I will admit that there are days when I forget how old Avalyn actually is. This realization will come at odd times... like when I casually ask her to accomplish a task that is years ahead of her skill-set. Oh- right, she is only two and can't properly tie a bow.
The reason for my forgetfulness is that she generally seems much more mature than just two. She is polite, obedient, converses well and is actually fairly responsible- like washing hands, throwing trash away and cleaning up the messes that she makes. But, the other day, I was thrown back and forth in this age-conundrum so much that I just had to laugh.
We were eating lunch. I had placed a plate food in front of her and then I sat down next to her with my plate. Although she was feeding herself nicely, she was eating a little slowly. This gave me plenty of time to finish my lunch and start to get a little impatient. I saw the 'enzyme clock' ticking away as she slowly picked at her food. So, I thought I would encourage her to move it along by forking the food myself and depositing it into her mouth, in one of her spacey moments.
She was so thrilled with this idea that she promptly asked me to "airplane" the food into her mouth.
Really?
So, OK, I'm doing the airplane thing when she started requesting a different thing every bite. Motorcycle! Choo-choo! Alright, kid, fine. But then it started getting more difficult when we got into; Caterpillar, butterfly, giraffe!
You guys, these things don't make sounds.
It was complicated, to say the least and I asked myself why I was even doing this for her. Then, because it hadn't occurred to me at the start of all of this, I realized that I was doing it because she is only two. Okay, my little two-year-old... "Here comes another hippo!"
"No," she says, "I'm fine. Thank you though."
Right. And now I'm back to wondering how old she really is.
