The Princess Diatribe

I really have to hand it to Disney. Their marketing department is the tops.

My daughter just turned two. The entirety of her vocabulary consists of nouns and the phrase "I want." The Doctor and I have been trying, with mixed success, to introduce the word "please."

She knows her ABCs, except for E and F, which during the song are substituted with H and I. Also she tends to get lost between V and W.

She knows words for colors, but has trouble identifying the colors. She thinks everything is blue, unless the object actually is blue, in which case she thinks it's red. Or yellow. Or orange. Sometimes purple.

This morning, when she put both legs through the same leg hole in her pants, she knew that she "need help please." I was so proud of my little toddler as she fell over.

She knows she will get attention if she tells a grown up that she was hit. She has claimed all of the following have hit her, in order to attract attention: her three-month-old brother, her mother, her father, her stuffed bear, her car seat, her three-month-old brother sitting five feet away secured in his own car seat, her tub toys and a door.

But there's one word that she has used correctly every time. "Princess."

I don't recall ever teaching her that word. I don't know where she learned it. She was pulling videos off the shelf one day and came across The Little Mermaid. She identified it as a princess right away and politely requested that we all sit down to watch it as a family.

Ha, ha! No, she actually pointed to it, yelled "Princess!" and grabbed me by the hand to pull me over to the DVD player so I could put it on for her.

Now, every afternoon after pre-school, she requests to see Princess. Only Princess Ariel will do. Furthermore, only the parts where Ariel is actually on the screen are acceptable. Otherwise, we are treated to a non-stop chorus of "Where'd Princess go?"

How Disney was able to find my daughter remains a mystery to me. But they got her good. Sesame Street diapers became passe as soon as she learned there were Princess diapers. She's even started to recognize Princess Belle, just from the images on the diapers. If Disney ever decides that my daughter needs a motorcycle, I'm in serious trouble.