Things I'll remind him of when he's 20...

I have been blessed with a number of wonderful “Sarahs” in my life and although it was fantastic that we got a visit from two of them (and children) two weekends in a row, it was rather confusing for Toby.

(He's not 3 yet and I’m already prefacing my stories to make excuses for his inappropriate comments…)

To preface the story even further, I’ll also clarify that one Sarah has two daughters while the other has one daughter.

And so as the 2^nd weekend of visiting Sarahs drew to a close and I lovingly tucked my innocent boy into bed I asked him if he’d enjoyed the visit.

“Yes,” he said thoughtfully, “I like playing with little girls.” After a long thoughtful pause he added, “But I like playing with two girls at the same time even better.”

My Alphabet Woes

The more Toby learns the more I recognize my own shortcomings as a teacher. Right now he is learning the alphabet. We can’t go anywhere without him pointing out the letters that he sees. “Look! It’s M for MOMMY!!!” he will say anytime we pass McDonalds. I know I need to cherish the moments of excitement that he has over a McDonalds sign because the M stands for Mommy and NOT because of what he will someday discover it is REALLY all about...

Every letter that he picks out of a word is EQUALLY exciting and said with a breathless exclamation and purposeful point of the finger. Breakfast time takes SIGNIFICANTLY longer because he munches away slowly as he peruses the cereal box searching for letters that he knows. Today was a milestone because he could not only identify every letter in “CORN BRAN” but also in the French “SON DE MAIS”.

Teaching his eager mind the alphabet is an exercise in spontaneous and creative thinking. You never know when you are going to be faced with a NEW letter and be put on the spot with the inevitable question, “What does it STAND for?” I made a fatal flaw with the letter ‘E’ and told him that it stood for Elephant OR Emily. That was confusing on a number of levels, particularly because he doesn’t KNOW anyone named Emily (despite my insistence that I have a very close friend named Emily- - if she’s not in his daycare group she doesn’t count). Now every time we see an E we stop to ponder the fact that it has TWO words that it stands for AND that there is no one at daycare named Emily.

Today, walking down the stairs at daycare he saw the big WELCOME sign and suddenly, in front of all the other mothers, I was on the spot again. What letter was THAT? The letter ‘W’. “OH.” He said matter of factly, “What does W stand for?”

What DOES start with W that a toddler would know? I certainly wasn’t going to hold out on him having a Walter or Wallace in his daycare group.

I went with Walrus and was met with a disappointed look. “WALRUS?” he repeated incredulously with an is-that-the-best-you-can-do? look on his face. “You know, the animal, Walrus with the big tusks” I tried to explain while simultaneously wracking my brain for an alternative W word. “I don’t HAVE a Walrus.” He announced. Indeed he doesn’t. In an attempt to get him out of daycare and earshot of other mothers who had probably taught their kids much better W words I suggested that maybe Santa would bring him one.

As we skulked out of daycare I felt like a double failure in my maternal role. Not only was I severely lacking in the creative alphabet naming part of my brain but also here I was BRIBING my kid with CHRISTMAS presents.

Tonight, after I finish my paperwork and cleaning up from dinner, I’m going to sit down and take a good hard look at the alphabet to ensure I have appropriate words for each letter. (You know I’ll need it when he gets to ‘F’.) Then I’m going to go ensure that I put “stuffed toy walrus” on his Christmas wish list for Grandma…

Creepy Baby talk

As my waistline expands, so too does Toby’s image of his new sibling. It is quite amazing to watch as he grasps the difficult concepts that the miracle of bringing new life into the world begs to have answered. I don’t know if it’s a blessing or a curse that my final trimester of pregnancy has coincided with this new “why” stage, but it certainly leads to some interesting conversations.

One of the sweetest conversations occurred today. We were talking about his physician “Dr. C” whom he adores. I told him that she would be there when the baby came out and he asked (you guessed it) “Why?” Couldn’t I just do it myself? I replied that getting the baby out was something that was a little “tricky” (ouch, wince, shudder…do I REALLY have to do it again!?!?) and that I needed Dr C. to help me. After thinking about this for a while very sweetly suggested, “Mommy, can I help you? I can help get the baby out!” (double shudder). I turned him down gently by suggesting perhaps he may have more fun playing with Grandma Lynda. As creepy as it was, I did think it was a rather thoughtful suggestion.

One of the more regular topics of conversation is the baby that’s in HIS belly. He’ll randomly say things like, “You have to be careful with my belly. There’s a baby in there.” Or “My belly is getting big. It’s because of the baby that’s growing in there.” And today, sometime after the sweet conversation from earlier, he announced that Gochar and a few of his other (imaginary) friends were going to be there with him to help get HIS baby out.

