One rule fits all

It's quite wonderful to witness this small human learning. He surprises us with something unexpected daily.

On Saturday morning I was lagging a bit. I thought I had covered the basics - fed him breakfast, changed his diaper, closed the right doors, had water and milk within his reach and then settled on the couch to nurse my ailing body while he played around me. A few minutes later he came, stood in front of me and made a hand gesture. I had seen this before but had to think for a second about where. Then it came to me. It was a sign for 'more'. He put his little fingers together and then touched his two hands together. Then he sat down in front of me.

I was delighted! The daycare staff had mentioned that the kids learn some sign language but I had never seen any of it. I glanced over at his sippy cups and noticed the milk one was empty. What a genius I had given birth to!

There have been countless other brilliant little feats too. I don't want to get carried away by listing them all but don't think I wasn't considering it. For instance, you can't imagine the precision with which he is able to indicate the body part I ask for. Bellybutton. Ears. Feet. Tongue. Hair. Some of these he picked up on his own; neither we nor the daycare drilled it into him.

But equally enchanting (to us parents anyway) are instances where we have been trying to teach him something and he finally learns. This was the case with the blowing of a kiss. Whenever one of us left the house the other would show Deaglan how to blow a kiss and wave bye-bye. It took several weeks for this to really materialize but when it did, it was as if we had won some long-standing civil suit or lost enough weight to finally fit back into our highschool jeans. Now when grandparents visit they are treated to a goodbye wave and a sailing kiss.

But our jubilation was slightly short-lived when on Monday, Deaglan seeing the neighbour across the street getting into his Ford Explorer and pulling out of the driveway, began to wave and blow kisses. In the parking lot of the doctor's office, he felt it was appropriate to blow kisses to the construction workers who were getting into their trucks to go for lunch. On our drivehome from work and daycare, he blows kisses to anyone passing by.

I guess we could learn a lot from his love thy neighbour attitude!