From Vet's Assistant to Master's Fellow & Family Update

My very good friend SW is leaving me. She's moving far away to a suburb of Albany, NY to work in a laboratory after being accepted into a Master's degree post-graduate Fellowship. (I think I've got that right - I struggled with the wording of that one sentence for nearly five minutes!) I will admit that, even though I'm excited for the opportunity she's pursuing, I'm feeling slightly abandoned. This is not her fault, and I know that she's thrilled at this new chapter in her life, and I'm happy for her, but I sure am going to miss her. She's been one of the constants in my life for nearly five years now! It's hard to let go of her and say, "Well...see ya 'round sometime!" even though I know that she'll come back to visit occasionally. Not only do I love her dearly, my family loves her, too; I hope she knows that. SW - I will miss you. Please do everything you can to stay in touch, and let me know where you are when you get there so I can write you often, or visit, if I happen to be in the frozen tundra that is Upstate NY. ****************************** Kiddo and Little Bit are doing fine. They're still having some small power struggles - what's mine is mine and what's yours is mine, too...though you can play with it occasionally unless I scream my bloody head off first and make a big deal out of nothing. Kiddo seems to be getting into quite a bit of unnecessary trouble over these struggles. I know that what they're doing is completely normal, and we're doing our best to help them both understand how things need to work, but sometimes, no matter how reasonable we are, we remember that you cannot reason with an 18 month old at all, and it is very difficult to reason with a 4 year old. Sharing is hard for them, especially Kiddo. The biggest thing right now is his manipulation of her to get what he wants. For example, the other day, we were all sitting in the living room watching Max & Ruby (ugh...) and neither of them were playing with anything at all. But then, Little Bit noticed Kiddo's doodle board and decided she wanted to draw. The second (I mean this literally) she put her hands on it with interest, Kiddo decided he wanted to draw, too, and started to take it away from her. This lead to not only a screaming match ("Mine!" vs "Mine!") it lead to a tug-of-war as well. I tried to calmly intervene by explaining to Kiddo that he should let her use it because he didn't even know it was there until she picked it up - but this just served to make him scream louder. Eventually he wound up in his room, screaming his fool head off with instructions not to come out until he could be calm and listen to Mommy. A similar situation arose a day later when Kiddo decided to help me fold laundry. I usually let him help with this, even though I have to go back later and re-fold everything because it's mostly just in a wadded-up pile of fabric. Anyway - Kiddo was "folding" one of Little Bit's shirts, and she came along, recognizing that it was hers, and took it off the chair where Kiddo had carefully placed it. I believe she was going to toddle it into her room, but he snatched it away from her before she got the chance. This led to another screaming/tugging match which landed both of them in their rooms for a period of time. She quit screaming first, so she was allowed out and that made Kiddo even angrier. He also does the, "Here [Little Bit]...don't you want to play with this?" Meaning that he wants whatever she's got at the moment and he's trying to get it by giving her something else to play with. This ploy rarely works, because then she wants both the things he's given her and...of course...screaming ensues. It's a vicious cycle, and I know it will end, but it sure is exhausting. It doesn't help that Little Bit is cutting some pretty serious teeth right now - so I'm sure that has something to do with the automatic "crazy" reactions. Anyway - other than these...disturbances...we're all doing well. We're still on the hunt for a mini-van, and Hubby is supposed to be going to look at and drive one tonight (along with Our Favorite Mechanic) so we'll see. I'm engrossed in a completely wonderful new vampire series and, though I'm still being somewhat domestic, my enthusiasm has lessened a bit with the want (no...strike that...need) to fly through these books. There are four and I'm already almost 1/2-way through the 3rd one! Who knew I could read so fast? Work is still good...though I'm having trouble concentrating because my books are like a siren call to me all day long. Hmmm...maybe I should leave them at home to avoid the temptation? TTFN JMS