Week 160: Speeches, cooperating, and playmates

I’d have to go back and check the archives to be sure, but I’m pretty sure that Mandy is more talkative than Sam was at this age. She’ll babble and coo at you for minutes on end if you don’t glace at your watch and tell her that you really need to be going now. The other day Ger and I were lying on our bed with Mandy between us, and the little gal was turning frantically between us and burbling at us like a madwoman. Just “Goooorr uuh!” this and “”Mmmmbbblluuaah Guh!” that while frantically flailing her tiny limbs and opening her eyes as wide as she could. I like to think of her doing it in her best Jack Baur voice, trying to say “No, listen! Listen to me OR THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE WILL DIE!”

She’s still an amazingly easy baby, ready to comply with any written order we bring her, such as the ones pertaining to going to sleep when we tell her to and staying that way for the next six to seven hours. Last night we put Mandy down in her crib while her eyes were still open and she just lay there until she went to sleep on her own. Of course, if my knowledge of cosmic karma is correct this means that I’ll pay for it by being eaten by angry beavers one day, but you know what? Deal.

Sam, on the other hand, is still hosing everything down with sparkling water drawn from her newfound well of independance. She’s still insisting on freaking out insto spastic hijinks whenever we’re trying to put her down to bed, though we did have an earnest discussion the other night about how if she didn’t want Daddy to grab her by the ankle, pull her out from under the bed, and carry her upside down back to her bedroom to finish brushing her teeth she’d just have to learn to cooperate.

Still, I feel bad for her. With the weather lately we haven’t been able to get out of the house much. This weekend we actually went to the mall just to get out and let her climb over things that we wouldn’t have to replace if they got broken. They had one of those big kiddie play areas near the food court, so we just dumped her in there and watched over her while she and about five thousand other toddlers swarmed over the playground and each other like some kind of roiling hive mind.

Watching Sam in this kind of situation was actually pretty interesting. When we first put her in there she immediately sought out another little girl who was about her size. This was her new bestest friend in the world, as evidenced by the way Sam glommed onto her and followed her everywhere she went, jabbering at her about who knows what. When the girl’s parents retrieved her from the undulating sea of toddlers, Sam would immediately look around for a replacement. This actually worked out pretty well, as most of the time the other girl would jabber back and appear to appreciate the company. Occasionally, though, one of Sam’s new partners would get a panicked look on her face and try to move away, only to become more stricken when Sam would follow after her, shouting something about Curious George or Grumpy Bear.

And then we went to the Mrs. Field’s Cookies stand and got Sam a chocolate chip cookie the size of her head, so all in all it was a pretty good outing.