Two Little Tales

Wilder had a pretty eventful day for a 1-year-old yesterday, filled with bad (story No. 1) and good (story No. 2):

1. I pick up Wilder from daycare each day around 3:30. The second I walked in the door, I was greeted by the somewhat-serious face of Miss Toni, who's one of Wilder's favorites. She handles the big kids' room, where Wilder sometimes spends time because he A) likes the big kids, and B) likes Miss Toni (and she adores him).

"I have something to tell you," she said, somewhat ominiously. Immediately, of course, my mind filled with images of Wilder having one of a myriad bad things happen to him. But then my sense kicked in and I knew if it was THAT bad they wouldn't have waited until I walked through the door to tell me.

"Uhh, OK ..." I said. "What?"

"Wilder got bit today."

My second immediate impulse was to ferret out the kid who bit him and bite his little ass back. But that's just the Mama Bear in me.

"By who?" I asked.

"J.J. They were fighting over a toy and he bit him." At this point I peered into the room at the always adorable little J.J. He's a black kid, a few months older than Wilder, and he is quite cute. He sometimes runs up to me when I get there to pick him up. On this day, he was dancing on his tippy toes with a huge grin on his face, obviously happy and oblivious to his transgressions earlier in the day. I wanted to be mad, but I know he knows no better at this point, and besides that he was looking darn adorable with his big brown gleaming eyes. And, at some point my kid will probably be the aggressor, and I don't want to be reminded of how I blew my cool when he was the victim.

He did, however, leave marks. Grrrr ...

I found Wilder and he was clearly no worse for the wear. One thing I did forget to ask was if J.J.'s parents were told. I'll ask today. If Wilder was doing that, I'd want to know. And I want them to address it at home so that Wilder doesn't become this kid's chew toy again.

This morning, as Jerry was putting W's jacket on him, he said: "Now Wilder, if J.J. wants a toy you're playing with, give it to him." I wanted to add: "And if he bites you again, bite his little butt back — HARD."

But I didn't. Because that would be, like, wrong and stuff.

2. Last night I was giving Wilder his daily bath. We were picking up animal bath toys and going over what they were and what sound they make. I.E.:

"Pig. Oink oink."
"Duck. Quack quack."
"Sheep. Baa Baa" (Incidentally, Wilder has this one DOWN. I don't even have to show him the sheep. I just say, "What does a sheep sound like?" And he says: "Baaaa," clearly delighted with his knowledge of this particular farm animal. I have to post video of it soon. It's a very impressive "baaaa.")

And so on.

At some point, Wilder found a stray animal I hadn't reviewed with him. He picked it up, held it up to me, and then this came out of his mouth:

"Wha dat?"

What the ...?

"JERRY!!!" I yelled. "Get in here!"

At which point Wilder yelled: "Daaaa! Dada! DAAAAADAAAAAA!"

It was an elephant, which he did at least try to say. And he was very amused by my elephant noises, which sounded more like some sick or birthing swamp creature.

Anyway, our boy asked his first question, said his first two word sentence, if you don't count "thank you," which he uses liberally and only sometimes appropriately; or "nite nite," which clearly doesn't count.

He. Said. "Wha dat?"

And I couldn't be prouder.