Dear Callum,

Something I’ve tried many times but never found to be successful has finally worked:  a progress chart.  You had become fixated on this bubble-blaster toy you swore you saw at JoAnn Fabrics, and I never got it for you, but you kept bringing it up.  I also set the summertime goal of getting you to be independent in your bathroom use.  You’ve been potty-trained for some time now, but you still needed lots of reminders to go to the bathroom (and often denied the need to go until it was too late), and once you were there, you wanted help with your pants and underwear and getting on and off the toilet.  I knew that a preschooler should be able to do that stuff on his own, so we made a chart.  We defined a success as going to the bathroom without any prompting from a parent and/or handling all the physical tasks independently.  We drew a smiley face on the chart for each success, and it really motivated you.  You enjoyed choosing a color and analyzing the small differences in your past smiley faces (“That one looks like an onion”).  Once you were getting close to filling the chart, you liked counting how many successes you had left.

You earned the bubble blaster (though we couldn’t find it at JoAnn’s and ended up getting it at Walgreen’s, which may well have been where you saw it in the first place) and have been shooting bubbles all over the yard and park ever since.  You still sometimes need reminders to go, but you’re getting better, and you are definitely much more confident about going by yourself.  I think as long as you keep up the good work all summer, you’ll be all set for preschool in the fall.

You are my errands buddy, which is why it’s not surprising that you get interested in many objects you see along the way.  You’re mostly good at dealing with it when I don’t let you buy a toy or treat on every trip (though I’m a sucker for those three-packs of little chocolate bars at Trader Joe’s).  You have friends at all the places we regularly go, most particularly the bakery staff at Hy-Vee

Thankfully, the peak of your allergies has passed, so you’ve been able to play outside more.  It’s baseball season for your brothers, and I’d been keeping you at home most of the nights when they play.  It’s a long night—your dad jumps off the bus at 5:00, I hand him a sandwich for his dinner, and he and the boys head out to the ballpark to make Tobin’s 5:30 game.  Miles’s game goes until 8:30, which means they usually don’t get home until 9:00.  Now that nobody has to get up early for school, that’s not quite as much a “kiss goodnight and jump into bed” schedule as it was last month, but it still means you don’t get a lot of time with your dad.  You’ve gotten really cuddly with him lately, and I know you miss him.  Now that you’re not suffering so much from allergies, we can get out to the ballpark more.  We probably can’t stay for the entire 4-hour adventure–it’s pretty exhausting trying to keep you safe from kids throwing balls and swinging bats, and you keep trying to run onto the field.  Still, June provides some beautiful nights, so I bet we can get out there more often this month.

Lately you’ve become very sensitive to the moods of others.  You can tell when I’m feeling tired or stressed, which happens a lot by the end of the night.  Taking care of three kids all day plus a four-year-old all evening is no joke.  I know managing the baseball schedule is a lot of work for your dad, too.  We’ll all be glad when the nights get a little more relaxed.  But anyway, you can definitely tell when I’m running on fumes.  You say, “Are you happy?” and if I answer with anything other than a yes, you offer me a hug.  The hug does help a lot of the time, but if I don’t answer enthusiastically enough, you pressure me to smile and make an eeee sound to prove my happiness.  As a person who does not enjoy being bossed around, I resent the emotional manipulation, but I also realize that you’re becoming more attuned to the climate around you.  That’s a good skill to have—being able to recognize the feelings of others will help you develop empathy.  It’s also okay to be sad or tired or frustrated, though.  Sometimes a person needs a little of that too.

Your current favorites:  PJ Masks, Word Girl, making art projects, squirting water and bubbles, taking baths, playing outside, and helping with kitchen tasks (especially making Kool-Aid).  This is one reason I am placing a high priority on stain-resistant countertops as we plan our kitchen remodeling project.

We’ve got lots of fun things to do this summer, Callum, and it’s so cool that you’re getting big enough to fully participate in them.  I’m excited to have these adventures with you.

Love,

Mommy