Friday, July 14, 2006

It's a toddler's prerogative...

...to change their mind.

Forget my smug proclamations about an easy switch from bottles to cups. The poo monkey took one look at her sippy cup this mooring and cried her eyes out for her "bot-uhl". Being the tough love parents that we are, said milk was reoffered in the plastic boobie substitute in about, oh ten seconds flat.

Then little miss decided today was the day to throw her first I-refuse-to-sit-in-the-trolley-damn-you-to-hell-mother tantrum. Which would have been fine, except that towards the end of our shopping expedition I had no other choice other than to carry her to stop her from making a bold bid for freedom and/or grabbing everything in sight.. This would not have been a problem if:
a) She didn't weigh as much as your average two and a half year old (or more)
b) We weren't in the express lane at Coles where we then needed a price check on a spare milk sippy cup (yes, I am an idiot), much to the disgust of the queue of cranky old biddies behind us.

Is it wrong to pop your beloved daughter down for her nap, close the door and punch your fist in delight?

Thursday, July 13, 2006

Picking up the pace

The poo monkey has picked up the pace in the last week or so. Silly mummy thought it was merely two new molars responsible for four night's of ridiculously little sleep (even my boss took pity on me this week and let me sit and stare inanely at my computer screen, knowing full well that he was not going to get his punchy brief on...well the stuff that I work on that I won't bore you with).

Nope. Look what my girl can do now:

1. Say mummy, daddy, nana, pop, nanny, pa, nicki (auntie), kooka (uncle), paul (other uncle), abi (yes her own name) properly and to the right person, both in real life and in photos as is the case for her Melbourne based relatives.

2. Further to 1, don't even get me started on the number of words added to the poo monkey's vocabulary each and every day. It's gobsmacking. As for actual phrases..."there you go", "daddy gone"....it just goes on and on. And don't get me started on the rapid fire direct imitations. Thank goodness I have trained myself out of swear words, "crikey" sounds much better coming from the monkey's mouth than some of mummy's other favourite phrases.

3. Animal noises. What does the monkey say? "ooh ooh!"! And the elephant, the snake, the lion, the dog, the bird......

4. Sing my little heart out. We've added "pay skool" to the repertoire!

5. Eat sitting down at her own small table and chairs. I mean, high chairs are for babies didn't you know?

6. Perform new physical tasks with death defying ease. Climb up and down stairs even though I have never really had the opportunity to do so before this morning's mother's group? No problem, give me less than three seconds and it is sorted.

7. Happily use a cup for milk rather than a bottle. What do you mean I kicked up a stink over the three months of prior attempts Mum, don't know what you are talking about.

8. Follow through with some fairly complex instructions. "Go and find baby and put her to bed", "blow your nose with the tissue and then put it in the bin". I kid you not.

Ahh my little monkey, you saved all this new stuff for the week after I wrote your seventeen months post. You certainly are a cheeky one. And mummy loves it.

Wednesday, July 05, 2006

Seventeen months

What a joy it must be to be seventeen months old, my little poo monkey -although I can't really call you that anymore, otherwise you will follow me around repeating that phrase all day-:

* To dance unashamedly when and wherever the mood takes you, just as you did this morning at library storytime. And let's not forget how well you do the actions to "Rock a bye your bear" (oh lordy, mummy cannot get that song out of her head)

* To sing enthusiastically along to the daggiest of songs, both mummy invented and on the radio. Your current fave is "Feeling hot hot hot", to which you enthusiastically shout " owehoweh'ot, 'ot, 'ot" like some pint sized french exchange student. And let's not forget that perennial Wiggles classic "hot potato". I've never heard such beautiful harmonies.."Tato! Nana!".

* To love and hate your toys with such abandon. You are fixated with bears and bananas in pajamas, and your little "baabee" doll. Not too sure about your Britney Spears method of care for the latter though.

You are undergoing so many changes my little blossom, physically you are blooming into a beautiful little girl and are getting more and more confident with running and doing some climbing. You are very pleased with yourself for being able to turn in a graceful circle when the mood takes you, kind of a toddler pirouette.

Just don't get any ideas about ballet, Mummy is still scarred from her own childhood experiences. But I digress.

You have a vocab that must be in the range of 50-100 words now, and some of them are just too funny, like 'lippy'. You are working so hard on sentences, the other day you said "bear gone" when that ^&** bear song was finally switched off, and you do love to repeat words in threes, like "clap clap clap" and as mentioned earlier "'ot, 'ot, 'ot".

Speaking of numbers, you most certainly have mastered the concept of counting to two. If I grab one of your shoes and say "one", you will find the other and say "two".

Genius at work.

My little princess, I had intended to write so much more, or at least get the chance to edit this post, but alas I must be off as with your single day nap of 1.5 hours there is not much time to get things done. You aren't the only one dealing with feelings of frustration from time to time!

Love you my girl, you are my world.

ETA: How could I have forgotten to mention that you now wait in the morning for a clean nappy, and then you go over to a quiet corner, squat, and once the job is done proudly announce "poo"? I think your mummy is in denial about the up and coming trials and tribulations of toilet training....