Eugenious

Some of Mommy’s Favorite Sylvan Pronunciations:

guy-ba-duck = garbage truck

yaw-noah = lawn mower

Beet Yife = Sweet Life, the best bakery in town

oak dokie = okie dokie

Like any toddler worth his diapers, Sylvan is fond of running around without his clothes. I shouldn’t expect any less from the grandson of my Mom, who sometimes vacuums in her underwear (who doesn’t, though?). He’s going to love summer in Eugene. In the middle of a diaper change, Sylvan will sometimes ask for some bare-bottom play time by saying, “Nakeh boy!” [sic]

Sylvan is in the middle of a language explosion. Long-time readers will remember our post about Sylvan’s 91 words. That was almost three months ago. Since then, he has picked up about 2-3 new words per day, probably more. There is no way that we could count all of his words now, but he must have three or four hundred. Almost every day, he says a word that I know I didn’t teach him.

He is now putting together two- and three-word phrases — Mommy shoes, Mommy chair, shoes on, on on on on on! — and saying four-syllable words — motorcycle, peanut butter, smoke detector. OK, those aren’t all words, but you get the idea.

He and I just got back from a quick walk to the store with Wendy. It’s about four blocks to the store. Our trip was about twenty minutes long. I didn’t have a voice recorder and didn’t think to take notes, but these were just some of the words he used to describe his surroundings during the trip:

around, ball, berry, bike, bin, bird, boots, brown shoes, car, cat, Chloe, computer, cow milk, dog, down, fan, flower, food, grass, hand, handle, home, oatmeal, socks, store, sun, touch, trailer, truck, up, water, Wendy, yogurt

And that’s just one twenty-minute trip.

It gets more amazing every day. And everyone tells me that it doesn’t stop. I don’t know if my brain’s amazement center can take it.

Dear Sylvan-

You’ve learned how to push my buttons. I’m assuming it just means you’re precocious that you learned how to do that three years before I think you should be able to and eleven years before you’ll be remarkably skilled at it. And, although you made me want to shoot myself, as I so eloquently stated in my frustrated huff at the library, I also needed to put my face up against yours afterward, to feel your soft cheek.

It started even before storytime, when you escaped from the room three times, each time turning around to see if I was watching. “No, I will not sit and read. Yes, I will point out the music to you, Mom (Vivaldi, it turns out; good taste), by saying ‘meegan,’ and I will even dance, but I won’t focus for more than 11 seconds. Yes, you can try to ply me with Cheerios, but it won’t work, at least not for long. I’m taking off!”

While the group singing fascinated you and held your attention for seven entire minutes, your communication then degenerated into yelling, “MELK! MELK!” while climbing on me. When I reminded you that there is no more milk and asked if you wanted yogurt, you screamed “YOGIT! YOGIT!” every three seconds until we reached the front of the line, which only took an endless three minutes and 46 seconds. Then you clammed up, not telling the nice barista what you so desperately needed so that you wouldn’t faint dead away from starvation. After the yogurt, two orders of fish and chips, a side of beef, four pears, and a whole angel food strawberry torte later, you walked up to the four-year-old boys eating their turkey sandwiches: “Excuse me,” you said, “but my Mum doesn’t feed me. Could I please have a bite?” Oh, and then there was the refusal to get in your backpack. Ah, and jumping in your carseat, refusing to sit down but crouching down charmingly: “Look, my bottom almost touches the seat.” We feed off each other, you and me. My imposed limits beget your iron will begets my frustration, which leads to, you got it, more stubbornness. I am 32 years older than you; I should know better than to get frustrated.

Then you fell asleep in the carseat. And you were beautiful.

The only milk you now drink is cow milk. Your almost endlessly energetic Dad looked tired when I returned from four days in Arizona last month, a trip I took largely to wean you. You didn’t ask for milk when I was gone, but you did turn into a “terrible two,” insistent and loud and hilarious. You made me laugh so hard the other day that I fell over on the ground. You were just giggling in the closet, SOOOOOO excited that you could wend your way through my shiny (“yiney”) costume skirts and cowboy shirts.

You seem to be somewhat unique among one-year-olds in your eating habits and abilities. At school, Birth to Three, and when other parents see you eat, the response is, “He’s such a good eater,” which means, “Whoa, he sure can put it away.” You regularly finish your peas, bananas, crackers, Cheerios, or cheese and look up at the purveyor of snacks expectantly. “Please, Sir,” you plead in your little British accent, “can I have some more?” Often, when I peek in on you at Birth to Three, the other tots are done with their snacks and are off rolling balls or pushing toy vacuums while you sit at the table, looking up and requesting, “Cracker.” You’re a bit of a bottomless pit, undoubtedly because you burn off 23,412 calories with your daily running, bouncing, dancing, running, spinning, bouncing, and running activities.

