A peanut's sense of direction

Last night Ellis and Grant came over for games and dessert. For the first time, Matthew made a good approximation of Ellis's name: Ai-yai. ... Well, if not good, at least recognizable, okay?

Today we went down to Provo to shop for rugs so we called Grant up to see if he wanted us to treat him to lunch. When we pulled in, Matthew started asking, Where Ai-yai? Smart kid, considering he's only seen Ellis there twice that I can think of, and not recently.

Later on in the evening, I took Matthew to the bookstore that we'd been to on Saturday -- the one with the train set laid out for kids to play with. As soon as I turned into the parking lot, he started clammoring, Train! Choo choo! Train! Target is in the same parking lot but I'm not sure how Rachel will go there now without having to stop at the train set too. :)

Final news for the day: Rachel suggested I take Matthew to Toys R Us while she went baby clothes shopping next door. "Never leave Matthew and Jonathan alone in a toy store" is her new resolution for the year. Matthew had a blast trying the toys out and we left with a Nerf crossbow, a mini-skateboard, and a helmet.

Note on the crossbow: I've been looking for a gun of some sort that Matthew can cock himself. There are battery-powered disc-throwers, but the discs are small and easily lost -- Nerf ammo is larger. But, all the air-powered guns have actions that are too tough for him to pull. (I tried the smallest gun a while ago. Still too tough.) But, I remembered that medieval crossbows required the user to load using his legs to force the bow back. This toy bow has its pump action in line with the stock, so I had him give it a try with his foot. It's not easy, but he can do it! (Balancing long enough to lock the action in is what makes it challenging.)

He had fun shooting his bow at the ceiling (Mommy rightly forbids any other orientation -- the nerf bolt packs enough punch to knock something off a shelf, even break a lightbulb) and when he tired of that, Daddy showed him that he could try to hit his balloon (that he got at one of the furniture stores we took Rachel to earlier). He's having a blast.

Update: we had to confiscate the balloon and crossbow to get him to sit for dinner. Even then he wouldn't eat anything until I told him he could get his balloon back by eating his beans and chicken, and his crossbow for an apple slice. He scarfed down his food then -- once I got the balloon and crossbow, he was done eating, even when offered chocolate cake for dessert.

He's getting to be a pretty good shot, too. :)

full-contact vacuuming

When Rachel vacuumed the living room today, Matthew wanted to vacuum too. Rachel told him he could have a turn after Mama. Matthew couldn't wait, though, and got his toy vacuum to "help" -- or so I thought. He really wanted to play FULL CONTACT VACUUMING. Whenever Rachel made a stroke with the vacuum, CRACK he would ram into hers from the side. CRACK. CRACK. CRACK. This is the first time he has done this. I sincerely hope he doesn't make it a habit.

Peanuts

• Matthew is figuring out pronouns. Well, one of them, at least. "I jump! I help!"
• Some things are better illicit. I made oatmeal yesterday (good oatmeal, with homemade jam), and Matthew stirred it around with a spoon and decided he wanted none of it. Then Rachel made oatmeal too when she got up, and again Matthew wanted none of it. Shortly after dissing Mommy's oatmeal, he reached up to the oats can on the counter and ran off with it, stuffing his face with raw oats!
• He's starting to develop clothes preferences. This morning he unzipped his sleeper: "Shirt! Shirt!" No, I said, keep your sleeper on and Mama will pick clothes for you when she gets up. "Shirt!" he insisted. "Ai-err! Rawrrrr!" Not just any shirt, you see -- his orange tiger shirt that he wore yesterday. So for once Matthew got dressed before Mama got up.
  

A morning tantrum

This morning I treated Matthew to some cheez-its after his breakfast yogurt. He ate some, then started handing some to me. I declined the first, but he insisted, so I ate it. Then he brought me a second, which I also ate. MINE! MINE! he yelled, hopping up and down in anger.

Even for a two-year-old I thought this was pretty irrational.

Airplane!

My vette is still in "transmission problem? What transmission problem" land. I was going to go show them the problem today, actually (it's pathetically easy to reproduce -- first to 2nd and back to first, or rather TRY to go back to first for several seconds until it decides to relax and allow it) but it snowed again. So Monday I'd taken the Ford to work, but Rachel called at 10:30 to say she had forgotten about her movie with Matthew at 11, so could I bring the car back. I did, and that's where this story comes from.

Rachel was watching our neighbor's kids while she had some kind of pregnancy checkup thing. I'm pretty sure it involved glucose. I'm not exactly sure whose idea it was -- Rachel's, I think -- but all 3 boys had "airplanes" made out of Matthew's toy blocks. (You know, the huge baby ones where the unit is about 1 inch.) They were having a good time except Matthew was prone to whacking things with his...

Tuesday I got home from work and Matthew went straight to his blocks and asked for an airplane. Okay, no sweat. Again, he ended up with a timeout for whacking Dad with the plane.

Today when he got up the first thing he said was, "Baby UP!" The second was, "Airplane!" And then when I made him one he said No no, Car! and directed me to build the wings onto the wheeled block. (This was an improvement on the basic plane design that Jacob, the older guest, had come up with.)

Wonder how long THIS fad will last.

sleep deprivation

Matthew's been able to reach the light switch in his room by climbing on his bookshelf (or his truck, or his upended toy basket...) for a while now. Monday night he took the next step and decided this means he doesn't have to go to sleep at bedtime. I put him down at 7:30; at 9:30 (after repeating the process several times) he fell asleep at the door, with the light on.

Tuesday he didn't sleep in and was a very cranky boy. Not only that, but that night he got up at 12:00, 2:00, 3:00, AND 4:00. Grr! Then he finally slept in, 'til 8:30. We have a lightswitch lock on order (none of the local stores stock them), but in the meantime Rachel instituted a policy of light turned on after bedtime = spanking and that was pretty effective last night.

In other news, Matthew got a cheap plastic "camera" in a kid's meal at Carl's Jr. Now he goes around saying "smile" and clicking the "shutter." Just like Daddy!