At age 2.5, Aidan is right smack in the middle of the disequilibrium stage. Oh, the meltdowns! It’s amazing how much angst a toddler can have. I mean, he’s only 2.5 years old and it’s like the world is ending if mama does not give him his crayons in the car.
Luckily for my first-born, he is rather amusing and highly entertaining so I haven’t harboured the thought of selling him to his grandparents. Yet.
Just the other day, my mum made curry chicken for the adults for dinner. She especially made a pot of porridge for my little man because he was nursing a cough and a fever. As Aidan and I sat down for dinner together, he insisted on spooning the curry gravy from the bowl into my plate of rice. Well, it’s good for his motor skills and all so I let him. But before I could stop him, he had conveniently dumped a spoonful of the gravy onto his porridge. Urghs!
I exclaimed loudly because, man, what a waste of food. Now he wouldn’t be able to eat the porridge, right?
WRONG.
He kicked up such a stink when I tried to stop him from eating the curry-laden porridge – and this was curry that had an extra spicy kick to it, mind you – that I decided to just let him do what he wanted. Because, TODDLER ANGST.
He proceeded to stick the porridge into his mouth as I sat there, watching him. IT WAS HILARIOUS. His face changed as he swallowed the porridge and without making a peep, he started to feed himself soup as fast as he could.
I quickly fed him some water and gave him a little “I told you so” spiel. But did our friend learn his lesson? NOOOOOOOOO.
He picked up a spoonful of curry gravy again, dunked it into his soup and TRIED TO DRINK IT UP. When I sternly told him that he should not do it because it’s spicy, his face crumpled and he started wailing dramatically.
Well, okay then. I stopped myself and let him drink the soup.
This time, the spice irritated his throat and he started coughing and sputtering until his eyes watered and his face turned red. Mama had to come to the rescue (after sniggering inwardly) and fed him water again to clear his throat. I would have felt sympathetic except, well, he kinda brought it upon himself, no? Very or bee good. After that, he didn’t attempt to ingest the curry any more.
After dinner, however, I thought about it and I realised that Aidan had really taken it like a man. He didn’t cry when he realised exactly how spicy the curry was, and he didn’t whine. He choked on the curry, drank the water and moved on. With nary a complaint.
So yes, I was sort of proud of him. Also, YAY TODDLER ATE SUPER SPICY CURRY! Atta boy!
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So the kid has been in school for the past four months and we can see that he is truly thriving after the rather difficult start. He sings all the time at home now, with some hilarious and funny lyrics.
For example, Twinkle twinkle traffic light/How I wonder what you are/Red means stop/Green means go/Yellow means wait.
Then, he commands us to make up lyrics for him. “Mummy sing airplane on road,” he says. So I do: (to the tune of The Wheels on the Bus) The airplane on the road goes zoom zoom zoom/Zoom zoom zoom/Zoom zoom zoom. After that, he says, “Sing the train on the sky!” And so on and so forth. I sing whatever he asks of me and it makes him smile.
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My little cutie. Love him like crazy.