Friday, July 29, 2011

Baby Sister



My three-year-old is going through a bit of an identity crisis.  He is teetering on the precipice between wanting so badly to be a big boy but still wanting to be Mama's little boy. I promised him I'll always make room for him in my lap even if it means that I have to have a winch to hoist him up into it.  Unfortunately, that was little consolation to him when I evicted him out of my lap, mid-cuddle, to rescue Cora from behind the chair.  (She gets stuck there sometimes in her quest to find little things on the floor to eat.  Bugs, fuzz, dried up pieces of cheese....she doesn't discern.  Her portly self gets wedged in there pretty tight so I have to shimmy myself in there and haul her out by her legs.)

He demands to put his clothing on all by himself with not one ounce of assistance from me; hence, he's gone out in public twice with his shirt on inside out and his shorts on backwards which, I suppose, is a blessing because he has yet to understand that plaid doesn't go well with stripes.  Thankfully no one could see that underneath that mess of an ensemble he wasn't wearing any underpants. 

Kai wants to make all his own decisions but has yet to master the art of sticking to them.  For instance....

He loves Cora.  He truly does.  He hasn't shown an ounce of jealousy since she entered center stage into his life.  But when he suddenly had an equally cute baby in his midst while on vacation in Florida, he started to waffle back and forth in his loyalty to his "Cooey."

Entering stage left was Shaye, Kai's cousin who is almost 2 months younger than Cora.  It was like he suddenly realized that there were other babies in the world besides the one he had been given and now he felt like he could choose.

One instance he looked at my brother playing with Cora and possessively demanded, "That's our baby.  He belongs to our house."  (Like the little issue with wearing underpants, pronouns just aren't his thing.)

And then the very next day he's on team Shaye.  He said:
"I want a different baby.....
(then he looked back and forth from Cora to Shaye, pointed at Shaye and said,)
like THAT guy!"

Fickle, three year olds.  Too many more evictions from my lap and Kai might start looking for another mother....like THAT guy.