Doctor Box, or, How to heal a cat.
Sooooo, Isaac had a banner Christmas. He got tons of loot, and although it took him some time to get into the whole opening thing, he got the hang of it in the end, and ended up opening some of mine, and many of Noelle's gifts too.

Of course, some humorous situations have arisen from some of the gifts, especially the "Let's Play Veterinarian" kit that came from, you guessed it, Jonathan and Jess (or more precisely, Jess and Jonathan). It contains a toy IV drip, several bandages, forceps, scissors, tweezers, a bottle of vitamins, a toy syringe, and lots of documentation, including prescription pages, and a set of two different X-Rays, one of an animal's paw, showing it broken, and the other of an animal's abdomen, clearly showing a baseball that has been swallowed.

It is, needless to say, comprehensive, and Isaac, who is a little unclear on the difference between Doctors and Vets (sorry Jess), refers to it as his "Doctor Box."

So today, Daddy was sick of being the patient, so he suggested that Isaac treat a small stuffed toy cat. "Kitty is sick," I told him. "You had better make him better."

So what follows, is Isaac's step by step instructions for healing a sick cat, as determined by observation.

1. Administer IntraVeinous drip, so as to restore lost fluids.
2. Palpate the abdomen vigorously, and I mean VIGOROUSLY, with a pair of forceps.
3. Try and cut the abdomen open with inadequately sharpened scissors.
4. Pick the cat up by one leg using the forceps, and drop on the ground from a height of about 1 1/2 feet.
5. Repeat step 4, 4-5 times.
6. Announce, "Kitty is better."
7. Take it gently in your arms, and rock it to sleep singing "Go to sleep, go to sleep, go to sleep little kitty."

Voila! Kitty is healed.

More later.

Rock 'N Roll
So this evening, we are playing with the aforementioned Little People Pirate Ship, and something very funny happened.

First I should explain that the pirate ship has a little perch for a 'little people' parrot, and when you press down the perch it makes a number of sounds.

I.e. a ship's bell ringing, a cannon firing (did I mention this is the only Little People toy with a weapon?) and splashing harmlessly into the sea, sea sounds (with seagulls) a brief sea shanty that ends with a splashing noise (because the ship comes with a retractable 'plank' that uncooperative little pirates can be forced to walk), and my favorite, a very vigorous piece of "sea shanty" kind of music - more of a hornpipe really. It's quite fast and lively, and is kind of like Gilbert and Sullivan on speed.

So this evening, we are playing pirates, and I press the perch once - the perch which I should mention had not a parrot on it, but a horse. Yes, the horses from the Little People stable fit quite nicely on the perch, and we can't seem to locate the parrot, so the horse was filling in on his day off. So I press the horse and the bell sounds, and I say "Land Ho!" or something like that.

I then press it again, and the lunatic speeding sea shanty starts up, and Isaac crouches over and in a loud voice announces "That's ROCK 'N ROLL!" in a clear voice.

I laughed until I was sore.

This prompted two observations.

One. In no way can this sea shanty/hornpipe/very fast unnamed nautical music be considered "rock 'n roll".

Two. Even if it was, how would he know?

Needless to say, it was the cutest thing he's done in weeks, and I thought I should share.

So Much to Tell
So much to tell about his royal unholy terrorness.

Oh yes, the tantrum last night. Last night Noelle was cooking, and had already been carrying around Isaac for nearly three hours as we shopped (more on that later), and Isaac started his usual mantra of "Mommy, pick up!"

"No." was the unusually stern reply, and he didn't like it, no siree, not one bit.

So he starts howling, and I take him and go and cuddle on the couch.

"I want mommy pick up!" he howls through enourmous crocodile tears.
"Sorry, Isaac, no. She's cooking, she will pick you up in a minute."

Then the clincher:
"You don't like me!" he howls. "I don't like you."

I know it's a terrible thing to say, but I started laughing. I had to put my hand over my mouth so he wouldn't see me, because I knew that would REALLY piss him off. So I cuddled him close to my chest while he continued to a) cry, and b) not get his way.

It was really funny though. I hadn't expected him to trot out THAT little chestnut until he was at least 4 or 5, or ideally 14 or so, but he seems to have discovered the joy of emotional blackmail early in life.

Also, the other morning I got up early with him, and gave him his morning sippy cup of watered down juice. He guzzled it, as he tends to, and promptly asked for another.

"Sorry Isaac, you'll have to wait for breakfast. You can have some water."

He fussed for a minute or two, but oddly didn't pursue it.

Then about 20 minutes later I hear Noelle waking up upstairs, and Isaac trundles off.

"Mommy!" he calls from the bottom of the stairs. "Can I have some juice?"
There is a long, very careful pause from Noelle. "What did daddy say?" she asks.
"He says yes."
At that point I had to step in. It had gone too far.

So not only is he very very smart, he is learning the value of parental manipulation and emotional blackmail early. I'm getting my attorney lined up NOW.

On the plus side - he continues to bend the needle on the cute-o-meter. He is obsessed by owls, and we have, as many of you know: A bird clock. Yes, a clock with the sound of a different bird chirping for every hour. He is crazy about the owl, and asks about it roughly every 15 minutes, when we are within sight of the clock.
"Owl hoo-ing?" he asks. Very cute.
Also, today he helped with every facet of baking some gingerbread cookies, including adding the flour, kneading the dough, cutting the cookies, and dumping a whole jar of sprinkles on the floor. It was a masterful job, and we now have a whole plate of gingerbread angels, men, and trains (yes, Thomas still reigns) that look like - well, they look like they've been decorated by a two year old with a love of sprinkles.

Finally he is learning the art of playing pirates from his dad. Dad has now taught him to say "Arrrr", "Ahoy Matey", and I'm working on "Avast!" Give me time. He has the infamous pirate little people ship, and the other day discovered that cannons are for more than shooting just cannonballs. Other options include Matchbox Cars, Little People Horses, and indeed, the pirates themselves. All of this was very very funny to him, and kept him giggling for some time - until he discovered that if he put the toy dumptruck at just the right place, the cannon would shoot the car into the dumper part, which he could then drive away and make car noises with.

Oh, did I mention that he goes "beep beep beep" every time he backs up? And he puts his fingers to his lips and makes a "twee twee" noise every time we cross the street (we have crossing guards in Ontario).

So that's that. I still haven't told you how much fun it is shopping for Christmas gifts with a two year old, but suffice it to say, if your gifts come after New Years, you know who to blame!