David Weekly, #39

It's been a cold week this week, with temperatures lower than normal. David's been alternately liking and hating putting on the clothes that he normally doesn't wear to make sure they fit.

I corrected David today, when I roar at him, he says, "Don't rar me, daddy!" This is usually when we're playing and roar at him. He also says it when I growl, but I told him I was growling, so now he calls it a growl. I spent a good part of my day at my mom's on Sunday, and we were successful most of the day at keeping his pullup dry. Every couple of hours I'd sit him on potty. He only went once, though. Late in the day, I noticed he was needing to go, but it was too late. Oh well. We're still getting better. We played, too...

So on Monday I had jury duty. Took David to Dot's at an hour before I normally get out of bed, and was at the courthouse by 8 AM. Monday night, I got to take him for a walk, and he tells me to stop, because of the STOP sign. Yeah, he knows the Stop sign. He read me the letters, and tells me it means stop. So we stop. And don't move. And stay stopped. It was really funny after a while. So literal! I told him that we can at least get close enough to the other road we're stopping for to be able to see the cars coming. He waits until there are no cars at all, and then he wants to run home. And we ran the two blocks. Every time a car would come, he'd stop on the side of the road to wait for all the traffic to stop before we went again. It took a little while to get home at that pace, but that's okay. It was time well spent. On the way he sees another sign: SPEED LIMIT 20. He says that's a Stop sign, too. I had to point out a Stop sign is red, has only the 4 letters...so he's not there yet. But he's got the concept down, which is great! On a related note, he tells me that the red light means stop, and the yellow light is slow down, and green is go. Not sure how he learned this. School? Dot? His own observation? The world may never know...only because I never think to ask anyone when I see them.

David's developing a sense of time as well. He seems to know about "tomorrow" and "yesterday"...I heard him trying out the word "yesterday", because he said it slowly, haltingly...He also is cognizant of the clock hands, too, especially because they're very relevant to his time to sit on the potty.

David has a bit of an exaggerated idea of who he is, since he was telling me something was going to come on TV, and I said, we have to wait to see what they say will be on next, and he says, "But it's what I said," will be on next. He also has a thing where he will repeat himself with the phrase: "I said: Let's go!" So I'm hearing what I say to him come back to me. Fortunately, I don't swear, or use foul language, so that's not a concern. But it still seems that I have to be aware of the way that I talk to him.

Meanwhile, we're developing a routine when we leave the house for Dot's: he runs into the back yard by the hot tub and either climbs on it in happy delight that I'm going to catch him, or he goes to find a leaf (remember the clue leaf?), so that he can carry it to Dot's when we go. We look for the tree that we know is there in the neighbor's back yard that drops these leaves. He also likes to get the crunchiest leaf he can find and crackle it -- inside the house, on the living room floor.

Another language note: there's more "flourish" to his language now. I'm losing the ability to describe the way his language is growing more clear, precise, and expressive. He's more able to communicate his thoughts, and thought process.

Next week is Thanksgiving, so I'll be thinking about what I'm thankful for, and eating lots of turkey, and showing "Charlie Brown Thanksgiving" this week to David. I know that I'm thankful for all of you that read my weekly updates about a little boy...

Rusty