Imitation - The Sincerest Form of Flattery?!

 Milo, rocking the Mickey Mouse Pyjamas

Yesterday morning, 2 hours after dropping Milo off at nursery, I received a phone call informing me that Milo seemed to be under the weather and they recommended that I come pick him up. I needed a bit of time as I was heavy in to a jewellery making session, which involves large amounts of beads, wires, chains, boxes, tools and the like to be scattered all over my sofa, so I needed to clear all that up before a toddler's roaming hands came near the sofa area! Off I trundled to nursery to be met by a rather cheerful and exuberant child. Now I do believe that he's not 100% well as he isn't eating as much as usual plus he's taken naps at home which have been unheard of in the last months but he is certainly full of beans and is far from the ill little thing he was made out to be. Nonetheless I've actually rather enjoyed having some solid time with him which doesn't happen all that often and I have especially been making the most of it as as of tomorrow afternoon, I will be Milo-less for 6 days with him taking a trip with his dad and his dad's girlfriend.

 Breakfast at the local Turkish Cafe 'Zimt & Mehl'

The last two days with Milo have actually been very pleasant. We've played, we've 'stickered' (I don't know when this became a verb to me but somehow it has), we've watched 'Cars 2' (twice) and we even searched for red squirrels at the playground this morning at a rather unpleasant -1 degrees. Milo was seemingly unbothered whereas I was very bothered by the temperature! Along with the extra time and cuddles and kisses of the last days I have also gotten to witness some very funny behaviour from my little sausage. He's in two strong phases right now. The first being a ''yes, no'' phase in which he constantly changes his mind when you ask him what he wants. For example:

Me ''Milo, would you like some orange juice?''

Milo: ''yes''

I motion to hand him the orange juice...

Milo ''I don't want orange juice''

I motion to take the orange juice away

Milo ''oooorrrraaaannnnggge jjjjuuuuuiiiiicccceeee!''

Me ''you just said you don't want the orange juice! Do you want the orange juice?''

Milo ''no''

etc etc

Of course I have had to get very strict with this. I now give him a max of 3 chances and that's it. Should it continue, I will lower the chances until his first answer is final. We'll see how that goes down!

 Playground 'fun' in -1 degrees!

The other phase is imitation. Now, we've been through the whole fake phone calls and finger wagging whilst telling me off kind of thing. Loved both of those! Today however it's gone in to a new form and now he's playing my roll of making sure I do things properly. For example, whilst at the dinner table, Milo kept getting down from his seat, coming over to where I was sat and saying ''pass auf Mama. Nicht unter fallen Mama!!'' (''watch out mummy, don't fall down mummy!!'') and then pushing my glass to a 'safer' position on the table. This comes from Milo's tendancy to want to have his glass placed as close to the edge of the table as possible and me (and his dad and the nursery) constantly telling him to move his glass to somewhere safer so it won't get spilled. It was so cute. He did it about 4 times or so and each time he looked very serious and concerned and placed his hand up, palm facing me when he said ''watch out!''. He also announces very loudly when he's off to go get something from his room or the living room and tells me over and over to wait for him and that he'll be right back. All these little behaviours melt my heart! It's so cute! I remember how much I was looking forward to his speech coming along so that we could converse and although it has taken a little longer to get there I am absolutely loving it and making the most of each and every chance at a conversation. Precious!

Here are some articles on children's learning my imitation of parents for those of you curious to read more about it. The first is more of an in-depth psycological study, the others are more general observations on the subject:

Yale Daily News Study: Children 'over-imitate' parents

Parents.com What Your Child Learns by Imitating You

Yahoo Voices: Children Can Imitate an Adult Until the Point Where They Can Get Confused

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