get my children to adulthood

I’ve known for a while that Noodle is precocious verbally. She’s putting together full and sometimes complicated sentences. Eg: “Don’t know how ride bike yet.” “Last night pacifier fall out my mouth far away.”

Today for fun – and I only say this here since you guys (mostly) don’t know me in real life so I won’t be blushing about how I’m boasting about this kid – Today for fun I looked up verbal development. At 2 (Noodle turned 2 in May) they’re supposed to have maybe 50 words. I know a perfectly bright little kid who had maybe 5 words then and is now (about 9 months later) quite verbal when she feels like it.

I started counting the words I know Noodle knows and with unscientific assessment and using only the web for figuring out normal language development – she’s got more of a 3 year old’s vocabulary. She’s blowing me away.

Don’t get me wrong. Faster development doesn’t mean better development necessarily. I know this. But I’m letting myself revel in being amazed by her. She’s such a bundle of sunshine. I adore her.

I try to write regularly in my blog, primarily about the kids, but just generally.

Lately Noodle has been doing so many cool things, and I’m not getting it in there. I’m going to lose track of the progress she and Q make if I don’t document it, and that will make me so sad later.

Today we went up to Kid City, which is free the 3rd Thursday of the month between 5 and 7. We didn’t make it there till 6:30 – hadn’t ever gone there before. The kids had a BLAST.

Wandering into one space, sort of made up to be a fortune teller’s room: silver ball, dark, mirrors at all different angles on the wall. Noodle says, unprompted, “That’s Fan-cy!” So funny and I’ve no idea how she knew it was right to apply. Mostly lately she says, “That’s si-ee-y!” (silly)

I think she’s wildly precocious verbally. She used the word ‘tangled’ the other day to describe a pretzel. She uses ‘I’ and ‘me’ and ‘you’ correctly. She also uses the third person to refer to herself and other people, but for a 2 year old, she’s way ahead of the game. I’m blown away by her long sentences sometimes. Today it was: “Q’s balloon way way up there.”

The verbal thing seems to help a lot with her cooperation. I can get her to tell me most of what she needs, and I try to insist on this instead of whining/crying. We understand most of what she says…

Last night she was crying late at night. I went in and asked what she needed/what was wrong. She usually needs her pacifier, but she actually had it for once. She kept repeating something that sounded close to her “pass-i-fy-er” but not quite.

This morning I finally figured it out. She wanted her pirate shirt.

I have no idea what speed an average toddler learns anything, I just keep being blown away by what Noodle produces. We realized this week that Noodle can ‘count’. Which is not to say that she has the slightest concept of numbers. But she can recite numbers up to 10, and sometimes beyond. She sings little songs and if you help her out a little, they’re recognizable: ‘Twinkle Twinkle’, ‘ABC’, ‘Happy Birthday’ etc. She’s got a total prankster attitude, but absolutely wants to please us, which is a huge relief.

A few weeks ago I walked into the kitchen to find the ‘bad stuff’ cabinet open and Noodle nowhere in sight. I panicked, calling her name loudly. She came running, obviously panicked by my fear, running to bring me the bottle of chemicals she’d helped herself to, then running back for the second bottle.

Poor Q is having a tough time lately. A head injury from playful wrestling required a sticky type stitch thing. Then he got pink eye the day my parents arrived. The day after they left, we got his cough checked out, and he had an ear infection. We’re getting talking back (minor, but we call him on it because we don’t want this to become the norm) and teenager huffy sighs. (I blame myself for those.) Then he bit his best friend last Friday and I’ve caught him hitting his sister a few times. (I don’t think these are serious assaults on Noodle because she is usually unfazed by them, but he gets immediate time outs and the scary voice.)

The theory on Q that we’re working with is two-fold. One is that Noodle is so much fun right now that he’s getting jealous and neglected, despite efforts to include him. (She ADORES him. And he seems to genuinely love her and like playing with her.) The other is that we heard a rumor that boys have their biggest surge in testosterone in their preschool years. (More than teen years? unclear) Which would explain all the testing of limits I am witnessing not just with Q, but also with his friends. Poor child. The more he is difficult, the more we would rather have time with Noodle.

Luckily, he is still his delightful self most of the time. He chatters little stories to himself and snuggles close to be read to, invites us to watch ‘Shawn the Sheep’ with him, is desperate to help Noodle do things, holds her hand (thrillsville for her) and plays a hilarious version of ‘hide and seek.’ (He hides and giggles way too loud to not be seen while we wander around pretending not to hear him. It must be hard to be nearly 5.

Kindergarten orientation (for parents only) next week…

Noodle has some really cool new words. I’ve given up on keeping track of all the ones she knows now. She’s actually communicating pretty well. It’s amazing.

But here are some of the words she has said this week for the first time:
star
gate
closed
star-fish (in context, she did know what she was saying. She has a bath toy…)
library
Epilogue

She’s got no clue what the last one means, she says it because it appears in a Mo Willems book. And she says it for that page, not just randomly. She probably does know what the library is, but she uses it to refer to the library books, which we mostly read at bedtime. (We keep them in our library bag and as she plunders the stash she says, ‘lie-bary!’ She also says ‘gook’ for book, which cracks me up.) It’s such a funny stage.

You know what always makes me feel better as a parent? a) Hearing stories of their children losing it and b) hearing stories of them losing it.

