Dad makes a sacrifice
I'll say this upfront. I'm not entirely thrilled with a particular incident last week but, at the same time, I suppose I can't really argue with the results either. I have to say that, for nearly 18 months now, I've been pretty good at not pushing Elliott one way or another by inundating him with toy trucks or whipping Nerf footballs at him. And that's probably a good thing because I get the sense that he's pretty malleable. Pretty much the only things we ever show him on youtube are old clips of The Muppet Show and Sesame Street and, after getting to watch about 10 minutes of Muppets Take Manhattan not long ago and now that's the only thing he wants. Shelbi walked down an aisle at Toys R Us the other day with DVDs and he couldn't stop pointing at all of them, no matter what was on the cover saying "Mup-pah?" "Mup-pah?"
So I've let Elliott pretty much explore whatever he finds interesting at his own pace. And that decision has yielded some previously unforeseen consequences. Because, while Elliott has a wide variety of interests, ranging from adding new contacts on my cell phone and rearranging our computer desktop to climbing up on chairs, grabbing the cheese slicer and then trying to fillet off his bellybutton, he definitely prefers a few select activities.
First off, my boy loves to sweep and mop. He completely freaks out when he wakes up in the morning, runs into the kitchen and finds that we have moved our broom and our swiffer into the garage. Interestingly, this is almost assuredly not a habit he picked up from either Shelbi or me. Elliott is by far the most diligent cleaner in our home. Cleaning supplies are close to being his favorite toys in the world.
That is until about a week ago. I'll just come out and say it. Elliott is now the proud owner of his own baby doll. Elliott loves babies. He can't see one in the mall or a picture of a toddler (even himself) without desperately needing to kiss it. The other day I phoned Shelbi at work and said: "Elliott just pulled out two bags of diapers and is now sitting on the floor in his room going back and forth kissing the babies on each package." She paused. "We might need to get him his own baby doll," she said. And when I didn't immediately start screaming while taking Elliott outside and whipping footballs at him, she took that as me giving my blessing to go out and buy him one that night.
Shelbi and Elliott went to Toys R Us that evening and into the giant aisle of baby dolls. It was Elliott's Valhalla. He eventually settled on one particular doll although, for a while, it was touch and go between his fairly innocuous choice and an anatomically correct baby that is used to teach potty training.
So, yes, my son plays with dolls. Or at least one doll. The day after we made the purchase, I put Elliott down for his nap and left his doll on the changing table. Elliott immediately popped up screaming and yelling "Ba-ba! Ba-ba!" I looked at him curiously since he has never slept with anything in his crib before. I handed him his doll and he immediately laid back down, cuddling it and was asleep in minutes. Now he can't sleep without it. The other night, Elliott was in the midst of talking himself to sleep when suddenly Shelbi heard piercing screams coming from his room. Instead of finding that he was pinned under a collapsed crib, which is what the intensity of his cries would have signified, she found that Elliott had simply dropped his baby (which I have named Fred) out of the crib.
Elliott also loves pretending to feed his baby which is, admittedly, adorable and makes me think he will make a great big brother someday. That is until Elliott is angry at something and then proceeds to grab Fred off the coach by the arm and hurl him across the room.
Elliott and Fred being cuddle buddies.
That picture is too cute for words! My son is obsessed with cleaning....he is constantly pulling out our vacuum, mop and swiffer and cleaning! I even bought him a toy broom, mop and vacuum from Toys R Us, but he still wants mine!
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