I love that the girls are old enought to express themselves verbally and Will is getting there.
Just this week, I took EA to the doctor because she has an ear infection. I remember those times when she was a baby and something was wrong. I would have to make what felt like blind guesses to figure out why she was crying and what was ailing her. Now, she can tell me on her own. The woke up Tuesday night crying that her “ear hurt”. And sure enough, yes, it was infected.
But although they can express themselves very well as three year olds. We still sometimes have communication issues.
They usualy occur because I tend to forget that three year olds take everything you say very literally!
Today was one such time.
We had a great dinner of meat loaf, mashed potatoes, vegetables, and a roll last night. And the had just enough meatloaf left over to make perfect meatloaf sandwiches.
As I was beginning to make the sandwiches, EA and MC requested sliced cheese.
I wasn’t sure if they wanted their cheese on their sandwich or off to the side of their plate, so I asked them.
“Girls, do you want your cheese to the side or on your sandwich?”
MC: “I want mine to the side”
Okay
EA: “I want my cheese on my sandwich.”
Okay.
Pretty simple, huh? Well, MC’s was.
EA’s was quite another story as we ran into some communication issues.
I fixed her sandwich in the following order:
bread
mayonaise
meatloaf
cheese
bread
She took one look at her sandwich and began to cry. No, I think a more appropriate term would be wail! She began to wail. Complete with big ‘ole crocodile tears.
When I asked her what was wrong she kept saying,”No! I want my cheese ON my sandwich!!! I want it ON my sandwich!!”
“EA, it is on your sandwich.”
“No, No! It isn’t!!! I want my cheese ON my sandwich. I want it ON my sandwich.”
And then it dawned on me.
When I asked her about having the cheese on her sandwich, she took me LITERALLY and wanted the cheese actually on top of the entire sandwich.
So, I switched things around a little bit so that she had:
bread
mayonaise
meatloaf
bread
cheese
The tears immediately disappeared.
A smile returned.
The crisis of the day was diffused.
And life could then go on!
Suzanne says
Ah… the literal-ness of a 3yr old 🙂 My 8yr old is still that way… sometimes I am grateful and other times not so much.
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Stephanie says
Been there! It does get better. Our most recent experience was trying to understand what Miss S meant when she said that her very sugary antibiotic was “salty.” It took me 3 days to realize that she meant that it was grainy. The medicine doesn’t completely dissolve so it has texture, and she didn’t like that. Have they started making up words to describe things they don’t have the vocabulary for yet? That’s good for lots of laughs.
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