deadlightsgirl | must mommy-preen for a moment

We have two rambunctious boys who live across the street, ages 7 and 9 or so. Gracie likes them, they like her, I am chummy with their mom when I see her. Problem is, going over there gets Gracie all keyed up (them too), she never wants to leave, and getting her home usually involves fighting and tantrums and me having to carry her back and her pulling my hair and general badness.

Today when we went over to say hi, she did require some chasing while playing with the boys, but not terrible - and here's the big news. When I wanted to go home again, I said "Gracie, let's go home and see Bugger and have pink lemonade". And she WENT!! She grumbled the teensiest bit, enough that I knew she was going because she was obeying me and that it wasn't her own idea (so really, a good thing), but she went. And we got inside, and I gave her pink lemonade, and I told her she was awesome and I was super proud of her listening.

Don't get me wrong, she still does more than her share of not-listening. But really, this is huge, and a new friend of ours from camp who is a K-2 special ed teacher when she's not building sets agrees.

YAYYYYY, Gracie!