Benglish - his latest and greatest!

"Ohhhh, how you doing that to me mom!?!"
What he means is why are you doing that to me mom? Which he says on a regular basis now. In this instance it was while I was trying to get a grass burr off of his pants during our hike this afternoon. That'll teach me to invade his space without explaining myself to him first! He very much wants to be in charge of all things BEN.

It was soon followed by, "how you taking that from me mom?", which he said when I picked up a toy that he wasn't immediately playing with... but it turns out he had big plans for in the near future, and it's random placement in the middle of the hallway wasn't as meaningless and random as I had wrongly assummed!

"You need to settle down!"
Spoken to his apparently ornary hula hoops during play time today. He's really into disciplining his toys, although I prefer to call it loving guidance. I'm not afraid to bring it though :), when necessary! Which might be the reason I also heard this today...
"You want to go to time out? No? OK then, you listen to me!"
and my personal favorite...
"Look in my eyes teddy. Teddy, TEDDY... look in my eyes!"

And the last doozy of the day was...
"Hey, you stop doing that to me!"
Motivated by my innocent, and mind you ultimately loving, attempts to get a hat on his head before he went out the door with daddy to the hardware store! Once again, it wasn't so much that I wanted him to wear a hat... he LOVES hats and would gladly wear one all the time! It was the fact that I didn't make him aware of the ensuing hatting! So here's one of those I'm-still-sort-of-figuring-this-out parenting moments... I do want him to say those words to other people, kids and adults, if they are being pushy or invading his space. I definately want him to have a voice and a good sense of taking care of himself. But I also don't want him to speak rudely to mommy or daddy. Although I did put it on his head without telling him I was going to do it. I would probably be annoyed if Marc did that to me. But I did have a good reason, I wanted him to be warm enough - a motherly duty - because I love him of course! So do I tell him, "I'm sorry, mommy just wanted to make sure you had a hat because it's cold outside." or "We don't talk to mommy like that, you should say 'Please don't do that mommy'" or "Watch it you little sass bucket!" He he he he he he :) I think I said a combo of all three followed by an indepth conversation with Marc about how we want to teach Benjamin how to defend himself, but still be polite and kind... which just ended in the fact that I think sometimes we can expect him to "thank you" and "please" everything to death... there are limits people! I certainly don't add a please and thank you to EVERYTHING I say... maybe I'm the real sass bucket.
Rambling now! Wow this blog thing is fun. Even if only our dear cousin Andie, our sweet friend Holly and Ben's future mother-in-law Jill ever read it!!! That's right people - I have a site meter now!...I know you're not reading!
We love you anyway though :)
-Jaimee