OF SHOES AND SPAGHETTI

Some of the 2 or 3-year-olds who start school at Pikkewyntjies have eaten only a small variety of foods in their lives so if there is something on their plates at lunchtime which they have never seen before, they tend to look at it suspiciously. When they see their friends tucking in they find the courage to have a taste and when they discover it’s good all is well.

It didn’t happen this way for 2-year old Mayamiko.

Faced with something that looked like thin, white worms, he picked up a piece in his fingers. (Louise always breaks the spaghetti into small pieces to make it easy for the children to eat). Very gingerly he put it in his mouth but he didn’t seem to know what to do with it because some of it was dangling down his chin.

Poor little boy, he looked so funny, standing stock still as if nailed to the floor, unable to cope with the soft thing half in and half out of his mouth. As his teacher went to help him everyone was laughing and he laughed too - as soon as he could.

He’s been shown raw spaghetti now and how to eat cooked spaghetti so he won’t have any more alarming moments. We think he gets 5 stars for not simply spitting it out on Louise’s spotless floor.

Logan loves spaghetti but last week when he walked into school the teachers noticed something odd about his shoes.

How he came to wear two different sandals he didn’t seem to know? He must have felt though that the left shoe was on the right foot and vice versa.

He did insist he was quite comfortable wearing his sandals on the wrong feet and didn’t want them swopped but one of the teachers said it would be better for his feet and helped him do it.

A few hours later she saw he had put them back on the wrong feet and - the next morning - he wore exactly the same pair of shoes he had worn the day before.

Perhaps he wants to make a fashion statement?