With the 4 year old gone, I kind of expected the baby (the 2 year old) to ... miss her a little at least, but nope. She's been happy as a clam in sand. Playing, knocking things over. She emptied out her toybox twice, climbed inside, and most mornings, I find her sleeping in there, curled up with a blanket and her favorite toy, a piano. She's been building block castles, and then knocking them down. And laughing. Loudly. Is that normal? Maybe she's a closet psychopath... or a closet demolitions expert. What? It could happen!
I wanted to take this opportunity to get to know her a little. Sometimes with so many kids, it's hard to see the gem behind the shine, you know what I mean? I know each of the kids, their quirks, their strengths, but at times it's hard to see the particulars. Knowing their favorite food isn't the same as knowing what they'll eat and what they won't. I had opportunity with each one to bond, but the littlest one confuses me. She just doesn't want to talk to me. Oh she babbles, she communicates, she sings, and she dances. But she just has no need to make other people (specifically me) understand her. She wants something, she screams, eventually she gets it. End of story.
She doesn't like to talk on command, although she communicates just fine. She's smart enough to understand what I say, but there's no feedback, no dialogue, just screams. Annoying. So, the first thing we worked on was her sippy cup. The other kids all understood "sippy cup accountability" and the fact that until we found their sippy cup, it didn't get filled. Not the youngest, because her older sister would bring me both sippy cups to fill. So we started working on sippy cup accountability. Not that she understands what accountability is, but ... Anyway. We've finally got her to a point where she understands that I'll be in her room looking for the sippy cup until I find it, no matter how loud she screams. It's like she feels no need to please me. My other kids all wanted Mommy approval (Mommy Mommy, watch this!) and I'm so used to it, I'm not sure how to proceed without it.
Well, after sippy cups, I started working on consequenses. At breakfast, she likes to bring a toy to play with while she eats. I usually give her water to drink with meals (and chocolate milk when she's thirsty, but if she gets a filling drink during meals, she'll just drink, she won't eat.) When she starts making a mess, something goes away. Today, she tried to poke the sippy cup with the toy, and when I told her no, she looked right at me, and jammed the toy into the sippy cup. I took the toy, she started screaming, but I saw a strange thing. While she was screaming, she was looking at me. The more she screamed, the blanker I made my face. I just sat there, and ate my breakfast.
Then she stopped, and looked at the toy. Reached for it with a little baby grunt. Sneaky. I gave her the toy back, and she kept it away from the sippy cup, passing it ever closer to the cup, glancing at me the whole time. She jammed the toy into the the (now completely un-spill-proofed) sippy cup, and looked at me. I took the toy, and the screaming process started over.
Eventually she stopped hitting the sippy cup. And I let her keep her toy. I asked her if she was done, and she wouldn't answer, she just started knocking her cup around like it owed her money. Ok, we're done.
I'm very surprised though at how little she's cried for her sister - actually, I think she cries less, since no one's around to take her toys ("Not to do that, baby sisser!") She doesn't try to replace her playmate with Mommy, she's just been playing happily by herself (well, if 'destructively' is used synonomously with 'happily!') I did find out though that it wasn't Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star she's been singing for the past year. I was watching her shows with her, and she started singing with the TV. It was the Alphabet Song. Smart little shit. She knows her ABC's (or at least A through G) but she refuses to say, "Mommy!" when I tell her too. What a pain in the ass!
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