Middle Child Syndrome?

Grace's brilliance, Finn's deviousness and Tallulah's helplessness may have been taking all of Pete's and my focus for the past couple months.  It seems poor Lola is threatening to fall through the cracks.  Grace was just naturally smart and so I tried not to expect too much from Finn.  Finn ended up being pretty bright on his own, so again I tried not to expect too much from Lola.  But then I think when she was old enough for preschool we were already worrying about the new baby on her way, plus the older two do take so much energy from me.

Lola came in the other day, crying cause she'd fallen off her scooter.  "I hurt my leg elbow!", she wailed.  "Look, it's bleeding!!"  She collapsed on the floor. 
"Honey, you mean your knee.", I tell her, while looking in vain for bandaids.  "Huh?", she replies, as though she learned to speak from a Japanimation voice over actor.  She sits with legs crossed on the living room carpet,  contemplating the joint in question.  I find a bandaid and join her on the floor.  "Be careful! my leg-knee hurts!!"  "It's just called a knee honey."  I notice she is wearing her sister's motorcycle boots and a white slip.  No actual dress.  I distinctly remember telling her to get dressed before she went outside, I know she wasn't wearing this earlier. 

Not only is my little daughter dressed like Courtney Love but she falls outside and screams, so any neighbor who didn't notice the outfit can get a chance,  and also get to hear her complain about her leg elbow.  Shame is a very powerful parenting tool, we all know this.  Wounds treated and appropriate 4 yr old clothing applied and she's outside playing good as new.

Later that day, I approach Lola to begin selling the idea of preschool.  "I don't need to go to school mama, I know my numbers"
She lists them for me.  "ello, o,"
"Those are letters, and it's just plain 'elle'"
"o with a line at the end of it"
"That's actually a lowercase a, and it's a letter"
"Umm.  s with a line through it!", she is triumphant, as though this was her ace in the hole.
"That's a symbol, oh for the love of... it's worse than I thought"

Looks like I'm going to spend the rest of the summer helping Lola cram so she's up to preschool speed.  Luckily we have a year to get her up to kindergarten level.  And she seems pretty eager to learn.  Maybe she will end up being as bright as  G1 and G2.  And if not, she's got the whole cute blonde thing to fall back on...