Laila had a play date with a friends, so it was just Ava and I for most of the day. WOOOHOOOO! We went to "the club," planning to spend the whole day there. I thought it would be a good chance for her to branch out without her sister; meet some new kids. There were perfect candidates playing in the water when we arrived. They looked about 4 years old, friendly and happy, they were there with their nannies too. She shyly wandered to the side a the pool. A cute red-headed girl with goggles bobbed over. "Hi!" she said. "I'm Maddie! Do you want to play with me?".
YES!
The golden words!
Ava's response?
"No thank you."
WHAT?!?!
You see, when we've gone to the park, the girls say that nobody wants to play with them. But I know that's not true. Kids try and play with them, but the girls sort of shy away. They are perfectly content playing on their own; they rarely let other kids into their little world.
What really drives me crazy?
Ava is just like me.
We get exactly what we want, the perfect situation laid out in front of us, and we simply say, "No".
It's a big problem.
I've talked about this before.
Sometimes it seems easier to stay by ourselves instead of letting someone else in to our little worlds, but that is no way to live.
So what should I do when I see a mini-me in the making?
I asked her why she didn't want to play with Maddie (she didn't know). I tried to coach her in things she could say, games she could play, to help her make friends (she was ambivalent). Maddie was a more experienced swimmer than her, it seemed to hard.
I don't know if I helped her, but she had a fun day regardless. Maybe next time she'll be able to play with the cool kids.
On another note, kids books are great.
I'm trying to train these kids to be good readers; we go to the library a couple times a week. It pains me every time when Laila picks out these sorts of books:
I actually try to pick out a couple "quality", age-appropriate books like this one:
and this one:
(As you can see, I've tried to tell the girls to look for books with seals on them. "That means they are good authors!" I say. Then Laila will pick up the latest in the tween-drama-gossipy-mean-girls book and say "My friends tells me that these are by a really good author!". Mmmmmm not quite.)
Maybe these books don't have as much flash as the other ones, but their brains will thank them for it later. It's sad to see books being dumbed down. Luckily, Ava will let me pick out and read pretty much anything to her.
So we read this today:
The story and the illustrations are quite charming.
kids kids kids.
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