The 'So Stinkin Cute' Blog

The staircase going to the second floor runs along the wall on one side, and the other side is open to the living room. I don't know if that's a very good description, but basically the way it is placed in the room allows me to store things all along the outside of the steps. To detract from the ugliness of the whole setup I have picture frames set on the outside ledge of each step. I also have random things stacked between the vertical part of the step and the spindles that run vertically from the railing.

As I sit here typing, Jacob is on his way to climbing the outside of the staircase to get the stack of books that are on their way upstairs. I asked him to get them so we could sit here and read for a little while before he goes to bed. The baby gate is up at the bottom of the stairs, where it's pretty much staying these days, thanks to The Great Chewing of Things. Jacob couldn't get to the books that way, so he walked around and half-heartedly tried to reach them. If he stretched they could easily have been obtained. Turning to me, Jacob knew I wouldn't want to get up with the computer already in place on my lap, so he acted like he couldn't get them and needed to climb the outside of the stairs. He'll use any excuse to do something dangerous.

I'm from the school of 'Pick Your Battles Parenting', so normally Jacob is allowed to do the climbing thing, but only to the 3rd step. It's the highest one I think he can safely navigate a fall from. I have the same philosophy about the dining room table, but I will get to that later.

So here he is standing on the 4th step, holding on to the railing with one hand a la Gene Kelly in Singing In the Rain and making up some crazy story. I'll call him down in a minute so we can read one of the books he has just let fall to the ground.

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It's later, the book has been read, and I am happily back to typing while Jacob sits at the other end of the couch looking at landscaping books with Zach. To get to this point I had to first wake Zach, who was asleep on the couch and strike up a deal that he would go feed the bunnies their evening helping of pellets, if I would take out the garbage. The way I see it, I'm getting the better of the two jobs because the former is a time-sensitive chore. And while taking the garbage out means that I have to go outside in the rain late at night, it technically doesn't have to be done til 5am so that gives me a whole lotta hours here on the computer without having to get up. Reading that over, it sounds like I am lazy, and I also realize that I mention sitting on the couch a lot? It's just that I wait all day to write this thing, and when I'm finally here all I want to do is type away. So it's not about being lazy. And the couch part is about the fact that when I am typing, I am usually on the couch (since getting the new one, plus the fact that all our flat surfaces are covered with random papers) so it naturally comes up a lot in my writing.

Now we're upstairs, the boys are in bed and I have been called up to be snuggled with. What would be the point of having a portable computer if you didn't carry it all around the house with you? Nevermind the fact that it's going to keep my kid awake - I'm multi-tasking. Zach thinks he hears a mouse in the wall. I've been hearing them at night, in the walls, over our heads...just as long as they stay put with that thin slice of sheetrock between us, I'm cool with it. So I think he's a little smug to be the one to have heard it first on this particular evening. "Could it be this?" I ask. He jerks in fright just a little before turning to see that it's just me typing away. Jacob doesn't get it so his mind sets to work formulating an explanation, "I know...there's a wion doin dat to da wall..with a hammer and a naiw. He's twying to knock it down; he's takin da naiws ouwt." Just as likely an explanation.

"You my big fatty-up mommy," he's saying now (when 'you' is the first word of the sentence, Jacob can usually pronounce it correctly). He does it to Zach too, "You my big fatty-up daddy." We don't know what it means. To be honest, it started out as a bunch of random syllables and one day Jacob must have decided to make real words of it. And this is what he came up with. My favorite is "Buoy down!" We don't really know where this came from either. Jacob says it was on a Bob the Builder video, but since we know them backwards and forward, we can be pretty sure that's not it. The most Zach and I can figure is that it was on a Dora video we borrowed from the library a month or two ago. Sort of half "boogie down" and half "man overboard!" It's just another one of those things that comes from his arsenal of catch phrases. I like to imagine that if a doll were ever made in likeness of Jacob, it would be one of those dolls with the string to pull for it to speak. "The Talking Jacob Doll! Now with 4 feature phrases: 'You my big fatty-up mommy', 'Buoy down', 'My tummy is bery fuwl', and (for good measure) 'I wove oou, Mommy'."

The 'buoy down' is funny to me because a few weeks ago we were waiting in line somewhere and this lady behind us was trying to talk to Jacob. He's a shy boy, so up until 2 or 3 weeks ago, he wouldn't have conversations with strangers (which I kind of felt safe in the knowledge of) at all. So he finally turned to the lady and stared at her for a few seconds before blurting out "Buoy down!" I was struck because I had never seen him do anything like that, and she didn't know what to say. It's not what he said, but the way he said it...maliciously? At least he found a socially appropriate way to get an annoying person off his back.

Well, the jimmie legs haven't ceased since I came up here so I'm packing it up to head back downstairs. As I head down the stairs, I hear "Daddy, can I snuggle wiss oou?" My place taken that easily.

When I came home from work tonight I had to do a few things quickly and then head out to go vote. Zach wasn't feeling well (coincidence?) so he didn't come, but I was pleasantly surprised to hear Jacob say "Wait for me Mommy, I'w come wiss oou." We spent the drive talking about voting and what it is. At this age he has a good enough understanding of the world that I am usually able to come up with a way of describing things on his level. My joy in this development never ceases. I love having conversations with Jacob. I can't get enough of it. And the stuff that comes out of his mouth is so validating, like "Yeah, I am doing a good job. I've brought a child into this world and have sucessfully raised him to the point where he says things that make sense, can carry on conversations with other people and be understood by them." For so long 'interpreter' was included in my job description, I am kind of missing it.

At the polling place Jacob was full of questions, and when we got up to the desk I gave my name as he proceeded to detail his life story to the women there. He's so stinkin cute that they just ate it up, but what happens when that cuteness wears off and people start ignoring his little stories, arm motions and all?

Well, I'm hitting that 12am mark that I swore would be the point when I turn off the computer, and this posting is still missing a lot of the 'cuteness' I had in mind. Frankly, the stuff I did write about is mostly just weird...so I think I'll try to pick up where I left off at another time. Goodnight.