Keys and Maps and Rabbits.

These are all over the house.

I usually find them on the floor waiting to be gobbled up by the vacuum, should anyone ever decided to vacuum. But, they are also on the kitchen counter, in the bathroom and sometimes in the pool. They are the ring part of a key ring. Anya is fixated by keys, key rings, carabineers, clips, dog leashes, dog collars, padlocks, key leashes and all the associated pieces.

They belong in here.

This is one of  the glittery, pretty girly boxes she got for her birthday. And that’s where all things keys go. But, just at first glance I can see many pieces that belong in here aren’t in here. Well, at least when she complains about not knowing where the ______ is, I can claim that I didn’t take it out of the box.

She will literally spend hours taking all the things apart and reassembling them. She put a charm (formerly on a key leash) on a ring on her necklace yesterday. I swear it took only 6 seconds. It’s like I turned my head and when I looked back, she already had the charm around her neck. I hate those key ring things. I would rather sit with her weeping in my lap for 30 minutes than to thread one of those. They always separate the layers in my nails and sometimes I have to use a tool to get the thing started. They just plain old annoy me. And my daughter LOVES them. I have to watch my mouth when I help her so I don’t blurt out any words I don’t want her saying! I find the dog with a different collar on every day. It's either a real dog collar, or party ribbon or a ball chain, but the tags are always hanging from his neck. She even puts her charms or bells on the dog with all his tags, then quick as lightening, they are off. We even bought new sneakers and just had to get the pair with the charms on them. They have since been taken off and put on toy dogs as dog tags.

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Then there is the whole, “That’s not America. It’s not orange.” Scott said a phrase in Spanish to Anya and in order not to confuse her, he thought he’d explain how all countries speak different languages. He brought down the globe for a visual explanation. “In Russia, see over here? You spoke Russian. In America, see here? We speak English. See here below America? This is Mexico, they speak Spanish.”

“That’s NOT America. It’s not orange.”

Please reference the place mat she uses daily pictured below with the globe. Whaddya know? She’s right. America IS orange!

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About four months ago, my parents and I took Anya to a Chinese restaurant. She was really grumpy as we sat at the table. Previously we had been having her circle the mac-n-cheese picture on the kids' menus at restaurants (or the cheeseburger or grilled cheese). Well guess what was on the  place mat at the restaurant? The Chinese animals based on what year you were born ie:The Year of the Monkey. So, poor Anya was looking at the place mat, thinking it was the menu and saw monkeys, dragons, bears, etc. It took her a LONG time to calm down after getting so worked up over the gross menu!

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Then there is the time a couple of days ago I caught her quietly headed out into the backyard with a green trash bag. I’d previously told her that the wild rabbits in the yard will scratch if you try to catch them and put them in a box in your room. Well then, doesn’t it seem logical to use the bag to protect yourself?!

Off to work on the reading. Hopefully by the holidays she’ll be reading at about a 3^rd-5^th grade level, by finishing the book. I might even get an hour or two of quiet every once in a while as she reads a book!! We’ll see.

~Monica

I wasn't kidding-I just found this on Anya's chair in her room.