Madam Mouth

The kids rarely fall asleep or wake at exactly the same time. If Simon, now 10 months old, wakes before Taylor, now 25 months old, it’s a race to get him changed out of his nighttime cloths and into his day-wear and downstairs before he starts making noise– usually in the form of a sing-song racket consisting of “da da da!,” “ma ma!,” “blah blah blah!,” or another jumbled combination of excited hullabaloo. On the other hand, if Taylor wakes before Simon then time is usually on my side: I can get Taylor changed, dressed, and her hair fixed without waking her brother. Inadvertently, I have taught her how to talk in a whisper when Simon is trying to fall asleep or has fallen asleep. She has also translated the subjective pronoun / verb combination “Simon’s napping” to mean she needs to refrain from running, crying out, talking loud, or playing her noisy electronic toys when his eyes are closed and when he is slumped over my left shoulder. This last part, physically being quiet, is something she somehow figured out on her own– like snapping her fingers to get one’s attention when she’s trying to take a picture of them, making sipping sounds when drinking “play” tea from her miniature tea set, telling Simon to “stop!” when he’s making too much noise by pounding on spare pots and pans on the kitchen floor or her grandfather’s wood-turned bowls on the coffee table, or blaming others, including the cat, when she passes gas.

This morning began the same as most mornings: Taylor woke before Simon. Excited to be free of night’s dark grasp, Taylor lept from my arms as quickly as she jumped out of bed and into them. Without doubt or hesitation, she was ready to play. Quickly reminding her that Simon’s still sleeping, she instantly became mouse-like, hushed, quiet. Posthaste, for I knew she could not subdue her morning jubilee for long, I gathered her clothes and whipped her up into my arms for a speedy exodus downstairs. That was when it happened.

While carrying Taylor, her two hand-quilted blankets Grandma made, her baby pack-n-play, baby stroller, baby carrier and an assortment of dolls, and the remnants of Simon’s midnight bottle downstairs, by happenstance, I dropped his bottle. Luckily, Simon did not wake from the noise, but what Taylor did and said would have made his premature waking worth the momentary aggravation. In a whisper, Taylor raised her pointer finger to her lips and said, “Sssshhhh. Si-Pa nap.” (Si-Pa being Taylor’s name for Simon; and the word nap meaning both napping and sleeping). I could have mauled her with kisses! Not only did she verbally react to the noise I made, she added the physical component of putting her finger to her lips signifying I needed to be quiet. In addition, she was concerned for her brother!

Taylor has been miraculously learning at an accelerated pace. That’s not to say she’s a savant, I’m sure she is learning at a normal, regular pace just like most middle-class toddlers. But her acquiring new skill sets: verbal, physical, and cognitive is just amazing to watch unfold before my eyes. For example, the family pet “Stichy” has a habit of laying her body across the kids’ heads while they are being changed on the living room floor. At a quick glance, it looks like the kids are wearing a black sheared beaver hat. So one can imaging how I just about fell over in stitches when, while changing Simon, Taylor chuckled, “Stichy hat.” I could not believe my ears! I have no idea how she could possibly come up with the joke, but we both had a good laugh at the cat’s expense.

One of her recent games is to repeat everything we say. She does a decent job repeating most common one or two word phrases. Washing dishes the other night I unknowingly stumbled into her game as I accidentally hit a miniature herb plant off the windowsill and onto the countertop. “Oooppps!” was, unfortunately, not the word I used. Taylor, to her mother’s furrowed disappointment and my chilled horror, repeated the stream of profanities with disturbingly, phonetically accuracy. Yes. She is learning quite quickly.