56 months old

A mere four months away from a five-year-old.  Seriously?!?  Britton spent the last three days with Memaw and PawPaw, and I swear she looked older this afternoon when she returned.  Maybe because Memaw cut her hair (shorter hair has a way of aging the young, as well as making the older look younger) or three days is a long time in kid-time, but dang it all, she was bigger and older.  Have I mentioned that she's ridiculously tall?  We just ordered her summer clothes because rumor has it that even though it snowed on Sunday, it might be summer one day, and we got size 8 and size 10.  She wears a 13.5 shoe.  

And the hubs and I have decided to enroll her in the five-year/kindergarten program at her daycare for school next year.  Pennsylvania doesn't require kids to attend kindergarten, and our local public school only offers a half-day (2.5 hours) program.  Instead of carting her from before-care, to school, then back to after-care at the daycare, it's easier all around for Britton to spend all day in one class with her friends.  The program has outdoor time twice a day, little emphasis on homework, and seems a much better fit than what our public school offers.

Speaking of school, Britton is still progressing really well with her reading!  We read 5 or 6 books every night, and I make sure to get a few "ready to read" books at the library so she can sound out the words.  I've caught on to her checking out the page for illustrations in order to guess at the word, but once I call her out on it she goes back to sounding it out.  Her handwriting is readable, no more random squiggles or made up letters.  And she will proudly (and loudly) count to 100 if you let her.

This weekend, Memaw and PawPaw came to visit (before taking Britton back to their house) and of course Britton jumped onto PawPaw!  She's got a ton of energy, and they just take the brunt of it while visiting.  

We all went out for Mexican food, and Britton decided she wanted to "get fancy."  So she went upstairs, got her new summer clothes on, then picked out jewelry and hair bows.  She added her Sadie Dog purse she got from Aunt Jessica for Christmas, and her ruffle socks and dressy shoes.  The whole thing was adorable.

Likes:  ballet/tap/tumbling class, The Croods (perhaps our first non-Disney animated movie?), reading, practicing her letter of the week, going on walks in the rain so we can jump in muddy puddles (Peppa the Pig fans?  Anyone?), playing in her fairy garden

Dislikes:  getting out of the bath, lice treatments (can't blame her there)