Because Babies Grow Up

“Third time’s the charm, eh?”

“Finally got it right, did ya?”

“Are you done having kids now that you got your boy?”

These are some of the comments my husband gets about our family. Not only is it driving me crazy, but it’s making him furious. He loves our daughters. They have melted his heart again and again. They are girly girls and tom boys. They love sports and princesses. He never, for one minute, wished they were boys instead of girls. We just have one question in response to those comments:

What is getting it “wrong” about having a girl?

Seriously! Would you tell your grandfather that he got it wrong when he fathered your mother? Did your father-in-law get it wrong when he fathered your wife? What are these men thinking when they tell Brent he got it right by having a son?

I’ll admit, I was hoping my first child would be a boy. I wanted all my other children to have a big brother. But when the tech said the baby was a girl, I fell in love with Sammi. I was excited for twirling dresses and setting curls in her hair. Then came baby number 2. I thought it would be fun to have a boy. You know, one of each. But when the tech said the baby was a girl, I was relieved. I knew what it was like to have a girl. I was excited to put her in all the girly clothes that Sammi grew out of too fast. Then with baby number three we hoped it would be a boy. I was ready for experiencing something different. But I had some fantastic girl names picked out. When the tech said baby was a boy we were excited, but I did have a moment of sadness of not having another girl and getting to use that fantastic name!

So far I’m happy with our family. We have stressful, tired, cranky days. But we also have loving, fun, playful days. I don’t know if we’re done adding children to our family, yet. Who knows. I’m grateful for each of our children, for who they are, not just their gender.

What comments do you get about your family that drive you crazy?

So a few weeks ago some friends lent us a video their daughter loved to see if Sammi would like it too. It was Leap Frog’s Letter Factory. They said their daughter loved it and learned all her letters right away. I was interested, but not completely sold on Sammi learning her letters from a video. The copy they gave us was scratched so we only got to watch 12 minutes. Sammi was so sad it wasn’t working. I put her off and said we’d try again tomorrow. The rest of the day she sang the little song for the letters she’d seen in those twelve minutes.

The next day we tried again and it still only went the 12 minutes. Even after I cleaned everything I could! Sammi was rally sad to not see the rest of the letters. So I hopped on Amazon and ordered the video along with the Talking Words Factory one and sat tight for the two days till we got it. First, I love Amazon Prime with its two day shipping. Second, I love living close to Lexington (Amazon headquarters) because sometimes our two-day shipping only takes one-day. So we got the videos the next day in time to watch the Letter Factory before Elli woke up from her nap.

Since then, Sammi has watched the video several times. She loves it. She sings the songs and points out letters every where we go. I sort of anticipated these outcomes. What I didn’t anticipate is that she’s started writing the letters. All. The. Time. At church she writes all over the chalkboards. We have to practically drag her to the car to go home for lunch. At my friend’s house she wrote some H’s and Q’s on her dryer with a white crayon (fortunately it washed off!) and most recently she wrote her entire name, in a line, with proper spacing, on the card she made for my mom.

I gave her no help in writing her name. She did all the letters on her own, in the right order. She just showed me the card when she was all done. Wow! I’m very impressed.

Here’s my caveat: There are many ways to teach kids letters. I love the hands on, personally approach I’ve also done with Sammi where we make crafts out of letters and play matching games and such. There are terrific ideas at blogs like No Time For Flashcards and Totally Tots for these kinds of crafts. I don’t think videos should replace parental interactions. But I was amazed at how quickly and thoroughly she learned her letters and was self-motivated to write them. I’m still amazed.

And the disclosure: I bought this video myself. I took the initiative to tell you about it all on my own because I was so surprised by how much Sammi liked the video and how much she has learned from it. I have not been compensated in anyway for writing this post. The links to the videos are Amazon affiliate links so I could earn a small commission if you make a purchase after clicking on the link to go to Amazon.