I've mentioned before how Ethan will boss Alex around some or more to the point, tell him to do whatever we've told him to do. I am realizing (yes, I know I should have caught this sooner) that he's not bossing Alex - he's just repeating me. Here is how this occurred to me:
When Alex is fussy, I'll give him his paci (which is why he was fussing anyway) and tell him to "plug it up" or "plug it up, buttercup" (in a joking way, of course). Saturday, Ethan handed Alex his paci just out of the blue - Alex wasn't even fussing. As he gave it to him, he said "Pwug it up, Buttacup." Clear as can be and has since said it everytime he hands Alex the paci and half the time laughs as he says it - I guess it sounds funny even to his ears.
I also call the boys various pet names - they usually pop out of my mouth based on a rhyming sound to whatever was going on. Recently I've been calling Alex "puddin" or "puddin popsiscle" or even "puddin popsiscle breath." Today, when I picked up the boys, as I strapped Alex in the car, I said something to Alex and called him "puddin." Ethan said, "yeah, pudding popsiscle, pudding popsiscle breath. Right, Mama?"
So if we didn't before, we definitely need to watch what we do and say more closely because Mr. Ethan has the best memory of any child I've ever seen. At least he's repeating cute things in a nice way.
Then there's Alex - who repeats everything his brother does but not always in the best way. If the gate is up between the kitchen & living room and Ethan is helping to clean, he throws his dirty socks and clothes over the gate into the kitchen; same with his cups, etc. If the gate is down, Ethan puts them in the sink & the clothes in the basket. Alex isn't so much interested in that aspect though. He just sees the throwing part and decides that's the one to do. Toys go in the toy pile - unless Alex puts them away - he throws them over the gate. Clean clothes from the basket of folded clothes at the foot of the stairs - yeah, those would be fun to throw onto the kitchen floor also. Friday night as I fixed dinner, I put Alex in the corner twice and gave Ethan the same pair of clothes 4 times to put back in the basket (if the question is why didn't I just take the clothes upstairs - I was really trying not to burn dinner and I tend to cook things on higher temps than they really require because I stupidly believe that will cook it faster but regardless of my reason it's not the best idea for me to leave them alone on the stove). I do have to say that if Ethan is in trouble for not cleaning up a mess he made, Alex does jump in to help clean it up and will also help Ethan find his sippy if he loses it by looking around like Ethan does.
However, he also does things that his brother does that are not at all good and sometimes ends up hurting himself which then gets Ethan in trouble. Ethan has a nasty habit of climbing on anything he thinks he can stand on and jumping on and off of the furniture. Alex now follows suit and climbs on anything he can and invariably falls off onto something else and hurts himself. Alex also gets up on the couch and runs from one end to the other and tries to jump off the arm - something he watched Ethan do. Ethan has been told numerous times not to jump on the furniture. He doesn't seem to think "because I said so" is a good enough reason but now that Alex has gotten hurt a time or 2 following Ethan's lead, I hope he's finally learning but I won't hold my breath.
So each of them is "learning" and repeating the behavior of his elders - Ethan repeats me & Steve and Alex repeats his brother. Maybe if Steve & I can become the perfect roll models, Ethan will follow that behavior exactly and then Alex will follow that example and he'll be completely perfect, too, and the terrible 2's will never enter our house again. Right? That's how it works isn't it? Hey, a girl can dream can't she?
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