Personality

Thomas is quite the little man these days, and quite often I'm hearing, "Nommy do it" over and over, but recently I've heard an unsolicited "please" and "ank-ooo" from him, too. He's especially adept at sniffing out candy, and I'm finding that I really can't keep any around. He's also a one man wrecking crew. While distracted putting laundry in, I heard him russling around in the corner of the laundry room. He comes out with a smile on his face, almost beckoning me to follow. I bit and followed him, only to find that he'd pulled the huge bottle of Costco ketchup off the shelving unit, twisted the cap off, pulled off the seal and poured ketchup all over the box he'd stood on, himself and the floor. While cleaning up the mess, he was busy in the bathroom. After throwing away the clean up papertowels, I went in to find that he'd thrown underwear in the toilet. This is a first for him, and he was running his hot rod around in toilet bowl. When I went to throw the underwear in the laundry, he scampered off to the bedroom, where I found him squirting a tube of toothpaste on my bedside table, with a ring of toothpaste around his lips. ("Spicy" he calls out to me, with a huge smile on his face.) Yes, I guess he might think toothpaste tastes spicy at his age. I'd no sooner cleaned up the toothpaste then I heard a crash from the laundry room, and walked in to find a Costco canister of beans scattered all over, along with the remnants of his own private nachos party crushed on the concrete. To his credit, he offered me one of his chips as I eyed him with both amusement and amazement. " I surrender" I said. He ran off, looking for another opportunity for the supreme mess. (Disclaimer...these events happened in the span of roughtly 15 minutes. And I wonder why I can't get anything done around this place!)

Tonight was the first time Thomas has asserted himself at bedtime. He's usually so tired that he's off to sleep without much trouble, but tonight he was having none of it. He's also starting to get some skills at manipulation, as apparent when he called for Mommy to rock him. "Mommy, Nommy rock you," he called in this soulful cry. Of course, I couldn't NOT go to him, but once I'd pulled him from the crib, he was struggling to get out of my arms to play. "Choo-choos" he called, struggling in my arms. I stuck to my guns and put him back in his crib, and then the sobbing began. I left the room, checked in with John and waited it out. After several minutes of listening to him wail, I went back in. Again he wanted me to hold and rock him. I tried it again, but like any good manipulator, once out of the crib he wanted down to play. This time I put him back in, all the while explaining it was bedtime, Mommy loves you, and so on, and then walked out. It killed me, but I know that I have to be firm and not let bedtime disintegrate into a battle of wills. We've never let him cry it out, but tonight was the first. After about 5 minutes of crying, he was done, and I could breathe again. What a miserable experience. I'm sure hoping Thomas is a quick learner and decides that when Mommy says something she means it, regardless of how big of a fit I throw. We'll see. Tonight I feel I won round one. I think Dobson would be proud. Dobson says in one of his books, "If your toddler wants to fight with you, you say bring it on," or something like that. Bring it on, Thomas. Mommy loves you too much to drop the ball now.