Memory Monday: Enter the Plot Hole

I've decided to start another regular segment on this blog, which I am going to entitle Memory Monday. Mostly, this is going to be me sharing fun moments with my kids, but as it is the Book and Baby blog, I don't think that's too out of place.

Today's adventure... my four-year-old discovers the concept of a plot hole.

My son has asked some interesting questions recently in regards to some of his favorite super-heroes. He loves to act out the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and while he had me pretending to me Michelangelo (on account of that's the only turtle I never mix up with the others), he asks, "Why don't the turtles just call the police and tell them to arrest Shredder?"

Very good point. "I don't know," I reply. "Why don't we do that?"

"Okay!" He proceeds to pick up an invisible phone and tell police that Shredder is being bad and should definitely be arrested. The police wholeheartedly agree and Shredder is thrown in jail. The turtles wait around for a while until my son realizes that pretending to be superheroes when the bad guy already got arrested is kind of boring.

"Oh," he says, sitting up. "The police fell asleep, and Shredder got out. We have to go get him."

"Okay," I agree, and off we go.

Fast forward a few weeks, and the superhero of the month is Batman. My son is questioning how The Joker keeps coming back all the time, even though Batman helps the police arrest him over and over.

"They should just have a fire jail," he declares in the car. "Then when the Joker tried to touch it, he would say, 'Ow! That's hot!' and then he wouldn't try to get out anymore."

Again, very good point. Although now I must wonder if somewhere over the various Batman universes, The Joker has ever been contained in a fire jail. (And if he was, how did he escape?)

Have you ever dissected a favorite childhood book or show by finding all the plot holes in it? (Or had someone too young to have heard of a VCR find them all for you?) Did it ruin the series or do you still love it anyway?

Fun Moments of Language Learning

My toddler daughter has taken to calling everything she doesn't know the word for "this". As we're trying to teach her we cannot read her mind and need more clarification, it's led to some amusing exchanges:

J.T.: (taking one of her toys) Let me see it.
Nene: (bursting into tears) My this! My this!

While Nene will often repeat words, it's not always when we would like it. For example, on J.T.'s birthday:

Me: Happy birthday, J.T.! Nene, say 'happy birthday'!
Nene: (smiles)
Me: Come on, Nene. It's your brother's birthday. Say, 'happy birthday'!
Nene: (smiles)
Me: Can you do it? Can you say, 'happy birthday'?
Nene: (still smiling, and with perfect pronunciation) No!

Scary to think Nene's old enough that I can start posting things she says. Even more scary to think that someday soon, I'll be hearing actual conversations between these two.

He Verbed It!

JT loves art. A lot. We brought home some paintings he did at school the other day and he was adamant about holding one of them in his hands on the ride home (as opposed to his blanket or a toy.) Reluctantly, we let him hold it, expecting it to be in tatters halfway through the ride. Nope, he held it in his hands the whole time and told us all about it. ("My painting. I paint red. I paint yellow. My painting.")

For his 2nd birthday, we got him an art easel. It's got a side to a paint on and a side with a chalkboard. JT has only used chalk once or twice before and was fascinated with the idea that he could make a mark and erase it. He also used his perfect two-year-old logic to put a word to this activity:

Using paint = painting Using the eraser = erasing Using chalk = "chalking"

Yup, he's happily scribbling all over the chalkboard with a mile-wide smile as he declares, "I chalking! I chalking!"

Daddy comes up to him and says, "Did you just verb the word chalk?"

JT grins and answers, "Yeah."

Daddy gives him a high five.

Why Funny Kid Quotes are Funny

99% of the time when people share funny kid quotes, the reason they are funny is because the child lacks some sort of understanding about the world and acted on whatever information he/she had.

A few days ago at bath time, JT demonstrated his lack of understanding on two things:
1) When a substance is in liquid form, it's not really possible to pick it up with a pincer grasp.
2) We say "thank you" when we receive something, not when we're handing it over.

It was bath time. JT reached out towards the little jets of water coming from the shower head and pinched one of them. Satisfied that he must've been holding the stream of water between his fingers, he held his hand out to give it to me. I decided to humor him and held out my hand and he proceeded to place the water that was not there into my palm. "Thank you," I told him.

"Da oo!" he replied. Then he did it again. Only he seemed to think that "Da oo" is either the word for water or the word for handing something over. So he sat there, pinching the water and thanking me as he handed it over.

It'll be interesting to see what odd lines this kid devises when he has more than a six-word vocabulary.

Parents Say the Dardest Things

We don't have any funny kid quotes yet, but as new parents we've said some amusing things now and again. Here's a recent one:

Other Half: Come look at JT!
(I come in. JT is standing in the crib, looking very proud of himself. Although this is a semi-new thing, he's stood on his own before.)
Me: Oh, he's standing again. Yea for JT!
Other Half: No, not that. What is he missing?
(After thinking for a moment, I realize that JT is not wearing pants.)
Me: Wait, did you change his diaper already?
Other Half: No, I did not.
(JT grins.)

By the way, I know God was merciful to me that morning, because although JT did manage to remove his socks and pants, his diaper was still intact. And while I did get some writing time that might've otherwise been taken up by cleaning a huge mess, I can't say I learned anything particular about the craft from this incident.