Though I really have given up on trying to keep up with all the cute and funny things that come out of his mouth these days, especially since they're bordering on sarcastic and disrespectful, I'll highlight the few that are worth remembering . . .
"Aw . . . Grief!" We have no idea where this one came from, unless he perhaps watched a Charlie Brown Christmas on his last day of preschool (it was movie day before the party, but I'm not sure what). And I cannot begin to describe the cadence with which he says it, but just imagine a truly exasperated and dramatic little boy, usually huffing, tucking his head onto his chest and crossing both arms over his chest. Have I mentioned dramatic? And repetitive - because we hear this one over and over and over again.
"I love you!" While this one never loses its initial charm (who doesn't want their little ones to say it to them?), hearing it about twenty times in the span of a single minute, always with the expectation that I will respond immediately with
"I love you, too!" (and having it repeated louder and with a bit of an edge each second that I don't respond, you know, as I'm trying to play with one of his brothers, sit in on a therapy session, fix a meal or do anything other than pay attention to my first born).
"I like that!" The good news is he's starting to tell us what he likes. The bad news is he likes everything - absolutely everything. We don't watch a lot of regular television with the boys (perhaps just some football on the weekends), usually just limiting them to PBS and Pixar movies, but yesterday he was tired and sitting on the couch with us during one of the games. And then the commercials came on, and for each and every one, his first and often-repeated response was
"Ooh, I like that." Sometimes it would get a
"That's so pretty!" or
"That's so nice!" tacked on to the end. You know,
"I like that Mountain Dew, that's so nice!" Or perhaps my favorite,
"I like that Zantac, that's so pretty!" Seriously? Heartburn medication? Yes, my son apparently likes everything.
"We get another one next time we go to the store." I'm not sure what started this one, perhaps some actual item that was broken or damaged and did really need to be replaced, like Sawyer's Chicken Little DVD. That's not an option, really. But now, every time any little thing gets broken or stops working properly (i.e. the batteries just go out), we hear,
"We go to the store, get another one!" Today it was his remote control car. The batteries had died, and he simply wanted to go out and buy a new one. He apparently thinks we're made of money (never mind that Mommy hasn't worked in three years and we are a family of five). We'll also not worry about the fact that a new car wouldn't even come with batteries, because what toy ever does?
"I sorry!" Oh, how I wish this one was a bit more heartfelt. He's sorry about everything, even when he's not. He's learned that they are magic words. It's just recently become a near constant stream of words from his mouth, and Mommy has just now started asking him to explain why he's sorry, and how he could do things differently so he wouldn't have to be sorry. You know, like today, when he purposefully walked over to the toys Sawyer was still in the process of arranging (today was hoarding and not lining up, if you're wondering) and knocked them over. He is always quick with the
"I sorry!" (especially if Mommy is around to witness and perhaps raises her voice a bit).
"That's not very nice!" Why do I see my own words coming back to mock me right now? When Connor does something, say the above-mentioned destruction of Sawyer's toys, we tell him why what he did is wrong. Part of that is simply that the behavior he's demonstrating is not very nice. So now he turns it around on us. If he's demanding Coke for dinner (thanks Grandma, by the way), and we calmly and politely tell him that vacation is now over and that we drink milk or juice for dinner as we always have in our house, then he points his little finger at us and says
"That's not very nice!""I shoot you!" So not nice, on so many levels. At first I thought he must be playing typical little boy games at preschool, cowboys and indians or cops and robbers, you know, something like that. But no, I realized, we've done this to ourselves. It's from his new favorite movie - Wall-E - where EVE shoots everything in site. Lovely.
And by far my favorite (and such a clear sign of the attitude and rebellion that we're seeing right now in our four-year old), is the frequently heard . . .
"I tell you!" And you must, of course, hear the sarcasm dripping off of every single word. Here's a little sample of a conversation today.
"Connor, it's time to eat lunch."
"One more minute," he stalls.
"I playing trains.""No, it's time to eat lunch. You've already had your minute. Come sit down, please." (We really do transition in our house, because Sawyer could not tolerate it otherwise. There are advance warnings about changes, and Connor really
had already been told that it would be time to eat
"in a minute").
"I . . tell . . you . . I playing trains." "Connor."
"Aw . . . Grief!" he says, huffing and stomping his way to the table.
"I tell you I playing trains." he mumbles under his breath as he sits down.
"I not ready to eat lunch yet. I playing trains."Sigh. We are in for some fun times at our house this year - a lot of hard lessons to be learned and a lot of attitude to work on. And a lot of stifled laughter too, because who can keep a straight face for some of things he comes up with! I tell you . . .
