red balloon

I forgot to take pictures today, but I do have a sad and sweet anecdote. Today was Lydia’s first day of Let’s Play Music, and the teacher sent her home with a red balloon. She ran downstairs to show Mary, who promptly came up the stairs sobbing huge crocodile tears because she wanted to go to Lydia’s special music class and get a red balloon. She even told me that she had grown bigger and that meant she could go.

My heart can’t take Mary’s tears, so I wrapped up one of her birthday present puzzles and gave it to her while Lydia was at preschool. We did the puzzle together, and then Mary ran around with Lydia’s balloon for the rest of the day. Lydia had other things on her mind. She wanted us to play “frog in the middle” and act out the puppet show to Carmen that the teacher taught them. We did all that after dinner.

I was a little impatient with Lydia today. She did a lot of crying and screaming, and no matter how I prep myself to be patient in such moments, I really struggle to be kind.