It’s all very sweet and probably quite fascinating to developmental theorists, but there is something that has been bothering me a lot lately about these conversations. As much as I know he’s referring to the baby in his belly, he has, over the past few weeks to months, started to refer to it as his COCK. “Gochar is going to help get the cock out of my belly” and “I have a cock in MY belly, mommy” just doesn’t have the same sweet ring to it that “baby” does.

At first I just chalked it up to his 2-year-old garbled speech but its consistency has left me a little worried. WHO has taught him the word COCK and in what context!?!? After reading a few of Jodi Picoult’s novels, it doesn’t take much to make me a little paranoid about sexual abuse. So tonight, while Rob and I listened as he excitedly explained for the upteenth time how Gochar was going to help him get the "cock" out of his belly we stopped him to CLARIFY what exactly he meant.

Toby was, of course, eager to get on with his story and glossed over the question, quickly repeating, “COCK” and going on with his tale. We stopped him again and clarified - -maybe he meant clock? NO, not clock it was a COCK (duh). We suggested a few other similar sounding words without success. Finally, in his annoyance at our constant interruptions he threw his hands up in the air and said, “MOMMY, you know COCK. As in COCKODILE!”

After taking a few deep sighs of relief we set to work on pronouncing the letter “r”.

The Quiet One

As the process of bringing another child into the world speeds by, I thought it only fair to spend at least ONE post mentioning this little being who is quickly taking over my heart…but not, as of yet, a huge amount of my time; Toby does enough of that for the both of them.

One of my favourite times of day (OK who am I kidding- - my FAVOURITE time of day) is bedtime for many reasons. A) I get to lie down B) I get to read C) I have no naivety about the upcoming road ahead and am hoping to please the baby sleep gods by being FULLY appreciative of every full nights sleep I am thankfully enjoying now…but most importantly, it’s the 5 minutes I spend with my hands on my belly just enjoying the little kicks and movements of the baby. Rob has started to enjoy these 5 minutes with me and commented the other night “Isn’t it funny that the baby ALWAYS seems to move at THIS time and never at any other time of day???”

I contemplated this for a second before I pointed out that the baby probably DOES move a lot at other times of the day but, unlike the first pregnancy, I just don’t have the luxury of time to recognize it and stop what I’m doing to acknowledge it.

How disappointing it is when we personify the fetus in utero based on their kicks and movements and then realize how lacking in marbles they really are when they come out a wailing, irrational hot mess. I remember Toby always kicked to Kanye when he was still in the womb and I pictured him as this cool little hip-hop kid. Needless to say, he didn’t come out that way and is only now acquiring a taste for MY kind of music ;)

Nonetheless, I can’t help but do it again with this next one and am already picturing him/her as a quiet little thing who waits patiently for my 5 minutes of attention at the end of the day and then sweetly and softly kicks away to let me know they're alive and well and excited to meet us.

I SUSPECT that, just like the last time, I’m in for a rude awakening…but until then, these 5 minutes are ones that I look forward to all day and I’m treasuring the opportunity to watch my belly and heart grow all over again.

Doctor Toby

What purpose does a hammer, 2 pieces of jigsaw puzzle, 3 clothes hangers, a toy stethoscope and a bag of bagels serve?

You mean it’s not OBVIOUS??? (It wasn’t to me either…)

They just so happen to be the random array of “things” Toby gathered together before announcing that he was “Dr Toby” and then coaxing me to the floor for a medical exam. I was in the middle of paying bills and normally don’t submit to his bossy demands, but was SO INTRIGUED that I promptly abandoned my paperwork and obediently lay down.

I have to say, my child gives a rather random by somewhat thorough physical exam. As it turns out, the little hammer was unfortunately (yet correctly) used to assess my reflexes. Apparently his “doctor books” didn’t give much suggestion in the way of techniques and he went at my knees like someone would attack a 21-inch nail. The bag of bagels turned out to be ultrasound gel, which was imaginarily squirted onto my abdomen. After pausing to think a little and ask me if it was cold (which of course it was) he then applied some more onto my chest and around my neck and then my forehead. It sounds like quite a potentially messy situation, but thankfully it turns out that the little pieces of jigsaw puzzle were for scraping the gel OFF of my forehead. (Technically, I still have imaginary ultrasound gel on all of the rest of me…)

I’m still a bit baffled by the coat hangers. They were strategically placed on my knee and my abdomen and I was instructed not to remove them or jiggle my legs in case they fell off. He then listened to the baby and my heart with his plastic stethoscope BEFORE gently removing the coat hangers.

All in all, I got a clean bill of health. Which is a good thing, because I’d HATE to see what sort of medicinal concoction he’d find in the fridge…