a sticky situation

LOL...OK, you guys are going to love this one. Seth just came to me pretending he had something for me to eat. Now, he loves to do this, and usually he just holds out an empty cup for me to pretend to sip from in delight, or holds an imaginary delicacy pinched in his little fingers. So when he came to me and held his fingers to my lips, I pretended to eat whatever he was offering. "Oh, yummy, thank you!"
Then I saw that he actually held something in his fingers. It looked like a seed. On closer inspection, I thought of something else. "Sethie, um, where did you get that?"
He grinned and pointed to his nose.

infectious laughter

Nobody needs to tell me Anaya's grandmother was a drama teacher. I probably could have figured it out even if Alan hadn't told me. For instance, today she was telling me something that was, to her, very important. "That's wonderful, Anaya," I answered absently.
"You shouldn't just say 'wonderful,' Mommy," she admonished. "You need to say it like this! She threw her arms in the air. "WON-derful!"
Vocabulary expansion is one of Anaya's hobbies. It's very entertaining, though not always in ways she wants it to be. She loves big words; the more syllables, the merrier. But she doesn't always get them right, resulting in unintentional hilarity at her expense.
Today, during a rather boisterous game of tag, she bumped her lip. It wasn't bad, but it bled a little, so I gave her an ice cube to hold on it. Soon she came to me with a sober announcement. "I think I know what the problem is, Mommy."
"Oh? What is it?" I asked.
"It's pain." This was followed shortly by, "Mommy, it's not funny!"
"'Pain' just means 'owies,' Anaya," I explained.
She returned a few minutes later. "Mommy, the pain is getting worser and worser!" Her eyes widened in staged fear. "I think I need to go to the DOCK-tor."
I assured her she would be fine, that we didn't need to go to the doctor unless there was lots and lots of blood, but the promise was deemed hollow. Soon she was back. "Mommy, I think there is an in-fec-tion," she announced. Once again the information was followed with, "Mommy, it's not funny!" and then, of course, "Mommy, what's an infection?"
Now, I used to think my English skills were sufficient for most of what life threw at me. But I suddenly found myself struggling for words. "Um, an infection is, well, it's when germs get into a cut," I tried to explain lamely. "Then it hurts very badly, and it gets worse and worse." It was no use; I could see the wheels turning, and I couldn't seem to find a way to explain that she didn't have a life-threatening infection, and wasn't going to get one in the next five minutes.
"And is there lots of BLOOD coming down?" a wide-eyed Anaya offered hopefully, making flowing motions down her chest.
"Not exactly, well, not always. It's more like some yellow stuff," I muttered.
"But Mommy, what IS an infection?"
I tried to find pictures of an infected wound on the Internet, but couldn't seem to come up with any. Anaya was getting impatient. "Mommy, what is an infection?"
"The pathological state resulting from the invasion of the body by pathogenic organisms," I spluttered (thank you, Google).
"Oh." She scampered off, satisfied, I suppose, that there were still several big words left in the world to learn.

Potty training

Seth just loves "helping" me in the kitchen. Last week he wanted to help me knead bread. "Go get the stool from the bathroom," I instructed him. He disappeared obediently into the bathroom, but came back a few moments later without the stool. Then I noticed that his hand was wet. Suddenly suspicious, I said, "Where did you get your hand wet? Show Mommy."
Seth led me into the bathroom and cheerfully lifted the lid on the toilet.
Now, please, someone assure me that he has never washed his hands there before.