More Bits and Bobs

Max is a major mimic – he likes to repeat things that people say ... with the same tone and inflection that they use. It's funny (and a little embarrassing), to hear him tell Molly, "No Molly, no Bob the Builder right Naaaaaaaaahhhhhooooow!" in a hassled, whiny tone (gee, wonder where he hears that?? ;). He cracked me up the other day when he and Molly were inspecting an ant that had wandered in the house and I heard him say, "Awwww, look at the little ant! He's sooOooOooo CUTE!" Then there was the other week when he was having trouble putting together one of his toys ... he started getting frustrated and saying things like, "Mama, this is not WORKING. Oh! GOSH!!!" Hmm, I guess it's a good thing that I watch what I say when the kids are driving me nuts, since I can think of a few other four-letter words that would have been quite a bit worse than "gosh."

Considering that we have one child (hopefully) finishing off his terrible "twos" and one child just entering them, we have to facilitate a lot of negotiating, compromising, and turn taking around our house. Molly is finally starting to get the concept of taking turns, and whenever she wants to do something she runs around squealing, "My turn! My turn! My turn!" Molly is also really starting to get into doing things herself (Max has been there for a long time now), whether it is walking down the stairs, taking off her clothes, or putting her cup away after dinner. But, there are still times when she doesn't want to be quite so grown up. If you ask her if she's big girl or a baby, Molly will reply, "Mahmee (Molly) a baby." And, when we're out and about and she gets tired, she'll reach up to you with her chubby little arms and say, "I hole (hold) you, I hole you" when she wants me to pick her up (we're still working on those pronouns).

Molly is really verbal and has been talking well enough to be understood and carry on conversations for months now. But, lately, I've noticed that when she gets tired, she starts talking complete gibberish -- very softly and totally incoherently. She uses her tongue to make a lot of her sleepy talk and it's very funny and very cute. I don't know what she thinks she's saying, but it definitely isn't a language that I can understand.

I took Max and Molly to the playground the other day, for our usual after-dinner walk. While M&M were swinging, Max let rip a loud fart (one of the butt-cracker variety). I looked at him and said, "What was that? I think I heard a little frog!" Max thought that was absolutely hysterical and for the rest of the day would pretend to fart and then exclaim, "A little frog come out of my bottom!!!" before laughing uproariously. He even has Molly in on the act now -- Grandpa would be proud!