I know who Sylvia will be at slumber parties. She will be the last one awake in the stay-up-late faction, the one who thinks the party is still happening even after the last other girl has given in to sleep, and then who wakes up first in the morning and charms the parents to give her an extra spoonful of sugar to put in her bowl of sugar cereal, and possibly an espresso as well. (Maggie will probably be the one saying, um, guys? I don't know if you should be doing that.)
Overheard last night in the girls' room, an hour or more after the little girls had gone to bed. Rosemary had just gone to bed a few minutes ago:
Sylvia: Hi...hi...hi
Rosemary: Hi
Sylvia: Hi
Rosemary: Hi
Sylvia: Hi [Thunderous sound of jumping in crib]
Rosemary: Hi
Sylvia: Hi
Rosemary: Sylvia, go back to bed.
Sylvia: Hi
Rosemary: (Resigned) Hi
Sylvia: Hi
And so on.
Finally Jason went down to tell Rosemary that the best way to get Sylvia to stop talking was to be quiet herself, which Rosemary did. Sylvia stopped with the hi-ing. Until Rosemary coughed. To which Sylvia said "Hi." This went on for sometime, too, and then finally all was quiet. Until 6:30 in the morning: "Mommy. Pause. Mommy, mommy, mommy, daddy. Daddy." And so it begins.
Stealing cherry tomatoes from the bowl, which she will bite into and then spit out onto the table:
If I had a nickel for every time someone has come up to me and said, about Sylvia, "She and I have an amazing connection," I'd have a sizable fund of nickels towards Sylvia's college fund. I feel a little bad writing that because I fear I might sound as if I don't think they actually do have a connection. To the contrary! They do. Sylvia seeks people out. She's looking at you, really looking at you, and she usually has a glint or a glimmer in her eye depending on her mood. As a friend of ours said, "Sylvia always looks like she thinks I'm going to say something amazing."
More and more we are starting to understand her endless sentences. Unlike Rosemary, who had (what I now know to be) phenomenal diction, Sylvia has a near-constant monologue of things we mostly don't understand. A few things are starting to emerge. "I don't want it," accompanied by frantic head shaking, sounds an awful lot like, "I want it," which is different because it's accompanied by two-handed finger wiggles in your direction, as in "Hand it over, lady." She loves to go outside, which seems to be happening infrequently these chilly winter days, and says, "Out go, out go!" adamantly. She says, "I draw," and goes to visit the art table, but really she does not draw. On paper at least. She chucks crayons around and uses the pens to make tattoos (thank you, Rosemary, for introducing that notion!).
Covered in washable Crayola Pipsqueak body art and proud of it:
And then there is her constant "Maggie," which is on two notes--high note, lower note--like an insistent little birdsong. They are getting to be playmates, and we've recently seen a few cute games of chase and cheers and a few other little things. Today they were doing some weird thing, banging their backs into the dishwasher, looking at each other, and laughing uproariously. I have no idea what that was about.
Sylvie pronounces her own name "SeeBee" and thinks it is part of the alphabet song, as in "a b SEE BEE," which she loves to sing.
While there are a lot (a LOT) of disputes regarding toys, I am also seeing a surprising amount of compromise and sharing. Today they were clamoring for their seats at the table (in the past week they have decided they are d-o-n-e with high chairs), and Sylvia got in the one that Maggie wanted. Maggie stood beside her saying, "Me, me!" and much to my surprise Sylvia obligingly surrendered her chair and took another. As long as I don't come to expect it, I'll always be pleased, right?
She continues to be the smallest person in her age bracket -- you can see the size difference in this picture below -- which I think ultimately will work in her favor. Right now it just makes us look like inattentive parents. I have a nearly constant stream of concerned adults coming over to me saying, "Is that your baby? She's about to walk down the stairs!!!!" or whatever. And yes, then she will get to the bottom stair and just jump off of it and sprint off into the distance.
Visiting Yayoi Kusama at David Zwirner gallery when Uncle Kevin was visiting:
Making friends with strangers, what Sylvia does best. This was at the entrance to one of Kusama's Infinity Rooms (low tech, gorgeous starry installations made with lights, mirrors and water). The lady was letting her look at her stop watch, since you only get 45 seconds in the Infinity Room. (Remember that game from middle school?)
The girl loves a good mess. For months and months, the first thing she likes to do in the morning is dump out the big box of stuffed animals all over the floor. And then walk away. She also likes to put things in things. She has a serious crush on Elmo - without ever having even watched Sesame Street? - which I think developed because he is on some of their diapers (others have Cookie Monster or Big Bird) and if she's paying attention she will pretty much only let you put an Elmo on her.
She is a jumpy little girl, and has an amazing way of arriving quickly at the scene, finishing with a little hop like Superman coming in for a landing.
