Joaquín Solo

This semester, Joaquin has been taking a Little Gym class, BY HIMSELF! That is, without Mommy in there as well. While he looks adorable obedient and with it in this picture, I'm afraid he is actually quite squirrely in class. The idea of doing what the rest of the group is doing even if it's not exactly what you want to do, is utterly foreign to Joaquin. He just wanders off and has to be gathered back up. Fortunately, while he's probably the most unstructured child there, there's a few other goofy little boys that also need constant re-focusing. My favorite is a little cutie named Xavier. What's entertaining to me about Xavier is that he, Joaquin and a little girl named Shasta are friends. One day they were playing Hide-and-Seek and the teacher ran over to them crying, "I found you, Joaquin, Xavier and Shasta!" and I thought, that teacher must hate all of us parents! Whatever happened to Bob and Mike? Anyway, here's a more realistic picture of Joaquin doing something totally different than anybody else, not even really paying attention to anyone else. Still, there's really positive things about Joaquin in his class.

1. He went in on the first day without me with not a whine or a fuss, just a wave and a walk. He continues to remain happily in the room without me the entire time - in contrast to most of the other children in the class. (Even the ones older them him)

2. He's learning structure, sort of. He's beginning to get the idea that now is the time we go here, everybody line up and go together, etc. He'll participate in lining up to go somewhere and often stay in the area he's supposed to. That's progress!

3. He tries more skills without me, trying to keep up with the bigger kids I think. He's also braver about taking a fall. I saw him fall on the beam last week and land with his little crotch on the beam. He looked very shocked, paused, then picked himself up and GOT BACK ON THE BEAM! (Admittedly he was holding very tight to handbars that were next to it, but still!)

4. He's having an absolutely fantastic time. It might be organized chaos, but he thinks it's the best thing in the world.