Scarlette is obsessed with her name. I can’t really blame her because I think her name is beautiful and not at all weirdly spelled.
She can’t actually say her name, however, on account of how she has a slight lisp. She used to call herself GarYick but lately, for reasons completely unbeknownst to me, she has taken to calling herself Shart.
That’s right. My beautiful, sweet, precious little girl refers to herself as Shart.
I DON’T EVEN KNOW, Y’ALL.
I’m unclear as to why she dropped the second syllable* completely but I do know that my best friend and I asked her to say her name repeatedly and then burst into giggles because we’re very mature thirty year old women.
*”You’re putting the wrong emPHAsis on the wrong sylLABle” – name that movie!
There’s a point to this story, I swear.
So, at some point Scarlette began to recognize her name in writing. Whenever we would color with her one of us would write her name on the paper. You know, in case we found a stray page torn from a coloring book and wondered which one of the three of us in this house had colored it; the adults or the two year old. We’re very logical. Plus, I just really love labeling stuff.
One day Scarlette pointed to her name painted on her easel and said “HEY! DAT MA NAME! DAT SHAY SHART BEANS!”
(Note: my family calls Scarlette “Beans” which is a travesty that I blame on my sister.)
(Also, the easel just said Scarlette, it did not at all say Scarlette Beans.)
Then we were all “ZOMG SHE CAN RECOGNIZE HER NAME SHE IS A GENIUS” because again, we are very logical and do not react at all like every thing our toddler does is the most amazing thing in the world.
Lately she has been asking if I will write her name for her so that she can trace it. Only the way she asks is to say “Mommy? You pine ma name? You pine ma name po me?” (Translation: Mommy, you find my name? You find my name for me?)
So I will paint it letter by letter on her easel. And THAT’S when I discovered that apparently, she also knows how to spell her name as after I finish the last stroke of the S she will say “Next a C! Next a A!”
(And then I die.)
The other day I walked through the room and she was painting over each of the letters in her name while singing a song she made up that went something like “I wernin to wite ma name, I wernin to wite ma name.”
(Okay so she IS totally a genius, right? I mean, RIGHT?!)
So I’ve been taking every chance I get to write her name on things, in addition to all the labels I have on all of her stuff, just because she gets so much joy out of seeing it.
This is all a great story on it’s own but then I took her with me to the store and as I casually perused the aisles she entertained herself by reading aloud all of the letters on the various packaging that we were surrounded by.
“H-U-G-G-I-E-S-P-A-M-P-E-R-S-H-A-P-P-Y-B-A-B-Y…”
You get the idea.
She was starting to shout a bit so I turned to have a conversation about “using our quiet voices” when I noticed her brow furrowed in frustration.
That’s when she raised up her hands and said “HEY! WHERE MA NAME? I CAN’T PINE MA NAME, MOMMY!”
And that’s the exact moment I discovered that I may have been a bit extreme in my love of personalized name labels as apparently, my child now thinks that her name belongs ON EVERYTHING.
I feel as though maybe I should redirect this before it turns into full blown only child syndrome.
(But seriously, let’s talk about what a genius my kid is.)
(The photo above is part of a custom family tree art print that I ordered from Minted for Scarlette’s room as we’ve been transitioning it from baby to big girl. I’ll share more photos of it in her room once it’s finished. The above link is my referral link for Minted, which gives you $25 off your purchase when you use it – which is what I used to purchase the print!)
