A mother to a 20 year old will probably think my following statement is a joke – Jonathan is quite the little man, he is! At Almost three years of age he has become quite an independent and sometimes headstrong boy! The mother to the 20 year old will however totally agree with my second statement – boy! But how time flies (especially when you are having fun!).
Jonathan can no longer answer to the title of a toddler! He is a real boy. He is almost three years old (the big 3 is in two weeks actually) and already so grown!
It’s not just the fact that he is almost 1 meter tall, he has developed a unique personality and he is growing to understand his own worth. This especially comes out in his ever increasing show of independence – he wants to get things done by himself, without mommy’s help (unless he asks for it), he wants to be left alone (ordering me to go away when I bother him or interfere with him too much) and he takes his own decisions too. Puberty has never started this early… nah, just kidding! But the kids of today are definitely not the kids of yesterday… here are 5 examples of occurrences marking Jonathan’s ever increasing independence.
1 – Jonathan has taken to trying and helping me with the house work. He wants to help me with the washing, shoving all the dirty clothes into the machine (especially the ones he takes off before a bath). He wants to help me pour the soap for the machine and he is the one to turn it on after everything is ready. He also likes to clean the toilet with the special brush intended for it (ordering me to leave when I try to stop him) and he likes to wash the floors too, mop and all!
When it comes to his DVD’s, his clothes and his shoes, he will always keep things tidy – returning each DVD back to its box before playing another (did I mention he operates the DVD and video in our home and his grandmothers all by himself?) his shoes are always returned to their place at the entrance of our home. Its only his toys that are always thrown about in the enthusiasm of play and are never returned – we are however working to tiding up his toys at home, jus like he must do (and already does) in kindergarten.
I cannot complain in general as Jonathan is generally a good boy and obedient. He is also a fast learner and one to try and set things right. On more than one occasion, when something broke, and especially if Jonathan has cause the breaking or tearing, he reacts to the scolding with a sad and pitiful face and then immediately runs to our stationary drawer and fetched the sticky tape – so that the broken item can be fixed. With books and other papers the solution works nicely, and he must have gotten the idea from witnessing me taping up his torn books more than once, but it was especially cute to see how his thinking works when he brought me the tape after he has accidentally broken a CD trying to get it out of its box. My husband says Jonathan also brought him the tape to fix a torn item.
2 - To top it all off, yesterday Jonathan helped me cook for the first time. The elaborate dish was just pasta but nevertheless Jonathan stirred the water and past in the pot and stood on a chair watching as the pasta cooked. He then ate the pasta he cooked for dinner. He liked to pour his own drink, helping me prepare juice for him or even getting water quire independently from the dispenser in our fringe (one Saturday morning I found 4 plastic cups filled with cold water in our living room, and not a drop spilled on the way from the kitchen and the refrigerator to where the cups stood). In the kitchen department he also insists on making his own slice of bread with chocolate, applying a butter knife to the chocolate cream and spreading it on his bread. When I try to assist him in any of these tasks he always wants to do it alone – the word “me” has become the most used word of his vocabulary. But he will ask for help if he does not succeeded or if he feels he has taken on too much, thus we usually pour apple juice form the juice bottle into a cup or Jonathans drinking bottle together. Together is in fact probably his second most used word of his vocabulary. He still likes my company and wants me to join in on almost everything he does. Ordering me how to go about joining his games.
3 – As much as he likes to do things alone, he is very impatient and has a short interest span; if he does not succeed in his task quickly he will whine his frustration and call for my help. He is also very aware of my schedule. Only this week I came late from work and my mother was babysitting. Jonathan noticed that the evening’s chores (such as eat9ing, getting a bath and going to bed) were conducted without me. My mother said he started looking for me, and even though my husband called me and I spoke to Jonathan on the phone, my mother claims he still felt quite lost without me and kept wondering about the house, eventually only falling asleep in my bed.
4 – His dependence only goes so far. Sometimes he likes to have the house to himself. Two weeks ago I was so exhausted that I fell asleep in my room although Jonathan was not taking his nap and my husband was out. I rarely leave Jonathan like this, and he immediately took advantage of the situation by watching the Simpsons on DVD, fully knowing that when I am awake he is not allowed to watch it (at 3 years of age a bit to young for the Simpsons in my opinion). I found him out when I got up and scolded him. The nest day, on Saturday morning Jonathan came tip toeing into out bedroom. On Saturdays (and every day actually) Jonathan usually wakes us up. This time he peeked at us to make sure we were asleep (stretching his neck to get a good look…the works) and then he left us to “sleep” some more (un aware that I was awake and had seen him through semi closed eyes) and happily returned alone to the living room to watch the Simpsons yet again. I decided that such cunning at the age of 3 deserves a reward, and thus he got to watch the Simpsons for about 30minutes ad I got to nap for an additional, precious half an hour. I might have allowed him a longer period of time has I not heard noises that distinctly told me that Jonathan was trying to get to his favorite serials, which are placed on top of the refrigerator. Leaving him alone in this effort was simply too much for my maternal instincts and I finally (if somewhat regretfully) got up to help him.
5 - Climbing on a chair to get to some forbidden food is by now routine. But the chairs are getting higher and from the chair in the kitchen he is already moving freely onto the marble. This is how he reaches his chips snacks. As a child I used to get to things in the kitchen using the same methods, especially to dishes that were stacked in the higher cupboards. I am considering lowering Jonathan’s plates (his cups are already in a new and low location) to spare him the need to continue to climb all over my kitchen. He has also started climbing on the chest in his room to get to the cream on it, which he likes to apply to my tummy (always after I apply it to his face…).
It is sometimes hard to remember that Jonathan is still just a boy of three. That he still needs his mommy and daddy so much! With other babies being born around us (family and friends) he just seems so big! So grown! So independent! Every time he does something smart, that shows thinking and learning processes, my heart bursts with pride. He may only be just three years old, but my time is too short! Soon he will not listen to me anymore! Time does fly! Jonathan is still an only child, and he has my undivided attention. And we both need to make the most of it.
