Temper, Temper!

Sophia continues to be quite strong-willed. I'm guessing she'll grow out of this one about never. Oh dear. She has learned where the cookies (actually rice cakes, but it's all in the name) live and frequently points to the cupboard demanding one.

She also prefers to hold her own books, often picking it up and throwing them on the floor when we try to hold them for her. Aunt Meghan and Uncle Patrick sent her a wonderful Baby Einstein book for her birthday that she never lets us read to her. She looks at it all the time, but only by herself.

One of her favorite games is finding Daddy's belly button. Generally, any mention of "belly button" will cause her to start tugging on Paul's shirt.

Tonight she had a massive, 10 minute tantrum. She was angry that Paul wanted her to sit next to him to read a book; she wanted to sit on his lap. So she screamed, and screamed, and cried. When he left the room she followed him so she could continue to scream out us. We had to remind ourselves the inspiring words of our friend Derek, "I will not negotiate with terrorists."

Frequently as Sophia has started to talk more I have quoted to friends and family a passage I once read in a book about baby babble. I thought it would be funny to share it with you. It's from The Big Over Easy by Jasper Fforde. (Fforde is one of my favorite authors, although I admit I don't like this book as much as his Thursday Next series). The Big Over Easy takes place in a world where nursery rhyme characters and ancient Greek gods live among us. The main character, Jack Spratt, has invited Prometheus (yes, the Titan) into his home where Prometheus encounters Stevie, the one-year-old, and they have the following conversation:

Stevie then stared at Prometheus with all the serious that one-year-olds can
muster, with is quite a lot.
"Da-woo," he said at length.
"A-boo," replied Prometheus with a large smile.
"Da-woo!" said Stevie with a shriek of laughter.
"You speak baby gibberish?" asked Jack.
"Fluently. The adult-education center ran a course, and I have a lot of time on my
hands."
"So what did he say?"
"I don't know."
"I thought you said you spoke gibberish?"
"I do. but your baby doesn't. I think he's speaking either pre-toddler nonsense, a form of infant burble or an obscure dialect of gobbledygook. In any event, I can't understand a word he's saying."

I think it expresses how many of us feel about speaking to a toddler. Sophia clearly knows what she's saying, and most of the time we understand her. Certainly other toddlers understand her quite well. I think toddlers speak their own language that we then train out of them by teaching them our language. I wonder if toddlers speak the same language all over the world, or if it's different in each country?