invited back to create the dinosaurs. Well, dress rehearsals are very quickly approaching and there are more and bigger and better (a truly major jump forward in construction) dinosaurs this year, so M. is starting to feel the crunch. Even to the extent of letting her siblings help her out. Something they have been begging to do for a while, so they were more than happy to spend an hour or two painting giant dinosaurs with their base layer of black paint. (Some of the dinosaurs are done, but the director has forbidden anyone to post pictures of them until the show opens. You have no idea how difficult this has been for me. First, they are very cool and second, it would be such an easy blog post.) And, P. and TM painted together very good-naturedly for the whole time. Since M. then had a big chunk of work being done it freed her up to do more construction, which in turn gave her time to head to the beach for a while. Which she did with P. and TM accompanying her. I love those positive interactions. Love, love, love.

The other thing about having people gone, particularly older ones, is that it creates a vacuum into which the younger ones step. P. in particular has risen to the challenge of being one of the few oldest around here in pretty significant ways. Yesterday, after the new children arrived, P. really took the three year old under her wing and really became his special person. This was so wonderful to witness. Normally A. is the first to leap into the mothering role, probably would have done this, but without A. here, it allowed P. to play that role. And she did it wonderfully. P. also is great with babies and helped give the baby the rest of her bottle at one point when I needed to do something else. TM also did his stint with holding the baby and it nearly made me cry to see him so calm and nurturing to that little being.

And for you mothers out there with trauma-affected children, I have left the best story for last. TM had been calm all day. This was not something I was expecting or prepared for because I was sure that the addition of two children and their obvious distress at having to say good-by to their mother at the end of the day would trigger... something. Instead, there was calm helpfulness. But the best was at the end of the day, after having watched a movie with M. and P., he comes to me, says, "I'm going to bed now," and then throws his arms around me to hug me. A hug that he initiated. A hug that did not involve him turning so his back was pressing against me instead of his front. I almost looked around for the Pod People to see what they had done with my son. Who knows what today will bring, but boy, am I going to cherish yesterday and remember it when the roller coaster is on a particularly hilly bit.
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And a little bit of bloggy advertising for a young friend. The homeschooled daughter of a good friend of mine, and a former member of our history co-op, has started a blog about books and reading and literature. She has done such a good job with it that I wanted to share it with you. So, go check out Ravens and Writing Desks... and support this talented high school writer.

Teaching reading

The children arrive this morning with their mother gradually joining us over the next days and weeks. Since I'm pretty sure I'm not getting much sleep the next two nights as the baby makes the transition to new caregivers, I thought I would write a post with some content because who knows when you will see that again?

Last night I finished reading the book, The Book Whisperer: Awakening the Inner Reader in Every Child, by Donalyn Miller. I really loved this book even though the intended audience were traditional school teachers, mainly because I share the author's love of books and reading and sharing that joy with children. And I loved her reading about her journey of how she shares that joy with the children who pass through her classroom. What I found particularly striking is that in reading her descriptions of how she 'teaches' reading is that where she has landed is what many of us homeschoolers do with books and reading and our children. I will elaborate, but first some background.

I remember this, and probably you do, too, and Ms. Miller describes it when she talks about how reading is usually taught. There are several things that happen... spending an entire semester on just one or two books, many lessons having to do with the book but that don't involve reading it, and classroom reading where children take turns reading out loud. (This was my particular pet-peeve. Being a very fast reader, I wouldn't follow along but read ahead and be done with the page long before the class reached it. The trick was to be able to find where we were when my turn was coming up next. It taught me a lot of things, but absolutely nothing about reading.) None of these strategies create children who love to read and read voluntarily. Actually, it is my opinion that if people set about to create a method to make children despise reading with every ounce of their being, they have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams.

