Caveat Emptor..

There really should be warning labels on kids. After the new experiences in potty training there are other concerns which crop up especially during the terrible twos-wala phase. This phase I'm told lasts till they turn 5 or parents end up in a loony bin, whichever occurs earlier :p

Last night, after he got a second wind and started laughing and playing catch-me-if-you-can at 9:30 I got to thinking...I'm responsible for all this energy. I encourage the rambunctiousness. While Red's taught him how to "THOO" with just about anything...I've been encouraging him to walk and run and jump and now it's been done in abundance.
I feed him chyawanprash and God only what else to give him energy and vitality. And when that energy comes right back at me I'm left floundering :)

At this age, children are natural imitators. They may not be able to express a lot of things terribly coherently but they comprehend a helluva lot. Yesterday the offspring hit me right in the eye with his bottle. It HURT. And I got quiet for a bit. Quelled the urge to spank his butt rosy red and was waiting for the eye to stop watering. The little man got all serious and made sure I was smothered with kisses till he got the "All clear" signal from me before running off to do more of the 'good stuff'!

It's actually quite silly to expect him or any other child to understand differentiations between what is good or bad. Because except for putting his hand in the power socket or touching sharp objects, there isn't much that he can do that I can genuinely object to. I ought not to take him to Gymboree then. He learns to climb, jump, go through tunnels and whatnot!
What happens at home is a reproduction of those activities but in the setting he is familiar with. He runs out the door to climb up or down the stairs (major eeks!), he crawls under the chairs of the dining table, he climbs on the sofas just so he can jump down and the rest of it simply because he likes doing it.
And at this age they really do not understand why their fun time needs to be rationed. I can't have him jump for an hour when it's fun for me to see him and applaud his efforts and then tell him to be a good boy and stop doing it. Confusion sets in. Why is he a good boy for doing something new and then a good boy again for not doing it?

The inevitable will happen. He'll continue jumping up and down, climbing, falling, running, scratching on mud, picking up dirt, taking my utensils, turning on taps and pretty much whatever he wants...because doing something is always more fun and exciting rather than *not*.
Who wants to sit quietly and listen to boring mom's take on the tickly tiger when you can pounce around, growl and roll on the ground the way the tigers on Animal Planet do?

He sleeps less. Only because there's so much stimulation around him and he's become used to it. But he's not a kid who is hyper unnecessarily. You supply the stimulation and obviously something will result from it. So all the bath squeezies that I gave him to make bath time fun have resulted in elaborate games being made up inside that little head and now he refuses to get out of the tub. Add to it the heat and bada bing!

So, to make a long story short. there's usually a reason for most of his behavior. Just need to remember that the next time I slip in a puddle of water in the living room which seems to anything but water :D