Keep running, but work on running in a straight line. We’re going to enter you in the All-Comers meets this July. Ah, Oregon, where you only have to be one and a half to enter your first running race.

Love-
Mom

Please click on photos for full effect (especially with the first one).

Chris completed his thesis last month, so Sylvan celebrated having Daddy back! I think he’s rather dapper wearing nothing but a rolled-up ladies’ vest.

Memory

On Saturday, the three of us (yippee, Chris is back!) ordered burritos, played in the park, went to a birthday party, and donated some items to a non-profit thrift store that assists homeless cats. They adopt out spayed and neutered cats with all of their shots from the store. The cats lounge on top of bookcases and hide under racks of jeans. On Saturday, over forty cats prowled the store, no small feat for any place, especially one this small. Contrary to what you might expect, the store does not smell like a litter box; they’ve rigged some good ventilation. Anyway, Sylvan’s been there once before, probably two months ago. As you might expect, he loves the place – lots of cats, most of whom are just dying to be touched, unlike our shy, prima donna cat. I drove up to the store on Saturday, parking directly in front of it. Sylvan looked out the window and immediately said, “Tdat,” which means “cat.” That’s right, Mr. Memory, this is where the cats live. So much for thinking toddlers don’t remember anything.

Yesterday, to celebrate his 18 month and 22 day birthday, Sylvan was diagnosed with the dreaded PINKEYE along with ear infections in both ears. “Moderate to severe,” said Dr. Diehl, whom we met for the first time but who lives exactly one block from us. When the doctor slid the end of the otoscope into Sylvan’s ear, Sylvan said, “buhd,” which, translated, means “bird.” Just as Sylvan spoke, Dr. Diehl starting to whistle, which is just what Sylvan’s regular doc does when she’s introducing the otoscope: “Listen for the birdies.” Sylvan remembered, and he was ready.

This is our friend Connor and his date, Yael. I think Connor and Sylvan resemble each other, especially from the noses up, so, of course, I think Connor’s adorable. We see Connor once a week if we’re lucky, usually along with a load of other toddlers and adults at Birth to Three. I’ve always considered Sylvan to be relatively internally focused at big gatherings, moving from toy to toy while ignoring the people. However, I showed Sylvan this photo, and he said, “Connor.” Yup, that’s your friend Connor, Mr. Smarty.

Language

Sylvan loves vehicles and heavy machinery. Trucks, backhoes, helicopters, and airplanes are a few of his favorite things. A recent addition to that list is “moga-dycles,” which makes me smile. I think that’s his first four syllable word.
My mum was here when Chris traveled to Savanna two weeks ago. She became “Gamba.” After she bathed Sylvan one evening, he really wanted to wear his frog towel from my cousins Jeff and Kath. “Wrap, wrap, bug” he insisted (Oh, come on, he’s close. It could be a bug). This has become an after-bath ritual now. Chris wrapped him up the other night and said, “You’re a frog.” Sylvan looked at him and replied, “Wibbit.”

My “first” grandmother, Sarah, who lived downstairs when we lived in Memphis before I was two, will really appreciate Sylvan’s latest pronunciation. He has used the word “down” for a while, pronouncing it with Chris’s and my broadcast news non-accent. But, in the past few days, he’s started saying “daa-uhn,” two syllables and all. I’m encouraging it.

My neighbor, a hip, urban Mom of two young boys, recently pointed me to dooce.com, a weblog by Heather Armstrong, another hip Mom who is not afraid to tell the world about the tribulations as well as the joys of parenting a three-year-old. Every month, Armstrong writes to her daughter, Leta, about what it’s been like to live with her. It seems like a great gift to her daughter, and I’m going to try to follow suit. Be aware that, if you decide to visit, dooce.com is frequently a little risqué and always completely candid.

The MPAA rates the following letter R for mild nudity.

Dear Sylvan-

Early this morning, you awoke at four a.m., calling for me. Your thesis-exhausted Dad asked if I’d like him to go in and try to calm you with a sip of water and Jamberry. That meant I could stay in bed. I love you, but I’m not dumb, so of course I said yes. But you didn’t calm, not at all, as he read to you and asked you to lie down. “Mom” {sob} “mee,” “Mom” {sob} “mee.” I felt like you were pulling my heart through my belly button. I gave you three minutes more of sobbing after your Dad came back to bed, then went in to see you, standing in your crib with tears rolling off your chin.

