Wednesday, March 21, 2012

16 months





It's weird: I remember a fat, crawling baby with socks in her mouth and I looked up and suddenly I had a fat, running baby who calls strawberries "sawdilalalal" or something to that effect with way to many ending syllables. She's busy unloading a pack of diapers right now while her sisters are watching Strawberry Shortcake. I just found her lying down next to one that she had spread out. I walked in to give the older two some more oatmeal and there she was, immobile lying next to a diaper. Hmmm, I thought, this situation seems to mean something. But I can't quite put my finger on what she's trying to tell me....

I think it's time to potty train. If you can spread your own diaper out and wait to have someone clean up your filth, I think you can let someone know you want to sit on the toilet.

She is talking a blue streak these days, with her favorite word being "dough-dee" for, you guessed it, what every sixteen-month-old should have every Sunday night- a honey-dipped donut from Tim Horton's. Their dad has taken them there so often, they have taken to calling it Tim's as though they were visiting a very close friend. Molly sat in the back seat, settled in with her sprinkle donut, took a big sip of her water and sighed, "Boy, Tim sure does make good water."

Susannah is loving the unseasonably warm weather we're having. She stands at the door shouting "'Side! 'Side! Shoes! Shoes!" until I let her pick out a pair, after she tosses the black ones, the blue ones, the pink ones, the brown ones, and settles on the white ones with pink flowers. As I hold out each pair, she shakes her head until I finally hit on the one she wants and she lets out a chortle of delight as though I have found just the spot on her back where the itch was. Once we are outside, she walks determinedly to the road until I yell "STOP!." Then she looks back, wanders in a foot, eying me all the while as she periodically starts to head toward the road, then wander back another foot, waiting for me to clap for her obedience. She trudges over to the neighbor's berm and climbs it, heedless of the fragile heads of the crocuses and runs down the side, arms akimbo, stumbling, laughing.

She still loves to eat and wanders by between meals and looks for someone to fill her mouth with something, anything, a "cacker" or some "sheese" or, best of all a cherry "poppie." People make the mistake of dishing out a small portion of oatmeal for her, double for her sisters, and soon learn, as she devours it in three bites, that she'll eat hers, ask for refills and then eat her sisters' leftovers.

She is very sweet to her sisters. Hugging them and caressing their cheeks when they cry. As soon as they cry, they go looking for Hukie, which has evolved from Sukie, and sometimes morphs into Huke, or Hukester. With other kids, she's not so sweet. Her "cousin" Jackson, who is six months older, clutches his water bottle, crying out "No touchie! My water! My water, Zanna!" as she leans forward and slaps the table repeatedly in his direction just to antagonize, to make him think she's about to make a lunge for him. He is frustrated repeatedly by her tendency, when she sits herself down with her plate of food, to grab fistfuls of her noodles as soon as he turns his head. He looks back in indignation while she placidly chews, looking him in the eye.

She's wandering from room to room right now, yelling Mama, and saying "Mama, kitty! Kitty!." I'm going to take her hand and go look, before I look up and her sixteen-month-old self is gone.

3 comments:

Janice said...

How can she possibly be getting so big? Could you make her stop? Babies should not grow so fast.

And I'm so glad I'm not the only mother to utilize clapping to trigger obedience.

susanswenton said...

you captured the little doll. I love you, Sister.

Molly said...

So fun to read this. She is one to reckon with. Will she be the biggest character of them all? I am eager to see how they grow. I have resorted to a great deal of clapping, finger-snapping, and eyebrow-furrowing with my 4-day laryngitis. It's surprisingly effective.