We went to a lot of farms in October, we went apple picking in Stribling, the Burke Fall Festival with Natalie, Chloe, and a whole Bright Horizon’s contingent, Butler Farms with Lucy and Nora, and Navi, and Great Country Farms (our favorite) by ourselves. The girls love the farms and fall festivals, Curie particularly likes the jump “pillow” a giant jumping bounce set-up at Great Country Farms.
In addition there were a number of birthday parties, Katie’s at the bounce place in Woodbridge, where we immediately ran out of batteries in our brand new car, EJ’s party at a different bounce place, and Etta’s party (which we had to miss Mateo’s party because it was on the same day) at Flight, basically ANOTHER bounce place!
We bought the new car, and Curie was really broken up about saying goodbye to the old yellow car (of course we haven’t gotten rid of it yet) we had the girls take a picture with the old car and she was beside herself. Elia will point to the old car, but Curie really has a bond with it. All the kids at Bright Horizons knew when we were there with the Yellow Bug. Both girls hugged the car, and it wasn’t until we went into the new car that she felt better. We asked her what the name of the new car is, and she said “Pug” because it rhymes like “Bug.” It has not stuck, but it was very cute, the “Yellow Pug.” A few days later, Erin dropped a bottle of white pepper onto our scale and it shattered like a car window, pretty amazing really. Curie’s response was “now I will miss the scale AND the car.”
Curie loves school, she loves going, gets scared if she thinks we might miss the bus. She has had some catching up to do because she is the youngest of the class, we now encourage Super Why and Sesame Street over “eggs” and spend a lot of time with Daddy and Mommy to do lessons. She actually insists on lessons most days. She had a zero on her color words when they began assessing and Albert worked on it with her using test prep techniques (how many “P” words are there? Which one is the longer one? There are three B words, there is only one O word), and spoiler alert for November’s blog: she got 100% on her latest assessment. It shows that she can learn and catch up quickly, and is learning and progressing at an amazing pace. Her drawings have improved dramatically drawing with her friends, and when we go back to Bright Horizons on occasion to pick up Elia, there is a difference between her and her friends in the K-prep class.
Curie takes the bus every morning and takes the martial arts bus to tae kwon do (which we just call “martial arts”) for after-school care. On the bus to school we wave to her from the side and try to see her in the windows (they are tinted on the buses here – which is different from when we were kids). The thing though is that unless she is sitting on our side and really up to the window, it is hard to see her. We asked her if she was sitting on our side on the bus and she said that the bus patrol tells her where to sit. So the next day, unprompted, while getting on the bus, Curie stops the line cold on the stairs (she is the first one on the bus normally). We wait, and wait, and wonder what is going on, then we hear the bus driver call to us and say “she asked if she could sit on the side where her parents are so that she can wave to you.” That’s our girl! Stand up for what you want! We were so proud.
So, Curie comes home and tells us she is going to test for her white belt (Albert said that he got his white belt when they gave him his uniform, but apparently you test for a white belt – and pay $35 for the privilege to do so). It is like a recital where you go watch, so we went. Curie is the smallest kid in the class by far. It was so cute. The teacher asks the class if anyone needs to use the bathroom before the test. The entire class except Curie runs off. Curie says looks at us with the “what? I don’t need to go” look. They do jumping jacks, push ups, low blocks, high blocks, kicks, simulated sparring, recite Korean numbers and words and tell their student creed. It is amazing and Curie only has to be asked to use the other hand once, one poor kid keeps using the wrong side and is asked a lot to switch hands or feet. It was a really good learning experience to see one kid not be able to break his board (more advanced students also tested) and not pass and to talk to Curie about it. The teachers are really good about self esteem and discipline, and Curie loves Mr. Arnold, her teacher and bus driver.
Curie said her tooth hurt and Erin called the dentist. There was a cancellation the next day and so she took Curie to have her tooth extracted. Albert was in Bloomington and beside himself. Erin told Albert he shouldn’t go to those kind of dentist visits any more. On the other hand, Elia had a great visit, and it might be genetics, or how Curie was in the womb, but Elia had a very different dentist experience. Curie had to take antibiotics while waiting for her original appointment and started with a lot of whining, but after a while, it became more routine, which was a relief. She does dislike grape candy because of the grape flavored Motrin though. Curie now shows off the space with her friends, chooses healthy foods and puts back sugary snacks even when Albert says they are okay (bad Albert).
Curie was the evil queen for Halloween as we posted earlier and wants to be the evil queen next year as well. She is very independent in her thinking, though can hesitate when making decisions. Curie had a great time with Etta and Isabella trick-or-treating. Elia loved it too. Choosing to be an evil queen instead of Snow White is the queen vs. princess thing we think but there is something cool about the independence to not be what everyone else was. Another incident was the Happy Meal toys where the girl toy you could comb her hair and only one arm moved, where the boy toy would shoot things or have wings that opened. Curie was indignant and asked Erin to write in to Old MacDonalds.
Albert stresses about school and testing, got nervous for the white belt testing, agonized over needing to work on the letters and so on. Erin worries about the whining, and baby talk. We both worry about food and sleep and all sorts of things. But here is the thing, Curie is doing great, she is smiling, loves the things she does, plays teacher at home all the time. And there is something more fundamental, she defends Elia, takes care of Elizabeth (Katie’s sister) and any little kid. She told us the Winnie the Pooh movie, “makes me cry” because they can’t find Christopher Robin. And most tellingly this month, Curie offered her coat without asking to a little girl she was playing tag with because the little girl said she was cold. Curie has a good heart and that makes us prouder than anything else.