The Young And The Quirky

Every now and then I like to sit back and give pause to appreciate my children.  They are growing so fast.  I feel the need to stop and reflect upon their unique personalities and developing imaginations.  As they play together and with me I laugh along, but so often my head shakes incredulously and my brow rises in wonder.  I have started to notice something lately; something I had perhaps just forgotten. 

Kids are weird.

Weird may be a strong word.  Let’s go with quirky.

Don’t get me wrong, I mean it in the most endearing way.  It is usually because I am entertained by their shenanigans that I whisper to myself, “Wow. That’s tapped.” 

Here are a few examples of what my kids have been up to lately:

My daughter speaks fluent Dog.  I am uncertain if she studied or if she is naturally gifted; it seems she just picked it up one day.  There are days when she refuses to speak English at all, and her part of our conversations will consist only of woofs, barks, yelps, and yips.  She will not even acknowledge that I am speaking to her or do what I ask unless I refer to her as Puppy.  As I am not blessed with the ability to interpret or speak Dog and clearly have not studied the language, this poses a wee bit of a problem for me.  I may ask her about her day, but can only guess at her answer.  If anyone knows where I can find a Dog to English dictionary, I would be most grateful.

Whenever tragedy strikes my son, such as the ladder breaking off his toy fire truck for the gazillionth time, he immediately exclaims, “Oh noooooo!”  What is so entertaining about that?  It is the way he says it.  He sounds just like Bruce from Family Guy, and it never stops being funny.  Being highly inappropriate for children, he has of course never seen the show.  It could be a natural response, but I have to assume he picked it up from me or my husband.  Regardless, I cannot help but reinforce the behavior by responding with an affirming “Oh nooooo!” of my own.

My daughter wrote a song.  Actually, she can only take partial credit since it was produced in collaboration with her cousin.  They made it up months ago, but she still sings it quite often.  “I can believe I can fly but I can’t really fly so I fall on my face” *Mash the face of Mr. Potato Head or any stuffed animal substitute into the nearest surface and repeat the lyric ad nauseum.* She has also taught the song to her brother.  We, the parental units, just can’t get enough of hearing that little ditty over and over.  What a real treat.

My son is obsessed with planes.  We must be under a general flight pattern, because we see a fair amount of them flying over our home on a daily basis.  When we are playing in the yard and the sound of a plane approaches, he stops whatever he is doing to gasp in excitement and look towards the sky.  As soon as he spies one he starts screaming out “PLANE!!!”  The only problem is that he has not yet grasped the “pl” sound.  The neighborhood is therefore treated to my boy screaming out “PAIN!!! PAIN!!! PAIN!!!” over and over at top volume.  It is actually pretty awesome.

What is my daughter’s latest obsession?  It is not Barbie dolls, or nail polish, or princesses, or any phenomenon of technology such as airplanes.  It is the act of watering plants.  Yes, I recognize the irony.  I guess this works out well for me.  Considering my tendency to commit herbicide and the number of plants that have been forced upon me lately, I suppose I should just be thankful (For the love of all that is holy I got ANOTHER seeded pot for Mother’s Day from the kids, a.k.a. Daycare).  My kill stats are dropping, even if it is by proxy.  Her watering antics have also extended to outside foliage.  She does not request to go outside for the purpose of play, she wants to water the plants.  She moves about with a watering can from rose bush to Hosta, making sure the thirst of each plant is properly quenched.  Now if I could only muster that sort of dedication for cleaning up her toys…

And finally:  The Coveted Fishy

This two inch tall plastic suction cup springing fish thingy, which they got at a birthday party many months ago, is the current bane of my existence.  There were originally two but only one survived.  I have had a vision.  I fear the last fishy may go belly up very soon.  I have been waiting for it to drop off the active toy list before making my move, therefore allowing its disappearance to go unnoticed.  Unfortunately this ridiculous fish, among all their possessions and all their toys and books, is currently the most prized.  This one fish is responsible for a thousand arguments and tears.  If one child is playing with the fish, the other is desperate to acquire it. “She took my fishy, no it’s my fishy, he already had a turn it’s my turn, noooooo I want the fishy, waaaahhhhh, IT’S MINE!!!!”  In an endless pursuit of justice I am looked upon by both parties to uphold the righteous and punish the offender. All I can do is laugh at the fact that each has a tendency to fall into both categories simultaneously. 

Oh yes. The fish is going down.  It is kind of a cool toy actually, the way you push the spring down and the little suction thing eventually lets go, causing it to do a flip…

Anyway, there you have it; some quirky stuff that goes on here at Mom et al.  I have to say, it’s our quirky stuff and I like it.  Woof.

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