Tor Tales: End of the Term

End of the term! End of the term! For me, that means no more teaching until mid-January--and what chaos will I sow with this sudden glut of free time? For Lars, as my previous post mentioned, that meant heavy-duty conferencing at the American Geophysical Union. So on 12/2, we sloshed through the sodden streets of San Francisco to meet some Wyoming friends for brunch. Then Lars watched Tor so that I could attend an engaging public lecture on Mars. Quid pro quo and all that.

Dipping bacon in syrup: some things don't need teaching

Unfortunates sans plaid were barred at the door

The rest of the week was drizzly, but the elf and I still had a good time. I'm continually tickled by new things he's doing, some of which are obviously thanks to day care.

--While we were driving, Tor started singing "Jingle bells, jingle bells, jingle all the waaaay," which marks the first time that he sang a song learned elsewhere and I actually recognized it. (Because of the words. Definitely not because of the tune.)

--Every day, Lars goes to work. It appears that every day, he also waves and says "Bye!" before closing the garage door, because that's the behavior Tor has started imitating over and over in our coat closet. Then he busts out with "I'm HO-OME!" Punching a clock probably seems the height of glamour to him, but the wisdom of a few more years should complicate that perspective.

Underbite indicates full concentration

His sustained entertainment is worth the
inevitable future hand-in-the-door moment

--Tor only consistently identifies a few alphabet letters (B, O, S, T, X, and Y), but he's started to point them out on signage around town. He also recognizes his name if he sees it printed somewhere, even without prompting or context.

--Most of all, I love that we have little conversations. Today when we pulled up at day care, ours went like this:

Me: What are you going to do today at Sonia's?

Tor: I learning.

Me: You're going to learn?

Tor: Mama learning.

Me: Yes, Mama's going to learn today too. Mama likes learning.

Tor: Everyone learning.

Me: Right, everyone is learning every day.

Tor: Snowman is decoration.

Me: Okay, let's go see the snowman.

I admit the cohesion fell apart at the end there, but it was legit for a minute! He even abstracted!

We're working on recasting his utterances as full sentences as models for him, and encouraging him to use full sentences when he knows how. E.g., "More Mickey Mouse Clubhouse!" becomes "May I please have more Mickey Mouse Clubhouse?" "May I please have more ___" is a favorite formulation of his, although the beginning sounds more like "Maymai plees" at this point.

Our budding omphaloskeptic

When Lars came home from San Francisco, his folks came with him, so we all got to hang out Saturday morning and decorate the tree, to Tor's delight. Thanks to Pakka for sharing his photos!