My daughter is the kind of kid who empowers herself to go after pleasure.  That could be dangerous in four to six years, but for now, it means she’s able to keep herself quite busy.

Her younger brother brought home a project to be completed for his kindergarten class.  It wasn’t a big surprise; I’d signed up to help out by completing these kinds of small tasks at home to ease the workload on the teacher.   Projects usually consist of little jobs like stapling and folding papers for creative or reading assignments to be doled out to the students.  Lucky me: teacher sends home a sheaf of “popcorn words” that need to be cut out and punched, two per student.  “Popcorn words” are those that pop up frequently in reading and are simply memorized rather than taught phonetically.  Each student has a little ring with a collection of popcorn words strung on it, each word on a piece of paper shaped like a single kernel of popcorn.  New ones are added each week; each student is supposed to practice the entire collection of popcorn words with parents several times a week, expanding their reading skills.

It’s not the usual puny little project.  This is going to take several hours: twenty-eight students at two popcorn words a piece, plus hole punching in each “kernel”, paper clipping a note on each pair of “kernels”…

I don’t even get the chance to start them.  My empowered daughter has already grabbed them and started cutting and punching away while I’m trying to finish cleaning up after dinner; she loves anything that’s an arts-and-craft project, didn’t even stop to ask me about it before diving in.  That’s fine, I don’t mind.  Or at least I didn’t until the cat-fight started.

Little brother demands to cut out popcorn words, too; they’re HIS, for HIS class, after all.  Damn; it’s hard to get around that logic.  I’d be glad to let him, except that his small motor skills aren’t coordinated enough to manage staying along/outside the lines with scissors.  He persuades me that he could a try a couple pieces, to see if he’s up to the task.  Soon there are wild gestures and raised voices, scissors waved in the air.  Gah. 

Dad steps in at this point; now there are three pairs of scissors at work; I’m literally being cut out of the project.  The voices are still loud; I yield the space to go and work on a project of my own.

This morning there remains about 1/3 of the work to be completed.  There’s a mound of clippings and healthy dusting of paper shreds on the floor.  The work the crew did last night looks a little shaky; I’m going to be branded Don’t-ask-her-to-do-it at school once they get a look at these sorry, bedraggled “kernels.”

Maybe it’s a blessing, who knows?  I sometimes wish someone here at home would brand me that way, too.

My empowered daughter went and raked leaves last evening in the front yard.  Most kids would wait until their parents raked leaves to enjoy leaf jumping, but not my little ball of spunk.  She loves to pile them up and jump in them, so much that she’s willing to do more raking than many of the men in the neighborhood.  There’s an enormous pile, golden brown and yellow, smack in the center of the lawn this morning.  Spectacular job by a nine-year-old; the rake is bigger than she is and the pile is a good ten feet around by two feet high, all raked and mounded and jumped in while I prepared dinner last evening.

Unfortunately, there’s a catch.  It’s going to rain this morning; as soon as I hit the “submit” button to file this post, I’m going to have to run like hell and bag that huge pile.  Ordinarily I’d just mulch the leaves into the lawn where they lay; no such luck when they’re in a pile this thick, they’d just clog the mower and suffocate the lawn.  The full leaf bags will have to be dragged to and stored in the garage until the next garbage day – Monday – because the bags will get too wet and heavy otherwise.

Some day I’ll be very glad my daughter is able to freely pursue the things she loves, I’ll be telling myself as I stuff damp leaves into bags.

10:47:38 AM    comment []

It’s like a box of assorted chocolates.  Open it up, try one.  Try more.

Tasty, yes?

And they’re calorie-free.

Go ahead, dig in.  Enjoy!

This edition of VO #42 brought to you by Mark Hoback and Paul Hinrichs.

9:28:35 AM    comment []