Sophia

Sophia has started giving me her bears before she gets out of the car in the morning. She used to demand to take one with her, and often the battle was over which one (I always wanted her to take the most battered, beat up ones which had Sophia scrawled on the tag and she invariably wanted the newest, shiniest, cleanest of her animals which I hadn’t written her name on). We lost Ping the Duck in one such argument many months ago, as she won out and took him inside and he was never seen again. Yesterday she said, in a most businesslike matter, before she’d even let me take her out of the car seat, “Here, here, here. Take Trucker. Here.” So I took Trucker and put him in the front seat, and she went to daycare emptyhanded.

So on Wednesday I scheduled our haircuts together. Sophia has cried her way through all 4 of the haircuts she’s had thus far in life, and I figured if she could see me having it done also (I usually get mine done separately from her, though at the same place) then she would see that it was just normal stuff and be more acquiescent about it. She has been more enthused since she realized that suckers accompany H.C.’s but she still sobbed her way through the last hair cut about 8 weeks ago so I was trying to make things easier this time around. Well no sooner had I sat my behind in the chair and Lynn (our fantabulously awesome hair chick) started fastening the apron thing around my neck when Sophia came running over saying “Miiiiiiiiiine” and trying to push me out of the chair. “Sophia’s chair!” she exclaimed, and then, highly annoyed, “Get away! Get away! Get away!” So I had to let her go first. And she didn’t cry a single tear. She hardly even frowned. She told Lynn all about how she had been swimming with Deirdra and asked for her sucker. It was like getting a haircut had never bothered her.

This morning, as we stopped by the trees next to the daycare parking lot to look at them (we do this every morning, no matter how late I’m running, except in cases of inclement weather), she pointed across the playground. “Squirrel! Squirrel!” she said excitedly. I looked over and sure enough, a squirrel was darting around the ground. Moreover, a gorgeous bird of prey (a hawk, perhaps?) was harrying it, possibly deciding on squirrel meat for breakfast. Ooooooh, look at the bird! Isn’t it beautiful? I asked. Boooful, she agreed solemnly. As we walked inside some moments later I realized that she had used the word squirrel and correctly identified the animal, and I hadn’t even noticed that it was a word I hadn’t heard her use before.

These are the ways in which my child grows up, almost unnoticed, before my very eyes.

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I am retelling one of those moments that touch you, and are so quickly gone that they are usually forgotten.

I told Sophia that after she came home from daycare, we would be going to get an H.C. with Ms. Lynn and that Ms. Lynn was going to make us both so pretty. I was hoping that if I prepared her in advance that she wouldn’t have a screaming tantrum, as she’s had on every other occasion. She looked at me and very, very softly, so that I almost couldn’t hear her, asked, “Sucker?” Hooray! The bribe has worked. Yes! Yes, when we go to Ms. Lynn’s we get a sucker! And there’s animals in her studio. Sophia smiled.

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I had dreams two nights in a row, but as I awoke and grasped for the fading images it was like they were so many cobwebs, disintegrating under the onslaught of my attention, leaving nothing but a sticky residue of confidence that I had dreamed many things but nothing now was left of them.

On Monday night, for the first time, Sophia said to me, “I don’t know.” We were sitting at the table and she was eating some pieces of pizza. She was looking down at her Peter Rabbit plate and so I asked her what was on her plate. I’ve asked her many times before so I know that she knows what it is, but the picture was covered by her food. I didn’t even realize she could express that she didn’t know the answer to a question. Usually if you ask her something she doesn’t know, she just pretends you didn’t say anything. However, on Monday she looked down, furrowed her brow and very clearly said, “I don’t know.” So I moved the pizza around on her plate until she could see the picture, and she correctly identified it as “bun-hop”. Her language development continues to delight me and take me by surprise.

She’s radically improving her use of pronouns. She now understands that “I” is a way for her to refer to herself. “I want to go outside,” she might say, or “I eating,” or “I go sleep.” The phase where she referred to herself as “Sophia” was quite brief. Now she uses Sophia to designate the possessive, “That’s Sophia shoes!” Sometimes she adds the possessive s at the end of her name, but often she leaves it off. Last week she came home from school saying “My name is Sophia.” so apparently through repetition they’ve taught her that her name can be the object of a sentence. Besides exemplary use of first person pronouns, she also uses the second person. “You eat it!” she’ll say, shoving her plate toward you when she’s had enough of her food. I haven’t yet heard her use third person pronouns, but I’m sure it won’t be long now, as she hears them quite a lot. She has also taken to, when given a choice, rejecting one item in the choice instead of choosing one. If I say “Sophia do you want to wear shoes or sandals to daycare today?” She might answer “No sandals!” instead of “Shoes.” Of course, often it’s “No sandals! No shoes!” but that’s just part of life with a two-year old. Sometimes, in fact, it’s hard to catch when she’s repeating what you’ve offered her and accepting it as opposed to when she’s rejecting something. You might ask, “Sophia would you like a banana?” And she will just as likely say “Baglagla!” as “No baglagla!” and the difference in sound between the two is not as great as it might be. She certainly is training us to to listen closely.

