My son has been home sick most of the week. Sick days (and nights) are hard on everyone, but this GI virus left us with a final recovery day that was more of a sweet vacation day. Since our bambino spends most of his days at daycare now, it was particularly nice to be together and ignore work briefly (sorry, students.)
The virus started slowly and hit my son hard. There was little sleeping, eating, drinking or peaceful rest; there was endless cleanup, fever and pain. I felt under the weather, too, from illness or exhaustion or both.
We visited the doctor just as the virus was peaking and then we turned the corner a few days after the start. The fever slowed down, but since he can't return to daycare until he's been fever free for 24 hours, we stayed home together a bit more.
Self-directed play has been proven to be best for younger children (and probably, by extension, adults). While I encourage cleaning up toys after he's done with them, I let him lead the way for the last day when he had the energy to move around. He stuck stickers on the Valentine's day owl balloon, added stuffed animals to a diaper box, moved legos in and out of a paper bag, poked his head through a foam puzzle-box we built, danced to the car alarm on the street, watched three huge hawks flying in the distance and lined up toys on the high chair steps.
There was also lots of chatting in Italian. I can't wait to understand more of his sounds and have more insight into his thoughts. I'm speaking to our bambino in Italian as much as possible, but he mostly hears English throughout his day. Over the last few days, his toy-filled bath time has gone like this:
In Italian, I ask him to find the duck toy. He does. I repeat, "Anatra!" He points and says, "Duck!"
In Italian I ask him to find the boat toy. He does. I repeat, "Barca!" He points and says, "Boat!"
And that repeats until we run out of words he can say in English. And then we laugh.
He hasn't said a (recognizable) word in Italian yet. He does seem to understand a lot of it, though. I know it will take him a long, long time to become a descriptive, reliable narrator about his thoughts, feelings and experiences, but I'm very much looking forward to it. In either language, but hopefully both.
For now, I'll rely on the smiles, laughter and kisses distributed evenly to the stuffed owls and his parents to let us know he's happy.
And the writing lesson from all of this? Get down on your hands and knees, even if that requires a gardening knee pad at bath time, and explore. You don't know what new objects and actions you'll discover pair well together.
The virus started slowly and hit my son hard. There was little sleeping, eating, drinking or peaceful rest; there was endless cleanup, fever and pain. I felt under the weather, too, from illness or exhaustion or both.
We visited the doctor just as the virus was peaking and then we turned the corner a few days after the start. The fever slowed down, but since he can't return to daycare until he's been fever free for 24 hours, we stayed home together a bit more.
Self-directed play has been proven to be best for younger children (and probably, by extension, adults). While I encourage cleaning up toys after he's done with them, I let him lead the way for the last day when he had the energy to move around. He stuck stickers on the Valentine's day owl balloon, added stuffed animals to a diaper box, moved legos in and out of a paper bag, poked his head through a foam puzzle-box we built, danced to the car alarm on the street, watched three huge hawks flying in the distance and lined up toys on the high chair steps.
There was also lots of chatting in Italian. I can't wait to understand more of his sounds and have more insight into his thoughts. I'm speaking to our bambino in Italian as much as possible, but he mostly hears English throughout his day. Over the last few days, his toy-filled bath time has gone like this:
In Italian, I ask him to find the duck toy. He does. I repeat, "Anatra!" He points and says, "Duck!"
In Italian I ask him to find the boat toy. He does. I repeat, "Barca!" He points and says, "Boat!"
And that repeats until we run out of words he can say in English. And then we laugh.
He hasn't said a (recognizable) word in Italian yet. He does seem to understand a lot of it, though. I know it will take him a long, long time to become a descriptive, reliable narrator about his thoughts, feelings and experiences, but I'm very much looking forward to it. In either language, but hopefully both.
For now, I'll rely on the smiles, laughter and kisses distributed evenly to the stuffed owls and his parents to let us know he's happy.
And the writing lesson from all of this? Get down on your hands and knees, even if that requires a gardening knee pad at bath time, and explore. You don't know what new objects and actions you'll discover pair well together.
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