Yoda baby, and other stories

This morning Rachel woke up at a decent hour for the first time in days (read: not 5 AM or 3 AM). It was so nice to get a good night's rest. So nice, in fact, that I kicked Andrew out of bed to get her breakfast while I slept in some more. Since I've been the one getting up with her at 5 and 3 AM I figured it was fair.

Later they came and woke me up and we all played on the bed for a while, hitting each other with pillows, and bouncing, and knocking Rachel over. It was fun.

Rachel was having a great time and then all of a sudden she stopped jumping, looked around, reached to the ceiling, and said,

"Big tent!"

We agreed with her. We have a mosquito net covering our bed and she has a mosquito net covering her bed. Our "tent" is significantly bigger. After we were through validating her observation she turned into Yoda.

"Big tent," she repeated, "Little not."

She's sounded so wise and serious and her voice was even a little creaky. It was perfect. Had her ears been a little bigger and she suddenly turned green and wrinkly I wouldn't have known who was Yoda and who was my baby girl!

Besides taking her opposites, like big and little, and her synonyms, like big and little-not, very seriously, Rachel also takes idiomatic expressions rather literally.

The other day we were going out for a walk and I told Rachel I didn't want to push the stroller so she'd have to walk as well. She then wanted "Elmo," her child-leash that is red and has Elmo on the front. I looked around in a few places that Elmo normally is but didn't find it anywhere.

"Rachel, I can't find it, so you'll have to hold my hand the whole way, okay?"

"Nooo!" she screamed, which is why we have the leash, "Want! Elmo!"

"Look," I said, "I don't know where it is off the top of my head. We need to go...now...so we have to leave without it."

My puzzling expression made her forget why she wanted the leash. Instead she was using all her brain power to figure out what "the top of my head" had to do with "Elmo" and why she had to "look" there.

She spent the whole walk repeating, "Head...Top...Elmo? See? Head top? Momma head top Elmo."

Several days later and she still hasn't figured out what I meant. We test her by occasionally saying "top of my head." Without fail she attempts to examine the top of our head while asking where Elmo is.

And this story doesn't involve Rachel at all so I don't know how to ease into it, but Andrew and I were up way too late talking last night. That's one of the dangers of going to bed with your best friend every night. We never run out of things to say to each other, or haven't yet, so eventually have to call a truce: I'll stop talking if you stop talking so we can finally go to sleep.

It only makes matters worse when we stay up until after 1 AM writing and editing papers because then when we talk it only gets more and more ridiculous as the minutes tick by.

"Stop talking and I'll say the prayer and then we will shall go to sleep!" I said.

Obviously I was tired. I used two modal verbs right in a row. Andrew noticed and said,

"Whatever you say, shall it could be would!"

This did not help us get ready for saying the prayer. His "shall it could be would" absolutely cracked me up. It sounded like he was singing Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo. Can't you hear it?

Shall it could be would mechicka boola
bibbidi-bobbidi-boo...

We need to start going to bed earlier. That's the only solution.