Underwear

Paul’s fully toilet trained and surprises me with his ability to get dressed all by himself. But. For some reason, the creators of toddler underwear decided to put Elmo’s (and Thomas’ and James’) face on the back of the underpants. Paul sometimes insists on wearing his underpants backwards so he can see Elmo (or Thomas or James).

Time

Paul loves clocks. Last week, I noticed that whenever I said, “ten minutes” or “what time is it?” Paul would look at his (naked) wrist and say “no, 12 minutes!” or  “it’s 1-0-2-3” or “it’s 5-8-9-7”. He likes to tell time and know the time. Since neither Mom nor Dad wear watches, I think he learned that people wear clocks on their wrists from his preschool teachers, both of whom wear watches.

Preschool

Paul loves preschool. When he was looking at his watch (see story above), I said, “Paul, did you learn that at preschool?” Ever since, everything he “learned at preschool.”

“How did you know how to put on your own shoes?”

“From preschool!”

“How did you learn to get the milk out of the fridge all by yourself?”

“I learned at preschool!”

“How did you get so good at putting that puzzle together?”

“At preschool!”

You name it, he learned it at preschool, even when I know he didn’t really.

McDonald’s

Since Ryan has been traveling the last few weeks, I’ve been trying to make our dinner times exciting so it won’t feel so lonely. One night, we were having Chicken Nuggets so I made Paul a menu to “order” from. I wrote a big golden arch on the front for our “McReid’s” restaurant. He saw the yellow M and said, “M is for french fries!”

We’ve only been there about twice in his lifetime (once when he was newborn in Australia) and we never watch television with commercials, so I was quite puzzled at this. I finally decided that a Halloween costume we saw (french fries in a red McDonald’s container) was memorable for him.

Christmas

There are Christmas decorations in the store and I’m working on a Christmas project. (Yes, it’s way too early, but there you go.) Each morning, Paul wakes up to ask if it is Christmas yet. This is going to be a long month.

Cheese

Paul says I should write about cheese. At preschool, they sometimes have cheese for snack. Paul leaves preschool saying, “yummy yummy cheese!” when I pick him up. Then we get home and I offer him a little sliver of cheese. “Yucky! I don’t like cheese.” So I asked him why he likes it at preschool and not at home:

“I like cheese at preschool only!”

Okay then.

Singing and Talking

Paul regularly likes singing songs as we drive in the car. But I started singing a primary song in the car the other day, and he was quite annoyed.

“No, Mommy! No singing in the car! Singing at home only! That’s the new rule.”

I asked him about singing at preschool, or singing at church, so he changed the rule.

“Number 1, home. Number 2, church, Number 3, preschool. That’s the only places you can sing. That’s the rule. Number 1, number 2, number 3. Three places.”

He also made a “no talking in the car rule” a little later. I think he was over tired and a bit cranky, though, so I don’t take it personally. He also started singing himself a little later, so apparently, it’s only a rule for me… And I find it funny that he sees it necessary to establish “rules.” Do I do that too often?

Right Now

I told Paul I was writing the cute things he says and does. He said I should write:

“Grandma. Grandpa. Great Grandma [we’ll see all three of them tomorrow]. I love them!”

Yes, Paul, those are very cute things to say!