Debi and I were talking over dinner one night about Toren’s development. His language skills are coming along fine and he’s always been perfectly well-developed with his physical skills. But Debi had noticed that he is particularly good at problem solving. If he can’t get something or wants something, he’s pretty good at figuring out a way to make it happen. I noted that one clear example of that was the fact that he ate pasta almost every night. He loves pasta and employs a number of manipulative techniques to get it. He’ll ask us to open the fridge before we ask him what he wants and ask for pasta (we usually have some fucilli or rigatoni pre-cooked for him). It’s hard to tell him he can’t eat something healthy when he could be asking for cookies or candy. He’ll sometimes ask for pasta directly. And sometimes he’ll just say no to anything else we suggest until we ask him if he wants pasta. He does eat other stuff, but pasta is preferred.
While we discussed all of this, Toren was eating pasta quietly at his table. At one point I said to Debi, “He’s definitely a good problem-solver because he gets pasta almost every night.”
Toren, who wasn’t a part of the conversation up to this point piped in and said, “Good mommy.”
We looked at him and he said, “Good daddy.”
Wondering why he was saying that we were good parents, I asked him, “Are you saying that because you have us well-trained?”
To which Toren said, “Uh huh,” as he continued eating his pasta.
