“Thank you” by Kinsley & Picture of the week

The other day Kinsley and I were sitting down to lunch at Mom and Dad Lavallee’s house.  As I served Kinsley a bowl of his favorite noodles (quinoa noodles), he was making his happy noises.  Then after a couple bites with the spoon, he grabbed a noodle with his hand, turned and looked at me and did the sign language for “thank you”.  My mom was up getting something, so I told her Kinsley just said thank you for his noodles.  Then he turned her direction and said it again, this time with both the sign and the sounds he uses for ‘thank you’ – basically the vowels without the consonants.  The unprompted wholehearted appreciation brought such joy. And as I wrote this it struck me how often he says thank you and please choosing the time himself.

He said it to me tonight while he was eating his cereal (yes, long day, cereal for supper!)  The sign we taught him is what I understand of the American Sign Language – to put your hand to your mouth and bring it away.  He’s done it quite precisely for a number of weeks now.  Tonight – again, unprompted – he did the sign and said the sounds.  Then he put his hand to his cheek, still looking at me.  Then he put his hand to his ear and said the sounds for thank you!  I don’t know what was going through his mind, but it made me wonder – Can one’s ears (listening) act with appreciation the same way one’s mouth (words) can?!

And for the picture of the week (well, 2 from last week too)

Last week’s favorite discovery – the fence doesn’t have the cross bars that the gate does.

Picking my battles on my sick days last week: So he got his clothes dirty or soaked, and it wasn’t quite time for bed yet, but close.  And it was warm, so we just didn’t bother with putting clothes on a wired Kinsley for a little while.  Also, he’s tall enough to pull the bag of celery off the table, quite happily pulling the celery out and breaking a piece off the bunch.  A new version of the tango in the works?!

Today at the office.  He’s always extra independent at the office and wanted to eat the banana at his little table where he plays.  As long as he sat still he was allowed (which didn’t last the whole banana of course!)