So speaketh Clio, when asked how preschool went. As predicted, she had a rough start -- a whole lotta crying and screaming. Alastair stuck around at the school office for a while (along with a few other parents in the same boat) then left when one of the co-teachers reported that Clio was down in the low-simmer territory, as opposed to a full-on, rolling boil of misery. (Metaphors inserted by the author.) When A. picked her up at the end of the day, on the playground, she was still sticking close to one of the teachers, but at least she wasn't crying.
I expect this will be the pattern for awhile, until she really gets comfortable. Which she will. But in the meantime: How about that sentence, huh? "I was a little sad, and then I was happy." Two thoughts in one sentence, a sense of time, an awareness of emotion! This is a far cry from "Pick up!" and "More milk!" Which, admittedly, are more representative specimens of the general tone and quality of toddler-speak in the Baby Squared household. But gradually, the sentences really are getting longer and more complex, and the thoughts they express more nuanced and coherent.
One thing in the area of language development that I'm finding particularly fascinating -- as a self-professed grammar snob -- is hearing the girls tussle with the mechanics of language. Pronouns still trip them up, so we often get sentences like "her was playing with me" or "We go home to we house." Often, in these cases, I'll repeat the phrase back, with the correct pronoun, and sometimes they'll give it another shot. But they's a long way from really mastering this particular linguistic skill. Past tense is still a work in progress, and irregular plurals are still pretty much a lost cause, but hey, that's English for you. (Is there any other language in the world that has so many irregularities and inconsistencies?)
It's also interesting to notice the girls' respective strengths when it comes to verbal ability. Clio tends to put longer sentences together, but Elsa is a champ when it comes to memory / recall. One of the latest manifestations of this is her enthusiasm for "reading." Lately, It's been almost impossible to read a book *to* her; she always wants to hold and "read" them herself. For a while, my reaction to this has been one of anger and annoyance -- it's incredibly frustrating when I'm trying to read a book to Elsa and Clio together, like we've always done as part of our bedtime routine, and she's trying to grab the book out of my hands, yelling "No, I want to read it!" (and then insisting that Clio and I each read our own book, which pisses Clio off, because she wants a story read to her.)
But lately, I'm trying not to fight it as much. If Elsa insists on reading a book on her own, I say that's OK, but why doesn't she read it to me and Clio? And in doing this, I've discovered that the girl really can "read" (as in, recite / riff on) entire books if she knows them well. Sure, she doesn't do it word for word, and she adds her own little twists and interpretations. Often, there are mommies and daddies inserted into the plot and interpreted from the illustrations. (If there are two people or animals on a page, it's fairly likely, in Elsa's interpretation, that one is the other one's mommy or daddy. Inter-species parentage is quite common.) But she also frequently picks up on subtleties and complexities that I'm amazed she can recall.
It bums me out to know that I was, for awhile, missing all this by intepreting her "I want to read it" behavior as sheer willfulness. I love reading to the girls -- having them both snuggled into my lap together. It's one of the few opportunities for that kind of calm, physical closeness, and I would hate to lose it completely. But there is also something quite lovely about listening to your two-year-old's interpretation of a book, and seeing how happy she is to be listened to.
A good reminder that often, when you scratch the surface of "terrible two" behavior, you see that there's some pretty exciting developmental stuff going on.
