"s" is for scamp

Next year Henry will be starting kindergarten. But for now, he loves preschool and preschool loves him.  He is writing his name and working with letters and dare I say, even learning to read.



When we signed him up for preschool, it was intended to be an opportunity for Henry to socialize with other similarly aged children and take direction from adults other than Charlie and I.  The fact that he's learning to read and getting a jump start on school is just an added bonus.  It's really quite amazing how far we've come in two years when I think back to our little boy that was dismissed from his first preschool after less than a week and was screened by Child Find and multiple psychologists over the past 24 months.

Every week, Henry's class works on a different letter of the alphabet. To help reinforce the lesson, their teacher instructs them to bring various items to school and she will spend the entire week writing, creating, and exploring things that begin with that letter.

This week's letter is "S."

Today, Henry wore his favorite stained, shrunk, small, shredded summer short sleeve shirt (that on countless occasions, I've unsuccessfully slipped out of his drawers and slid in to a sack for storage, but he always surprises me by finding it and stuffing it back in his sock drawer for safe keeping.) While his brother supplemented his stash for show and tell, by picking out Shamu, shark and snake from our overflowing stuffed animal supply. Henry was thrilled that he had so much to share with his class as he happily traipsed off to school.

Tonight, during dinner, he recapped his day and showed us the Super Why toy that he had brought home. When I inquired where he had picked up such a toy, he told me, "I STOLE IT!  STOLE with an S!" Hmm. Such a conundrum as a parent.  Disappointed and yet, impressed at his grasp of the English language.



Tomorrow, he'll be bringing it back and saying he's super sorry. This isn't the first time our tot has had sticky fingers. Over the past few months, I've had to return to a few stores with a begrudgingly apologetic Henry who had items tucked in to his pocket, or under his hat, or inside my purse. It wasn't until we'd reached the car that I noticed I'd been hauling around a 8 x 10 picture frame with an image of Spiderman inside that didn't belong to us. That was an awkward moment.

We need to convey to our five-year-old that if he grows up snatching things that don't belong to him, he'll end up in the slammer one day.

(And that'll make me so sad.)