When W. is working...

C. does her "school" too now.

  In fact she is quite insistent on doing "school."  

She has a deep, breathy, husky voice when she first wakes up.  It sounds like she's been a two pack a day smoker for the past 20 years (a difficult accomplishment in her two years...sometimes I suspect "screamer's nodules.") 

She stands on the top of the stairs and demands,

 "Daddy, I go down stairs!"  

soon followed by, "Mommy, I need water and puzzles."  

In my bleary pre-coffee state, I often mistake her "puzzles" with "pretzels" which is then met with a glare of disapproval when I hand her a pretzel.  Soon, I get with the program and hand her the first puzzle of the day.  Often it will be the getting the bear family dressed puzzle that she wants first thing.  

I think of it as a language tool as well as a matching and sorting puzzle.  

She always matches the bear family to what our family is wearing.  

First thing in the morning, she puts on the bears' jammies.  She then looks at our faces and puts on a face that matches (Baby bear is always so happy...Momma bear is usually yawning, and Daddy bear is looking a bit confused.)  

If she chooses it later in the day you never know what the family will be wearing.  She tells me all about the family she has created.  

Then she asks for another.

 Her current favorite is a wooden alphabet puzzle. 

 She dumps it out, and then finds a letter.  Then she finds where it fits.  Next she sings the alphabet song and points to each hole in the puzzle until she gets to the place where she put the letter in.  She then declares what letter she has inserted.  She has begun memorizing the letters and when she is down to a few, she'll yell "Momma where did MY (letter) go?...Oh there you are silly (letter.)"  

In this way she has taken previous knowledge (the ABC song) and expanded it to create a self correcting puzzle.  It amazes me how she does things sometimes.  Usually she will then move to a jigsaw puzzle.  She narrates the process telling all about which part of the animal she is going to put on, or why the pirates are fighting. 

 In my house, it is rarely quiet.