This past weekend, Emry and Ethan spent a few hours at their
Sunday School “teacher’s” house while Ed and I went to see Beauty and the Beast. (Yes,
Ed was a good husband and suffered through it…maybe even enjoyed it!) A couple about
the age of my parents, I think they have had the 0-2 year old Sunday School
hour for the past decade or more. They’ve known nearly every child in that
church as a baby and are like an extra set of grandparents to many of them.
They loved having Emry and Ethan, but especially Emry for in Sunday School she
tends to be a bit less of herself. (Definition: on her best behavior.) One
thing they both learned is how much she talks! Amen to that. She seems to talk
all day long…
Emry will be two in three weeks. Although a tiny two-years
(how long have we been in 12-month clothes????), everything about her is
starting to scream “TWO!”. Especially her vocabulary. She parrots just about
everything we say. And all day long, she chatters away whether it’s talking to
her stuffed animals, playing with her dollhouse or just wandering about looking
for her next activity. I can’t understand every “word” but most of it is a
repeat of her life, from changing Ethan, to taking her vitamins, to getting the
switch for disobedience. It’s rather amusing. The funniest one is when she says
(and signs) “please”. Trying to get her to use her words more than her little
whines and pointing, I would respond, “Please what?” And she would say, “Please
spat.” For weeks I didn’t know what “spat” referred to and why she thought this
was the right response. Finally, Ed enlightened me: “She’s saying ‘Please what’
back at you,” As funny as it can be, I just wish (especially after repeating
her disobedient act for the second or third time) that she understood the
action as clearly as she parrots the words.
With “growing up” has also come stumbles and our first
scrapes and bruises. Emry has never been daring. Until she was a year old, she
simply sat wherever she was put. Then came crawling, but she avoided tight
spaces or climbing up to her feet. When she finally decided that standing was
in order, that feat was only done when holding on to something. She never
walked unless holding both hands of Ed or me. She was 18 months before she
walked on her own. And it’s only been in the past month that climbing has been
attempted. Of course, climbing equals falling. So within the first week of
moving into our new home, she took two tumbles. The first was down the steps –
nearly all of them in a somersault form. Thankfully, God has created toddlers
to handle these terrifying tumbles with little more than a small carpet burn on
her cheek and a few moments of tears. A few days later, Emry went up and over
her bed rail. In this situation, she may have deserved it. She has my old bed,
which is a captain’s bed with drawers, so it’s quite high up and she has never
attempted to crawl in or out of it except on two occasions when she was so
angry/upset she didn’t know what she was doing when she climbed out and started
banging on the door. This time she was simply goofing off, standing up and
shaking the rail until over she tumbled. Except for a moment of fright, she
wasn’t hurt.
Growing up is certainly painful at times. For
near-two-year-olds and their exhausted parents!
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