Hosted a women's luncheon for CCC women today.  Busy, but fun. 

I served Coffee Punch...delicious!

RDI:  Goal-Teach Steven to be my apprentice and follow my lead.

1.  Tried to get Steven to help with laundry.  He ran away so fast, I hardly saw him!!  Interesting??  I was too busy getting ready to push him, but was disappointed with myself for this.

2.  Build bridge out of blocks:  He had already been building so that made it a little tricky for me to "take over" as the guide.  But, he did pretty good.  I began building the tower and showing him where to put the blocks.  He went along with it, but was trying very hard to be silly (his M.O.) and I could tell he was uncomfortable/irritated with me being the guide.  So, i made a quicker bridge. 

Then, I had him pick up the blocks with me.  Me first, then him.  Then, I hold the box and he toss them in...vice versa.  Variations of variety of blocks and moving around the box and role switching.  he was much more engaged with this and seemed to enjoy it more.  We finished and it felt somewhat successful.  I am, again, reminded of how hard it is for him to follow my lead.  It's weird b/c i don't notice it unless we do these activities that push him.

3.  Bathing baby with Steven.  I had him rub on her soap.  Then, i had him rub a litlte lotion on her.  He was very excited to do this with me.  It was very simple (i didn't really try hard at all as you can see).  But, he really seemed to be empowered by it!

While i was finishing up with baby, Steven went in to the kitchen and for the first time in his life (age 5 now), he began sweeping the kitchen floor.  Most kids are interested in Mommy's chores much earlier, but Steven never had been.  Our consultant explained to me how Steven is so afraid of doing anything new where he feels insecure or has the possiblity to fail, that he rarely tries anything.  This is so true...until, maybe, now.

I walked in to the kitchen, very surprised.  He was enthusiastically sweeping, using the dust pan, and had even pulled out the trash can.  I just sat there and watched and cheered him on (not focusing on the quality of the task, but on his being so big and doing it!).  It was really cool.

4.  Daddy and building a wooden train (small and simple).  Steven, Jackson and I built a Balsa Wood train.  It was a little complicated.  I tried to do actionms that Steven and Jackson could follow me on and repeat.  Steven seemed to follow along well and was good at taking turns.  I think that I could have broken it down a little more and used non-verbals like noises or chants (were building a train,etc) to keep him more engaged.,  Over all I think it went okay, but a couple times I had to chase down Jackson so that made it a little harder.