Christmas Isn't Over Until Harper Sings

Here is the video clip I was trying to get off the computer earlier this week. The only Christmas song Harper knows entirely is "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer," and getting her to stay in one place long enough to catch her singing on video was a bit of a challenge. (Note to self, remember to use the light on the video camera!) Please enjoy this little post-holiday performance:

*****

Harper got way more than her share of Christmas gifts (and we still have round two, up in Wisconsin, to go!) and several of them were pseudo learning games/toys. I have mentioned before that I don' t "work" with Harper on learning things in a let's-sit-down-and-do-flashcards kind of way, but lately her level of interest in numbers and letters (the symbols themselves) has gone way up, so it seems to make sense to encourage her. She's also been expressing and interest in reading her books, by herself, and then doing a very dramatic and sorrowful monologue about how she doesn't know what any of the words say. We have had the discussion about many kinds of reading, and I have told her that she can tell the story based on the pictures or what she remembers, but over and over she replies, "But Mo-om, I don't know the words!"

Trust me, I'm not delusional enough to think that I'm going to actually teach her to read before age four, but she does seem ready to learn some basic concepts.

The other night we were sitting in a restaurant and Harper asked Matt to write her name on that little paper piece that wraps around the napkin and silverware. He wrote her name with a crayon and passed it back to her. She took one look and said, "No Dad! Do it the right way!"

Matt looked perplexed, so I asked him if he used lower case letters (many of which she doesn't recognize yet).

Harper heard me say this and piped up, "Dad, use higher case letters!"