4 Year-Olds Are Fun!

Someone coined the term, 'Terrible Two's', but for Mikayla, she was a sweet and EASY and fun little two year-old.  THREE, however, was a huge challenge for us.

1. Didn't want to potty

2. Didn't want to EAT

3. Didn't want to go to sleep at night

Other than that, she was great! (HA! Only problem is those are 3 kinda essential elements for making up a happy child and happy parents.  

This is what she did on many a night when she couldn't fall asleep: Book Castles!!! (love her creativity though!)

Anyway, now that she's 4 all of the above problems have pretty much gone away!  She is a potty pro, she is TRYING NEW FOODS (huge breakthrough for us), and she goes to sleep pretty well at night.  (Eliminating naps took care of the night-owl problem.....on most nights.....she IS having a few issues with nightmares now and being scared to sleep in her own room.  Her imagination is too vivid!  She tells me details about her dreams and they would scare anyone!  Like getting eaten by wolves, or our house burning down and her sister dying!  Awful stuff!  It breaks my heart.)

But apart from some nights, she is a happy, excited, fun 4 year-old.  We are so grateful that she has finally overcome her fear of trying new foods.  We started the 'one bite rule' with her and I think she was ready for it.  Even though for the first week she sat at the dining room table for an hour sulking and complaining that she had to try a bite, and we went through lots of drama, she finally just started trying new foods, and liking them pretty well.  She still takes a while to warm up to new tastes and textures, so even if she likes something new, she doesn't want more of it right away.  Strange, huh. She still has a hard time swallowing new textures.

 Anyway, here's a list of what she's tried so far:

1. Chilli

2. BBQ chicken

3. Mashed potatoes

4. Carrots, peas, corn, celery

5. Salad

6. Beef Stew

7. Chicken Noodle Soup

8. Chicken Alfredo

9. Spaghetti

I know these are probably all foods most 4 year olds eat, but this is a girl who wouldn't even touch any dinner foods except for the typical kid foods - you know, mac n cheese and chicken nuggets and junk.

I am so grateful and so proud of her.  It really has been a fear-of -throwing-up issue for her.  It started when she was one year old and had a super sensitive gag reflex and would choke/throw up on anything with texture!  Before introducing lumpy textures, she was one of those babies that would eat ANYTHING pureed, even the broccoli and spinach and stuff.

A lot of 'parenting experts' have said don't pressure your kids to eat new foods, but I am convinced that if we just continually laid foods out on the table and hoped that one day she would try them on her own, it would take years, like, she would be twenty years old before she tried a salad!  We have tried so many different approaches to eating (no dessert, playing a game, making mealtimes fun, etc.) and the only thing that worked for her is waiting till she ready to try the one bite rule, and being really strict with it.  She cannot leave the dinner table until she tries one bite of everything on her plate. 

Note: We did try the one bite rule when she turned three.  She would sit there until it was time for bed.  She was so determined and stubborn about it!  And then we were concerned about her weight (and doc was too) so we stopped doing it because we just had to get some calories into her!  The more I parent, the more I learn that we cannot force these little people to do something they are dead set against.  We need to wait for them to be ready.

Yay for 4 year olds!!!!  

Here's a few more fun pics.

She is a great little builder.  She loves to build these little walls.

This is with her grandma 'Lessie'.  She's growing up really fast!

 On the train - my girls both love trains!  Mikayla wants to be a train conductor and a mom to 5 kids when she grows up.  Oh yeah, and she's going to live in a city far away, 'in California', she tells me.  Makes me sad when she talks like that!