Big and Little Girls

I watch my 8 month old niece, Dorita, two days a week while her wonderful mommy Chloe teaches 5th grade. We started at the end of last school year when Dorita was a itty bitty lump of snuggles and back then Chucky-Sue was wary of her, she never liked it if Jake or I held her; she never wanted t share toys or even recognize this wriggly crying thing in her mommy's arms.

Fast forward through an all too short summer and Dorita is not just a lump anymore! She plays, babbles, crawls and more importantly, fights back. Chucky-Sue has grown to like her a bit more, they will sit and do "parallel play" for a decent amount of time. But Chucky-Sue still tries to boss her around. She has just started talking in two word sentences, her favorites being "Bay-bay NO!" when Dorita crawls too close to a favorite toy and "Bay-bay Bye bye?" when Dorita grabs the toy back.

Chucky-Sue is completely certain that she is the babysitter for Dorita. She gets very worried ("Oh No Bay-bay!") when Dorita fusses, she constantly makes sure Dorita has her bink, and will jam it in her face until it actually reaches her mouth. More often than not it pokes her eyes or forehead first. When I feed Dorita, Chucky Sue goes back and forth from our snack cupboard, offering her cousin all her fruit snacks and my chocolate. When we read books, Dorita must sit and watch as Chucky-Sue shows her all the pictures and babbles her own stories. Thankfully Dorita loves watching kids play, so it's been working out well!

From stories my mom told me about my toddlerhood, I too, wanted to be a grown-up right away; I wanted to be with the adults, talk to them all the time and I think Chucky-Sue has inherited the same trait!!

For Grandmothers: Yes, Chucky-Sue has a lot more words, she is soaking them up! She now says Baybay (baby) DoughFah (Dora) Way (Wait) and WoWo (You're Welcome) and understands even more, she knows ball, cup, dish, fork, diaper (we say Diaper? and she answers yes or no for a new diaper. Classy system I know.), wait, slow down, slide, swing, run, book, puppy, and kitty. She signs thank you, more, eat, and drink almost 100% correctly most of the time. She is great with the new two word sentences, mostly "*person* bye-bye?"