Here’s a) for you:
Went with Q to the Big E for a model train hobby show. Big excitement. We went with another little boy and his mom. Q, almost right away, starts losing it, failing to cooperate with simple requests like ‘we need to stay together’. He actually falls to the ground with whining and melting down. I thought he must be sick, he was so un-Q. Kept checking his forehead for a temp. But no. He was starving. Two bags of cookies and a trip to the potty and the boy was good to go. Me, I was rolling my eyes the rest of the trip.

b) Tonight I wanted to spank Noodle. Q lost it at bedtime. He was pretty tired, and we were tired, and it was late to be getting them to bed. So it was a 2 book night and Q was upset at that (a boy of routine), so J carries him into the bedroom and pops him into bed. Well, that evaded the routine of getting a wee drink before bed and Q then spent the next 10 minutes screaming he needed a drink of water. I was torn between not wanting to give into the tantrum and knowing that he was simply tired and wanted his damn routine. So I made the mistake of giving into his tantrum and brought him some water. (after he put in a “Mommy!” I’m a sucker.) Then Noodle wants a drink, “Owl? Owl?” (a new word. She also says “owl” for owls in case you were wondering.) I bring her the cup, let her take a sip. She spills some, chokes a little, I take it away, pat her back. Tell her to lie down and go to sleep now.

No. Noodle now knows Mommy can be manipulated – Q showed her. So she screams and screams and screams.

I can’t go in there. The boy is bad enough, but Noodle has been pulling this stunt in the early hours of the morning and I’m ready to kill myself with sleep deprivation.

I stomp up the stairs. Go to the bathroom. Noodle keeps screaming. I go to the bedroom and pray my husband will intervene before something bad happens.

He comes upstairs. Opens the door. Says something firmly. The screaming stops.

Oh my. That rant got carried away. Sorry.

Q read full sentences on his own. I’m giddy with delight.

Sad tonight.

Q loves scissors. He’s just reached the point where his fine motor skills make it possible to cut shapes, however clumsily. He got to use his scissors yesterday and came up with some excuse to use them today.

We were having a low key day and Noodle was napping, so I didn’t pay much attention. I determined that he did not want to learn how to make snowflakes, left him with the paper and his scissors and went about my own business.

Sometime during the afternoon, he took the scissors to a couple of books. Not severely. Luckily, each time it was to the final pages of a book, and fairly easily repaired with tape. However one of those books was a library book, much to my horror.

To add to the incident, Q then claimed he didn’t know what had happened.

Initially I thought perhaps Noodle had an opportunity to do the cutting, but taking a look at the damage, we realized only deft little fingers could have accomplished the work.

So the consequences: scissors are off limits for a while. (Undetermined, but my guess is that there won’t be unsupervised cutting for a few months.) And for the lying, which we gave him a few chances to back out of, down to the point of reminding him of a story he knows about someone lying, well, there was no booktime for Q.

Salt to the wound was that something got in his eyes right before bathtime (which he was hoping to avoid anyways). So he was sobbing over various indignities (beads removed from his custody, the eye issue, the bath issue, the scrubbing of his body) and then the news of no booktime kind of finished off the night with screaming sobs.

It might have been a mercy, actually. He fell asleep so fast that the crying might have helped him push through exhaustion into sleep.

This isn’t cheap, but we decided for multiple reasons to sign Q up for Gymnastics classes. It’s mid-season, so it’s a bit cheaper, and easy to see how well it integrates into our lives and how much he likes it before putting down a full session’s tuition.

Anyways. I went there Thursday to check it out with Q. He didn’t really know what I was up to, but we watched the two classes for maybe five minutes. Then he whispered, “Mommy? Can I try it?” Last night we looked at photos on their website and a couple of youtube videos of preschool gymnastics (I specifically avoided the older version of gymnastics since I didn’t want him getting ideas).

Q entered the mat area and just looked thrilled to be there. The teacher asked an imagination question and he piped right up with an answer. He bounced and hopped and grinned and concentrated and listened pretty well. I followed instructions and didn’t interfere. (A friend had to restrain herself after calling out to her son to ‘stay in line!’ which is against the explicit instructions to parents to not coach or instruct their children from the sidelines.) Watching all these little four year olds was really cute. We (the two other parents I knew) all had boys starting mid-session, and they were the only boys. We kept trying to figure out what the kids were supposed to do by watching the girls, but mostly just kept dissolving into laughter.

It was just really lovely to watch Q enjoy himself, and being so physical and bouncy, traits I’m not good with. (I’m seriously sedentary. “Let’s read a book Q!”)

Picked up 2 trikes (well, ride on toys) for the kids at a rummage sale for a total of $1 today. Why 2? Because I had the insight that if I got one for Noodle (which I knew she’d love) that Q would constantly pilfer it from her causing lots of screaming and needing me to monitor them constantly over a stupid toy.

Already happy I did this. Also picked up a huge Tonka firetruck (worn, but who cares?) for 50 cents, a pull toy for free (tied to a ride on toy) which makes Noodle giggle hysterically and a pair of jeans for Q for $1.50. He almost has enough winter grade clothing to get through a school week now.

The preschool class Q is in was shorthanded on aides today, so they asked if I could come in to give them a hand this afternoon. (They chose me because I know most of the kids at least by name. Or so they said.) I was touched and happy to have an excuse to finally rearrange work to do this. Last year most of Q’s friends had a parent come in for a class, and I never finagled work time off to do it. (I’m basically scheduled to work days he’s at preschool.)

This class has about 11 kids and because it is the preschool for kids with identified needs in the school district there is a wide range of abilities and personalities. And I was so impressed by these kids. They were all cute and sweet of course, I mean, they’re four years old, so of course they’re cute. Like puppies. But they were so accepting and calm about each other. One kid with autism was having a tough time without his usual aide and he melted down hard in the first 5 minutes I was there. But the other kids just were matter of fact and basically ignored it. And he was giggling and made a joke- with me! by the time I left. The kids were so sincere and sharing things with me and I am just smiling thinking about one little girl getting excited and volunteering when a teacher suggested another child find a friend to help her.