I got the girls outside for 30 minutes in 20 degree weather.
I provided a nutritious breakfast and lunch, regardless of whether they ate all of the options. I will be making a nutritious dinner that they will hopefully eat.
L has used the potty as many times as B today.
I got L through the night even though it was the worst night we’ve had in months.
I’ll preface my reply that my child is a girl and we live in a different country (also I have some suspicions that maybe not neurotypical but she is only 5). She is a March birthday and here cut off is June 30. At our kindergarten (which she was eligible to start when she was still 3) it seemed that more children than not did a second year, especially those with birthdays in the first half of the year. She was still 4 at the start of the school year which was a concern for us.
We agonised about doing a second year of kindergarten. Her teacher recommended it but when we asked for her to explain how it would benefit our child specifically she only said that she was concerned that pikelet would be smaller than the other kids… well yes, her mum is 4’11”, we can hold her back but she is still probably going to be shorter than the other kids. Also that she recommended it for all kids. Still, not doing what the teacher recommended was a big leap.
We were having a lot behavioral challenges during the kindergarten year and I felt that moving to a more structured school environment might help. We discussed it with the school and decided to send her. We have one week to go for the first year and so far have 0 regrets.
Off topic but we are height twins!!
Benefits to private school:
-If it’s a program/philosophy you really love or fits your child perfectly, then that can be awesome.
-possibly smaller class sizes and/or better student to teacher ratio (but this depends on the school)
Benefits to public school:
-free!!!
-if they need special education services, much more likely to get them and to get them better in public school than private
-even if they don’t qualify for special education but might have some neurodiversity or something that makes them need some accommodations to help them do well in the school environment, public school is used to it and has staff to support kids that private usually does not
-transportation to and from school is provided
-they go to school with neighborhood kids which helps with friends and community
I think you realized Meowlet’s birthday makes him older in kinder rather than younger, but I would say that I think your boy is too smart to be redshirted. I know I haven’t met him but based on your reports of the things he comes up with (his thinking abilities) and his ability to express himself and reason and logic, and his high level of knowledge-seeking (you might not know it’s a high level based on not having others around to compare him to, but trust me, it’s high), in academic terms, I think your kid needs to be in school at five, not hanging around for an extra year. I also think it’s important to think beyond kinder, 1st, 2nd, etc. when deciding if you should keep your kinder-aged kid back a year. Because they are only tiny cute little teeth-missing goofballs for so long. Then puberty hits. And it’s such a weird time and if your body is maturing a year ahead of everyone else’s, well, that can be pretty uncomfortable for the kid. It’s something to consider, at least, and i think it can be hard to imagine your five-year-old as a hulking, smelly, pimply thing or as a growing boobs and having a period person, but it does happen and I guess you kind of want them to be going through that when everyone else in their class is too instead of first when it’s still weird to everyone.
Ahahha not either of my kids, and I have an Introvert and a FOMO
How much lego time is too much lego. Should I be encouraging non-lego pursuits? Get my kid non-lego building things? Model building kits? Stuff to make real things and not just lego things? He uses the movable pieces to make some intricate little vehicles.
Half my loungeroom is Lego Building space
I think you just lean in to the lego and possibly there will one day be another hobby
We have several non-lego building things that get rotated around but the lego box stays out all the time. We just have one box of lego, though (this may change after Christmas).
No such thing as too much Lego!
The only caveats I can think of (from myself, sibling, and teenage nephew) are if they get obsessed with only buying and building premade kits to a degree that doesn’t work for your budget or stifles creativity (doesn’t sound like that’s the case). Or if they don’t also get outdoor time – there was just a conversation on outdoor time reducing myopia somewhere around here.
Lego can be used and played with in so many different ways. I too believe that there is no such thing as too much lego time! (J1 hates lego and has rarely used it. J2 on the other hand loves it).
editing to add: I guess I should say, too much lego time during indoor play? yes, children need to go outside etc, but for playroom / indoor time, lego is an awesome toy
This was my thought. My little builder will get very engrossed in building with whichever set we have out (magnet blocks, lego, mega blocks) and sometimes her brain will hyper-focus on only doing that thing all day long. We have to force her to get outside and do some outside time for her vision.
Take the legos outside! 
Ducky of all things to be obsessed with, Lego is a wonderful option. I agree about the rigid kits versus free play though.
Babies exist on a spectrum from extremely easy to extremely hard, and I firmly believe they are born that way. Some people with extremely easy babies think that they are easy because of something the parents did, so they like to give advice, like “you too could have an easy baby if you do what I do!” Don’t let them get you down.
I have now had one of each type of baby and the first one was the easy one. Thankfully I knew that I didn’t know shit about babies, so I never went around telling people how awesome my baby and I were. Because that would have bit me in the ass after second baby arrived and I did all the same things and he was still very hard.
So Latte is old enough to change gymnastics classes (and her coach recommended it) and also we want to add one more morning a week of forest preschool.
Currently she goes Tuesday AM nastics, Wednesday and Friday AM school.
There is no school at her location on Monday’s.
She loves school but it’s very tiring and means she goes down late for nap.
Would you add a day of school Tuesday (with nastics Monday)? So she’s 2 days on, 1 day off, 1 day on? Or would you add Thursday and do a run of 3 days of school and keep gymnastics Tuesday (new time slot)?
Trying to balance rest time and nap preservation versus confusion about days for her? Thoughts?
So would that be Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday are school/late nap days?
My inclination would be to have more consecutive days, so school on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.
Yeah, I would try to have consecutive days to keep as steady of a schedule as possible. B is very routine-oriented and she really really needs the routine to stay as steady as possible so that would sway my decision. If Latte isn’t so routine-oriented then having a break in the week might not matter as much?
Oh, re Lego. I think one thing to try and avoid is the Lego museum effect. Creations should be transient. If he wants to keep building, he needs to choose what to take apart. Not have new legos miraculously appear.
I was the kid who was really into legos.
I now have three degrees in engineering and severe myopia (-9.5, -10) so 
.
I also did not go outside much. My mom made me stare outside our apartment window instead in hopes of improving my vision. It did not work. 
I would do three days in a row. It was hard for us when we had tue/thur daycare, mon/wed grandma, Fri dad stayed home and the weekend was family. Every day was different and it was harder to keep track of and I think Pipsqueak found it very disorienting (but she was only 6 months old when we had this schedule)
Yeah I don’t think it helps that SirB’s schedule is totally unpredictable. He’s home some days, gone for a few hours sometimes, gone for a single night or 6 days. All over the place lol. So I didn’t know if it was better to have a school week/“weekend” vibe, or if that would be exhausting and she’d be melting down by Friday LOL