What's Been Going On

I have been out of the writing thing for a bit now. I thought I would share a few things to update:
FISH...
We got some. Claire was trying really hard to have nice hands at school. We had planned on getting an aquarium for her, but she was having these bad days at school so we figured we would wait until she had a good hands day at school. The day arrived...about $80 later we had an aquarium, gravel, a Buddha statue, some fake greenery, a couple of bottles of beta water and two Mollies. About a week later, the Dalmatian Molly had passed and a few days after that the Black Molly sunk...definitely NOT the unsinkable Molly. Claire was devastated. She had a hard time sleeping that night and wanted a new fish right away.
We consulted the pet shop people who figured we needed some sacrificial fish...those who would help balance the water in the tank, but probably would not live. Claire took that all pretty well. I said these are not pets...they are workers. Their job is to clean the tank and they probably won't live for more than a week (Will PETA be on me for this?) Now watch, those Zebra Danios will live FOREVER!!!
Here is a picture of her tank and her first two fish...RIP.


PLAY THERAPY
As you read above, Claire was having trouble keeping her hands to herself and was really lashing out at home physically. We thought we would look into play therapy to see if that might help with some of the aggression. Claire met with Maura who showed Claire a tabletop sandbox with some red sand. Then she opened a cupboard with a million toys (Claire of course gravitated to the horse figures-there were at least 20). She played for an hour! Maura ocassionally would ask her questions, but for the most part, Claire led the playing and loved it! At times she showed a bit of being uncomfortable with the questions, but also that she was OK with it. She was excited to go back tonight (ummm, yeah....I wrote the wrong time down and was an hour late for the appt so we have to reschedule). But overall the experience was very positive for her. And...she has been doing SOOOOO well with her relationships with her classmates and with us. She has taken control of her behavior in such a wonderful way. We have three more sessions over the month, and I am sure we will see even more interesting improvements.

So cute...Claire and I were racing to the car after our appointment that didn't happen, and she got to the car first and said, "I won!" Then in the next breath, she said, "But good try Mama." I love that she is able to look at the other person and build them up. It is a big step for her.
Here is a pic of my cutie!!!

I saw her out of the bedroom window. She took her horse and book to her table and enjoyed reading in the beautiful weather. Made my heart smile.