So, I have a confession to make. I’m a bad, bad mommy. This morning after Sophia had eaten her waffle, I was standing in the kitchen and she was sitting at her easel/table when she said,”Syrut”. What’s that? I asked her. She repeated herself. Hmmmm, ok, wait, I know this one. I know this one! Syrup? I asked her. “No syrup!” What, then? Again, the inscrutable “Syrut”. Shirt? Are you asking about a shirt? “No Shirt!” She’s starting to look exasperated. However, she’s determined. “Dsyrut” she says, very carefully and slowly. Dessert? I ask incredulously. She smiles winsomely, cocks her head coquettishly and agrees, “Desyrut”. She wants dessert. I was so thrilled that we’d made the connection, that I’d understood, that I rushed over to the refrigerator to see what I could find that might qualify as “dessert”. It did not occur to me that this child did not need, and probably should not have, dessert. My only thought was, hmmm, will she buy that yoghurt is a dessert? She really likes it, after all. No, that won’t do. What about ice cream? I can’t give her ice cream. That’d be ridiculous. Oh wait, here’s some mango sherbet. Well, it’s not like giving her ice cream, now, is it? After all, it has fruit, doesn’t it? So I filled a bowl with mango sherbet, and Sophia had dessert for second breakfast.

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A few minutes ago, Sophia and I were sitting at the table. I was reciting and she was cackling. At each pause she would say “more, more” until I repeated the lines that made her squeal and laugh delightedly. I get a lot of pleasure out of the idea that she’s enjoying words so much they are making her laugh uncontrollably, regardless of their meaning.

“Do you know who’s asleep out in Foona Lagoona?”

Peals of laughter.

“Two very nice Foona Lagoona Baboona.”

Screams and giggles.

With bright eyes she says “More.” Then again, “More?” When I hesitate, she adds, “Please?”

With such a compelling argument before me, I can do nothing but comply with her request. Thanks, Dr. Seuss. You make my daughter’s eyes sparkle, her nose wrinkle and her laughter well known to me. In these moments, I can count every one of her teeth. We are all safe, and we are happy. It’s alright with me if every happy family is like us, and if because of these secret treasured moments we’re not worth a gigantic novel by Tolstoy. In fact, I wish for all families to have what we do. It’s well worth being discarded with disinterest, considered one of the many cookie cutter homes, measured as too burgeouis for time and words in exchange for the secret magic of nonsense odes attended by a symphony of laughter around the table.

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We’ve has quite a busy weekend so far. On Friday evening we went to Deirdra’s apartment complex, to let Sophia have her first experience in a swimming pool. Tentative and considered as she is in all things, we fully expected her to refuse to get in the water, or to just watch us intently, trying to figure out what it was we were doing and whether she wished to participate. She started out this way, saying “No fank you,” quite emphatically when we asked her if she wanted to get into the water. We left her alone and chatted with Deirdra and swum around for a bit and in a few moments she had come to the water’s edge and started to peer in curiously. I asked her again if she wanted to get in and she still said she didn’t. But she did, I could tell. Slowly, gradually, we lowered her onto the first step. She stayed there for a while, unsure, but in less than five minutes Kurt and I were pulling her all around the pool. She was floating along, kicking her legs as though she knew how to swim and grinning. Soon she was commanding us imperiously. “This way! To the steps. No, this way!” as we ferried her back and forth across the pool. Sometimes she’d be hugging us tight as we walked around in the water, sometimes she’d float behind or before us, skimming the surface as we held her lightly by the arms and pulled her around. So much did she enjoy herself that she threw a small tantrum as we started to leave, though we assured her this would not be the last time she’d get to go swimming. This morning, when she woke up and started talking to me she asked me “We swimming today?” I told her that no, we would not be swimming today, but we would be going to church instead. She frowned and shook her head. Apparently, going to church is not an acceptable substitute for going swimming.

