This Sara story warms my heart, right down to the core.  Watching your child work really, really (REALLY) hard at something that isn’t coming easy to them, and then GET IT, may be just about the best feeling in the world.

I don’t remember when I learned to write or how I felt about it when I did, but it’s become apparent to me that learning to write is no easy task.  After fruitless attempts at teaching Sara over the summer, I just backed away from it entirely.  If she wasn’t ready to have fun trying, I wasn’t going to force the issue whatsoever.  Sara’s learning anything new is complicated by the fact that if she can’t do something perfectly on her first attempt, she’s DONE.  D-O-N-E.  Try, Try Again ain’t her bag baby.  Her teachers have alerted me several times since starting school that A) This trait is very common in kids like Sara, and B) She apparently got a double dose of this trait.  This year, her teachers recommended we start chanting “Can Do”, and never one to turn down excellent advice, it has become my daily mantra.

Sara’s school teaches a handwriting method called, “Handwriting Without Tears”.  The name seemed odd to me until it became quite clear that, much like “Snakes on a Plane”, it was named plainly, directly, and correctly.  Suddenly, Sara wanted to WRITE and she became very focused on gaining the skill.  She didn’t at all seem pressured or anxious, not in the least.  She seemed driven, by a power all her own.  At the advice of my good friend Amie, I purchased a dry erase tracing book that Sara indeed loved, but suddenly CRAVED.  She was opening it up at 7am while waiting on carpool.  If she had 3 minutes to spare, she’d open it.  If she had hours to spare, she could be found, tracing and tracing, erasing and tracing.  Never writing independently, never asking how anything is spelled, but tracing until she could do it perfectly.

2 nights ago, without warning, Sara asked how I spelled my name.  She had just traced an “L”, and figured out that Lori starts with an “L” sound.  I smiled and said, “Oh, my name is easy.  It’s filled with letters you already know how to print.  L-O-R-I.  You are great at circles, and you draw “R” every time you write Sara.  Add a stick down, stick across and across for “I”, and there you have it.”  Sara can somewhat write “Sara”, but I have always referred to it as a loosely Picasso style version of “Sara”.

She got very excited and called me over to her book.  And there, plain as day (to me anyway), was Sara’s first free form word outside of her own name:

Sara wrote a word.  And that word was followed by another and another.  Intense, wild words like “Cat” and “Dog”, and a river of understanding that letters turn into words that she will be able to eventually master.  A LIGHT CAME ON in a way that lit up the entire house.  I felt like Helen Keller’s teacher, standing at the well.

Then the drama happened.  Somehow, something sticky got on the book, and last night as we opened her favorite tool, it ripped apart.  The look on her face was so sad, I started to cry for her.  When toys die, I generally let them go, but this was an educational EMERGENCY.  I scooped up the girls, ran over to consignment to collect my money, and drove to Sam’s Club as quickly as possible.  No sign of the books.  As we dejectedly walked through the last row, I spotted a tracing book, deep underneath a table.  Could it be?  Is it possible it is….a PRINCESS TRACING BOOK?!  Sara yelled, ‘I LOVE YOU MOMMY!”, Kelly, having no clue what all this mayhem was about, yelled, ‘ME TOO! ME TOO!”  After getting it home, Sara was so focused on writing her letters, that Kelly took the chair right out from under her, and Sara never noticed:

Today as I picked her up from school, she pulled out her bat assignment from class where she proudly showed me for the first time, she was able to legibly (almost!) write her name across the top of the page.  Name: Sara.  Just like that.  Months of practice, diligence, and the excellent instruction of 3 teachers….so, you know, just like that.

It matters not WHEN you learn to write.  I know surgeons who couldn’t scribble a letter until well into the first grade.  What matters is a good work ethic.  To me, excellence is so little about what you do for a living, and more connected to HOW YOU DO IT.  A strong work ethic paired with just a tablespoon of scrappy has made my life what it is…a very happy and satisfying life, indeed.  Sara trying so hard at something that took months of practice for her to get….seriously, I tear up just thinking about it.

To celebrate Sara’s first completion of “Fill in your name here”, we got milkshakes with lunch.  And she enjoyed every single sip, while her goofy Mother quietly chanted at the sink, “Can do!  Can do!  Can do!”  Congratulations honey.  Let’s roll around in this victory for a long while, because you know what follows writing?  Ugh.  Reading…I’m SO NOT touching that one…call up the professionals please…