Chatty Matty
Chatty Matty is a pretty funny guy. He's learning words like
crazy; he can probably identify a hundred things or more by name (we test this
all the time by saying, "Where's the flag? Where's the attic? Where's the
basket?" You get the point). I'm constantly amused by how quickly he
learns new words, which words he thinks are hilarious, and which words he
thinks are different words.
For example, the other day I told someone that I hoped
something wouldn't collapse. Matt started clapping. I was so confused. Then I
thought, "Oh, right. Claps." Yesterday, I told him he could "go
ahead and play with the blocks" and he started hitting himself in the
head. I thought, "Huh, must not want to play with blocks." Then later
I said he could go ahead and play outside. He started hitting his head again.
Yeah, that time I figured it out.
The other thing that's so entertaining to me is how Matthew
makes connections between things. For example, he makes a noise with his tongue
when he sees a clock, like a clock-ticking noise. He tries to make a buzzing
noise when he sees flying insects, or when he's apparently thinking about them
(complete with spastic arm motions; I may have accidentally taught him that).
Today Matt was playing with a kazoo and making noise through it, so I said,
“Hey, play me a song with your kazoo.” Matthew got all excited, ran into the
living room, and started using the kazoo to play notes on the piano. That’s one
way to play a song with a kazoo, I suppose.
Some words cause Mattoddler to ROFL when he first hears
them. It usually lasts a couple days before they just become regular,
non-hilarious words, but it's so funny when he falls over laughing at them at
first. If you're feeling a little sad, just say these words out loud, and soon
you'll be rolling around laughing: pony, ponytail, tickle, mohawk, fauxhawk,
zipper, peaches, buzz, kazoo. Hee hee hee.
The one thing I'm not loving all the time is how Matthew is
so very, very talkative. But not only talkative––aggressively talkative. How
did we get such a loud guy? It doesn't make sense. I watched some videos of
Matt when he was a baby, and, sure enough, he was still making noise all the
time. When he says a word, he will keep saying a word until I confirm that I
know what he's saying. Which is fine and all, but my goodness, the talking
never stops. Must take after Jeff.
Potty fun
We've been having potty fun here this week! One of my
friends posted on Facebook that her daughter has been using the potty a lot,
and she's only a couple months older than Matt, so I thought, "Hmm,
Matthew loves toilets. Maybe he'd like to use his potty now." Success so
far! He's good at using it for solids, but I'm not sure he quite understands
peeing right now. As much as changing diapers doesn't bother me, having Matthew
use the potty is still way better.
In the past, I haven't had any views on potty training, but
I've been reading some stuff and thinking about some stuff, and we're pretty
much going to continue on with it. It's crazy how in other countries kids are
potty trained way, way earlier than in the US, like by a year or 18 months. And
that's how it used to be here, I guess, before 1950, when disposable diapers
got popular. It makes sense to potty train younger, though, before the
headstrong "terrible twos" get started. And one thing that really
made sense to me is the comparison between teaching a toddler what's expected
at mealtime or in social settings and what's expected for toilet hygiene. But
in spite of how much sense it makes for us to be potty training now, I don't
really have expectations for Matthew to be totally out of diapers by a certain
point. We'll just see how it goes.
Tough times hopefully ending
It's been a challenging two years for me, physically. Here's
the rough rundown:
·
pregnancy (felt pretty good throughout)
·
terrible, terrible postpartum joint pain (and
accompanying lack of weight loss)
·
umbilical hernia requiring surgery
·
joint pain subsiding and weight loss beginning
as apparent result of stopping breastfeeding
·
working out more, playing roller derby, feeling
good again
·
broken ankle requiring surgery
·
rapid weight loss as result of my broken-ankle
workout plan (hopping and crawling everywhere)
And now, two full years later, I'm finally starting to feel
good again. I'm almost my normal weight, and I can do some amount of exercise
without being in terrible pain (though my ankle does still ache quite a bit).
It's crazy how much I've taken for granted my formidable physical fitness and
health my whole life until I didn't have it anymore. And it's crazy that I've
had to have two surgeries this year for bad things that happened as a result of
working out. Ugh. I have high hopes that now I can just be my normal self
again, but we'll see what God's plans are.
No comments:
Post a Comment