Mr. Repeat

As you can see, Ben was very proud of the little zoo that he set up with his toy animals. What you can’t see from this photo is that this was about the tenth time Ben assembled that zoo in a span of twenty minutes. He puts the fence together, sets up the animals in their spots, plays, then takes the whole thing apart only to start over again. And again. And again.

Ben seems to have a strange fascination with repeating things. Most of the time it just makes us shake our head and wonder, sometimes it makes us laugh, and other times it just plain wears us out!

Just the other day, Ben followed me around as I opened windows to let in a little fresh air. Apparently it made an impression on him, because later that night it came up at bedtime. As I sat in his room, Ben ran from one end of his crib to the other, flicking the latches on it and telling me he had to ‘open his windows’. It was fun…for about the first five minutes. After about a half hour Daddy was praying that Ben would fall asleep. He finally gassed out and went to bed, but I think it took about an hour and a half! (He didn’t spend the whole time opening windows, there was also some jumping, talking, and playing with his stuffed friends. Bud the bedtime routine is for a whole other post.)

Sometimes Ben can just physically wear you out with his repeating. Just ask Poppop how long Ben likes to be pushed on his swing in the backyard. Unfortunately, Ben also enjoys when Poppop sings to him while he swings. Some days I wonder how Poppop still has a voice afterwards…I think Ben would just keep on swinging unless you made him stop. For another example you should talk to Aunt Devon. One day, just for fun, she starting dancing Ben around Nana & Poppop’s living room to a country music CD. This quickly became something he asked for every week…and you can’t dance just once. Ben wants you to dance over and over…and you have to keep repeating the same track on the CD (he gets upset and will let you hear it if you try to change songs).

There are all kinds of things that Ben repeats an alarming number of times, but there is one particular incident that recently inspired this post. Ben has a portable DVD player which we sit on the couch and watch movies on from time to time. Lately, Ben has asked for his musical DVD, Choo Choo Soul, that has a number of fun, short, dance songs and videos. There is one song in particular (The Blue Zoo Train song..its burned in my head forever) that Ben likes to sing along to and act out what is happening in the video. But, every time we get to a point about 20 seconds into the song, Ben insists on rewinding to the beginning and listening again. Its almost impossible to get through the whole song, as Ben will have you replay that first 20 seconds over and over and over. He thinks its hilarious. I think we better get another copy of that DVD because we are going to wear it out!

Oh well, even when he is repeating things, Ben never gets less fun or less cute, whether its the second time he is doing something, or the twentieth. And I can’t complain about one thing we repeat every day: each night before bed, Ben gives me a hug, a kiss, knuckles, high five, and then tries to make the I love you sign with his hand. Its our little thing and that never gets old.

Hopefully by the time you are reading this, Ben will be off to Storybook Land with Gram and cousin Ryan. We also visited the carnival this week, and next week it is off to Dutch Wonderland! So next week’s blog will be all about Ben and his amusement park ride experiences! Should be fun.

See you next week!