Lap Ian
As I write this, I’m sitting at the computer, legs crossed, with a cat spread across my lap.* She’s purring, looking cute, and no doubt wondering what more she can do to coax me into dropping just a few more cat food pellets into her food dish.
In an amazing display of mimicry, Ian has also learned to rest in my lap. He’ll lay face-first across my lap, cooing cutely, and no doubt wondering what more he can do to coax me into giving him just a little more bottle. Or maybe he didn’t learn this behavior from the cats since they tend to spend all day hiding until they hear the kids’ room door latch shut for naptime. No matter where he picked it up, I can’t sit on the floor with the kids anymore without Ian crawling across my legs.
I sit on the floor with the kids often. If I’m not busy feeding someone, changing someone, or cleaning up after someone, I’m on the floor. While down there, I read to the kids, stack blocks, and yell at Abbie to stop ripping her books. Ian likes to take this opportunity to crawl up to me, flop his arms over my legs, and roll like a beached flounder until he positions himself across my lap perpendicular to me. From there he’ll continue rolling, perhaps chewing on his fingers or my leg, and making occasional noises. It would be unbearably cute if he didn’t soak my pants with drool after a couple of books.
Tory will do the same thing, but he’s more of a climber. He enjoys crawling up to me, pulling himself up by my shirt, and cruising around my body until I notice him and, hopefully, give him a little more bottle.
I’m glad that I’ve found a personality difference between them. I know that it takes time for children to develop into little people, but usually I can only speak about their personality traits in vague terms, like Ian is a little more patient, or Tory has a slightly higher gravitational pull. Most of the traits are the same like they both sleep well at night, like drinking their bottles, and hate it when Abbie pushes them over onto their heads. Now when someone asks what they like to do, I can say that Ian likes to crawl in my lap, while Tory likes to circle around me.
Of course Abbie doesn’t sit idly and let me pay a modicum of attention to a brother when I could be paying full attention to her. Maybe she’ll throw a book in my lap and on top of a brother. Maybe she’ll circle around to my back, knocking Tory over if necessary, and climb aboard. Maybe she’ll try to bounce on my lap with a look of glee in her eyes that says, “first born!” Whatever she does, our floor sessions often degenerate into greater violence until I rise to set someone down for a nap.
At naptime, I can set the boys down for their naps easily since they’re within arm’s reach of wherever I’m sitting, plus they’re wound down from all that sitting and reading. Either that or they’re screaming bounced around on them, which works just as well because they’ll scream to sleep quickly. Abbie needs a bit more unwinding before naptime as we sing and march through the house. When she finally goes down, I’m usually ready for a nap. In fact, I’m ready to sleep right now. It’s easy for me to move since the cat left a few minutes ago.
* It’s the soft one, not the fat one.
In an amazing display of mimicry, Ian has also learned to rest in my lap. He’ll lay face-first across my lap, cooing cutely, and no doubt wondering what more he can do to coax me into giving him just a little more bottle. Or maybe he didn’t learn this behavior from the cats since they tend to spend all day hiding until they hear the kids’ room door latch shut for naptime. No matter where he picked it up, I can’t sit on the floor with the kids anymore without Ian crawling across my legs.
I sit on the floor with the kids often. If I’m not busy feeding someone, changing someone, or cleaning up after someone, I’m on the floor. While down there, I read to the kids, stack blocks, and yell at Abbie to stop ripping her books. Ian likes to take this opportunity to crawl up to me, flop his arms over my legs, and roll like a beached flounder until he positions himself across my lap perpendicular to me. From there he’ll continue rolling, perhaps chewing on his fingers or my leg, and making occasional noises. It would be unbearably cute if he didn’t soak my pants with drool after a couple of books.
Tory will do the same thing, but he’s more of a climber. He enjoys crawling up to me, pulling himself up by my shirt, and cruising around my body until I notice him and, hopefully, give him a little more bottle.
I’m glad that I’ve found a personality difference between them. I know that it takes time for children to develop into little people, but usually I can only speak about their personality traits in vague terms, like Ian is a little more patient, or Tory has a slightly higher gravitational pull. Most of the traits are the same like they both sleep well at night, like drinking their bottles, and hate it when Abbie pushes them over onto their heads. Now when someone asks what they like to do, I can say that Ian likes to crawl in my lap, while Tory likes to circle around me.
Of course Abbie doesn’t sit idly and let me pay a modicum of attention to a brother when I could be paying full attention to her. Maybe she’ll throw a book in my lap and on top of a brother. Maybe she’ll circle around to my back, knocking Tory over if necessary, and climb aboard. Maybe she’ll try to bounce on my lap with a look of glee in her eyes that says, “first born!” Whatever she does, our floor sessions often degenerate into greater violence until I rise to set someone down for a nap.
At naptime, I can set the boys down for their naps easily since they’re within arm’s reach of wherever I’m sitting, plus they’re wound down from all that sitting and reading. Either that or they’re screaming bounced around on them, which works just as well because they’ll scream to sleep quickly. Abbie needs a bit more unwinding before naptime as we sing and march through the house. When she finally goes down, I’m usually ready for a nap. In fact, I’m ready to sleep right now. It’s easy for me to move since the cat left a few minutes ago.
* It’s the soft one, not the fat one.
posted by Matt at
11:35 PM
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