so i fully intended to write about sailor tonight, to give her fair screen time (i think i got that term from reading descriptions of the top 24 american idol competitors. i don't watch the show, couldn't tell you a thing about it, but remember when i mentioned stupid random yahoo headlines? i spent some of my idle media time running through the profiles of every single one of the final 24. plus discussions on how much "screen time" they were given last week. TALK ABOUT A WASTE OF TIME.)
anyway, sailor. she tries to give huge open-mouthed kisses these days. she'll plant one on your jawbone and kind of slobbery bite you - i'm pretty sure this is a sign of affection. either that or she's turning into a vampire. which would be pretty incredible, seeing as how she doesn't have any teeth yet. and yes, that is fairly unusual for a 10 month old. i have strange irrational fears that she'll still be gumming her cake on her fourth birthday. and she loves to chase things around the house on all fours - cats, the dog, her brother, me... and put anything and everything in her mouth (there's the vampire take again). she's got great speed and disappearance potential - she's got the courage to leave the room now, and she'll just take off in a cloud of dust (in my house, you can pretty much take that literally) and be gone. if i don't head after her right away, i can lose track of her pretty quickly - and find her sucking on a pair of shoes or eating dirt off of the mat inside the sliding glass door. (maybe now is the time to take the focus off of my housekeeping skills.)
well, tonight i was thinking i'd do a whole sailor blog thing. which is pretty hard, because honestly at 10 months she doesn't do a whole heck of a lot except for look amazingly cute and do tons of amazingly cute things - which make for entertaining watching but not so much entertaining blogging.
but today sunny was a demon child, really like some kind of changeling, for about two hours after his nap. so i just kind of assumed that i'd write about that, and the absolute hopelessness i felt as he sat in bed and screamed and cried. he even at one point pushed sailor and shoved her over backwards (much to my anger and dismay. i dealt with that quickly and -let's face it - pretty meanly). but i kind of feel like i've been doing a lot of negative sunny blogging recently. and really, he's a pretty good kid overall. so sailor got her two bits tonight, and sunny can have his.
this is a conversation we had after the demon child turned back into my sane and lovable boy. i had overheard his teacher talking to another mom about her son using his "hitting hands." (we preschool teachers are pretty cheesy. comes from... um... teaching preschool.) so i said to sunny,"mommy's proud of you for being a good listener at school." then i paused. "are you a good listener at school?"
"yes. i say please."
"well, honey, it's great that you say please."
"yes, and i say thank you."
"sunny, that's wonderful." (i'm big on positive reinforcement.)
"i not hitting."
"good job, baby."
"i not pushing, either."
"ok, i'm glad."
here there was a long, long silence. he looked sad, and determined.
"mommy, i not push baby again any more. ever." and he leaned over to her and started making his little lovey sailor noises, as she laughed delightedly.
sweet boy.