And perhaps creating non-readers really is the agenda. I'm not trying to go all conspiracy theorist on you, but you've got to wonder when you read quotes such as this:

"In 2000, the National Reading Panel left independent reading off their recommendations for improving reading instruction, stating, 'The Panel was unable to find a positive relationship between programs and instruction that encourage large amounts of independent reading and improvement in reading achievement.' (National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, 2000, pp. 12-13)"

Ms. Miller then goes on to say, "It puzzles me that an initiative with the purpose of improving students' reading achievement leaves out independent, free-choice reading. Stephen Krashen, respected researcher, activist, and author of The Power of Reading, identifies fifty-one studies that prove that students in free-reading programs perform better than or equal to students in any other type of reading program. Krashen found that students' motivation and interest in reading is higher when they get the opportunity to read in school." And actually, anyone who stops to think about it for longer than a minute or two, could figure out the more you do something, the easier it becomes... even reading. Especially reading. If a child is only reading two or three books a year, and they are books that are not compelling to that child, how on earth will that child ever have the skill or interest to do more?

And this is why Ms. Miller is actually a homeschooler at heart. She recreates in her classroom what we (and many other homeschoolers I know) do in the course of living our lives. First, she allows her children time to read whatever they want in class. She makes time for it. We homeschoolers have a lot of time for reading, but instead of her half an hour, I have children who routinely spend one to two hours a day reading. Second the reading is free choice. Ours is as well. I will occasionally require certain books to be read, but more often than not, it is what my children want to read. Third, she actively seeks out books her students will enjoy and recommends them. I do the same thing. I am constantly recommending books to my children, keeping my ears open for things that will interest them, talk to them about books. Books are a part of life around here, you can't help talking about them. Fourth, she takes her students to the library often and helps them to learn how to find things to read. Well, I have written enough about our library visits for you to know that we do that a lot. My children view libraries as places to find interesting things and are excited about going. Fifth, she models the enjoyment of reading for her students. Most homeschoolers are also book lovers. In fact, dealing with the amount of books in the house is a constant joking problem often discussed when homeschoolers get together. We take very seriously Cicero's quote, "A room without books is like a body without a soul."

As excited as I was to find a teacher who is making a difference in the reading lives of her students, I was also incredibly saddened. Read this paragraph from the end of the book;

"I want more for my students than this nonreading state. I want them to feel that reading is a pursuit in which they continue to learn and receive solace and joy throughout their life. I want what English Journal editor and columnist Chris Crowe wants for his own children when he begs, 'I'd like just once, to have one of them stagger into the kitchen, bleary-eyed and late for breakfast, because of staying up all night to finish a novel. I'd love to see them curled up on the couch rereading a favorite book. I would go to my grave a contented old man if once before I die, and before my kids grow up, if I could hear one of my children talking excitedly to a friend about a book just finished.' This entreaty was not an admonishment directed toward his children or a missive from an expert; this was a dad pleading with his children's teachers to encourage his kids to read."

I read this and wanted to scream and cry all at the same time. I'm sure you can figure out why, I've written about institutionalized parent-abdication before. Please, if you are a parent with a child in a traditional school, I strongly encourage you to read this book. And if you are a homeschooler, I would encourage you to do so also, especially if you are tempted by any number of curricula which aim at 'teaching' reading, but have the capacity to suck the soul out of even the best book.
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I have a new article up at Heart of the Matter on Encouraging and Discovering Your Child's Interests.

Happy 4th birthday G. and L. and Happy 18th Birthday, B.!

Today is our triple birthday of B., G., and L. We celebrated last night because B. and A. leave today to be counselors at church camp. Here are some of the many pictures taken.

 We did presents first since the peach pie was still really hot. Here are the three birthday people.

L. (on left) and G. on their new slumber bags.

Now for these next pictures, had I known what was going to happen, I would have had someone take video as well. You all know that L. loves Superman, right? Well, with the new movie coming out, there are a lot of Superman items in the stores, so I thought L. would enjoy having a small Superman doll. Boy was a I right. In the next three pictures, you must also imagine a child so overcome with excitement that she has lost all power of speech. All she could do was to make one long continuous sound something along the lines of, "Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee....." This went on until she has the actual figure in her hand.

Seeing Superman (and the noise beginning)

sound continues

A. is taking Superman out of his packaging. Note L.'s arms (she is still making the noise).

Ahhh, Superman. 