After swimming, we took her to our daycare’s fun Friday. We’d been dropping her off on several other occasions to this event, so that we could go out and catch a movie or a nice, quiet meal together. They have them about every two weeks or so, and Sophia’s been 3 times so far, although each time we’ve picked her up around 11 at night and brought her home. The thing is technically a sleepover, though you don’t have to leave your child all night unless you want to. Well, we left her all night, and she had a complete blast. So, in one day she had her first swimming pool experience and her first night’s sleep away from her parents. Quite a day, don’t you think? Her favorite teacher, Ms. Vicky, was the one staying over (it varies) and she said Sophia slept next to her, though she did not go to sleep until about 1:30. So add staying up past midnight as another first for her.

On Saturday, after her nap, we went over to Matthew’s house so that she could play in his paddle pool. Well, Matthew was a little too rambunctious and splashy for her, so she wouldn’t get in, but she did have a great time swinging on his swing and playing with his toys. When Matthew’s mother had returned, we all picked up some food and then went to a nearby park. At first all Sophia wanted to do was swing. Kurt pushed her for a zillion years, then I pushed her for another couple of million. Then we went back to the table where our food was. Sophia accompanied us, but soon wandered off. Kurt got up to follow her but I told him to stay back and let her go alone. She went out there and ran around for a bit, then started climbing the play equipment and sliding down the slide. The slide she was sliding on was taller and steeper than the one she had refused to go down previously with my coaxing and encouragement. Sidelong we watched her, hidden so she could not see that we were discovering how much more adventurous she was without us.

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On Saturday afternoon we took Sophia to the movie theater for the first time. We told her ahead of time that we were going that day, and she kept asking about the movie and going to the TV. We told her that we were going to the movie theatre to watch a movie and that there would be other people and a big, big screen. When we got to the theatre, about ten minutes before the movie, Finding Nemo, the showing we had intended to see was sold out, so we had to go to the next showing, which was about 40 minutes away. Sophia walked around the concession stand to the theatre, looking at all the videogames and saying stuff about how big the screens were. Kurt told her to just wait, that the movie would be on a much bigger screen than the ones currently around her. I was a bit aghast at how many of the video game were gun shooting games, and how there was really no place to take Sophia where she wouldn’t see an endless loop of shooting, explosions and blood. She was watching an Area 51 space invasion type game intro and she kept saying something, and I couldn’t figure out what it was, and finally I realized that she was saying “Hot”. I guess the bright orange explosions and flames translated to “hot” for her.

So, at any rate, we finally got inside the theatre and sat way at the back. Sophia did not show any interest in sitting in her own seat, even though we bought a ticket for her, and instead sat in Kurt’s lap while the lights were up and the commercials urging you to buy popcorn showed. The theatre was pretty packed, and there were lots of children and babies present. Before I go further, I do want to say that this was the least obnoxious movie crowd I’ve experienced in the last four or five movie excursions. I don’t know why this should be, but there you have it. People of all ages were quiet, respectful and cordial. It was a pleasure. As soon as the theatre darkened for the movie, Sophia asked to sit in my lap, and she sat there, huddled against me for all the previews and the entire movie. She was a little awed by the whole experience : the noise, the darkness, the people. During the previews, she actually panicked and started to cry out and I had to hug her tightly and assure her that everything was going to be alright. After that, she calmed right down. In another episode of the unexplainable fears of children, the preview that really set her off, which you can see here, was for The Incredibles. We have no idea why, but when his belt popped off and hit the light, she started to scream and squirm to get out of my arms. Strange, isn’t it? Everyone has asked me if she was afraid of the shark, Bruce, but she gave no indications whatever of being scared of him. Superhero too fat to get into his belt, on the other hand, is utterly terrifying.

Kurt jokes that she only saw half the movie, because she was sort of facing sideways, with her cheek pressed against me, and watching the movie out of one eye. Clearly, the stimuli was a bit overwhelming. However, about an hour or so into it she turned her body to face the movie. She never acted like she wanted us to leave, either, so we stayed. The only part of the movie itself that scared her was when Darla was screaming and shaking Nemo, and the dentist was running around the room shouting, and there was complete mayhem and too much volume. I think she did admirably well, all things considered. After the movie was over, as we walked to the parking lot, we asked her what she thought. She didn’t say anything at first, still soaking in the experience, then burst into non-stop words: “Fish, wa-wa, orange fish! Blue fish! Turtle. Wa-wa. Bird. Fish.”

