#toddlers

#toddlers

My 18-month-old grandson doesn't have the biggest vocabulary, but like most toddlers, he makes what he wants known pretty clearly. That's especially true when it comes to his favorite foods, which these days is pretty much anything he can stuff into his mouth unassisted. His most practiced phrase is "Eat, eat!" followed by a gesture he learned at daycare - tapping his thumbs and fingers together in a flat "O" to make the American Sign Language sign for "more."

Although she can say short sentences-"I need cake!"-her humor isn't particularly verbal. Instead, she giggles while stumbling around in grownup shoes, or blows bubbles in her water when she should be drinking it. She likes to put on a hat, pull it down over her eyes, and then blunder around, arms outstretched, like a mummy. She's also discovered the humor of exaggeration: recently, when her brother resisted getting out of his pajamas in the morning,

"'Now, with the bath, make sure you fill the tub all the way up, but then crack the drain a little bit and let the water continue fizzling out because he likes to use a cup - make sure his cup is in the bath. He likes to use a cup to fill up the water and then just continue dumping the water out, filling it up, dumping it out.'"

After throwing big, afternoon birthday bashes for the past three years and always feeling so stressed, I decided to try something different. 'Come join us for a birthday breakfast from 8am to 12pm.'