The blowout boy

Every day, the folks at daycare send home a report with the kids. The first part of this report is a broad discussion of what the kids in a particular classroom have done up until around naptime, at which point the teachers have time to sit down at the computer to write up the report. The second part involves the minutiae of, for example, Teddy's day noting how long he napped, how much he ate, and how many and what kind of diapers he had. Most of the time, neither report is terribly interesting, although we occasionally get notices about the first time one of our kids sat up in the infant room, said a certain word, or got bloodied by a classmate. (Incidentally, I can't actually remember the dates of many of these milestones, but rest assured, we've saved the report sheets.)

Yesterday, when reading through Teddy's personal report, we noted the following details: Snack - 2 servings! Lunch - 2 servings! We've noticed that he also likes to eat at home, although he often complains at first, putting up symbolic resistance when he's given his dinner. The boy's stellar appetite has a couple of implications.

First, he's becoming a serious bruiser. While he's nowhere near as big as his cousin for a kid his age (15 months), he's clearly out of 12 month clothes and is solidly in the 18 month, and often the 2 year, clothes size (the sizing of clothes being a real random card in the infant clothing industry.) Given his Buddha belly, which is a really amusing sight when he gets ready for a bath, he'll probably pass Margaret soon in girth and possibly in weight, despite the fact that she currently towers over him.

Second, Teddy is prone to blowouts at school. Each kid has a bin in his or her cubby that holds spare clothes for use in the event of an accident. In Margaret's case, these accidents typically involve potty-training snafus, potty-training being something that we're working on, but she doesn't have quite down (particularly at home where she objects to the potty by plaintively saying, "I'm a baby girl".) Occasionally, she also has episodes of over-energetic art that necessitate a wardrobe change.

Teddy, on the other hand, is a blowout boy. We have to keep his back-up cubby well-stocked given his propensity for working through his clothes inventory. Whenever I show up after work and he trundles towards me in a one-piece bodysuit, something that we rarely use when dressing him in the morning, I always know that he's had a diaper event, and I mumble apologies to the teachers. (To be fair, he sometimes has a food event that requires a change of clothes. Such as when he dumped his tomato soup on his head a few weeks back and Ms. Dana actually had to give him a bath, which is a rare event in the Toddler I room. I was so proud.)

The teachers typically smile and brush off any concerns. Except for yesterday. In light of his yeoman's work at snack and lunch, Teddy apparently had the blowout to end all blowouts. Both of his teachers, Ms. Mary and Mr. Ty, marveled at the diaper that caused the problem. And, as noted above, they clearly recorded how much food he'd eaten beforehand. Ms. Mary was quite philosophical about the cause-and-effect associated with eating so much food. And as I told her today after school, what can I say except for "That's my boy!"

In other developments, Teddy is starting to develop his verbal skills. Which is a good thing, because he's also becoming pretty vocal in his various objections about his life. Doesn't like his food (at least initially)? Wail. Doesn't like when his sister takes his toy (and often pushes him in the process of taking it)? Wail. Doesn't like his hat or coat? Wail. Doesn't like ______ (fill in the blank)? Wail. Abby thinks that he's frustrated that he isn't effectively able to communicate what he wants. I suspect that he's just being difficult, but there's probably something to Abby's theory given that, unlike a newborn who wails at just about anything, Teddy's complaints are becoming quite focused.

So it's a good thing that he's starting to "talk." He can say "Mama" in a clearly correct context. Such as when I'm rocking him before bed and Abby walks by the bedroom door, leading him to pull out his nuk-nuk to declare "Mama." (His ability to say "Papa" or "Dada" is much less developed, although I do have to say that he fancies me at this point given how he wails when I desert him by leaving the room.) He can also mumble "nuk," something that he's becoming as attached to as his sister (although pretty soon, we'll have a cold-turkey day regarding those little devices, notwithstanding the blessed succor that they provide on car trips.) One of his first words was "spider" in the context of his favorite song "The Itsy Bitsy Spider." A couple weeks ago, we went to Safeway early on Saturday morning, and Teddy kept shouting "spider!" as we walked through the aisles. I thought it was pretty funny, but no one else could understand him. He also says "Thank you," although it sounds more like "Da doo." But he does appropriately use that phrase, such as when he's given more food, which is nice if he's to grow up to be something other than a bruiser hooligan. Another phrase in Teddy's vocabulary is "Uh oh," which is particularly important given how often he gets in trouble. Finally, he's working on "No," which is important for reasons analogous to those for "Uh oh." The nice thing about a simple word like "No" is that he can really work on the subtleties. He can sharply say "NO!" or he can drag it out: "Noooooo." At this point, one of the real joys in my life is listening to him work on verbal nuances related to the word "No" when he's been brought into bed with us at 5:00 in the morning (after having been up at 11:30, 2:00 and 4:00 as he was last night.) Yep, a pleasant, smart little guy.