Hayley and Kate Minter

Hayley was an absolute terror today. I don’t know what got into her, but it was as if we flipped the switch from the “Terrible Twos” to the “Psychotic Twos.”

We started off all right in the morning, eating breakfast and playing. She’s been doing this weird thing recently, though. If we fuss at her for doing something she’s not supposed to, even if we just tell her “No” or something else mild, she’ll start hitting herself in the head or chest and saying “Bad! Bad! Bad!” I don’t know where she picked that up from, since we don’t spank her yet or anything. But it’s pretty disturbing to see her do it. We try to stop the beatings and tell her “You’re not bad, Hayley, you just [whatever]…”

Anyway, back to today. Her problem this morning was her not listening, such as when we’d tell her to lay down for her diaper change and she’d sprint to the other side of the house. But things really got painful at naptime.

Starting on our Thanksgiving trip, she would get very fussy when we tried to put her down for her nap. She’d start yelling that she wanted to go out the bedroom door, or revert to her old habit of being quiet when she was held but screaming as soon as you moved to put her into her crib. After about 20 minutes of this today, we put her in her crib for 10 minutes and left the room. After that, she was crying quietly but not going to sleep, so I went back into her room. She was standing up, and when I picked her up she wanted Holly. Ok, fine, Holly came in and we did the “don’t put me down” act for about 15 minutes. We tried having her lay in the big bed with Holly, but she said she wanted to go to her room. At some point during this, we tried to clean her tears off and she took a slap-swing at Holly’s face, which got her a severe fussing-at. It took about 15 more minutes for her to stop hyperventilating from that. By this time, we’d been trying to put her down for an hour with no luck, so we gave up and I took her outside to play while Holly slept.

Tonight was more of the morning routine - playing with gusts of not-listening and self-beatings. Thankfully she went down to sleep with only a small effort.

What a day. Hopefully tomorrow will be better.

Poor Hayley’s been sick for the past few days. It started out in her sinuses, but today when I got home from work it had turned into a kind of barking cough. We’ve got the humidifier going in her room, and if she’s still sick tomorrow, we’ll at least call the nurse line, if not bring her into the doctor directly.

I’ve been impressed with her memory and identification skills. Tonight, she went and got a book of animals that we read to her pretty regularly, sat down in the chair, opened up the book, and started naming animals. She was hitting over 50%, too. She was pointing and saying “Guinea pig….emu…..pony….” It was pretty cool.

I think she does it to get a reaction, but she doesn’t like me to read to her at night. If I try to start reading, she’ll pull the book out of my hand and say “Dada go way!” Of course, I’ll go in the corner to sulk, and she’ll come over to me, give me a hug and a kiss, and say “I sorry Dada.” I’d rather she not shun me at all, but at least she’s cute when she apologizes.

Hayley is 22 months old today. Yup, we’re exactly two months away from having a two-year-old, even though Holly would probably say that she’s been “two” for several months now.

Hayley and I went to Target this afternoon, and since I didn’t feel like fixing dinner tonight, I stopped by McDonald’s to get her a happy meal. Of course, there is always a toy in the meal, which I let Hayley have after she eats. After finishing a few fries, one and a half chicken nuggets and lots of ketchup, I let Hayley have the toy. The current theme is characters from the new movie The Incredibles. Hayley got Violet, the young girl from the family. We ate a late dinner, so she hadn’t been playing with the toy long when it was time for her bath. So, she brought the toy upstairs and tried to put it in the tub, but it isn’t exactly a bath toy. While I was getting her dressed for bed, I heard her say a word that sounded an awful lot like “Superhero” in reference to her new toy. I thought I imagined it, but she said it again. I said, “Hayley, are you trying to say Superhero?” She said, “Otay.” I was floored. How on earth does she know what a superhero is? We haven’t seen The Incredibles movie, and as far as I know, she’s never watched or read anything about a superhero. Hayley never ceases to amaze me.

Yesterday after Wade left, Hayley did something really cute. She still carries around her pumpkin from Halloween, filling it not with candy, but with various items “important” to her that she finds around the house. We had been in the dining room eating, and after I put Hayley down from her high chair, she went into the living room, got her pumpkin, tossed in her sippy cup, came back to the dining room and said, “Bye.” I said, “Where are you going?” She said, “Go find Dada.” And, she actually went to the door and reached up to try to open it. How precious! I had to explain to her that she couldn’t venture out on her own, but she had the right idea to pack a beverage for a long trip.

I also got a little glimpse of myself in her last night. Hayley has always been observant, but she is more so than even I realize. Hayley often talks to my mom on my cell phone (I talk to my mom every day), and last night when she saw my cell phone just sitting on the arm of the sofa, she picked it up, opened it, pulled up the antenna with her teeth, and put it to her ear saying, “Hello, Dam.” When she did the thing with the antenna, it hit me–I do that ALL the time! It’s funny what things kids pick up on.

Hayley’s verbal skills are improving daily. She combines a lot of words and often says short sentences or phrases. Friday I told her I was going to take a bath during her nap and she said, “Mama take bath with me.” A five- or six-word combo is probably her longest, but I’m impressed. There are still times when I can’t quite understand her, but after a few repetitions, I can usually figure it out. The lower level of frustration is good for both of us.

Earlier she was obsessed with the Great Pumpkin…now it’s Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. She likes Santa, but she calls him “Ho Ho.” I can’t get the songs from that movie out of my head. But, at least I’m getting a break from “Date Pump” (aka Great Pumpkin in Hayley-talk).

We were hanging out in the living room this evening, as we often do. After a round of “chase Hayley through the downstairs” was over, I kind of collapsed on my back onto the floor.

Hayley came over and was abusing playing with me by taking this foam cow and bouncing it up and down on my chest. Then she moved around to my head and started playing with what little hair I have left, saying “fix hair! fix hair!”

Realizing that attempting to fix my hair has about the same degree of success as trying to hold off a hurricane with a desk fan, I saw her get another idea. I saw it. She got up and started looking around for something. She searched the living room, saying something that sounded like “town….town”. We eventually figured out that she was looking for her crayons.

She found them, picked them up, walked over to my head, and sat down. She then began to color my head.

She was getting into it, too, as you can tell by looking at the picture above. No, those aren’t prominent veins on my forehead, they’re crayon. She was putting some muscle into it, too, so the crayons left pretty vivid marks. By the time it was over, I looked like some sort of satanic gang member.

It was fun being a part of her play session, especially since the effects washed off easily. As Holly said, at least it wasn’t permanent marker!

I suppose I’ll go through this again when she discovers fingernail polish.

When I was a kid, one of the best parts about Fall was the holiday specials that came on TV. I was especially fond of the Peanuts ones - “It’s The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown” and “A Charlie Brown Christmas.” I was a huge Peanuts fan from an early age, reading the comic strip books, and the specials were an extension of that.

Of course, when the Peanuts Holiday Collection came out on DVD, I got it. This year, a few days before Halloween, I decided to introduce Hayley to the Peanuts world, and we all watched Great Pumpkin together. She liked it so much that she watched it a second time that night.

However, in the spirit of the season, we’ve apparently unleashed a Faustian demon from within our child. She is now addicted to The Great Pumpkin. She wants to watch it all day, every day. Our life is filled with calls of “Day Pum! Day Pum! Day Pum!” We’ll let her see it a couple of times, and when we turn the TV off, she’ll run to it and paw at the dark screen, crying “Day Pum! Day Pum!”

It’s really, really weird. She’s even forgotten about the Wiggles. We can’t mention the words “Great Pumpkin” around her for fear of triggering the reflex.

I shudder to think what will happen when she sees the Christmas special…