March 29, 2010

Kaylynn demonstrates how she puts on her coat...

Monday turned out to be a very long day. Kaylynn had a good day at school. They said, “Kaylynn had a really good day!! At group time we read the book The Night Before Easter. For art we decorated a cross with flower stickers. She had fun coloring & putting puzzles together. We played outside on the playground - Kaylynn liked swinging & sliding down the slide. Very smiley & happy. :) "

We had a dinner party to go to Monday night, and Kaylynn was invited, too. There were about a dozen adults and two 6 year old boys. This is a group of very close friends who have all heard about Kaylynn, so she was very warmly greeted. She was shy girl for a long time, which is to be expected. She didn’t want to sit in a high chair for dinner, and I didn’t push the issue - I let her sit on my lap. It was a very long dinner and she opened up after a while when the adults near her started to play with her. She wasn’t interested in playing with the other kids, most likely because they were in another room and she didn’t want to be away from Julian or me. We had brought finger puppets for her to play with, but of course she found other very interesting things. Fork & spoon make a nice noise when banged together. Crackers are crumbly when they meet fork tines. Origami frogs are fun to retrieve from under the table. And grown-ups do silly things to make little girls laugh.

Julian arrived a little later than I – he had to work late. We pre-arranged that he would take her home for bed, so we needed separate cars anyway. At one point during dinner, my leg started to feel unusually warm. Yup – she had peed through her diaper and not only onto me but onto the floor as well. Julian took her for a diaper & pants change – thank goodness we always pack a spare pair of pants! One of our hosts brought me some paper towels & cleaner for the floor and then went hunting for jeans that would fit me. Thank goodness she kept her pants from before she lost all that weight!

Kaylynn made it through the soup course – and LOVED the soup – but then she flopped back on me and looked like she was suddenly overwhelmingly tired. That was Julian’s cue to take her home. It was a little past her bedtime. She wanted to do a lot more things and protested a little about leaving, but he said she was really sweet & snuggly at home and went to sleep right away.