Lydia Log: Dad's Real Name

Further to what I last posted on the subject - Lydia has become quite the little myna bird, soaking in and spitting back her special interpretations of every uttered phrase, every question, every strangled, friendly, PG-fied cuss word. She has even taken to calling me "Aaron". Her recent developments in this area have even surprised her babysitter, who will now have to watch her trucker's mouth and curb her endearing-at-first habit of referring to the kids under her watch as "godless bastards".**

She (Lydia) is also becoming quite demanding of our evaluation and praise, a trait readily identifiable in her Dad; ordering us to come watch her, for example, eat a piece of fruit by herself, or brush her teeth, or allow us to wash her hair - things that we have been encouraging her to do for some time now. Such accomplishments are met with excited praise and encouragement from us, have become expected, and are even reflected in her own shaking, squealing, proud reactions to these new feats: "Look! I do it! Eeeeeee!" While the results are cute, I'm not sure where this falls on the scale of good parenting techniques, but I'll wager it is harmless and standard - and we'll enjoy these reactions while they last.

Related to the above, Lydia's new favourite phrase is "do it myself", as in "let me do it", and applies to... pretty much everything. Making breakfast. Getting dressed. Washing herself. Loading the family shotgun. All positives I should add, and we are more than happy that she has become so dedicated to self-improvement and learning, but man does it slow down your day. The mean time to accomplish anything essentially doubles. Fortunately, her second favourite phrase is "help, please", which she still uses pretty liberally.

And finally, in what could be a preview of her birthday/Christmas, Lydia's excitement over receiving a new bed (her previous crib is being donated to her to-be-born sibling) was downright Theo Fleury-esque. I'll be sure to have the video camera at my ready.

** Obviously I am joking, she actually calls them "effing drunken midgets".