Independence

It's amazing how quickly children grow up. If we continued learning at the rate that children do, we'd all be brilliant. Unfortunately, the older we get, the less we learn. Since Katherine was officially potty trained a couple of weeks ago, she has started acting so old and independent. She loves being big sister and she loves to do everything all by herself. One of her biggest struggles is asking for help.

Yesterday, I sat nursing the baby while the kids were upstairs doing their Saturday chores. Katherine came down with the toilet cleaner and asked me to open it. I assumed that she was asking on behalf of Lillie since she usually 'helps' Lillie with her part of cleaning the bathroom. About ten minutes later Michael comes down, looking sheepish. I asked him what was up, and after some coercing (we'd recently discussed tattling) he informs me that Katherine had poured toilet cleaner all over the tub. I said to him, "Isn't she helping Lillie?" He informs me that no, she's cleaning it all by herself. When I was finally able to get up there, Lillie was rinsing out the toilet cleaner from the tub and Katherine looked quite proud of herself. The downside was that the cleaner had a lot of bleach in it and Katherine got it all over the front of one of her spring dresses that was my favorite. We had a little discussion about waiting for help, but who can scold a child who is just trying to clean! She thinks she is quite grown up!!