For me, this realization is also a sobering acknowledgement that although he looks nothing like me, when he opens his mouth, he’s all me?
That’s Kai! And here it is… Sorry Mom and Dad. Was it as painful for you as it is for me?
Now don’t get me wrong, I do love it! Kai is a talking “genius” in my eyes, but it’s exhausting!! His incessant talking creates not one second of peace in this house unless Dora is on. Now I'm told, "no more than 3 hours of Dora a week" but I can’t help but think: It’s either Dora intoxicating his brain or me blowing mine! Dora = peace!
Here’s an example of typical conversation during approximately 1 minute of my entire 840minutes (14 hours) with Kai each home day!
Kai: “hey Momma…”
Q Mom: “Yes Kai”
Kai: “watch me”, “what you doing?”, “wanna play hockey?”, “can I have a cookie?”, “where’s baby?”, “what’s baby doing?”, “wanna do puzzles with me?”, “I have to go pee pee”, “I need a drink”, “where’s daddy?”, “why’s daddy at work?”, “ did Daddy bike today?”, “watch me”, “watch this”, “did you see that?”, “come look”, “I wanna watch a movie”, “ I have a question for you?”…
Q Mom: “What’s your question?”
Kai: "When I was a little baby I had a puppy named Jack. He ate a cookie and liked to play ball catch with me."
Q Mom: “But that’s a story, not a question...”
Kai: silence…staring at me, thinking… eyes slanted up to top left corner of his eye balls… “ooopppffffff, boink, poopy poops” while bopping self on head, wiggling eyes back and forth with tongue sticking out.
Q Mom: sign… close eyes, deep breath, count and return to reality.
This kid is exactly me with the non-stop gift of gab, and exactly Jeff with the silly actions, facial expressions and vocal intonation. He’s a wonderful collision of our two personalities…and I think to myself: this kid has a bright future ahead of him!