Thankful For Those That Help Us Make Sense Of Our Letters

Hadley’s taken to communicating through spelling.  One morning she asked, “Is my e-g-g ready?” I said, “Not y-e-t.” She gave me one of those smiles people give when they see you understand what they’re trying to say.  Those are the best smiles, aren’t they? The smiles of people able to speak the same language are some of my favorite.

Harper tries too, although, she prefers to take the game to paper, writing words with glitter crayons, a blue pencil with a blue eraser, or my BIC round stic medium point blue pen that I use for my rough drafts.

Harper, however, doesn’t always know what she’s spelling. She can write her name, the word “dino,” but usually, she writes several letters and then wants to know what she wrote.

I tread carefully when this happens. She’s taken so much time on her project: slowly and carefully drawing lines, and curves. She colors in block letters she’s made, adds pictures next to the letters.  This means something to her and she wants it to mean something to someone else.  I understand that feeling very well, but don’t we all?  Don’t we all want to create something and have someone else say, “Oh yes, I can see that.”

When she brings me what she just created and asks, “What’s this spell?” I look at it for a second and sound out the letters as best I can.

“What word does that mean?” she asks.

And so I look at her picture and come up with a definition.  She is suspiciously satisfied and walks away, studying what she just made.

A few minutes later, she comes back, crayon in hand and picture in the other. “How do you spell ‘birthday cake’?”  I sit down with her and helped her write what she meant to say.

 

I can’t write about Harper’s work and not think of those who, when I presented them with a piece of my writing, understood what I was trying to say, and then helped me to say it better.  They didn’t do the work for me, but they sat down with me and helped me make my letters clearer, my words stronger, my story better.

I don’t know what Harper and Hadley will dream about becoming one day, but I hope that I can show my daughters the lovely difficulty in creating something – whatever that may be.

 

A few days ago, the girls got a large roll of butcher paper and some crayons from their aunt and uncle.  We rolled it out and they asked me to trace them – a favorite activity to do with chalk outside on the blacktop.  They both love to draw the clothes they are wearing on the paper and I’m impressed how close they get to the real thing.

Harper wrote her name on her shirt, but, after looking at it realized she wrote more letters then were in her name.

“What did I write?” she asked in a voice full of hope that she still wrote something.

Hadley and I walked over to what she wrote and stared at it for a minute.

“What is it? What is it?” Harper, otherwise known as “she of little patience” was getting anxious. Hadley and I were taking too long and Harper hung her head and said, “I didn’t write anything!”

“You wrote Harpaker,” Hadley said.

“Harpaker?”

“Yeah! Harpaker,” Hadley said. “Good job!” she added.

“Harpaker,” Harper said and smiled.  Then she kneeled down to the paper and began a new drawing.

G-O-O-D  J-O-B, Hadley.