All in all, she provided a fairly good review of the movie. I think she enjoyed it, though it was somewhat an intimidating venture. She’s been talking some about Nemo since the movie, so she remembers it. She also learned the word shark. One of her bath toys, which had previously just been “fish” is now “shark” because of his many, many teeth.

Also this weekend was Father’s Day. The following dialogue occured yesterday, while we enjoyed lunch :
“Happy Father’s Day, Daddy.” Sophia.
“Thank you, Sophia.” Daddy.
“You’re welcome, daddy.” Sophia.
“You’re welcome, daddy.” Sophia.
“You’re welcome, daddy.” Sophia.
“You’re welcome, daddy.” Sophia.
You see, she doesn’t understand that you’re welcome is the end of the exchange, so she repeats it until something else is said, believing (I suppose) that she has not been heard. At this point, I intervene.
“How nice of you to say you’re welcome, Sophia.” Mama.
Sophia smiles, pleased with herself. She enjoyed this. “Happy Father’s Day, Daddy.” She begins again. Repeat this conversation as played out above about half a dozen times. What are you going to say, though, “Cut it out with the pleasantries already!”? You just have to smile and keep practicing right along with her, until she’s done. I’m thrilled that she’s saying “thank you” and “you’re welcome” at 2, even if it means having conversations over and over and over again. Another charming conversation we were practicing a couple of weeks ago was “How are you doing?” It goes like this:
“How are you doing, mama?” Sophia
“I’m doing fine, Sophia, thanks for asking. How are you doing?” Mama.
“I fine.” Sophia
This conversation can be had at any moment, by the way, not just when we first meet each other. Still, who can complain? It’s much better than when she starts with her “Stop talking, Daddy! Stop talking, Mama!” which is what she does lately when we try to have a conversation that doesn’t include her. I haven’t come up with an answer to that yet, though I have said once or twice that we will stop when we are finished and once or twice that it isn’t very nice to tell people to stop talking. Neither has had an effect, by the way.

I’d like to revisit books for a moment, because we have had some great finds in library books this past week. I checked out a Days with Frog and Toad. I wanted to see if Sophia might have the attention span for longer stories with less pictures and although I couldn’t remember the particulars of any of the stories, I do remember really liking the Frog and Toad books. They are truly delightful. A story or so at a time is about all she can do without getting squirmy, but she does enjoy them and so do I. One advantage of having poor memory, I suppose, is that I don’t remember much of what I read as a child, and I can rediscover old favorites with Sophia. Another, is the hard learned lesson that if I don’t write things down they will leave me, hence what I’m writing right now. The other fantastic find out of this set of library books was a book I just stumbled on by accident I Look Like A Girl. In addition to having what I consider to be a really positive and encouraging message for girls, it is beautifully painted and Sophia loves having it read to her. This one is getting as many reads as In The Night Kitchen and The Big Red Bus got when they were checked out. The Big Red Bus, by the way, was recommended to me by a co-worker, and it completely surprised me that Sophia liked it as much as she did. Kurt still recites what he remembers of it to her from time to time, and she always asks for more. Last but not least, we’ve arrived at the stage where Sophia can sometimes read to us, which is a joy. This weekend she recited Good Night Moon first to Kurt, and later on to me. I wish I could describe how sweet it is to hear her soft, girlish voice saying “and a picture of…” pause while she turns the page,”cow jump over da moon”. I think it’s among the most beautiful things I’ve ever heard. We are truly blessed to have Sophia.

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I haven’t had time to write about much except dreams, lately, it seems, and even so, I’ve missed some. There were several this past weekend that were remembered for a bit, then forgotten. I’ve found if I don’t write them down the day I have them or jot down some notes about them, they vanish in the wake of the next night’s sleep and I can’t bring them back no matter how many times I went over them in my head the day before.

Sophia’s birthday party was a smashing success. She really enjoyed her balloons and her pizza and her cake. It didn’t seem to matter at all that it was just the three of us. We took loads of pictures, and Kurt filmed part of the extravaganza as well. She loved all her presents, especially the ones sent to her by her Aunt Kelly. When she pulled the panda bear out of the bag we’d put it in she called it a “dog” but now she calls it “panda bear”. She was a bit scared of the dinosaur beach hoodie towel thing from the nonos at first, but now she asks to have it put on her periodically. She alternates calling it a dinosaur and a monster. She also loved her train set and her Potato Head. Everything we’d given her has enjoyed lots of use so far.

