At 16 months, it was no longer sufficient for Miles to walk around with a pacifier in his mouth. Soon he started carrying around a spare Nuk. He can count them, one two (not with words, but by pushing them onto your face in sequence). Then he discovered that he could have one in his mouth and one in each hand, for a total of three. Miles fetishizes his Nuks. He gazes into them as though they had soothsaying powers, and presses them onto misc objects to see how the silicon will react. He wants to share his Nuks with stuffed animals and house guests. Yesterday he was being a fussy eater, so we lined them up on the dinner table for him to admire. It worked. I think that for him it was like reading the newspaper while eating.
The booty post turned out to be a fluke — he never said “booty” again, so it was probably a coincidence. But lately he’s been working really really hard on saying “apple” (he gets as far as “app-puh”) which is funny since he doesn’t even like apples. We think his first actual word was “nope,” which we were lucky enough to capture on tape.
If my kid got stuck in the cat door, I’d HELP HIM GET OUT before grabbing the camcorder.
But that’s just me.
OK, that just cracks me up. While I’m kinda with PJ, if your wife hadn’t done what she did, I wouldn’t have laughed nearly as hard this AM…
PJ — Children get into all kinds of funky situations, many times per day. Parents know the difference between an “I’m hurt, help me!” cry and an “Hey, over here, I’m frustrated!” cry. Amy would never place getting a good camera shot or video footage in front of Miles’ actual or immediate needs. In fact if you knew her, it would never occur to you to cast such an aspersion. She’s the most rockin’ , most caring, most loving mom on the planet, seriously.
I love that picture! Did Amy take it? No offense to your own photographic skillz, of course. It just kinda reminds me of the Cheerio shot.
The video’s awesome, thanks for getting my day back on track after a rough start. Miles reminds me of Winnie-the-Pooh. Doesn’t look like he’s in any kind of emergency situation there, either. Shame on anyone who impugns this mother’s judgement! I think I’d be more unsettled by the mother who races to save her darling baby from all frustration. Not to mention (I couldn’t hear the sound too well cuz I’m at work and must be stealthy) but it sounds like Amy’s coaching him and helping him to learn from the experience. Seems pretty loving to me! Much better than the K-Mart mommies who snatch their spawn away from all exploration and risk with no explanation except a raised, angry voice.
For the record, I would have grabbed the camcorder too. My original post was a failed attempt at humor through feigned indignation.
funny how each family has it’s own lexicon, we also know the greatness of nuk, the gerneric term for all pacifiers in our household was “nuk-nuk”.
That ended when the wife left town for a few days and i cut a small hole in the end of each one. It was a long day, but we are now a nuk-nuk free zone.