A Little Bit of Lyda

Well Lyda is almost 7 and is just plugging along with first grade. She's become a great reader and is really excelling at math. She is pretty hilarious to watch when she does subtraction because she hits her head with the palm of her hand at the beginning of each problem. I told her to put the number in her head when I was showing her how I do subtraction and she took it quite literally.



She's a good student but still asks when I'm going to start homeschooling her, which is not even on the radar at this point. I keep telling her that we will do home school when she can obey me all the time. Her and I have had some pretty good power struggles lately. It is pretty frustrating but I'm glad to know that other parents with first graders are experiencing similar sassiness. She is still such a great helper around here but if homework or housework are suggested, watch out! You will suddenly become the meanest mom ever. When Lyda gets home from school everyday, the mood in our house changes. All day long is pretty quiet and peaceful but the moment she arrives some in depth game, that will probably destroy our house, begins. She loves to play house and assigns everybody a role in the game. She always runs the show. And for some reason everybody ends up in pajamas and pretends to go to bed. She made a bunk bed out of our portacrib. Very clever but when her and a cousin got on top of it together it broke. Steve had to take the whole thing completely apart to fix it. The portacrib bunk has been banned at our house now.


Lyda loves to dress Ruby up and fix her hair. The other day she dressed Ruby up and put some paper fans in her hand and posed her while she took pictures. It was hilarious. Ruby is a good sport and really looks up to her big sister.


Lyda loves to sit on the roof. All of our kids do really, but Lyda asks for it the most. When Steve and I were dating I would often sit on my roof and watch the sunset. It is a strange practice that has sort of continued in our house, or on our house.



Lyda has been doing a dance class for the past 8 months. She had her first performance in December and she did great. It was fun to watch her doing something that she typically wouldn't be comfortable doing. She is a little performer at home but she gets pretty shy in front of others. Pretty sure she gets that from me.


A little while back Lyda was unlucky enough to get head lice. Yikes! It was as terrible as you think it might be. I have no idea who she got it from but by the time I realized she had it, her head was pretty infested. It still gives me the heebie jeebies just thinking about it. We bagged up toys and pillows for weeks to make sure there wouldn't be any surviving lice. We used nix on her head which seemed to barely kill anything. I picked off several living bugs after that treatment. I finally tried using mayonnaise to suffocate them and it worked. Lyda had to wear a shower cap for 8 hours with mayo on her hair. It was a pretty gross day for us.


I combed through her hair for 3 hours picking off bugs and nits. It was a nightmare for all of us. I cleaned and vacuumed places in my house that don't usually get that kind of treatment. And I had Steve check my head multiple times just to make sure I didn't have it either. Even now it makes my head itch!


Another unfortunate thing that poor Lyda has to deal with is migraines. She gets headaches quite frequently but every once in a while if she doesn't get Tylenol quickly enough it will turn into a full blown migraine. She usually is down for about 24 hours hibernating in a dark room with a throw up bowl. It breaks my heart to see her deal with this at such a young age. We have visited with a neurologist and watched her diet but we still can't quite find what triggers them. So in the meantime we push lots of water and keep Tylenol on hand.



One of Lyda's favorite things to do is to make random phone calls to extended family members and close friends. I often find her off in her room talking to a grandma, Uncle Jim or Zoey. She doesn't always pick convenient times to chat and I hope she isn't waking people up early on Saturday mornings.


She loves to be with our families and is always asking if we can go to either grandparent's house, especially on Sunday nights. This weekend she was whisked away to Disneyland with her Uncle Brad, Aunt Lisa and their niece Olivia. Talk about a couple of spoiled little girls. Brad and Lisa totally showed us up. Not only did she come home with a ton of souvenirs, but they even took them to get their hair and makeup done at the Bippidi Boppidi Boutique. I hope to get pictures of that soon. It was hard for Steve and me to let her go on a trip without us. While she was picking out souvenirs she found a mother's day present for me. A giant cubic zirconium ring that looks like a wedding ring. She snuck in on Mother's day morning while I showered and left me a note and put the ring in one of her little coin purses. It fit perfectly and she was thrilled that I wore it to church. It was the first time that she picked something out just for me and kept it a secret. It was a sweet gift.
She really seems to have grown up suddenly. She needs less and less from us and I'm not really sure how I feel about that. Next week she turns 7 and I can hardly believe it. I love my Lyda!