Last night Casey and Puppy Rooney came over for dinner. They were headed into our neck of the woods for puppy class so they came early to hang out with us for a little bit, which William was very excited about. Toddler excitement can be confusing. He touched Rooney for about 2 seconds when she first came in, then didn't say a word but instead ran to his toy bins and held up a toy airplane. As his mom, I knew this meant "I'm so happy you're here I want you to see my airplane!" but I can only imagine as a guest it must have been interpreted as, "Ok, you're here, ho hum, I'm going to my toys now".
Only the beginning of the confusion of following a toddler's thought process.
The dinner setup was pretty out of the ordinary - rather than eating at either the "big brown table" (family dinner) or the "yellow table" (mommy and daddy are lazy and watching football...shame shame) we stood at the kitchen counter and I set William's place on the opposite side with a bench. I knew this would make his behavior out of the ordinary too, not to mention being in performance-mode...but...well, I don't have a good excuse I just did it. ok? The point is I fully expected a little bit of a battle. I didn't expect him to have our heads spinning in circles trying to follow his wants and needs.
To start us off, I held up a red "NM" plate which is generally a good go-to plate for dinner. I was emphatically told "I don't WANT that plate I want the green BOWL". ok...after a little bit of coercing for some manners, green bowl it is.
But wait, we actually only want ranch dressing in the green bowl. Enough to dip his finger in. Really we do want the spaghetti on the red plate after all. So, I moved his spaghetti out of his bowl onto his plate and offered extra cheese. "No, I don't WANT that".
half a second later...
"I need cheese mommy"
I tried to pour more on top but he said he wanted to pour it. I tried to suggest he reach in the bag with his hand rather than pour, but he liked the idea of pouring. He changed his mind though and decided to grab a handful - naturally this was his idea, not mine. He put the handful on top of his spaghetti and then said he needed more just for his hand. No. The cheese game is over.
To avoid actually eating the spaghetti he declared that he also needed yogurt in the green bowl. My response: once you've eaten some spaghetti you can have yogurt.
**Insert some whines and foot stomps and demands for yogurt until he realized the yogurt was not going to happen.**
He saw me pouring dressing on my salad and asked, "What's that?"
"This is balsamic vinaigrette dressing. You won't like it."
"I DO like it"
"ok, would you like some?"
"Yes, right HERE" (imagine him pointing right next to the drop of still-untouched ranch dressing)
Then instantly, as I pour a drop, "I don't like that"
Really? Weird, I was so sure he would! But he did, then, make an attempt to go back to the yogurt conversation one more time until he finally let that one die.
At this point I held him to try to calm down his excitement and help him eat his spaghetti. As I'm holding a fork of spaghetti he looks at me and says, "Oh I need to wash my hands". Ok - yes, avoidance tactic, but his hands were a sticky mess...So, we washed hands. Then he had an accident which internally infuriated me as he had gone accident free for 3 straight days. But, I didn't show my disappointment because I knew he was overly excited and the dinner battle was enough for one night. **they do say pick your battles right???**
After we got back downstairs from changing clothes Casey said, "Hey William, do you want to try your spaghetti? It's really yummy and your mommy worked hard on it. You should thank her"
Cue the biggest, longest, sweetest self-initiated hug he has ever given me. Also cue the melting of my heart.
Crap, back to dinner.
"Ok William, thanks for the sweet hug. Let's try to eat now"
"But I need PRETZELS mommy"
"We don't even have pretzels William"
"But at Mr. Steve's house he does"
"William, you have no idea what is in his pantry you've never even been inside Mr. Steve's house" (Mr Steve is our across the street neighbor who has hosted many garage football watching parties)
At this he appears to be conceding as he opens his mouth. I move in with the spaghetti but am about .5 seconds late as he has put in one piece of cheese and closed the steel trap.
"William, you need to eat"
"ok but I only need ONE piece of candy first"
"not happening"
Casey had gone from trying to hide her laughter to trying to hide her confusion as she said, "wait, so we no longer need yogurt or cheese or dressing that we won't touch but now we need pretzels? wait, candy? man i'm not around toddlers enough. this is hard to follow".
FINALLY dada gets home, the games stop, and it's time for puppy rooney's class. Does he play these games with Dada? no. Did he end up eating his spaghetti? One bite and he was done - but the crazy requests were non existent. Either I'm a sucker or he just liked performing for Casey.
Please say you think it's the second, but I won't blame you if you don't.
**don't ever fall victim to the myth of the terrible two's**
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