Monkey See...

...Monkey Do

A Three Part Tale From Yesterday Morning

I. First thing in the morning J had a stuffed animal in his shirt. He said his belly was getting bigger. I looked down at mine. He's commented more than once recently about how large I am getting. I guess he didn't notice that much last time I was pregnant?

We call the baby by her name regularly & I comment on how she is growing bigger and that is why my belly is growing bigger too. Occasionally he asks about her and her growth...concerned a bit on how big she will really get.

Once his "baby" was "big enough", he just plopped it right out of the bottom of his shirt.

I thought "now that would be nice & easy..."

I have to admit the idea of a 'natural childbirth' is starting to feel a bit daunting, since I've never done it before.

II. While I was hanging up laundry, J came in the laundry room with his baby doll. We used this baby doll to help him get used to the idea of a baby in the house before N was born (gentle, quiet, etc). When N was a baby he would carry this baby around and even attempted to breastfeed the little 

thing! 


J walked in with the same babe (who I have not seen him play with since we moved here) and said "Look, Mama! He is getting big! He is walking now!" and demonstrated how the baby was learning how to walk. I applauded the baby's walking efforts and J's parenting skills. He really is watching/listening to everything that goes on in our family. Before he was nursing that baby (when I was nursing N all day long) and now he is teaching him how to walk (which is what we are doing now with N). So cute.

III. For snack time, J requested string cheese (a favorite). After he opened the package, he popped the cylindrical cheese stick in his mouth and started to blow on it. I wasn't sure what he was doing (is it a trumpet? a whistle?) so I asked. 

He said "like my neighbor does." I prodded further, and he answered "like my neighbor Jenny does--and then the wind blows it away." He was referring to the neighbor, Jenny, & his observance of her smoking addiction (she goes outside to smoke-- many, many, many times a day--outside puffing away). I was surprised that he had taken note of that (we aren't outside very often, and we don't have chats with the neighbors much either) so specifically and applied to his cheese stick (that really would be more like a cigar-shape, but I digress). 

I didn't say much about it but I was kind of sad. I mean, eventually I will teach him that smoking is bad for our bodies and then he will wonder why people do it and probably say something to someone smoking...

...for now I'll hold onto the innocence of youth...

monkeys & all.