We never know what is the next word that the child is going to pick up from the TV. That day, we were watching TV together, but she wasn’t really paying attention to the movie, but when someone in the show mentioned the word “sex”, she immediately captured the word and got it registered. And then she went “sex, sex, sex”. Of the hundreds and thousands of different sounds and words projected from the speaker, that is the only word she learnt that night.

And then on many other days, I have been too careless and exclaimed “Oh shit!” when my character got slained by some nasty virtual mobs. She must have heard me loud and clear, probably noticed my upset expression and decided that it would be nice to repeat after me. That’s how she learnt “Oh shit!” from her mother. We tried our best to refrain from that exclamation when the kid is around. We also try to teach her to say “oh no” instead of “oh shit”. Yeah, she is rather cooperative. Nowadays, she would say, “Oh shit! No ‘oh shit’, oh no!”

Children pick up actions from people around them or from TV too. I was dumbfounded one day when I saw her standing beside the wall, one hand holding on the wall, right leg balancing herself, and lifted her left leg up. Then she said “shhhh shhhh shhh”. Oh man, of all things nice and sweet, she decided to imitate the doggie urinating.

Most of the time, I couldn’t help but want to have a good laugh when I hear or see those expressions and funny actions coming out of her. I find them extremely amusing, although I see them as undesirable. Controlling my laughter is probably as difficult as getting Yauyau to unlearn them. So now, we have to be mindful of our language, our action, our behaviour, and it can get kind of tiring trying hard to set a good example.

I don’t think it has only genetic connection that the kid like to manipulate the steering wheel like her parents do. It is a child’s fantasy to be able to drive a real car, all children loves to play with the steering wheel.

I have not been exactly a safe mom that diligently uses a car seat. We have packed her space invading throne into the store room a long time ago. Now, I sit her on the passenger seat and strap her in place using the safety belt. Initially, I felt like a bad mom who ignored/neglected the safety aspect of the kid by not using a proper car seat. There was once when she stood up looking out the window while I was driving, and have a bad fall when I applied a sudden brake. It gave both of us a bad fright, but from then onwards, she understood the importance of sitting properly while I was driving. Hence, I got bolder and said bye bye to the car seat. Not exactly something I would encourage anyone to do, maybe I should get a toddler booster seat as soon as possible.

Sometimes, it gets me a bit worrying that Yauyau could actually sit absolutely still throughout a 30min drive. Why isn’t she restless like the other kids? Why isn’t she trying to climb around the car? Why isn’t she trying to unbuckle the seat belt? You know, you get worry when the kid behaves, but get frustrated when they plays like most kids do. Oh well, nothing please us moms.

It also surprises me that children can pick up small detail in identifying cars. I always ninja my father’s car and drive it around. He just changed a new car a couple of months ago. As we know, all the normal and popular family sedan looks identical nowadays. Even I had problem locating the liver colour Nissan Sunny in the car park if I don’t look at the car plate. There are a few really similar looking, liver colour Toyotas in the same car park, and the kid never failed going up to the right car. Amazing! How did she do it? Did she remember the car plate number? Or she actually picks up the difference in their logo?