G. got Sully from the new Monsters movie. (She does like him, the picture just didn't catch her smile.)

B. received his presents from us a couple of months ago. Grow lights aren't much good after the growing season has begun. He also really wanted an miniature orange tree which he has been nurturing for the past couple of months. Don't worry, his grandparents gave him a very nice gift.

A. and P. gave the little girls ponies.

And then the noise began again when L. saw the present from Grammy and Grandpa. She has become something of a sports buff (don't ask me how) and is routinely dressing up in her 'basketball' outfit. So her grandparents got her a basketball hoop. Cue the eeeeeeeeeeee noise.

G. got a new plasma car from Grammy and Grandpa. She loves it.

And then the pies were cool enough to eat. So we sang (three times) and blew out candles. I actually had a '4' candle for the little girls.

L.

G. waiting for her turn.

G.

And she blew the candle out!

I didn't have an '18' candle, so J. held a match. B. wasn't terribly amused.

But he put up with it.

Superman was hiding under her other clothes. (And their hair was done earlier, as usual, they took out the hairbands.)

B.

Just cute.

So Happy Birthday, my darling and adored children. I love all three of you very, very much. It is a bit much for you all to be getting so old and all at the same time, though.

Life is never dull around here

Everything is still a little bit up in the air and probably won't be finalized until the weekend, but if I wait until Monday to tell you what is going on, it will be not as helpful to ask for the items I will need to borrow. That's all very cryptic and mysterious isn't it?

I have blogged about Safe Families before. Our good friends, the H-S family have been hosting two little ones for the past month. For various reasons, they will be unable to continue to care for them starting next week, so everyone has been working on figuring out what is best for the children and their mother. Well, between Safe Families, the H-S family, Su Casa (the shelter the mother is living in... from my brief contact with them a truly phenomenal place), and the mother, it looks as though we are the best choice. And the way that works (because you all know our family size is a huge issue for many people) is that it is also looking as though the mother will be moving in, possibly in stages, as well. So, for a little while it seems we will be filling every seat in our van.

Obviously, there is a whole lot about this that I cannot share. It is not my story and I want to be VERY careful about others privacy. But it all looks pretty God arranged. We have the room and the time, we have already had some contact with the children so we are not strangers, and we have unique experience in dealing with various mental health concerns. Plus, we have hosted a mother and her child during the summer time already, though under quite different circumstances. Other than say yes, we haven't done anything... even fight the large family ruling... but it has happened. It seems. Nothing has been signed yet and we still have another meeting or so. It's a good thing I gave up on trying to plan things a long time ago.

I'm sharing all of this with you for several reasons. First, as you remember, I gave away every single baby thing I had. And it hurt to do it and now I'm really regretting it on top of everything else. I am going to need to borrow some things. So, my local friends, do any of you have a baby swing I can borrow for a while? One of the children is 3 months old (1 month old adjusted age) and the other just turned 3 years old. (G. and L. think he is soooo cute, because he is so much littler than they are. In their own little world.) I have a crib-sized mattress for the little boy, but having a toddler bed to put it on would be great. And crib sheets would also be welcome. It would be a loan only, so I could return them when we are done. Please call me at home if you have any of these items. Thank you!

My next reason is to urge you, really, really urge you to become a Safe Family. They are located in more states then Illinois. If you go to the website there is an interactive map that you can use to see if Safe Families operates in your state. The need is great. And some of the placements are very short term. Some are as short as a couple of days to watch a child while the child's mother is in the hospital having a baby and has no one to care for her older child. Surely just about everyone could do that couldn't they? It takes a little while to become approved and have the necessary clearances done, so if you start now then you can be helping that much sooner. There is also a huge need for families who are willing to take more than one child. There are many sibling groups that come through and they are nearly always separated because there are so few families willing to take more than one child. It adds to the children's distress to be separated from their siblings. What can you do to help? This is a wonderful way to actively play a part in family preservation.

