Miss Manners

Elise is becoming quite a little lady in terms of her manners, which goes to show that nagging can, in fact, be successful (I knew it!). Our little one has taken to using polite phrases such as “Cuse Me”, “Tank Too”, "Soddy" and “Peas” on a fairly consistent basis much to the delight of her parents who have been drilling this into her since before she could talk. The hilarity of it comes when she draws particular attention to WHY she is being polite, belting out such gems as “Ellie burped! Cuse me!” or “’Cuse me, Ellie tooted” or my personal favorite “Ellie gas. Cuse me”.

Don’t get me wrong, I am not trying to paint the picture that Ellie sits around with her hands folded in her lap saying things like “When you have the opportunity, please pass the broccoli. Thank you, my dear Mother” as though she is the miracle polite child, because that is not true at all. First of all, she is still in her vegetable rebellion phase and never requests veggies, and secondly, she is nowhere near the pinnacle of politeness. She is, afterall, a toddler.

She still has her moments of demands, forgetting to add please onto her “request” (Mommy, Come!). She’ll say “cuse me” but often she is saying this as she elbows and pushes you out of her way. She still occasionally snatches something from your hands without a thank you. But still, I really do think that it’s becoming something that is ingrained in her and she is beginning to be polite as a reflex. Marty and I do not have to remind her to say please and thank you and excuse me every time it is appropriate, and that in itself is completely exciting after months and months of nagging reminders. The other day I sneezed and she casually said “Bess you, Mommy” and I nearly passed out with happiness. It’s these small things that keep us going during toddler tantrums and meltdowns.

Now we need to start working on getting her to stop lifting up her shirt for no reason.