Aviva

• Aviva likes school and talks a lot about how they’re learning "doditch ball" and how to "jiggle". Jiggling is when you throw a ball from one hand to the other, and catch it, kind of like juggling but no, she says it’s jiggling. 

• They learn in school how it’s so important to check in with someone if they’re hurt. The way you check in is to ask, “I’m sorry you’re hurt. Are you okay? Is there anything I can do to make it better?” It’s so helpful to check in, and it’s okay if you hit someone back if you check in with them afterwards. Not sure if that’s Aviva-Logic or if that’s what commonly happens. I got to witness this the other day, when she hit a boy back but explained to me that it’s okay because she checked in with him. 

• She has a new doll, which she loves, and she named her Eska. I asked her how she thought of the name, and she said it came from her belly, or right here on the side. That’s how she thought of it. Her two stuffed cats are named Ada and Data, but she keeps forgetting which is which, so she asks Josh and he reminds her. Today she was washing Eska’s face (for a half hour, while I was cooking) and she kept telling Eska, “Eska, you’re as dirty as a whistle! No, you’re dirty like the street. But it's okay, Eska."

• Her hair is getting long and I like braiding it. She told me, though, that “I might should cut it” because it’s maybe too long. 

• She likes to pretend things and tell me what to say, and we have many conversations that go like this:

A: let’s pretend I’m a baby. And you say, ‘hi baby!’Me: Hi, baby!A: and now let’s pretend you’re just walking down the street, dooo too doo, and you see meMe: Doo too doo, oh look! A baby!A: and now let’s say you didn’t know where we areMe: I don’t know where we are!A: and now let’s say we’re really at home and you forgotMe: Oh! I forgot we’re really at home

This type of conversation happens daily. But last week while we were driving there was a special one:

A: Let’s pretend I’m a baby. And I just throwed up. And let’s pretend it was so much that it was all over. It was all over the car seat and even the outside of the car. And even on the people on the street. And let’s pretend it was even in their eyes and it won't wash away. It still won’t for a hundred hundred years.

Lovely, yes?

• The other day she pretended she had a store. She had a pretend store, and she told me: 

“Here’s the toy store. You can buy one thing. First you give me money and then I give you money, and then I’ll give you the item (she really used that word) and tell you to enjoy it, and here is a bag, and you should share it with your brother."

The things that were being sold were pretend money, a book, paper tickets, and some balls. I asked her why I give her money and she gives me money, and she said it’s because I didn’t have enough and that’s how it happens, and people give each other money. I realized later it’s because someone gives money and then gets change back.

• Aviva says "silly" endearingly, and calls everyone (especially her stuffies) silly. “You can’t wear your boots on your head, silly Eska.” “I just told you that, silly Mommy” “It’s my turn now, Noah silly!”

• At school, they use the word “snarly” to mean fussy or whiny or mean. Aviva says Snarly Face is what that drunk homeless man had. She definitely has times when she is snarly, though she’ll snap back at me if I mention it and she’ll say, “No!!!!!! I’m NOT snarly!!!” She says the opposite of snarly is open-hearted. 

• When you say "it doesn't matter," you put your hands up like this (like you’re hands are both palm up at your shoulders, like you’re saying “I don’t know”)