Sunday, February 15, 2009

Unsettling

Grace sings incessantly. I mean it. And her repertoire is extensive. She sings a lot of normal, happy church songs, like "I Am A Child of God," "I Love to See the Temple," "I Lived in Heaven," "How Firm a Foundation," and lots of others.

For a while there, she was singing a lot of Disney. Like, "Someday my Prince will come, and away to his castle we'll goooooo," and "...big brass band [while pumping her arm Dick Van Dyke style], ooohhhh it's a jolly 'olidye wi' Mary...."

Other times she just improvs. "Mom is feeding CLAAAYY-rrrr... and Claire is CRY-ing!!!" You know, composing her life soundtrack.

When she's not doing one of the above, she's la-la-ing. Or she's humming. Or she's asleep. One of those.

She sings at dinner. She sings in Sacrament Meeting. She sings during scriptures and on her way to sleep. She sings always.

It drives me crazy. 

And to add to the insanity, I've lately found her singing lyrics I didn't know she'd ever heard. Like this one: "she wears short skirts, I wear t-shirts, she's cheer captain and I'm on the bleachers..." and this one: "Ohhh, it's what you do to meeeeee.... Ohhhh, it's what you do to meeee." And this slightly modified version of a popular favorite: "You've had a bad day. Something just died. You had a bad day... you had a bad day." 

I'm just hoping these lyrics never make the cut for her favorite performance of the evening: Prayertime.

And I'm also a little befuddled. Because she hasn't heard those songs with me. Which means that either someone is sneaking headphones onto her ears in the middle of the night, or she's learning these songs in very short clips with Karlee--her aunt. Karlee does listen to such music. But mostly not with Grace.

And that makes me sort of nervous, my friends. Not because of the songs themselves. I suppose they're mostly harmless. 

I said Mostly. 

The question gnawing at me, is: What else is Grace memorizing in thirty-second segments? And at what other inopportune times is she regurgitating it?

8 comments:

  1. Elise, your posts ALWAYS make me laugh out loud! Your girls are so cute! I especially loved her version of what would consist of a "bad day"... totally funny!

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  2. Elise, I too love your blog. It makes me smile. Your daughter is clearly, brilliant. I would definitely invest in the primary CD's and have them playing non-stop. You know, programming is everything!

    And, I might add, relax and enjoy the ride. You are a wonderful, wonderful, mother.

    Jan Stanfill

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  3. apparently when I was like 18 months old I used to wander around in my diaper singing, "Oh, here she comes. Watchout boys she'll chew you up! She's a MAN EATER!"

    my kids sing mostly inspiring songs like, "someday you're gonna DIE-EIEIE!!"

    good times.

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  4. I run into this problem as well. Not quite to Grace's extreme, but one of my boys humms like 80% of the time that there is not the TV, radio or something else on. It too, drives me crazy. I have a hard time telling him to be quite because being a musician, I want to encourage him to love music. So I tell him that I would prefer to hear him sing.
    I, like you, am surprised at the number of pop-song lyrics he knows. It is strange how they pick it up only hearing it a few times. I just try and teach them music that is good and will stick now-thus my new preschool music class. Check it out.http://aprilsacademyforyoungmusicians.blogspot.com/
    They really do learn through music so quickly!
    You are great. Don't worry, just be aware and do the best you can!

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  5. Hey Elise, the "oh it's what you do to me" song is a good one actually. nothing explicit. I just learned to play it on the guitar. Now that I know grace likes it i'll try playing it for her.

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  6. You should record her singing. No doubt it will be priceless to listen to later.

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  7. Me, too. . . you are making me LOL! this is exactly Brooke when she was 3 and 4. I loved it! She would sing a totally random story.....this is hilarious. I am so glad you blogged this so you can remember this always. now, the trick is to get it on video! You'll cherish it. Brooke turns 22 next week, time flies as fast as a blink. thanks for making me smile today!

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  8. I sang Carly Simon songs like crazy...and when I realized later what it was talking about I was shocked that my mom let me listen to that stuff! "I know nothing stays the same, but if you're willing to play the game, it's coming around again. So don't mind if I fall apart, there's more room in a broken heart." Haha!

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