We were trying hard to find some sort of fall/school routine, but then we hit a night where no one slept, and I was thankful for a day where we could stay in our jams later than usual. Transitions are always tricky with young kids. Charlotte has really been wanting to go to school lately (because all of the kids in her life go to “real” school), and I’m feeling a little guilty that she’s not going to Pre-K this year. I have many thoughts on school and often feel like I want to homeschool (because I am a teacher, and I would enjoy it), but I’m not afraid of her going to school, and if that’s what she wants that’s fine (although she doesn’t know what school is really like). I wish the options we had were less academic and more progressive/play based, but that’s not the case in our neighborhood/with our budget. This year I made the decision to keep Charlotte home for many reasons, but mainly because I really wanted her to have this year to play with Winnie. If she went to school this year, she would be at school during the day, and then she would be playing with the older kids that I nanny after the school day, and she and Winnie would not have a lot of time to play with just the two of them. I love walking into a room and seeing Charlotte “reading” Winnie a book, or the two of them engaged in a make-believe narrative. Even though Winnie is at the stage of major tantrums, biting, pinching, hair pulling, and scratching, Charlotte does not retaliate (yet). She loves making Winnie her baby in play. I will often find Winnie with a bib on with her mouth wide open and Charlotte pretend feeding her. On this day, Winnie was Charlotte’s daughter, and I was the neighbor. Her other kid was her doll she named Heart Angel (for the record, I am not a fan of that doll’s name). I asked Charlotte if the baby Winnie was strolling around was her granddaughter, and she assured me that it was just Winnie’s doll. They love their babies. They took them on a walk and fed them several times with lots of hugging and patting. Finally, the dolls needed to go to the doctor, and I was asked to be the doctor, so I exchanged my camera for a stethoscope and gave the babies a check up.
All Mountains and Molehills 
we do homeschool (that’s my girl’s decision) but she misses the contact with other children, even if school isn’t the best socializing place. your little girl has the luck to play with a real baby 🙂