And my last reason is just to give everyone a heads up that life could get a little crazy around here for a while. I have no idea how much time I will have for posting or, if you know me personally, how many functioning brain cells I will have. Memory is not a strong suit around here on good days, and I'm pretty sure a baby will not help the situation. I know I can type one-handed and nurse a baby (I've done it), but there is no way to type while bottle-feeding a baby. I just have no idea what to expect.

So thank you all for your prayers. And while I cannot share the mother's story, God knows what she needs, so please add her to your prayer list.

Now to get ready to celebrate three birthdays tonight. Never dull, I tell you.

Parenting a little differently

One of the comments left on yesterday's post asked a question that I felt really needed to be answered in a post. It's an important question and one that I have certainly asked myself. The gist of the question is, "Does parenting a child in the way I described yesterday, cause them to learn it is OK to misbehave?" That is, if I ignore some of the behaviors I see in TM, does that somehow communicate to him that it is OK to act that way? And once again, had you asked me 7 years ago, my answer would be very different from what it is now. It is all part of that humbling experience.

I think the authors of the book, The Explosive Child, explain it best. Pretty much, a child does the best that he can. Due to the way his brain has been wired, being flexible, changing plans, making transitions are things that are VERY difficult for that child to do. His brain is literally unable to cope and that is when we see behaviors we would rather not. We would not expect a child who is dyslexic to learn to read faster than they are able; the ability to change, transition, and be flexible are tasks that are difficult for this child's brain to accomplish. And then when you add a layer of trauma over the whole thing it makes it that much more difficult. Children who have experienced and internalized trauma spend much of their existence trying to avoid, at all costs, feeling that pain associated with that trauma. Anything is better than feeling that pain. Raging, disassociating, talking, talking, talking are all things used to block out any thoughts of the pain. I have watched my son allow himself to feel grief and then purposefully bring himself to raging because it is just too painful to go there. He would rather rage than hurt. And allowing himself to let people get close is scary because he knows that hurt that follows must be just around the corner. Even if it won't.

Now imagine a time in your life when you were really worried and concerned about something. The type of thing that really overshadows all of your thoughts and colors your days. It is difficult not to think about the thing you are worried about. It is difficult to enjoy the things you usually enjoy because you find yourself constantly thinking about the thing you are worried about. And perhaps it is just me (but I hope it's not), but if I am extremely worried about something, I am not necessarily the nicest person in the world. I can find myself saying things and acting ways that are a little self-centered and not very nice. I have not done it purposefully, but because my brain is filled with worry, it happens. I believe that this is how a child affected by trauma feels all the time. Except that they don't even know what they are worried about. They feel the emotion, but have no name for it. And for some, it has been with them for so long it is how they think life is. They can't remember feeling any differently.

Go back to you when you are extremely worried and perhaps said something in a rude or brusque manner to your spouse. Does it help in that moment for your spouse to lose his or her temper and shout at you for not behaving kindly? Or does it help if your spouse ignores the comment and instead looks you in the eye, gives you a hug, and expresses sorrow over your worry? I'm sure you play out each scenario in your head without my help and find it very simple to figure out which you would choose. Later, if the second scenario is chosen, your spouse could even mention that it felt a little hurtful when you said the unkind words because emotional support was provided before based on what was really going on.

This is exactly what we are doing when we parent our children from hard places. We are dealing with the problem at the root and not what is presenting itself. A friend of mine who has a daughter with similar issues as TM told a story that made me laugh. (OK, it wasn't real laughter, but more along the lines of "at least I'm not the only one and this time I'm glad it was you" sort of laughter.) A sibling said, "Cock-a Doodle-Doo" which prompted a major meltdown for the daughter. While trying to discover what went on, all the daughter could say was, "He said, 'Cock-a-Doodle-Doo!'" as if that explained everything. Now we all know what was going on was not about the rooster noise; there was something else happening that probably she wasn't even sure of. The phrase, "Cock-a-Doodle-Doo" has become a useful family code word for remembering that what we are seeing really isn't the whole story.

