The little things.

Last week the after school program (ASP) and I tested our little twig boats in the recreation pool. Then I had a bit of a disagreement with one of the girls about obedience (not running off ahead when I'm the only caregiver present, for one), and we had to go talk to her mom. She then proceeded to pout the rest of the day, at one point picking up a stick and a big block of cedar and rubbing them together, saying that she was going to make a fire and throw it on me. I ignored the behavior, assuming that she had some pent-up agression and needed to release it through imaginative play. I knew she wasn't ACTUALLY going to start a fire. Nevertheless, I told her mother about it the next day, and she was very upset. She told me to tell the girl that it was not appropriate, and the next time she did something like that to immediately call her.
It seems that day she gave her daughter a lecture about it before dropping her off with me, because she wouldn't speak to me. She spent most of this week ignoring or trying to be disobedient in one way or another.
Then yesterday she and her brother were the only ones present for ASP. Her brother was tired and slept the whole time, leaving just the two of us to play and talk. We were playing "Sorry" (the board game based on Parchisi) when she all of a sudden said "I'm sorry, Kate."
I thought she was talking about the game, so I asked what for.
"For being mean to you."
Unbidden. We hadn't even discussed it. I was so proud of her! I am still so proud of her! I told her that I'm a safe person to be mad at because I'm not just going to up and leave because she says something mean to me, and that it was alright. Then she invited me to her spelling bee.
This child is used to having all the attention and then suddenly her little cousin is taking all of it, staying at their house a lot, and she's not getting her way in everything. Learning this lesson at nine years old is hard, much harder than learning it at four, and I know that she is making progress in learning to think about how other people feel. And that is awesome.