Eric: February 2009 Archives
Lately, Ollie's language skills have gotten good enough that his brain can construct the sentences faster than he can say them. This leads, first of all, to the world's cutest "Ummmmm...." while he tries to figure out what he's trying to say. Second of all it leads to a fair number of spoonerisms and malapropisms. Tonight during his bath, Ollie was talking about his "Dubber Ruckies", but I missed the best one. Apparently Ollie and Jenny were in the car a few days ago driving home from daycare and Ollie saw a fire truck and got very excited, repeatedly yelling "Tire..." (I'm sure you can figure out the rest ;). I guess after several repetitions he stopped and said in a thoughtful tone, "This is hard" before continuing. Myself, I can't imagine how Jenny stayed on the road for laughing.
It seems like every month brings a new set of catchphrases and funny behaviors. Ollie seems to have picked up on our attempts to get him ready for various transitions ("Ollie, you can play trains for 2 more minutes, then it's bath time", etc) and now announces at random intervals that he's going to run in circles for "two minutes!".
Also, I think he may need to be checked into a Betty Ford clinic; he has a fairly serious addiction to granola bars ("ola bars" in toddler parlance). Since we keep a box of granola bars from Costco in the front seat to hand out to homeless people (you'd be surprised how many actually turn them down), he likes to take a quick detour while climbing into his seat, lunge over the cupholder, and seize a granola bar. A lot of the time he doesn't really even want to eat it, at least not right away, just hold it like some magic talisman. The other night he slept with an ola bar... still in its wrapper. He woke up, picked it up, carried it downstairs, and then ate it. I think he was testing to see if ola bars, among their many wonderful qualities, fended off nightmares. Unfortunately that hypothesis turned out to be unsupported.
I have to reassure Ollie each night right before I close his door that there are no masks in the room and that if any show up, I'll come right back. Tonight he's sleeping with a new stuffed dragon from Barnes & Noble (his current favorite stuffed animal, he picked it out Saturday), maybe that will help.
Other recent favorite activities: He's loving playing with the farm set his Aunt MeMe sent him, especially the tractor and the pigs. He's very into reverse psychology; the surest way to get him to do anything -- eat a new food, give kisses and hugs, climb the stairs for a bath -- is to tell him you do not want him, under any circumstances, to do it. Of course this carries the very real risk that when you then tell him not to do something seriously (such as, oh, I don't know, run out into the street chasing a leaf) he is only too eager to disobey. It's a tough balancing act some days.
Another current favorite game is to pretend to be a froggie, crawling around on the floor and popping up to scare/attack people. We played this game with me lying on our bed and him sneaking all around it for about an hour straight on Sunday. I don't know why a froggie, honestly.
We've planted much of our garden, including starting a bunch of seedlings in a little indoor greenhouse. He loves to check on the seedlings every day--he always tells them "Grow up baby plants, I eat you!" I'm pretty sure he means it as an inspirational speech. Hopefully the plants take it that way. :) Growing our own food and trying new stuff from the CSA basket (which starts again soon) has been a great way to get him interested in all kinds of veggies (and us too, honestly). We went out to dinner Friday at Trudy's, and the only non-water drink we could get for him was a Shirley Temple, which he did not like at all -- he asked for water after one sip. He loves tomatoes and carrots, especially if he can steal them out of my salad, and he'll eat an entire corn on the cob in one go. Tonight we had a really tasty leek and cauliflower tart (Jenny made some awesome pastry dough for the crust) and he loved that too, as well as the leek and sweet potato chowder we had this weekend.
Finally, I give you--the Trouble Face. This is the face Ollie makes when he wants attention and isn't getting it. He walks up to you and makes this face to inform you that if you don't start entertaining him, he's going to start breaking the rules until you do. Frankly, it's really helpful. :)
Also, I think he may need to be checked into a Betty Ford clinic; he has a fairly serious addiction to granola bars ("ola bars" in toddler parlance). Since we keep a box of granola bars from Costco in the front seat to hand out to homeless people (you'd be surprised how many actually turn them down), he likes to take a quick detour while climbing into his seat, lunge over the cupholder, and seize a granola bar. A lot of the time he doesn't really even want to eat it, at least not right away, just hold it like some magic talisman. The other night he slept with an ola bar... still in its wrapper. He woke up, picked it up, carried it downstairs, and then ate it. I think he was testing to see if ola bars, among their many wonderful qualities, fended off nightmares. Unfortunately that hypothesis turned out to be unsupported.
I have to reassure Ollie each night right before I close his door that there are no masks in the room and that if any show up, I'll come right back. Tonight he's sleeping with a new stuffed dragon from Barnes & Noble (his current favorite stuffed animal, he picked it out Saturday), maybe that will help.
Other recent favorite activities: He's loving playing with the farm set his Aunt MeMe sent him, especially the tractor and the pigs. He's very into reverse psychology; the surest way to get him to do anything -- eat a new food, give kisses and hugs, climb the stairs for a bath -- is to tell him you do not want him, under any circumstances, to do it. Of course this carries the very real risk that when you then tell him not to do something seriously (such as, oh, I don't know, run out into the street chasing a leaf) he is only too eager to disobey. It's a tough balancing act some days.
Another current favorite game is to pretend to be a froggie, crawling around on the floor and popping up to scare/attack people. We played this game with me lying on our bed and him sneaking all around it for about an hour straight on Sunday. I don't know why a froggie, honestly.
We've planted much of our garden, including starting a bunch of seedlings in a little indoor greenhouse. He loves to check on the seedlings every day--he always tells them "Grow up baby plants, I eat you!" I'm pretty sure he means it as an inspirational speech. Hopefully the plants take it that way. :) Growing our own food and trying new stuff from the CSA basket (which starts again soon) has been a great way to get him interested in all kinds of veggies (and us too, honestly). We went out to dinner Friday at Trudy's, and the only non-water drink we could get for him was a Shirley Temple, which he did not like at all -- he asked for water after one sip. He loves tomatoes and carrots, especially if he can steal them out of my salad, and he'll eat an entire corn on the cob in one go. Tonight we had a really tasty leek and cauliflower tart (Jenny made some awesome pastry dough for the crust) and he loved that too, as well as the leek and sweet potato chowder we had this weekend.
Finally, I give you--the Trouble Face. This is the face Ollie makes when he wants attention and isn't getting it. He walks up to you and makes this face to inform you that if you don't start entertaining him, he's going to start breaking the rules until you do. Frankly, it's really helpful. :)
