Dear Diary

Doodle recently got a new diary as a birthday present. When she kept a diary in the past, she tended to focus on where we went/what we did ; in other words, pretty boring stuff. When she opened the present, I encouraged her to write about her thoughts and feelings. Tonight at bedtime we had the following conversation about the diary.

Doodle: Too bad I haven't had time to write in my diary the last couple of days.

Me: Give me a hint about what you've written about so far (the diary is locked).

Doodle: My first entry is about the lice comb and magnifying glass that you bought and what a waste of time and money it was. (I suspected she had lice in her hair because she was scratching her scalp and there have been recent cases in her class, but it was a false alarm.) I can't believe you spent so much money on the comb ($10) and how much time you wasted looking at my hair. But I also wrote, "At least my mom cares enough about me to do this."

Me: That's very sweet.

I think she's taking my advice. As she becomes freer about expressing her feelings in writing and she gets closer to the teen years, I suspect that I won't always be portrayed quite as favorably.