Idiosyncracies.

We checked out a preschool the other day. There were pros and cons. First, my kid is so much smarter and well behaved than most of the kids a year older than him. I’m terrified of sending him to an establishment that will make him more immature or stupider. 🙂 I don’t expect that to happen, but I also don’t want to hinder progress either. The biggest pro was really convenience (and somewhat decent lunch food), but that’s not a reason for me to send my son to a school that could potentially have a completely different tradition and culture. That was very obvious by this preschool despite it being relatively nice otherwise.

David is in my lap right now and he’s not letting me type easily as he wants to stand up between my right arm and the computer. It’s a bit painful to try, but here I am. That’s one of his first idiosyncrasies — but it is typically normal for babies to want to be held. However, he has more funny quirks that are both annoying and adorable:

He loves closing the closet doors: He hates when cabinets or doors are open. Sometimes that means he closes his finger in them. Oops. (Don’t worry, nothing serious has happened!)

He is messy and clean all the same: He doesn’t mind when his toys are strewn across the floor, but when it comes to “extraneous” items he wasn’t exposed to regularly, he doesn’t want it. That means no tissues near his bed when he has a cold and no napkins on his high chair tray when he’s eating. He gets annoyed that I would even suggest that we keep the napkin there.

He HAS to eat everything with a fork: Even bread. “No David, you don’t eat that with a fork.” He doesn’t care.

He has to put his sippy cup away: And he has to find a place in the fridge for it. Sometimes this gets excessive. “Away,” he says. Five minutes later, he wants it back again. Sometimes I have to put my foot down, even if he doesn’t let me.

I have to wipe his nose: Right now, David has a minor cold. His nose is running slightly. Even though he knows the process of wiping his nose, he has to keep yelling “nose” from his high chair or coming to me saying “nose” and I have to wipe his nose for him. He doesn’t want to try it himself, and there’s no way you can teach an almost 23-month-old how to blow his nose. This can translate to me wiping his nose every 2-3 minutes — literally.

But I love his bedtime routine:

We read a book, Night Night Little Pookie, which he happily helps fill the blanks on.

“And now, to the sink on your own…”
“…Tippytoes!”
“You can brush your fine…”
“…teeth!”
“You can wash your fine…”
“…nose! And mommy’s nose!”

Sometimes, the three kisses section is filled with him reciprocating. 🙂 And he’s great at identifying everything in the illustrations.

We read another story (which I actually cannot find online) for the Sh’ma bedtime prayer (called Goodnight Sh’ma), and he fills in the blanks too. As it’s a newer book (only about a month old), he’s still a little rusty.

“I hug my…”
“…eyes.”
No David, you don’t hug your eyes. You hug your bear and close your eyes.

We’ll get there.

We say the prayer and go into bed, and he insists upon a hug and a kiss before he quietly lies down on his bee pillow. Then he asks for his blankie and goes to bed.

I love this little man.