Last night, Caitlyn announced, pretty much randomly: I’m not just the Queen of Cats. I have wings and a mermaid tail. And I breathe fire! And I have beautiful tie-dyed fur. Meow! Followed by: Time to set the table! That’s my job! And much joyous skipping.
Caitlyn came home from school last week and announced, “It’s the first day of Hanukkah! Can we light candles?” I figured, why not? So, our non-Jewish household has been lighting candles at dinnertime for the last week, one more each night. We’ve made a circle of tea lights since we don’t have a menorah, and Caitlyn – without any prompting – changes out the old lights for new ones every morning. I’ve found some blessings to read, and we’ve talked about Maccabees and miracles. This morning, Caitlyn asked for a menorah for Christmas. So, she hasn’t thrown out the other …
I enjoyed Christmas as a kid – what child doesn’t like presents and a party? But it’s only recently (yes, and belatedly) occurred to me that I haven’t really done anything to make sure Caitlyn will be able to say the same in 20 years. Traditions, apparently, don’t make themselves. After moving out for college, I always went back home for Christmas. I wasn’t responsible for shaping the holiday there, and by then the patterns were pretty much set. When we didn’t go to my family’s home, Ian and I went somewhere else where we still weren’t responsible, leaving the …
About the time the email discussion of How We Would Do Thanksgiving This Year got started last month, I saw this over at Uncommon Grace. We were discussing food, as one does, and spreading out the cooking responsibilities and I suggested that maybe, in addition to potatoes and pie, we could have a craft table set up. While most of the family members are quite happy to sit around and talk, Caitlyn doesn’t see the appeal. I thought having a creative space might keep her from being too much underfoot in the kitchen or from jumping on the couch unsupervised. …
A neighbor asked Caitlyn, “What were you for Halloween?” “A princess. Fairy Princess!” “How nice,” the neighbor replied. “Yeah, she was really scary,” added Caitlyn’s uncle, which inspired chuckles from the rest of us. Caitlyn was offended. “I was not!” “You were!” he insisted. “Some people are afraid of clowns, I’m afraid of princesses.” Caitlyn hasn’t quite figured out how to tell when people are teasing her, and she doesn’t know the cultural reference to coulrophobia. Someone else admitting a fear is apparently grounds for asserting superiority: “I’m not afraid of anything!” she declared. Everyone else thought this was hysterical, …
Caitlyn dreams of spelling or reading, apparently. When I woke her up for school yesterday morning, before she got out of bed, she told me (her version was much longer than this one): “I played this game called WordTag in my head. There were all these letters. I was pink and I ran around and put them together. Yellow wanted to break them. But if I made really long words, then Yellow couldn’t. Or if there were lots of ‘a’s or ‘the’s on the ends. Those were red, the sight words (she really called them that). So pink and red …
