Imagination

One of the great things about Ronan talking so much more now is that I get a better glimpse into what's going on in that head of his. There seem to be a few things that he's really latched on to recently.

First, we've suddenly started encountering monsters. Usually at bedtime, but sometimes at random points in the day. He'll suddenly gasp and say, "Oh no! Monsters! Hide!" and then dives under the covers (or runs into a room and closes the door). He doesn't seem too scared of them - it's more of a pretend scared. When we lay down at night, though, he will suddenly curl up next to me and say, "Mommy, I scared." When I ask him what he's scared of, he'll usually just point to the door or window. But after that, he's fine.

The other thing that crops up fairly regularly is "the big bird." It's not Sesame Street related - I believe it refers to the condors at the Akron Zoo. A few months ago, on one of our many trips there, one of the condors was sitting right next to the glass. Ronan went up to get a good look at it, when suddenly, the bird lunged and started attacking the glass with its beak, as though it was looking to peck Ronan's eyes. It startled him, but he was also kind of thrilled by it and would hold up his finger to the glass to get the bird to peck at that too. However, since then, he'll often note that the big bird is going to eat him. Once again, there's no real sense of fear or dread over this - it's just a statement of fact. "The big bird's gonna eat me." He still loves seeing that condor though. I'm not sure he buys my reassurance that he isn't going to be eaten by a bird, but at least it doesn't seem to be giving him nightmares or anything.

Thankfully, there's more fun stuff as well. Today, I took Ronan to the Cleveland's Children Museum. It was kind of an odd place, at least from the outside. It didn't seem to be much bigger than my house. But Ronan had a blast. There was a water table on the lower level, which he loved. Next time, I'll be sure to bring an extra shirt or two, since he ended up soaked. There was a also a large car display. Ronan loved to sit in it, put his seat belt on and then tell me to move out of the way, waving good-bye and saying "See you later!" If I got in the car with him, he informed me that I had to "buckle up" before we could go. There was also a stoplight with buttons you could push to make the red, yellow, or green light go on. When other kids were in the car, Ronan liked to turn on the red light, turn around, and yell, "Red means stop!" while also waving his arms. It was fun to watch him and he really had a great time. I do wish there was more kid stuff to do around here - it was about an hour drive to get to the Children's museum. I would also like to take him to the Natural History museum at some point - I think he'd love the dinosaur exhibit!

Speaking of dinosaurs, my final story for the night: Ronan has a dinosaur puzzle - there's a stegosaurus, triceratops, t-rex, and brontosaurus* figure. Ronan's gotten really good at identifying dinosaurs. He also has t-rex, triceratops, and brontosaurus decals on his bedroom wall, which we often name every day. Anyway, tonight we were doing the puzzle once again and I was asking Ronan what each dinosaur was. The last one he put in was the brontosaurus, the name he has the hardest time with. When I told him what it was, you could suddenly see a light bulb turn on over his head. He grabbed the brontosaurus, t-rex, and triceratops pieces and ran to his room, where he had me help him put each one with its corresponding wall decal. It was pretty cool and he was very excited to put that together. (As was I.)

So that's the main news here. We recently got our Christmas tree and, after a bit of a freak-out over the lights, got it decorated. Now we just need some snow. :)


*I realize that brontosaurus is no longer viewed as a distinct species of dinosaur, but that's what these look like. Chalk it up to one more thing that I was taught as fact as a child but then later changed, like Pluto no longer being a planet.