Car Conversation

There's nothing to spectacular about this conversation. Its a bit day-in-the-life. But it does show the types of discussions we have and how much fun I have talking to her.

Anya and I were driving over the 520 this morning. They have started building the new bridge so there are all manner of boats and cranes and pylons going up.

Dad: What do you think they're doing out there?
Kid: Fishing?
Dad: No, but that's a very good guess. They are building a new bridge.
Kid: Why are they all out on boats?
Dad: Well they have to be on boats so they can work. That's how they float.
Kid: But what if sharks come and smash into them?
Dad: Are there sharks in that water?
Kid: No.
Dad: Why not?
Kid: Because sharks live where there are lots of fish and there aren't any fish in there.
Dad: No, but it's a good guess.
Kid: because it's too cold?
Dad: Also a good guess, but sharks live in sone very cold water. Where do sharks live?
Kid: The sea.
Dad: ...and the sea is?
Kid: Salt water.
Dad: So....
Kid: The sharks don't live in it because it's fresh water. What kind of fish live in fresh water?
Dad: I don't know... Trout, bass, walleye, minnows, guppies...
Kid: Well then why does Areal call flounder a guppy? They live in the ocean.
Dad: That's a very good point. You have found your first cinematic inconsistency my dear.

Anya Welcomes a new friend

Our good friends, the Jackys just had a new baby girl, Esme. Now Anya will have a new kid to play with at the pool...in a few months.
Welcome to the world [not so] little Esme Jacky!

Where the stuffed animals came from

Today I was driving Anya to the pool, and she told me the following origin story for her stuffed animals:
None of my stuffed animals have moms and dads. One night, all of their parents decided to go to a movie with out their kids. But the parents never came home. The stuffed animal babies tried to find the place where their parents went to the movie but they couldn't find it, instead they wound up at our house.

Anya's night terror

The other night, our friend Fergus was over. We were all quietly watching TV in the basement when we heard Anya scream bloody murder and start wailing. Anya doesn't have many nightmares (which is amazing considering the terrifying tv shows she favors) and I don't think she has ever had a night terror before. Amy and I rushed to her side and began trying to calm and wake her up. It took us literally shaking her and slapping her bottom (not very hard) to finally getting her to tell us what happened. Did some one die? Was she being chased? Was there a fire?
"I don't want anymore yogurt!" she cried.
For the record, while Anya does eat her fair share of yogurt we do not force feed her the stuff (we generally don't need to force feed her anything).

Anya Finds Ammonites in the Microsoft Lobby

Anya and Reading

Note: This is a dad’s perspective only post.  I read Anya to sleep pretty much every night that I’m home. It’s one of my very favorite things to do, so I get a fair amount of reading time with the kidlet. Mom generally reads to Anya when I’m not around (or so she would have me believe!) but since I’m not there, I can’t speak to mom’s experience with Anya and reading. 

Here is dad’s assessment of Anya’s reading around 4 1/2 year old.

Anya reads better than her father spells, but since that is a pretty base achievement, let me provide some details.

She’s known her alphabet for some time,  she also knows all the sounds that the letters make (there might be one or two like Q that she’s not real clear on, but q’s pretty silly so who cares).  She often gets b d and p confused as well as u and n, but then again so do I.

At this point she can sound out simple words that don’t have any tricks in them.  No long vowel sounds for instance, where you say the first vowel’s name and the second vowel is silent, or ph = f or schwas.  You know, all those weird English spelling rules that you probably don’t even think about but the poor spellers among you still struggle with.

She does know that “oo” makes an u sound (she learned that one from “z-o-o”), so she was able to sound out the word “balloon” a few days back. 

Tonight she and I read through a few early reading books.  My technique is to read along and, when I come upon an easy word, I’ll stop and point at it.  She’ll sound it out, say the word, and I’ll keep going.  If it’s a hard word but I think she can get it, I’ll say, “oooh, this one’s a really tough one, but I bet you can figure it out!”  Or if she's in a more contrary mood, I'll say, "Man I bet you can't get this one, since you can't read."  Sometime there will be a repeating word that I’ll point too and she’ll yell it out when it comes by.  She has even read a sentence or two like “Bob got a bat” and the like.

Here are an assortment of words she read by herself tonight:

Scat, cat, small, dog, bird, bus, duck, frog, goose, dark, owl, bat, log, skunk, boy, pillbug, class, helmet, truck, up, stop, drop, roll, zoom. 

Sometimes she’s really into it, like tonight, other nights she doesn’t want to even try and screams, “I can’t do it!” and cries without even trying the first letter, so I try to get her to sound the word out slowly.  Once that’s accomplished I’ll generally stop trying to get her to read for the night. (She really needs to figure out that saying, “I can’t do it” doesn’t work well with me.)

At any rate, I remember struggling with “See Bob Run” in 1^st grade (thank you mom for your patience), so I’m very proud and impressed with Anya’s skills.

Parent Teacher Conference

Teacher notes from Anya's spring parent-teacher conference:

Awesome Conversation Over Dinner

Amy was gone tonight so Anya and I had a good long sit down and talk sort of dinner.
I asked her what she wanted to be when she grew up and she (of course) said, "paleontologist". I wanted to make sure that she wasn't just saying that because she knows it tickles me to have my 4.5 year old say "paleontologist" (let alone aspire to be one). Here is the actual conversation her and I had.
Dad: Why do you want to be a paleontologist?
Anya: Because I want to see dinosaurs
Dad: Well if you just wanted to see dinosaurs you could just work at a museum.
Anya: No. I want to see the dinosaurs in the dirt when I dig them up. Dad! You should be a paleontologist too!
Dad: Naw. I like to make things and be creative and lead groups of people. Paleontologist isn't my kind of job. But they DISCOVER things which is really cool and if you wanted to do that I think that would be great.
Anya: Well maybe you could NAME the Dinosaurs. That's creative, and that uses your brain.
Dad: Well, I tell you what, if you discover a new dinosaur, and you need a name for it, you let me know. But I'd probably just call it the Anyasaurus.

Which she thought was very funny.