My daughter gave me a little pillow for Christmas that was soft in both material and consistency. I told her there was a moon on it as well as some stars. Both she and I like to name things and I told her I wasn't sure if I wanted to call it 'Star Pillow' or 'Moon Pillow' (following the naming standard she likes to use for things). After a few days, I said I'd decided on Moon Pillow and she continues to check to see where Moon Pillow is, including borrowing it to use it here and there.
I told her I could teach her how to make a star like the ones on the pillow if she was interested, and after showing her how to make one, she'd be able to draw one. She was interested so we went up to the craft room where I got the corkboard, some push pins, and string. I placed the pins on the board in a pentagonal orientation and tied the string to one of the five.
I let her feel the configuration and then explained all she needed to do was take the string from the location it was, skip one of the pins going around and then loop the string over the next pin. Repeat that step until she was back at the first pin and she'd have a star.
She did so and then we talked about the geometry inside the star. She undid it and redid the star several more times. She's recently told me she hates braille (even though she types away on things she wants to write down most days of late.) She said she couldn't draw a star because she'd get lost in the writing of the shape.
This is true, it's hard to write or draw with your eyes closed. Try it yourself. Take a sheet of paper, close your eyes and try to draw something simple like a stick figure or a dog in profile. Once you pick up the pencil you don't know how far to move to get to other areas you've drawn. My daughter writes and does so in large letters and we can sort of read it. She's getting better, but it's hard for anyone, and for her, considering she has no memory of what things look like, it's doubly hard.
But she wants to write, so we're supporting her efforts. And that's why the star came to mind. It's five connected strokes that return to the starting point, which she can keep her finger on. Drawn stars are usually asymmetrical and don't need to be perfect to look nice. I think she can do it and I think she'd like to be able to draw something successfully. Tomorrow we'll see if she can draw one using the landmarking skills she already has. Here's the star she made today:
The Big Boy Update: My son has been taking care of himself so much lately. While his sister is bored and lonely, he is spending his time doing different things. He is getting in more screen time than he really should have, but his father and I are also spending a decent amount of time in front of our computers, phones or tablets so we're trying to be reasonable yet flexible with him. He was able to go and play outside with Rayan a few times, but it's been raining for most of the last three days so that's been less frequent than he would like. He's so self-sufficient. What he does crave is our attention when he wants to talk to us about the things he's interested in or excited about. I try to listen and ask questions. He absolutely loves it when we're interested in what he's excited about.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter would love a friend right now that is her age she could play with. Today, though, she got to make chocolate chip M&M cookies with her father from scratch. She called me up to try the butter and sugar is before the dry ingredients were added, then again to try the dough which she I and love. Then again when the cookies were ready, telling me which spot to walk to (describing our kitchen as she sees it motion-wise instead of landmark-wise which was interesting) so that I wouldn't get the cooling cookies and could instead get the ones that were ready to eat. It made her day, making those cookies with her father. Then, she wanted to wrestle with him. She so needs a friend.
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