New skills

It’s funny to me how Biscuit’s learning goes in spits and spurts. I mean, it’s clear that he’s learning small things constantly, but every once in a while, a big item will get ticked off the list of "things every kid have to learn."

A small thing would be something like ... landing gear.

The shirt Biscuit wore yesterday had an airplane on it. So I picked him up and zoomed him around the room, all the while making airplane noises and telling him to hold out his arms. As we neared my bed, I said, “Get ready. We’re coming in for a landing.” My plan was to skid him across my bed until his head touched the pillows.

“No, Mom,” Biscuit said to me with a stern look on his face. “The tires are not down. The plane can't land at the airport. The tires are not down."

Biscuit actually says "pwane" and "wand" instead of “plane” and “land.” But more importantly, how does my son know about landing gear? Did he see it in a book or on TV? Does he secretly visit the airport that’s only about 10 minutes from our house and hang out with pilots?

Biscuit is also picking up a good many words in Spanish. His day care teacher has taught him numbers, emotions, body parts and other words. Most recently, he’s learned the direction words for up and down (or “arriba” and “abajo” – pronounced ah-ree-bah and ah-bah-hoe).

Last night, he held his cup up and said, “Mom, my cup is arriba.” Then he lowered his cup and said, “Now, it’s abajo.” He knows the words, and he understands what they mean.

His Spanish vocabulary is not far from passing mine, so if his teacher keeps teaching him new Spanish words, I might have to get myself a Spanish to English dictionary to keep up!

But the most impressive thing Biscuit has learned recently is counting objects. He's been able to recite his numbers for a long time, but it's only been in the past week or so that he's been able to actually apply those number to objects.

There were four crayons on the table, and I asked Biscuit if he could count them. Usually, he would point to the crayons and count to 10, no matter how many crayons there actually were. But the other night, he pointed to a crayon and said, "One." Then he pointed to another crayon and said, "Two." He kept going until he counted all four crayons. "Four crayons, Mom. Red, bwue, green and orange. Rojo, azul, verde and naranja."

We always count the front door steps as we leave in the morning. But that's routine -- take a step, say the next number. Now, he could stand at the bottom of the steps and just point and count them.

I'm continually amazed at Biscuit's learning process. I wish we could have that learning capacity for our entire lives.