Every time we respond with love and grace to our children, they learn millimeter by millimeter that we can be trusted. Trusted to understand them and love them. Trusted not to react and fly off the handle. Trusted to be the solid ground that they so desperately need, even if they don't know it. This is not to say we let our son get away with whatever he pleases. We do talk about using kind words, being careful with our own and other's possessions, thinking before acting. We do ask that words be repeated respectfully. But we do this in calm moments or if the situation seems like a normal child-rearing situation. It is no use at all to try to instruct an already disregulated child on respect and obedience. You just end up sounding like the adults on the old Charlie Brown cartoons... wah-wah-wah-wah-wah. I've learned to save my breath. Usually.

Positive interactions

A while back, when it became clear exactly how far south things had gone with my traumatized boy, I made a conscious decision. My goal for my interactions with him was to have as many positive ones as possible. Because of the way trauma affects children, it was very simple for him to take any situation and make it negative. People suffering from trauma want to make others feel as yucky as they do. It doesn't help them feel any better, but misery does love company. And unless you, as a parent, are consciously working against it, it is so easy to join in the negativity.

Obviously this is not good, because no one wants to live with constant negativity, but there is another reason as well. Brain science has shown that the things we do repeatedly make paths in our brains. The more we do something, the bigger and stronger the path. (Obviously this is not a technical description of the process.) This is why habits are so difficult to break; the brain must be rewired to make it happen. Thus, every time the traumatized child responds negatively to a person and the person responds negatively in return, a path is reinforced... even for the parent. I knew this and decided I needed to change my part of the equation. I had to address my part in our little negativity dance.

I will be the first to say this is a work in progress, but I have seen progress. The non-reacting-thing is really difficult. It means that the parent needs to set aside what they really, really want to do and act very differently. It means feeling as though you are setting aside your needs and feelings (those would be the not-so-terribly grown-up ones of 'getting what you deserve' and 'everything should be easy for me') and doing the hard thing of offering love where it doesn't seem to be returned.

In practical terms, this means doing a lot of translating in my head. The boy said this, but deep down he really means something else. I will respond to the something else. It means that if I am truly incapable of responding in a positive way, I will leave the scene before I say anything to escalate the situation. Needing to refill my coffee cup provides a handy excuse. (I could never give up coffee at this point in my parenting, or I would need to find another reasons to excuse myself.) It means being sure I am smiling at my child, even though habit and experience have prepped me to be angry. It means I offer physical touch as much as possible, but keeping it to levels he can tolerate... a brush on the arm, a pat on the head, a quick and passing hug, and sometimes I can even sneak in a kiss on the cheek. It means making jokes and trying to get him to laugh. This last one surprised me. Not surprised that it is something I should be doing, but at his reaction to my doing it. Evidently laughing with someone indicates a deeper, thus frightening, relationship. When I do joke around, sometimes he will join in, but sometimes I will see him purposefully pull away. A shared joke can feel too intimate. And at that point I have another chance to have a positive interaction, because it can feel hurtful for someone to pull away when you were reaching out. I can choose to continue to smile and leave it instead of acting hurt. In better moments, we can then (briefly) talk about why that behavior might make someone feel badly. It's all about timing and finding the right moment to address things. Rarely is that moment at the moment of hurt.

This way of parenting is tiring. Instead of reacting on auto-pilot, as we do so much of the time, I have to make conscious decisions. And often these decisions require great effort to make happen. There is a reason we have quiet time around here.

Not only do I need to be concerned about my own interactions with the boy, but since his tendency is to burn any bridge he happens upon, I have been working to facilitate positive interactions between siblings as well. Sometimes I am able to create them, sometimes I can help something along that has already started, and sometimes I can just enjoy the scene of positive interactions that appear before me. Such as this little game playing scenario that happened yesterday afternoon.

TM had created his own game (which involved a lot of voluntary writing!) and asked K. to play it with him. And they managed to play it together without unkind words on one boy's part or horrible whining on the other's. Sometimes I think I am so focused on the negative that I don't pay close enough attention to the good stuff. So I took some pictures.

Here's the game board with dice, markers, and cards to turn over.

It was one heaping dose of good brain connections being formed right here.