Toddler Logic

While I was still teaching, the school librarian gave me a great piece of advice. She told me to get a journal and use it to record all those silly things that your child(ren) will say as they acquire language. She kept such a journal for her son. In it she would not only write what he said but also provide some context with which to enrich her memory. I guess instead of a journal I am using a blog, but the idea is the same- to write down all the silly memories of motherhood that somehow get lost among all the other moments. Pictures are great, and so is video, but the English teacher that I am favors the written word.

Which brings me to last Saturday. I decided to pick up some bagels for our breakfast. Alice is a big fan of bagels and cream cheese so it is always a winner of a breakfast. When she saw her plain bagel and cream cheese on her plate she shrieked, "Yeah, bagel and butt cheese!" John and I looked at each other with the same question in our eyes, "Butt cheese?" I feverishly started running a list of all the possibilities for this odd phrasing: Something she picked up in school? Is it because we are potty training? Does she just like the word "butt"? Nothing seemed right and then John hit on it- diaper rash ointment. Every night after he gives Alice a bath, she tells her he is going to put on her "butt cream". Both creams are white. In toddler logic, it makes perfect sense. Now I just have to make sure to keep the diaper cream in the kitchen out of her reach or we might have a culinary disaster on our hands.