Here’s my entry for Tara’s Gallery at Sticky Fingers- head over there and have a look around at the other entries!
Are words really necessary here?
This is my post for the Gallery at Sticky Fingers. Head over there and have a look!
My little boy turns eighteen months old next week.
He’s no longer a baby, he’s a toddler, a little boy, a kid. He has an independent streak a mile long. He’s big enough to choose his own clothes: he utterly refuses to entertain the concept of trousers. He barrels around everywhere at ninety miles an hour, stopping occasionally for a second or two to pick a daisy, examine the pattern on the bricks, pick up gravel from the drive. He talks in sentences. ”Mummy, go car now? Go car? VROOOM!”. He’s obsessed with cars, like his dad: he can name most of the marques we see when we’re out in the car. He loves to read.
I adore watching him run off to discover new things. I also love that he comes running back for a cuddle, or to take my hand and show me what he’s discovered. I love the closeness we have when I feed him, or when he’s snuggled next to my chest in the sling. I can’t bear to hear him cry: when he cries for me I run to him.
He knows that he’s secure, that he’s loved, and with that he can find his feet at his own pace and know that he can come running back to me.
The quote that sums it up for me, I think, is ”It is the nature of the child to be dependent, and it is the nature of dependence to be outgrown. Begrudging dependency because it is not independence is like begrudging winter because it is not yet spring. Dependency blossoms into independence in its own time.”
I just hope it won’t be too soon.
Darling David,
Yesterday you turned seventeen months, and you’re the owner of a happily married set of parents- hooray!
David, when are you going to learn to fall asleep on your own again? I know there’s a lot to process in that brain of yours before you fall asleep, but we’ve had to go for a drive every night for the last few weeks, sometimes for an hour or an hour and a half, just to get you to sleep. I won’t leave you to cry, I promise, but SERIOUSLY, sleep would be nice.
Your speech has come on in leaps and bounds. Marmite is now called “marmarcar”, your friend Josie is “Dosie!”, Wilfred is “baby”. You lead us to the front door and say “go there!”, we get in the car and you shout “Vroom! Vroom! Go, go, GO!”. You’ve learned so many more words that I can’t catalogue them all, and I love it.
You have a new buggy! It’s a Quinny Buzz 3, and you call it “my car!”. It’s made life so much easier- I can go shopping without breaking my back trying to steer the old buggy, or carry you and half a ton of shopping. It even fits in Marmite’s boot- just. It seems much more comfortable than your old one, and you can see out when you’re facing me- always a bonus!
Food is good. We’ve reached a stage where there are things you’ll reliably eat, you’re prepared to try new things, and you eat a reasonable amount of fruit. (Vegetables are a different story altogether.). You love dipping things into salsa or sauce, or grapes (or bacon!) into custard or yoghurt. It’s not that long ago that you wouldn’t have touched anything wet or icky, now you delight in being covered in it. You’re also drinking plain water, alongside juice and milk, and you’ve learned to drink from a straw.
You’ve spent an awful lot of time outside, as the weather’s been gorgeous. You cry when we bring you back inside, and take us by the hand and drag us to the door when you want to go outside. You’ll also steal my car keys and try to open the front door from the inside. As soon as we’re out you try to open Marmite’s door and climb in, so you can pretend you’re driving. You run everywhere, inside and out, only occasionally pausing to wreak havoc on the clothes line or annoy the cats.
You are all curls and big brown eyes now. There are occasions, yes, when you’re mistaken for a girl by well-meaning people who stop to chat with us, although that may just be because I refuse to dress you in blue or camouflage-coloured clothes. We like interesting colours in this house! I still refuse to cut your baby curls, although I know that it will eventually be inevitable.
So, my definitely-not-a-baby-any-more-but-a-toddler, I love you with all my heart, and I love this. I know you won’t stay this way forever, but please, for a little while longer? These months are passing far too fast.
I love you.
Mummy (and Daddy, who, as usual, will sniffle when he reads this)