Moses has been a busy, curious boy this past month. He asks to "see" everything, from the boiling pot on the stove to the rain dancing on the surface of the pool from the kitchen window. He also requests to "try" everything, from cracking an egg to throwing ice cubes into an overflowing pot of boiling rice noodles. Moses' desire to see and try everything is demonstrative of his inquisitive nature. This evening, for example, he asked me, "where Daddy?" after Joe left for worship team practice.
One of Moses' favorite pastimes is peeling things. He can easily occupy himself for a solid 30 minutes by peeling the paper labels off of crayons. Another one of his favorite activities is collecting small twigs and sticks in the yard and bringing them inside the house (Joe likes to say that Moses is looking for his staff). The other day while he was outside with Joe, he found a small Y-shaped branch, held it up, and said, "Y". I didn't believe Joe when he told me, so I asked Moses what letter he was holding, and was impressed when he replied, "Y". It's amazing to see what he picks up on the sly.
In addition to his covert independent study of the alphabet, Moses is also becoming very good at counting. He usually counts "1, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9." He can drink from a cup without spilling, feed himself milk and cereal with a spoon (and make less of a mess than his 4-year-old brothers when they do the same), helps me hang laundry to dry, and thinks that he can swim all by himself. Most people guess that he's 6-12 months older than he really is, and it doesn't help that he's a good bit taller than some of his 2-year-old friends. Seeing that he's so much more bronzed than the rest of us, most people probably think he's adopted, too! I affectionately refer to him as "my big brown baby." Moses is still pretty skinny, though. We just weighed him tonight, and he rung in at 25 lbs. Caleb is 40 lbs. and Joshua is 45 lbs.
Caleb and Joshua are nurturing older brothers and deserve a lot of the credit for Moses' quick development. For example, Caleb often uses the time that he's sitting on the toilet as an opportunity to educate his baby brother. While Caleb is pooping, Moses will loiter outside the bathroom door while his brother drills him. The drills sound something like this and will go on and on for quite some time:
"Say horse."
"orse."
"Say chicken."
"chi-en" etc.
Joshua will sometimes "read" books to Moses while they sit together on the couch. Since Joshua can't actually read yet, he usually opts for books that involve numbers. This is probably one reason why Moses demonstrates such an interest in counting things. Joshua will ask Moses, "how many flowers are there?" and they will point and count the flowers in unison. Moses loves his big brothers and missed them dearly while they were in Vacation Bible School last week. When I would tell him it was time to go pick up Joshua and Caleb, Moses' face would light up and he'd yell, "Jahhhhhhh-shwa!" while running towards the door.
Of course, Moses also picks up undesirable behavior from his brothers, such as pretending to shoot his brothers with coat hanger "guns" and hitting each other in the head with large blunt objects. Whenever the twins come crying to me because Moses has assaulted them in such a manner, I am quick to remind them that he learns from their example. This doesn't seem to curb their desire to act this way, unfortunately. Boys will be boys, I suppose!
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