Here are some things that have happened with my kids lately that I wanted to share with all of you, because well...I just think my kids are so stinking cute! (It's sickening, I know...)
1. My son is making up his own words. When talking about the couches, or his bed, or pillows and blankets, one of the words we all use to describe these things is comfortable (an adjective). So somewhere in his mind, if these things are comfortable, or comfy as we would usually say in our house, and we wanted to refer to them as a noun, they must be collectively called "comf". So now when he is piling all his stuffed animals on the floor and wants to make the pile bigger with pillows and blankets he says, "I need to get some more comf".
2. Being in the process of raising to kids of my own, it's clear that kids most easily learn words they here repeated over and over. When my son was little and we still had our dog, he heard me refer to our dog as "dumb dog" on several occasions. That was probably not the best thing to say to the dog or say in front of my son, but our dog was pretty bad and at times I wanted to send some profanity his way. To refrain from doing so, since I don't think you should swear, I ended up just calling him a dumb dog. Looking back I realize that did little to teach my son about how to treat others with respect. This was made painfully clear when he blurted out one day at a young age "dumb dog".
So, this year we have had a bit of an ant problem in the house and my daughter really hates bugs. Every time she would see one she would yell out "ant, ant". My MIL who is here with the kids during the day, started asking her, "Should I get him?", meaning should I kill the ant and dispose of it. So now every time my daughter sees an ant she yells out "Ant, ant!", followed by "Get him!".
3. Both of my children love books but it can be a struggle at times to find ones that are appealing to both. My son doesn't mind reading some of the books aimed at younger kids, especially because so many of them he loved at one time and hasn't heard in a while, but that only lasts so long. So I was sifting through the books looking for one that both my son and daughter would enjoy. I decided on a book called "Mine-o-saur". It's a bit long for my daughter, so I wasn't sure if she would sit through it but if has great rhyming sequences in it and some repetition of the word "Mine".
Now the Mine-o-saur, of course, wanted everything to be "MINE!" as he says in the book. He was mean to the other kids at school and snatched all their snacks and toys away from them while shouting "Mine, Mine, Mine!" Then none of the other dinosaurs wanted to play with him because he wouldn't share, which made the mine-o-saur sad. So the mine-o-saur decides to apologize and give all their stuff back because what he really wants is to play and make friends. Do you see the moral of the story here?
Well, my daughter loved the book. And she even learned a new word from it. Can you guess? Yep. She learned to say "mine". So now when my son tries to take her things from her I hear her yelling "Mine. Mine. Mine!", which totally wasn't the point of the book. So while it's a great book loved by all, including myself, the moral of the story is a bit above the comprehension level of an 18 month old.
4. My daughter figured out at a young age that skipping the middle man and just doing things yourself is quicker and more efficient. Usually when she gets hurt we just kiss it and say "All better" and she runs along like nothing ever happened. She got to the point where she would point at her "ouchie" and grunt, indicating that she wanted us to kiss it. Then she learned to say "Ow" and make a kiss sound, indicating to us that she wanted us to kiss it. Now...she just kisses it herself. Really funny to see, but also really cute.
Sincerely,
The-M-O-M
