Week of Money: Where Little Bun gets creative

DAY ONE

7:25 p.m. — Little Bun burst into tears tonight from verb conjugations and I thought his father was being hard on him. It takes 20 minutes to get to the truth because I am asking soft questions like:

“So what happened?”

Little Bun: DADDY EXPECTS ME TO BE PERFECT ON THE FIRST TRY!

“Oh, so Daddy is not having realistic expectations of learning?”

LIttle Bun: NO! AND I ONLY JUST SAW THE VERBS FOR THE FIRST TIME *sobbing*

“Okay, so I see that Daddy has to work on giving you grace in learning the verbs?”

…so I am asking, answering, his father walks in, and clarifies that it is NOT HIM saying that AT ALL. My partner tells me immediately that he did NOT yell at him or scold him for any of it, Little Bun is the one being hard on himself, but saying that his father expects it because he thinks he expects it when he doesn’t.

He was mixing up working hard and doing your best, taking your time and checking your work (math problems), with being perfect. It turns out he was hard on himself and thought his father expected perfection. I quickly clarified between wanting him to work hard and put his best work forward to focus versus being perfect.

I told him that in math, WE KNOW he knows how to do it. His problem there, is not the knowledge, it’s the focus and checking your work. The discipline to do this, instead of guessing at answers. Not being perfect, but being careful.

In verb conjugations, he misses the knowledge but he is learning and that is okay. It is two different things, and none of it has to do with being perfect.

His father says: What he is doing, is beyond amazing right now. It is very very good, even adults cannot reach his level because he feels the verbs and gets them so quickly, it is really quite remarkable.

Little Bun, sitting there, absorbs that, and smiles a very tiny smile hearing it because I think he realized that his father WAS proud of him … but his father didn’t realize he also had to give some praise once in a while (this is not the old way of French teaching, the way that he was taught in school – praise was very very scarce, if given at all).

I also told him mistakes were also okay and part of learning, and I remind him of what his father said. I told him that his father is not angry at him or expecting perfection. My partner was silent, but the next day, he did in fact, give him more praise than usual, to encourage him.

DAY TWO

11:08 a.m. — At the park, Little Bun easily makes friends. Even not being in school, it’s amazing! I actually sat in the car and took a call while he was playing, while keeping an eye out for him.

He later ran back and told me he made friends just by gathering leaves into a big pile, and then the other two kids his age started gathering leaves in a big pile and cleaning up as well. Then he showed them his favourite rocks (kept in his jacket pocket), and explained where he got them and why.

Then he helped them find leaves for their school project (big beautiful red and yellow ones), and somehow they became friends. He wants to go back again tomorrow to see if they’re there again. It was really quite sweet, and nice to see him be friendly and make friends on his own. It made me so happy.

DAY THREE

11:08 a.m. — Little Bun comes back from playing soccer with his father and exclaims: OH MOMMY! I love the new colour on your toes! (I did my nails while they were gone). I post this, and someone writes in:

Not to mention that I am raising a Little Feminist Activist by showing him how unfair it is when women are treated differently for not conforming to a specific template, among other things.

DAY FOUR

8:08 a.m. — I need this. Work is starting to ramp up. I am just losing control over my personal life.

10:25 a.m. — Little Bun’s school page killed me today. All of this conversion back and forth, I don’t even know how he did it, to be honest, I was getting lost, myself…. but I will say it is also because I am extremely tired from work, and my brain fatigue is setting in.

 

DAY FIVE

8:08 a.m. — This happened. I was about to toss this floss dispenser and he squeals: NO MOMMY! MAY I HAVE IT? … and we removed the sharp metallic cutter inside, to create a box (?)… he also popped out the clear plastic window, put it on the inside, and created what he called a new video game controller, which he uses to control himself (LOL)… to make him go left or right.

3:40 p.m. — These were written by him:

Can you believe it? I go through a whole day of mind-bending, mentally crazy work, and then I have to also at night, debate questions like this because Little Bun is super curious.

DAY SIX

8:25 p.m. — LIES. ABSOLUTE LIES. That said, I helped him make this one, and then he came up with his own template on the computer with lines, and created his own ninja stars out of plain paper….. I don’t even know how he managed to do that.

 

DAY SEVEN

2:25 p.m. — He created little STUFFIE Uno cards so that the stuffies could play together with us as their helpers. He used a ruler to do it, but clearly did not measure anything .. lol.. see how the sizes are all different?

6:16 p.m. — Then at night, I brought out a toy I wanted to donate, and suddenly he was interested in it again:

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Want more? Read all of my previous Week of Money Diaries.