At 20 months... Olivia had her first real incident at school. I will just cut/paste what I wrote to a friend regarding this event, since I really can't bring myself to talk about it again...
So ... finally... on Tuesday I drove to pick up Olivia. Looking forward to finally having Wednesday off to run errands and getting bubble tea. I just listened to the last minute of the Abdi episode and was emotional from that. I go to Olivia's class and she is sitting all by herself on a chair with a book surrounded by her peers. I think... oh that's cute... she is reading to them. She turns her little face towards me and it's all scratched up!! Three gashes on the side her face! The teacher says to me, nonchalantly, Olivia got in a fight with a kid over a toy and got scratched. I ask - who is this kid... scowling the room for another bloody baby (saw none). She tells me - oh we are not allowed to say.
Well at this point I was so sad/angry/pissed I just grab my baby and leave. She tries to tell me goodbye and have a good day and make me sign a incident report, all the time I make no eye contact, say no word, try to look as pissed off as my RBF will allow. I storm into the director's office (she isn't there, only the assistant) and burst into tears. I tell her how angry I am. Both she and Olivia look at me with wide eyes. I blubber for a few min (getting nowhere because a. she isn't in charge and b. she has no idea without happens, and c. she isn't allowed to tell me which kid it is). I storm out, still crying... parents/other kids/Olivia all look at me. I don't care. I hug my baby in the back of the car for a full 5 min, like she was just rescued from a building in Aleppo. I drive home and call steve, my bff, my dad, crying some more. Only person just as pissed off as me is my dad, who demands to know how the teacher could have let this happen.... what kid of wild animal would hurt his sweet grand baby... will i ever let her go back to school... all good questions.
To make a long story short, Olivia goes back to school the next day. I have a big meeting with director and owner and they say all the right things to assure me. Olivia's face is still red but seems to be healing...
my baby's face, freshly assaulted...
Olivia seems to be unaffected. It's mostly me who is constantly peeking a the scratch, examine redness/depth/potential for scarring.
So continues my love/hate relationship with daycare. Two days have passed and I can almost convince myself that this is "normal" and that i may have over-reacted. What was really hard is that Olivia can tell me nothing about what happened, not a word from her side of the story. That will change, I know. In the meantime I over-react to compensate.
Fall is finally here and I have never been so outdoorsy! I want her to enjoy the beautiful weather, fun freely with wind in her hair, and most importantly... reduce youtube time. So far we have been doing ok. Olivia doesn't like slides or swings too much, but loves chasing after (other people's) balls, pointing to dogs, and just walking up to random strangers and say "hi"!
At Lucas's star war themed 4th birthday party!
Meryl dressed Olivia in baby Jedi outfit. Olivia was not feeling it.
hahaha
Met a doggie at Roswell park and all is good again. Olivia pointed to a person on a bike and said "bi-cy-cle". I almost fainted.
First trip to the Aquarium with the Penedo Family!
First trip this year to a pumpkin patch! Auntie Thuy/Uncle Eric came to visit with the babies. Surprisingly Olivia and Natalie "played" together!
At 20 months, Olivia pretty much blabbers all the time. Most of it is gibberish. She imitates everything we do. She is quite a youtube video junkie (nursery rhythms are her favorite), we're working on that. Nai Nai is in China for a month with limited FaceTime and yei yei is headed that way soon. She is finally sleeping BETTER! That's all I will say about that subject for fear of jinxing it!
