Oh, baby

Eli woke up a genius today. His dancing alone is amazing. He’s like a young Elvis, and he tries to snap along with the beat when we play the radio in the car. If you ask him where “outside” is, he points to the window and says, “utsuh.” He puts the phone to his ear and says, “hi” and “Ee-eye” (video of that is coming tomorrow). Wait until you see him try to imitate daddy’s juggling (also, video coming tomorrow).

But even better, he’s taken to saying “baby,” to hilarious effect. He started using it today as a substitute for, “I WANT THAT! GIVE IT TO ME!” He points at things, and he alternately says plainly, shrieks, or stutter-whines, “bwabway” or “bweebwee” or sometimes just, “baby.” Sometimes he just sort of mumbles “baby” and “my baby” as he plays with things (yes, yes, we say it all the time … busted.) It’s pretty much outrageously adorable.

So, we’ve been enjoying that all day, but things really got spectacular in the car on the way home tonight. He was dancing along with the radio, which looks like a cross between a hula and churnin’ the butter. A commercial came on and we switched stations, and on came some slow, jazzy song, and the first words we heard were, “Oh, baby.” Eli, from the backseat, promptly repeated, perfectly, like a grown-up human, “Oh, baby,” and proceeded to rock his little dance. We both spun around (we were at a red light) and stared at him in shock, so much so that he stopped his dancing and looked at us with genuine concern. We had to reassure him that he was, in fact, utterly awesome and not in any trouble at all.

So far, 13 months is pretty great.