Little Overlord
At 16 months, Monkey has a very highly developed sense of order. I know everyone says that toddlers thrive on routine, but I never expected it to be quite like this. He’s our one and only so I have no basis for comparison, but I have to wonder if this is a bit of OCD in the making!
It’s not that things have to be done in the right order – he tolerates slight changes to the bedtime routine, like if we forget to sing Twinkle Twinkle, or if he’s crashing hard and we skip one of his stories.
It’s more like an incredible sense of orderliness.
The child can spot a dog poo on the lawn from 20 paces. He will point it out, then storm over to where the pooper scooper lives and insist you go get it. Once you pick up the scooper, he’ll race back over to the poo and point emphatically until you remove it as instructed. (He’s bossy too!)
Do as I command!
This morning when he got up, he insisted that the dirty nappies get put inside the nappy bucket, and the clean ones get lifted off the floor onto the desk (where we keep them out of his reach while he’s awake!).
When the dogs have finished their breakfast, the bowls simply must be picked up.
Any open cupboard in the kitchen must be closed. If he spills water on the floor, he will go and fetch a towel to wipe it up.
It’s really cute to watch, but I wonder where he gets it from. Are all toddlers like this? These aren’t things we’ve taught him – they’re all things he has observed on his own. It’s amazing to watch how his little brain recognizes the order in things and wants it all to be just so.
I hope that sticks around for the teenage years!
How helpful! Our Bean likes order, but not the same order we like. For instance, yesterday he very neatly transferred around 50 Qtips one by one from the container into the trash can.
Oh yes, the rubbish bin! Monkey insists his cheese wrappers be thrown out immediately. And the dogs must be summoned to clean up any food he has dropped (or thrown) on the floor.
He also took all the clean wet wipes one by one to the dirty nappy bin. Thank goodness we use cloth!
Mine also has a strong sense of order, about all things needing to be on the floor. M’s sounds like a charming idiosyncracy. I’ll be curious to see how it plays out as he ages.
Lol. The correct place for all his toys is strewn on the living room floor… He rarely plays with any of them but if we put them away, he’ll promptly get them all back out again.