Thursday, September 30, 2010

I Naughty

Today I caught Moses bracing himself against a chair, with that look on his face. "Do you need to poop?" I asked, while quickly taking off his pants and diaper. "Yeah, I pooping" he replied, so we hurried to the toilet where he sat for a few minutes before the novelty wore off and he demanded to get down. This happened twice in the span of about half an hour. Not long after he disembarked from the toilet for the second time, he waddled over to me and sheepishly said, "Mommy, I pooped."

"Oh Moses, you should have pooped while you were sitting on the potty!" I groaned. He somberly cast his eyes to the ground and said, "I naughty." How could I be upset with him? At least he is telling me he needs to go and is not entirely opposed to sitting on the toilet. After my experience potty training the twins, though, I'm not getting my hopes up too high that he'll be diaper-free anytime soon.

Thursday, September 23, 2010

Caleb vs. 6

A few months ago, I noticed that the digital alarm clock on our bedside table was facing the wall. I assumed that someone had accidentally knocked it that way, so I turned it around. After all, the clock does share tight quarters with a cluttered assortment of diapers, wipes, lotions, tissues, books, and toys. But the next time I came into the bedroom looking to see what time it was, I noticed that the clock was once again facing the wall. This continued on until one day when I finally caught Caleb in the act of turning the clock towards the wall. I asked him why he was turning the clock, and he became a little flustered and told me that he didn't want to see the "6". I asked him why he didn't want to see it, and he gave his classic reply, "Because I don't need to!"

When I turned the clock back around so that we could see the numbers, he started to freak out and yelled, "No! No! The 6 is coming! I don't want to see the 6!" and struggled to turn the clock back towards the wall. Even though the number 6 was not currently displayed, he knew that the numbers changed every minute and it was due to reappear soon. When he failed to thwart my efforts to keep the clock in a viewable position, he dashed out of the room. I can't help but wonder if it's some sort of spiritual thing? We have never told him that 6 is the devil's number or anything like that, and he has never before or since then shown any sort of aversion or favoritism towards any other number. Interesting, isn't it?

Saturday, September 18, 2010

19-Month-Old Vigilante

I'm not so sure how I feel about Moses' first 6-word sentence, spoken the morning after his 19-month birthday after repeatedly beating a whiffle ball with a dinosaur Pez dispenser: "Mommy, I killed a bad guy!"

Friday, September 17, 2010

Bug Love

"Sweet daddy long legs! Moses killed you and now you're dead! It makes me so sad!" - Joshua, talking to a smushed daddy long legs.

"Here you go, fuzzy caterpillar, have a nice snack! Bye bye!" -Caleb, after picking a clover and setting it in front of a caterpillar he found on the sidewalk.

Earlier this week, Joshua found a cricket in Mimi and Papa's house and whacked a shoe at it until it was dead. When I explained to him that crickets are basically harmless "good guys", Joshua became very remorseful. "Oh dear, I killed the cricket! I need to find another cricket!" he insisted, as if he could redeem himself by finding another cricket and sparing its life. While he grieved, mourned, and frantically tried to find another cricket, I tried to reassure him that it was ok because there are plenty of other crickets in the world. Joshua was unable to find solace until a couple days later when he found another cricket and graciously spared it an appointment with the underside of his shoe. Sweet Joshua.

TOMY

Over the Summer I'd occasionally help the twins sound out letters in an attempt to read words. This morning Caleb picked up a Thomas train and asked me what its name was. For those of you who aren't familiar, most wooden and metal Thomas trains have the name of the train imprinted somewhere on the bottom. Well, this particular train was plastic, unlike most of our other ones, and I couldn't find its name anywhere. I handed it back to Caleb and said, "I'm sorry, I don't know what his name is." Less than a minute later, Caleb said, "Mommy, I think his name is Toe-me". Surprised, I took the train back from him and upon closer inspection of the engine's underside, I saw the toy brand name "TOMY" subtly embossed in the black plastic. "Wow, Caleb, did you read that?" I asked. "Yeah!" he replied, smiling and beaming with pride. I knew he must have, since it was a proper noun that he's not familiar with. So there you have it, Caleb officially read his first word all by himself, and of his own volition, too!

Friday, September 10, 2010

Moses' 18-Month Stats

Today Moses had his 18-month check-up (a few weeks late). He is 33 inches tall (60th %tile) and weighs 28 lb. 4 oz. (75th %tile). I think this was the first time his weight was a higher percentile than his height! I'm kind of surprised because he still seems like a little stick figure compared to the twins circa 3 years ago. Where does all of his weight come from? Maybe he's pure muscle? ;-) But in all seriousness, we continue to thank God for blessing us with such a healthy and bright little boy.

Sunday, September 5, 2010

Verbose Moses

Every week I get an email from BabyCenter.com telling me what kinds of milestones my baby should be reaching each week. Today I got the following email for 18 months, week 3:
Now that your child has mastered some key words, she'll soon figure out (if she hasn't already) that saying those words in a REALLY LOUD VOICE is a surefire way to get what she wants. Some toddlers can even make simple two-word sentences such as "No more" or "All done." And, as a sign of your child's growing self-awareness, she may start referring to herself by name: "Claire go," for example.
Now, I realize that these generic emails probably err on the side of very gradual development so that if you have babies who don't like to talk (a certain set of twins comes to mind) you won't feel so bad. But Moses keeps blowing us away with his conversations and sentences which are definitely more than two words long. Here are just a few examples that come to mind from the past couple days:

Joe: Moses, do you want to get in the pool?
Moses: No.
Joe: Why not?
Moses: Cold.
Joe: Because it's cold?
Moses: Yeah. Because cold.

Moses: Mommy, get it!
Me: What do you want me to get?
Moses: Goggle.
Me: Where are the goggles?
Moses: Pool.
(Sure enough, there was a pair of goggles at the bottom of the pool.)

Moses: Where'd Daddy go?
Me: He went to take Caleb to the bathroom.
Moses: Why?
Me: Because Caleb needs to poop.
Moses: Ohhhh.
(I don't think the twins started asking "why" questions until they were close to 4.)

I tired!
(He actually says this when he is tired and ready for a nap or bedtime.)

Me: Sweet Moses.
Moses: Sweet Mommy.
(We go back and forth telling each other how sweet we are.)

Where bikes go?
(When he realized that his ride-on trikes weren't in their usual corner in the basement.)

'sat? (what's that?)

Where Joshua go? Joshua, where are you?
Where Key-eb go? Key-eb, where are you?


Excuse me, Daddy. Excuse me, Joshua.
When you're in the way and he wants to get by.

Where are you, al-gator? There you are, al-gator!
When playing with an alligator.

M! Moses!
When he sees an "M" somewhere. He realizes that his name begins with "M".