I’m a bit late (10 days to be exact) with Avery’s latest update, but better late than never!
Though Avery’s not that much different than how she was during our last update, several big things have happened in the last six months. The biggest, of course, is that she said good-bye to the JCC and started kindergarten. Orientation day was a bit tough – with her not wanting to enter the classroom – but it’s been smooth sailing ever since. (She later told me about that morning, “I just acted like that because it’s a new classroom and a new school. But I won’t be like that again.” And she hasn’t been!)
She really likes school. Though she said a week or two into the new school year that kindergarten was boring because “all they do is teach us,” she has since had a change of heart, telling me that she’s in the “best kindergarten in the whole wide world.†She has a different teacher than her sister did, and the fit is just perfect. She talks about her teachers and what she has learned from them often, and they reported to us recently that she has really blossomed, and shown her true self, over the last few months.
In terms of academics, the first semester of kindergarten has focused on letter and number formation, basic math, and beginning reading via sight words. She’s not reading full books yet but she can read several dozen words and is constantly sounding words out and asking us how to spell words, which are good starts. Before kindergarten she had little interest in reading, but that’s not the case now.
As for friendships, she remains close to Naomi, a good friend from preschool, and she’s developed relationships with several other girls in her class. She is also quite taken by AJ, who she remains engaged to.
Avery, who appears quiet and sweet to those who first meet her, has a big personality. She’s very silly – telling jokes, talking about things she knows she shouldn’t (like the butt, which she finds hysterical to talk about), and sometimes singing funny songs. She likes to jump on top of people, too – if I’m ever on all fours (looking for or cleaning something), she inevitably hops on my back with a huge laugh. She also likes to perform, often dancing around for us or hamming it up if we ask to take her photo (which, as readers know, happens quite often). And she has a big laugh; I like this one recent picture because it captures how she looks much of the time.
She can be feisty – yelling at her sister if she feels frustrated or wronged. (Despite their closeness we’ve seen more sibling rivalry and fighting over the last six months.) She can be defiant with us, too – saying “I don’t care” when we tell her she’s lost a privilege for bad behavior. And, yet, she still has a very sweet side. She often uses a baby voice (“Mama’s lap”) and climbs up for a hug, and she’s very affectionate – rubbing my hair or face or touching my necklace, much like she did when she was a baby – when we’re cuddling. She’s often very sweet to her sister, too; they have a very close relationship and now that they share a room the first thing Avery does in the morning is call out for Zoe.
Speaking of the room: that’s another big development. We bought the girls bunk beds and moved Avery into her sister’s room just last month. I’ve fretted at times – especially when they bicker at bedtime or when one girl insists that we leave the door open and hallway light on, and the other complains it’s too bright – that perhaps we made a mistake. But all in all they seem happy with the move; the adjustment was very easy, with Zoe not complaining when we started moving Avery’s clothes and books in, and Avery not expressing sadness over her old room (which has been reconfigured as a playroom).
Other stuff: Avery still loves playing with her sister and doing things with her like throwing tea parties, opening stores or restaurants, and playing school. While we very much have an on-the-go lifestyle, one of her favorite things this fall has been to stick around home on Sundays and either watch football with her dad or entertain friends while the dads watch football. (Almost every Sunday, she asks who’s coming over for a football party.) She has gotten more sensitive as of late, often saying she’s scared of the dark or of monsters at bedtime, and she always asks if there are scary parts or “bad guys” in any movie she watches. (She’s very concerned about bad guys.) She often asks questions I wouldn’t have thought of, and don’t always have the answer to, like whether God sleeps. She can be a big tease, and she recently started to poke fun at how sentimental I am. We’ll be at a store and she’ll pick up a baby shoe or point to a crib and say, “Remember when I was that small, Mama? Doesn’t that make you want to cry?” Lastly, one of my favorite things about Avery is how she always notices and admires a pretty leaf or a flower – we can be anywhere and she’ll spot one and stop. “Look, Mama, it’s so pretty,” she’ll say, literally reminding me of the importance of stopping to smell the flowers.
-M
