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Experiences and apprehension from the life of a new father.
We've been reading to our daughter since before she could make many noises. It's good for the child, but leads to a lot of repitition for a parent.
Many's the night I lie awake in bed with a silly rhyme about monkeys or some such playing endlessly in my head. Fortunately, we are reaching a new milestone that may cut down on some of that repetition: Giovanna's starting to "read" some of the books by herself.
For about a year now, she has been able to sit and turn the pages of a book. Normally she doesn't say anything but just looks at the pictures. While she has long been able to point to a picture and call out "duck", "apple" or "ball" while we are reading a book to her, she has recently started using words while looking at a book by herself.
We have some great books by Sandra Boynton, one of which features counting hippos and a wild rhyme. It is fun to read because you can play with the pacing of the rhyme. In the middle of the story, the hippos are at a party and they go berserk! When I reach that page, I make the book dance about in the air to emphasize the zaniness of the party. Tonight Giovanna was flipping through that book. On every page she said "hippo" and when she go to the party, she made the book dance about in the air.
Next she picked up the big book that features a gorilla looking for a hug from his mommy. All he sees are other animals embracing in hugs while he futilely asks, "hug?". At the end his mommy spies him and calls out "Bobo" which is returned with a big "Mommy" and they hug. As she flipped the pages she kept calling "Mommy!", until the climactic hug when she cried out "Bobo!" -- but never mentioned hug the whole time.
It's interesting to see what she remembers of a story and what seems to be important about it. I know she is aware of hugs because when we say "hug, hug" as guests are leaving, she runs over and gives them a big hug. But it seems she remembers more that Bobo was looking for his mother than a hug.
Tags: imitation
Today we were looking at some beds. Giovanna will soon need to move from the crib to a larger bed.
We visited a store in Santa Monica and took turns looking at their furniture because Giovanna was sleeping in the back seat of the car. While I was watching sleeping beauty, two attack helicopters flew overhead. They were large, black, loud and fearsome. They seemed to be cruising at a very low altitude as if they were looking for something. They appeared to have missiles on each side of the landing gear. My mind went to terrorist alerts and military actions, I shuddered thinking of my daughter's future fears and glanced at her quiet sleeping features.
That's when I noticed she was wearing camouflage pants and pink boots. They looked quite stunning, actually, but I wondered if that was really a good image to project.
Tags: wardrobe
Fannie has always let Giovanna participate in everything she does around the house. This means that the little girl has had a hand in all the chores as well.
In the morning, she walks around the bed tugging on the blankets to help mommy. During the day, she might climb in the laundry basket and "fold" some clothes. She especially likes to hold the dustpan or try to use the broom. Since the broom was too big for her, I bought a floor brush with a handle and matching dustpan that she can use to rescatter whatever dirt is on the floor.
Tonight she cleared her plate, silverware and glass from the table in separate trips to the kitchen. She scraped the bones into the trash, handed the dishes to mommy for rinsing, and loaded them into the dishwasher.
She's still 2 months away from her 2nd birthday, but is already a big help around the house. Fannie's fear is that she'll get tired of the game when it comes time for her to do the job by herself.
I'm betting Fannie's right.
Tags: manners