Now, we’ve had two days of seventy-degree weather in Eugene, so our conveniently uninsulated roof has made our bedrooms quite warm. I had just taken off my shirt in bed, and I walked into your room in my underwear. You stopped crying, looked at me, with your milk supply in plain view, and said, “duht,” which, as I’ve come to understand your vocabulary, means “shirt.” I took you out of the crib and stood you on the floor, where you pointed to the door and said, “Out. Duht.” Not until we walked into my bedroom and I put on my shirt did you want milk. Thank you for protecting my integrity.

This is probably your last few days of breastfeeding, although you don’t know that yet. I need to have surgery within the next month and a half, and I’ll be on some anticoagulant drugs afterward that we don’t want in your little body. Since I’ll be away for four days next weekend, you, with your Dad’s help, will be going cold turkey. It seems unfair that, just as breastfeeding has become something I really enjoy, we have to stop. You were a bit of a parasite as a baby, wanting milk every 1.5-2 hours; it was, um, tiresome. Now that you don’t need my milk for nutrition, you just ask for it for comfort. You’ll just have to learn to cuddle.

Two months ago, you started going to childcare two mornings a week, where you play with all manner of cool toys and run around for four hours. You couldn’t be bothered with something as banal as sleeping when so much cool stuff is going on, so you’ve largely transitioned to one nap a day. Sometimes those naps are three or four hours long! Hallelujah, hallelujah.

The one thing about you, Sylvan, that consistently amazes us is your mastery of language. A number of friends and acquaintances have noticed your vocabulary and your ability to string words together. As your Dad pointed out, though, you actually clam up in front of other folks, so they don’t know the half of it. They don’t know that when you were climbing over logs as we walked through the snow, you found one that was cantilevered perfectly, so you rode it like a horse and said “bounce.” Your Dad said you know that word because Sarah, Percy, and Bill, the owl babies, bounce up and down on their branch in your board book. HOW did you make that conceptual leap? Or this one: You’ve pointed out a paper clip, a five-inch long toothed hair clip, and nail clippers, saying “clip” to each one. I’m sure all parents are astonished by their brilliant children at one point or another, so you, Sir, are just keeping up your end of the bargain.

Everyone tells me that parenting keeps getting easier — well, at least until you’re eleven — and better. I am really enjoying you now, though, and I hope our relationship isn’t peaking. But if the past fourteen months are any indication, you will continue to be more fun and interesting every day. The four months before that, well, let’s just say that you were lucky we have a covered porch when I left you on the doorstep.

Love-
Mommy

Last spring, Chandra gave Sylvan a gorgeous, knitted blanket that she apologized was “late” (here’s a woman who doesn’t know that we have amazingly unique and beautiful quilt squares from our wedding guests that still haven’t been made into a quilt; yes, our sixth anniversary is this year). Sylvan has used the blanket well, cuddling with it in the car and in the baby jogger; he was too little before she gave it to him to even appreciate it. Today, I saw harbingers of a toddler’s obsession with blankies, a la Linus, as Sylvan pulled the blanket around the house, saying, yes, “blankie.” When I showed him he could wear it as a cape, he wrapped up in it, reminding me of Klimt’s The Kiss, all colorful and swaddled.

Later, Tephra didn’t want to miss out on the blankie action.

Sylvan is experiencing a renaissance, I think, a rebirth from babyhood and its drive toward greater mobility to toddlerhood with a goal of greater understanding and communication (not that mobility is taking a backseat; see “My son is a monkey.”). I suppose Sylvan’s great leap in communication started in December, when he started to mimic words, but he’s really blossomed in the past couple of weeks.

Sylvan started singing. It started with “rum sum sum,” a song with hand motions that keeps him from going nutso in the carseat; then, in the car last night, he started patting his knees and singing “dum dit dum dit,” which is similar to the rhythmic refrain in his book Hand Hand Fingers Thumb. He also sang with his friend Leo’s piano today, doing his bobbing dance and singing “dum dit dum dit.”

His vocabulary continues to develop at the rate of 2-3 new words a day. This morning we found out that he knows “shaving,” then he said “penguin” this afternoon, and he’s gaining prepositions, like “on” and “under,” with their related concepts.

Sylvan’s personality is becoming more apparent, especially when we spend time with his peers. Sylvan is happy! He plays contentedly on his own and will talk to himself in his crib about what he sees before falling asleep. At our Birth to Three meetings, he plays in the playroom next door to the adult room for two hours, coming in occasionally to flash a big, dimpled smile and ask for a snack. Ah, I love my little independent.

Sylvan is also sweet. His passive nature means that he doesn’t really mind when his toys get taken or when another toddler pokes his nose. He moves on, which is a trait I admire. We might have to do some assertiveness training later, but it’s a nice quality in a toddler – and it would be a nice quality in me.