Two Stories: Portraits of a Budding Personality

Acting Casual. . .

Yesterday morning, Helena has was a bundle of mischief. TWICE she overturned a small set of Sterilite blue plastic drawers containing older Nintendo accessories (that is, pre-Game Cube) to get something the identity of which only she knew. She literally hopped from one thing to another, mostly innocent (luckily), making the living room more of a mess than it was already, and pausing to ask for "nilk" and "nanas" (that is, "milk" and "bananas").

At one point, I looked over to my sewing machine, which sits on a desk in the living room, currently with no chair (chairs are moved from room to room depending on need--eating, cello practice, sewing) and she had pushed a file box of papers & various extraneous items closer to the front of the desk. She was standing on the box, facing the sewing machine, investigating the place where the bobbin is filled. So I said questioningly, but not very sternly, "Helena, what are you doing?" And she immediately turned around and rolled her eyes up, pursing her lips and looking very non-chalant. Then she turned to look at me with wide eyes, pulled up her shirt and showed me her belly button, and said what is currently her combination of sounds that means "belly button," though it sounds like "bucky" or something similar, nodding her head and clearly waiting for my acknowledgment! I love her diversionary tactics!!

Don't Ignore the Toddler

Helena's favorite thing to do when I am working on the computer (or wasting--*ahem* spending--time checking email & blogs) is to grab me by the hand and pull me, usually over various pieces of furniture, across the house to assist her with some task, usually one involving food (the aforesaid "nanas" and "nilk," sometimes "rink").

Today, I was actually working on an assignment that my students will be completing on Calvino's Invisible Cities while I am away from class caring for a littler one. I was trying to type, holding the book in one hand so that I could read the "categories" of cities, when Helena comes up to pull me away, like usual, but I'm not budging. She fusses a little (not a crying fuss, mind you, but an annoyed imitating Momma fussing). She pulls. Then, she has an idea: she takes the book from me (when I'm busy typing), brings it around the coffee table, then goes to the bookshelf, clearly trying to figure out where to put it. She looks at the shelf, then at my black file box of class supplies, finally deciding that the floor of the entry is the best place for it. She looks up with the same wide-eyed expression and earnestly says a little babbling sentence ending with an emphatic "book." I said, "Yes, you took my book." She repeats the sentence with a nod and another emphatic, "book." She then comes over to me, takes my grading pen, and talks to me about the letters on the pen (I believe I detected "A, B, A, B"), reveling in the fact that she now has my complete & undivided attention, having taken the offending item.