One of the things we got her for her birthday was her very own copy of How Do Dinosaurs Say Goodnight? by Jane Yolen. This is a book we had checked out of the library, and she loved it. She was very happy to see it again, and had me read it several nights in a row before going to bed. Then, she cleverly took it away from the nighttime reading stack and put it in her daytime reading stack, and had it read to her several times a day by both Kurt and myself instead of just the once at night. Right now, her obsessive nighttime reading book is a book called My Little Orsay. It was a gift from Aunt Kelly and it’s about the Orsay museum. It’s got some examples of some of the works of art there and talks about what is going on in the paintings or tells you a little bit about the creators of the pieces. It’s visually gorgeous, but neither of us is sure why she likes this book so much. Now after she brushes her teeth she runs out of the bathroom saying “Little Orsay? Little Orsay?” before I can even say “Ok, Sophia, it’s time to pick a book to read.”

Flash anecdote : The other day (almost two weeks ago, now, I think), I was almost moved to tears because I went into Sophia’s room after she’d woken from her nap and started talking to her. We were pointing out the things in her room as we often do when she first wakes up. She sat up, and I asked her if she was ready to come out of her crib yet. She looked up at me, still sleepy-eyed and with the most desolate and heartbroken expression on her face I have yet seen and said, querulously, “Time Out?” “Oh no no no no!” I exclaimed, horrified at the misunderstanding. “Come out. Get out. Of the crib. Not time out.” Poor girl had no idea what she might have done to get in trouble, but figured she was going to have endure the punishment anyways. This reminded me that she still can’t understand things if we talk too quickly and that even though she talks so much and follows so much of what we say, she still needs for us to be clear and speak distinctly to her or she might mistake what we are saying. I hugged her very close and reassured her that everything was fine.

As for time out she’s only been in it ONCE at our house. It’s a method they use at daycare, and that I find a convenient thing to warn her might be a consequence of her actions. Usually just telling her she might need a timeout can get her to settle down. At home we don’t have a regular disciplinary tactic that we use all the time, except to allow consequences to follow actions, such as “I know you’d like to go outside, but you didn’t want to put your shoes on, so you will have to stay inside. I’m sorry.” Dealing with a two year old seems to require some flexibility and different tactics all the time anyways, so sticking to one solution doesn’t seem worthwhile to me. Sometimes she just needs a snack or a nap, and at that point time out or a handslap or a spanking is kind of pointless. Not that time out doesn’t have its uses. It’s particularly good at disconnecting her from a particular environment or situation that is aggravating a problem. The only time I ever took her into time out was when she was deliberately hitting Kurt over and over. We told her that was quite enough. We told her no hitting. We told her she would have to stop or go to time out. Of course, once you make the threat you have to follow through. So, after she persisted in her hitting, I took her to the comfy futon in her room and sat her down, and told her she was in time out. Doing so seemed kind of ludicrous. What would keep her from getting up and running around? Still, she sat right where I put her. She started playing with her lion that was there, as if to see whether that would get a rise out of me, but I wanted her to play with something. Focus on something else rather than hitting, dear child. Then, she started bawling. You’d think I was beating the child instead of standing in the doorway to her room with my back to her while she sat on a soft cushion and held her toys, the way she was howling. Anyways, we decided, after about a minute and a half of tension relieving tears, that we’d like to get off the futon and go tell daddy we were sorry for hitting him. There was lots and lots of prompting from me on what she should do, and I had to repeat myself often, but we got our apology out at last and all was well with the world again.

I love Sophia. She’s an awesome kid. And she’s a good kid. If we do right by her, she always does right by us. I figure that’s about all a parent can ask for.

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Sophia had nightmares last night. We aren’t sure why, but we think the ending to The Fox and the Hound which she saw last night, might have been a little too scary for her. She talked about the bear being scary. Then, at night, she woke up several times crying intensely. Poor thing. Kurt had to rock her to sleep. It’s been months and months and months since she had to be rocked to sleep. I had no idea the movie would scare her (of course) and I’m not sure what exactly she’s scared of. I guess she’s not used to bears being scary, since to her they are always friendly and loving animals. Even the pictures out of the nature magazines with the bears tearing into fish that I have pasted in the bathroom seem to interest her rather than intimidate her. I hope this is a transitory fear. Still, it’s unlikely to be the last time she wakes in the night frightened, and I guess we need to come up with a strategy and some things to say to her when this happens. Poor girl.

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