Repetition for Otter: bathtime

Part of what makes Otter happy (and me, too) is a sense of pattern, routines that we follow. If you haven't noticed, I'm sort of boring that way. I like to do stuff I like over, and over, and over. This makes for someone fairly suited for monogamy, home-body-ness, and parenting a toddler. If there is anything a toddler loves more than doing something three or four times in a row, it is doing the same thing ten or twelve times in a row--even, in a pinch, if it's something the toddler really loves, thirty or forty times in a row.

Or maybe it's not all toddlers. Maybe other small children crave variety not repetition in their daily life. Not Otter.

Last night, while bathing him, G filled a plastic beach-toy cup with water, as he slowly raised it a foot in the air, he said, "it's com-PLETE-ly full, it's com-PLETE-ly full, it's com-PLETE-ly full, it's comPLETE-ly full..." then, while dumping the water out quickly, "OHHHH... not anymore."

Otter found this delightful, so delightful that he said "again, Daddy... again?"

So G repeated his fill-raise-dump-the-cup trick again, using the same words. Much laughter from Otter. "Again, again?" G repeated again.

Now, if I were truly to reproduce the bathing experience, I would cut and past that last paragraph about twenty times in a row. After a few paragraphs, you'd need to add in a soundtrack of G and I laughing too. With each repetition, Otter's delight and giggling increased.

We were only able to stop when we sang the Row Row Row Your Boat song three times (our cue to Otter that bathtime is ending), and then let him push the lever to drain the water from the tub, pulling up the duck-covered bathmat to watch and feel the water go away.

I suspect that during his next bath, no matter when that is, Otter will insist on the new "completely full---not anymore" game again.

And again. And again.

You get the picture.