Tenacious MZ

MZ and I have taken a lot of classes together over the last 1.5 years. We didn't do classes pre-6 mos because we did coffee dates and museums and a moms group that called itself a playgroup then, mostly for me. But as soon as she was allowed in a pool, we signed up for swimming, adding music and art and the fabulous free CCSF child observation classes along the way.

She seems to have enjoyed the full array, and we've all enjoyed watching her master new skills or just plain have fun. But nothing matches our current My Gym experience. MZ goes in there every week and devises some sort of circuit training course for herself, which she does over and over again, until she's doing it all by herself, not reaching for my hand. Until she's mastered it.

This is amazing for a kid who walked at 17 mos. and has seemed pretty significantly non-physical through most of her life. At this place, she runs, jumps, climbs, crawls, skootches and rolls her way through. Whenever I decide there's some area of the room she just doesn't care for, that's where she spends her time. After having avoided clusters of toddlers for the eight weeks, last week she charged under the parachute to grab a puppet. This week she approached the trampoline, backed off when three girls beat her to it, then tried it out for real when she could get it alone, she jumped on her feet, then dropped to her knees and finally did a full-on drop to the bum, where she dissolved into giggles and did it all again. The next time, when there were kids there already, she jumped on, although she stuck close to the edge, and when she decided to roll down an adjoining ramp and a girl followed her lead, she was clearly delighted.

But the part I don't want to forget is this week's circuit, where she scaled a (short) wall, balanced across a foam pipe she's been avoiding for weeks, crept like a tightrope walker along the edge of a ball pit, charged up a slide, then skootched down and did it all over again... and again... and again. Tenacious MZ indeed.