Saturday, March 23, 2013

"Big, Huge, Giant..." and other words

[Fair warning: this is a purely "mom" post, not one for deep thinking.]

You know you're a mom when your day started out right because your son did a "big, huge, giant poop" (his words, but I don't disagree) in the potty. We've been potty training this week. I hesitated to use those words because that milestone seems so formidable, but I decided on Monday to see how things would go if we just always wore underwear at home. After a week of only a handful of accidents, I think it's fair to say that we're definitely potty training and now I'm not sure how I feel about my little boy shedding one of his last remnants of babyhood. I mean, I will be very glad to not be scraping large quantities of poop off of his behind and out of his diaper (I cloth diaper, so there is incentive for both of us to use the potty); but there's just something so grown-up about Elmo and Lightning McQueen underwear instead of a diap.

[By the way, this has been way easier than I imagined-- hope I don't jinx myself or whatever the Christian equivalent is by saying this. If you are interested in some of the reasons that I think this has been easy, I'm glad to chat with you, but I won't bore my general readership with the details beyond this hint: lots of naked time for the last year. Or, maybe he's just a super easy kid and E won't be potty trained until she's 11.]

So that's that. If I haven't scared you off, here's a less potty-minded list for you, mostly for me, to remember some of my favorite things that I hear around the house on a regular basis.

1. "Big, huge, giant" and "little tiny." I'm pretty sure this started with the potty, but it's spread to other things. So, for example, Callie is "Little tiny doggie" and Migo is a "big, huge, giant dog." Still, it's predominantly a potty term, starting with "big, huge, giant" ... but I couldn't let him get away with calling three drips of urine "big, huge, giant," and so "little, tiny pee" was born. Sorry to bring it up again; that's a huge chunk of our life around here.

2. "POP WHEELIE." Daddy must have taught T how to pop wheelies because this sure didn't come from me. We left off last fall with T absolutely loving his balance bike; his feet finally hit the ground well enough for him to push himself and cruise over piles of dirt and up and down gently sloped driveways. Now that spring is darting in and out, we've managed to take a few outings on T's bike again; I push E in the stroller and T will bike for as far as 1.5 miles. And at least every 50 yards, he will stop, pull up the handlebars and shout, "POP WHEELIE." As though he didn't give enough evidence that he loves being alive. It warms my heart every time.

3. "Hug." JR's aunt and uncle gave T a Hug book when E was born. It took me a little while to warm up to it because there's pretty much only one word in the whole book ("hug"), but it tells the story of a little monkey who's lost his mom and goes around watching other baby animals getting hugs from their mommas. In a sweet way, he gets more and more dejected until his mom bursts on the scene (enter words #2 and 3 in the book, "BOBO" and "MOMMY" as they rush to embrace). I love the book now because every time we read it, T is really affectionate and has to give me lots of hugs, complete with narration.

4. "Titi do." He calls himself "Titi" and insists on doing lots of things for himself.

5. "Puker." Tito is growing up in a generation that will never have experienced dial-up Internet, pay phones, 35mm film, and the age when touch-screens on computers were things of science fiction. He is baffled at how we control the laptop computer that I keep on our kitchen counter. To him, it's not a super-interesting piece of equipment compared to the "Hi-Pahd," except for one thing: it is where he occasionally watches old-school Donald Duck while eating breakfast. And so, I regularly hear him ask for (and occasionally I say "yes") "Wa' Dah' Duck on puker" ("Watch Donald Duck on the Computer"). I love it: the puker.

6. "Titi love..." This phase started in Costco a few weeks ago: the boy loudly proclaimed his undying love for everything I put in the cart. "Tito love chicken!" "Titi love milk!" "Tito love yogurt!" "Titi love spinach!" It now happens with nearly everything he sees while we're driving down the street ("Titi love airplanes!" "Titi love motorcycles!" "Titi love water!") and, well, nearly everything we do. What can I say? He's got a heart (and a belly) full of love.

7. "High falutin' root-tootin' son-of-a-gun from ol' Wyoming." When we visited Wyoming in February, we went to the Brown & Gold store for some new apparel for the kids, in honor of Gra-JIM. T made out like a bandit, with a brown & gold mini basketball and a t-shirt; he quickly learned that the emblem on both was "Cowboy Joe." I thought it would be cute to teach him the lyrics to "Ragtime Cowboy Joe" to surprise Grandpa Jim when he wore his t-shirt; I quickly decided that it's a pretty apt description of Grandpa Jim as well as Cowboy Joe. Fortunately, T thinks it's as fun to say as I think it is cute to make him say it.

I'm sure there's more, but that's all I can think of for now and probably all you have the stomach for, if you're still reading. If I remember more, I'll just add them to his book.

1 comment:

Addie said...

No, no. I love posts like this, too. Keep 'em coming!