10 REASONS MY BABY IS CUTER THAN YOURS

The whole "tagged" thing got me thinking, I really could brag on my baby way more than myself. And it's somewhat acceptable in American culture to brag about your children, so here goes;

1. She's nearly 2 and 1/2, but still gets the syllables in two-syllable words mixed up. My favorite is "chicken" for "kitchen." Now we've taken to calling the kitchen, the chicken. For some reason I don't have a problem with this adult infantalizing of our language, when I do indeed have problems with parents who talk to their kids constantly in baby-jabber e.g. "Does Emma-wee want to weah her wed waincoat today? Does she? Oh, mommy wuvs dat waincoat!" And then are surprised when, in preschool, their kids are diagnosed with speech impediments and need hours of expensive therapy to correct a problem that they have created. JUST SPEAK LIKE FRIGGIN' ADULTS PEOPLE! PLEASE! gads.
Actually the aforementioned problem makes me laugh my ass off because it usually happens to over-indulgent yuppie parents, and they get what they deserve. :)
As long as 'ella pronounces both "chicken" and "kitchen" correctly, we're fine.

2. Speaking of cute language things, she also came up with saying "Weeeee" in place what I think should be "very" or "way". We have also taken to using this, adverb, shall we say, in our own speech, especially around her. Example: 'ella and Daddy Bruce have a nighttime ritual, which helps her go night-night, where they walk around the house and turn all the lights off, and say "night-night kitchen/chicken" "night-night bathroom" etc. Once, she realized her sippy cup was still in the kitchen after they'd turned off the lights, so she ran to get it and immediately exclaimed, "ooo, it weee dark in the chicken!!" Still cracks me up. We imagine it is very dark, indeed, inside the chicken.

3. Have I mentioned 'ella goes to a Jewish temple preschool? Well, she does. We're not Jews, but one of my grandmothers was and we like the educational /enrichment aspects of it, plus the warm fuzzy care they give and the added bonus of having around 20 surrogate Jewish mothers, blah blah blah. Right now they're on Passover Break. Before Passover break, as you might imagine, they were gearing up with all sorts of songs, art projects featuring Baby Moses, etc. A couple mornings before vacation, she woke up and spontaneously told her father, "Let my people Go!" We think she wanted out of her crib. Again, we are still laughing about this.

4. As another sign of her brilliance, she already has imaginary friends. They are fairie-sized, near as we can tell, they like to hang out near lamps, and they are named Coco, Bobo, and Plunk-o, near as we can tell. She catches "Coco" in her hands like a firefly, gives him a smooch and sends him off to school. (this happens a lot at bedtime- so apparently her fairie-friends live in a different space-time-zone).

5. She tries to kiss our devil-cat Hazel on the butt, even though we've repeatedly advised against that.

6. The actual cuteness- well, I'm extremely paranoid about pedophiles and stalkers, for reasons I may elaborate on later, so I refuse to post photos of her- but suffice it to say, she's cuter than a bug's ear. She is just starting to get hair, so she still looks somewhat baby-like, and the hair she is getting in? That's right, it's a mullet.

7. Maybe it's because she's 2, but she wants everything in twos now. This is either really cute, or it drives me crazy. She has to have TWO sippies, not just one. One with juice, one with milk. Or both with milk. She doesn't care that it's the same substance in different bottles - she wants TWO. She's our two-fisted wonder.

8. She's also a dancing fool, and has been ever since she could move. Maybe I'm just a doting parent, but ever since she was TINY she's been able to pick out music from the general noise-stream going on around her- and soon as she hears it, she would either go stock-still, or start bopping around like she was on SoulTrain. One day she came home from daycare, heard some jingle music on the TV, and said "shake your booty mommy!" and stuck her butt out and started shakin' it. I did not teach her this. It's clearly natural talent.

9. This goes under the more disturbing traits- a little background- I haven't spoken to my parents in 8 years because they were abusive (unprintable). She has never met them and never will. My dad was a heavy-equipment broker and had "yellow-iron fever" as my mom put it. In short, Ella LOVES heavy equipment. Bulldozers, backhoes, D-10s, hot asphalt plants, huge earthmovers, whatever. To her, they all go by the beloved name, "Truck!" While I encourage the tomboy-ness of this, I know that God is laughing at me.

10. She puts pajamas on her stuffed Sneetch and calls him/her "Nietzsche!" At least that's what it sounds like. nuff said!