Memory and Imagination

Finn's memory and imagination have been blowing my mind lately. It always strikes me as funny when we're outside and Finn hears and recognizes the sounds of a lawnmower, a leafblower, city bus, garbage truck and a weedwacker. I'm pretty sure these are all things that daddy must have pointed out to him!

You can actually see the "wheels turning" so to speak when you're talking to him, like one day he had played with his friend Matteo and when I asked him about it the next day, he kind of stopped and thought for a second and said "Matteo bicycle helmet" remembering the best toy ever that the two of them were fighting over the day before! Anytime we turn down this one street on our walks he always shouts "Davis, bicycle" because his friend Davis lives on that street and has a bicycle. Whenever he sees a big white SUV he says "Maggie's car!" and any color Honda Element is "mommy's car".

He's also starting to sing along to songs, he'll just suddenly bust into a rendition of wheels on the bus, monkeys jumping on the bed, or ring around the rosy and sings along to our Raffi CD in the car (although he should because we've been listening to that CD for almost 2 years now!).

And the imagination.......I have to tell you I've been worried about the imagination/pretending part of raising a kid. I have zero imagination or creativity....and I don't want to throw daddy under the bus or anything but..... And it started when we pulled out the crayons or the sidewalk chalk, suddenly I had to start thinking of things to draw.....I seem to always draw a sun, it is the ONLY thing I can EVER think of. Sad. But I am happy too report, that it must be an innate kid thing (so surely mommy and daddy had it back in the day too!) because he's doing it, all on his own!

When reading books he will look at pictures of things and say "pick up" and lift his hand up like he's picking it up out of the book. He will pretend eat foods in books, pretend to drink things, pull a truck out of a book and wheel it around and the best story ever.......I finished a roll of paper towels this week and as I was about to throw away the cardboard roll, Finn asked for it. I thought oh yeah, this is FUN, so I started singing into one end of it, the roll magnifying the sound. Finn picked it up, gave it a try himself and after a little bit he then pointed it towards the ground and said "Leaf Blower" and starting making a leaf blower noise! OMG! I almost died! HILARIOUS! Then he started walking around the house with the "leaf blower". And then he'd pinch one end of it to turn it on and off and he had to take the leaf blower outside with the lawnmower! If only these things really worked, mommy and daddy wouldn't have to do any yard work!

So just one more month and our little guy turns 2! Unbelievable! We're having a lot of FUN right now and I'm really hoping those terrible two's don't start too soon!