Monday, March 17, 2014

Babies Learning Language

It is ridiculous how many curse words a baby knows these days.

Silas learned how to say "foxes," for example. The first twenty times, it sounded much more like he was dropping F bombs left and right (and up and down for good measure). He kept pointing to the fox on the shirt he was wearing each time he said it, which helped calm my frazzled nerves. I figured if anyone in public heard him, I could quickly clear up any confusion.

Then Silas learned how to say "cook." Only, it sounded like he was crudely referencing the male genitalia. He tried to mimic me stirring a pot on the stove, though, and eventually his pronunciation got better.

Shirt was another tough one. Silas was more than happy to hand me any of his t-shirts or onesies while dropping the "r" in the word. (This, too, has gotten better over time.)

I think learning to talk is a cruel prank sometimes. On the one hand, when Silas busts out a perfectly innocent swear, I want to laugh because it is cute and adorable that he has no clue what he is doing. On the other hand, toddlers thrive on making others laugh and while the swearing child on TV might be hilarious, I don't think it's as funny in real life.

Luckily, when I type about it on the internet, I can laugh as much as I want and he doesn't know. Then he only thinks I'm crazy. Which may or may not be a good trade off.

Friday, March 7, 2014

A Progression of Google Searches

I was all set to wear a cutesy dress tonight and while Silas napped, I thought to myself that I should attempt a fancy-type hairstyle. This is what happened next:

Search One: Braided Chignon

Search Two: Updos for long hair

Search Three: Updos for really long hair

Search Four: Updos for long, thin hair

Search Five: Hairstyle ideas

Search Six: How to use a bobby pin

Search Seven: Seriously, bobby pins are impossible to use

Search Eight: How to pixie hair cut at home

No, I didn't cut off all of my hair, but it was tempting. You can see my searches degrade from a specific style I was hoping to recreate to increasingly desperate attempts to find updos suited to my hair.

Once I decided on a fairly simple bun, I quickly realized that I have a bobby pin deficiency. This prompted my realization that maybe I am not meant to have long hair. Other people with long hair always seem to be able to twirl their hair up and pin it perfectly in one easy motion. I was still jamming bobby pins frantically into my quickly unraveling hair when Silas woke up from his nap.


Wednesday, March 5, 2014

Things My Baby Has Found At The Park

I need to start taking pictures to document this. I always thought that the park was fairly clean until Silas took to finding things.

The last time we were there, Silas found:

Half-eaten cheetos (they were half-eaten at the time of finding and we threw those out before they became fully eaten cheetos)
Pink and blue balloon shreds
One super moldy orange slice (Half hidden beneath a slide, I can only assume a thrifty child left it there for safekeeping)
A safety pin
A beer cap (budweiser. Yuck.)
Various candy wrappers (manufacturers, rest assured that you have designed packages so appealing that Silas can spot them even if they are 99% buried under leaves)

And my personal "favorite,"
A two-inch screw.

Everything else on my list makes sense. Those are things that people bring to parks. But a screw?

Saturday, March 1, 2014

A Trip to the Park

Though Silas is not quite old enough to use park equipment yet, he and I enjoy going to the park for a change of scenery. Plus, he likes to try to climb on everything when there's no one around.

We headed out to the park on a cool Thursday, Silas dressed up warmly in his adorable fox printed sweater onesie and me in double sweatshirts and fuzzy socks. I had forgotten that Thursday is homeschool meeting day at the park; the normally empty playground was overrun by boys and girls of all ages.

Silas was in baby heaven! Right when we got out of the car, he saw kids on the baseball field playing kickball. He pointed, "Football! Football!"

"Not quite, baby," I said, putting him down on the sidewalk. He ran up to the fence and watched in awe as one boy kicked the ball through a puddle and another ran after it, tossing the ball back towards first base.

The next twenty minutes were spent with Silas walking around the park, looking at everyone and everything. He picked up various sticks, comparing each new one against the two he was currently carrying and discarding appropriately. He found a little pink bouncy ball and tried to kick it, but kept missing due to its small size. He found no less than six scraps of garbage and insisted on picking up each one to throw out, except for the airheads wrapper. He wanted to chew on that one and was a little bit upset that I threw it out for him.

At some point, a person walked by with their dog. Silas alternated between shouting "dog" and freezing in place, too excited to actually go up to the dog, which admittedly was about three times bigger than our tiny pups. Eventually he made it to the dog and gave her a few tentative pats, complete with giant smiles.

Then he was off to watch another bout of kickball, followed by jaunts towards the puddle (while saying "no puddle, no puddle") and attempts to reach the sand ("no sand, no sand"). Can you guess what I was telling him every time he got too close to either?

Eventually, Silas ran into a little girl about his age. She was toddling around in her warm pajamas and Silas lit up when he saw a baby so close in age. He started by making a peace offering, giving her the stick that he had deemed worthy of being held almost all afternoon. She grinned and took the stick.

"Leaf!" Silas said as he handed the little girl the fistful of leaves he had picked up a few minutes ago.

She took the leaves and gave them to her mom, then turned back to Silas.

Silas starting picking up leaves from the ground, presenting each one to the little girl with an enthusiastic, "Leaf! Leaf!" The little girl happily took each leaf, handing them one at a time to her mom. Every fifth leaf or so, her mom would toss a handful of leaves back onto the ground. Our kids were clearly stuck in a leaf loop, which was broken only when the little girl's older sibling came by to say that another kid needed help with his shoes. Then they were off towards the other equipment.

After that, Silas wandered around a bit more, but he was beginning to slow down and people were starting to set up tables and whatnot and I figured we'd get out of the way for now. We headed back to the car, Silas holding on tightly to a handful of leaves. Another successful park day.