Laurel and Hardy

I was looking through my old journals yesterday once again and I came across this funny old memory of Sophie and Jake when they were practically babies (four and one). Those two have always been my favorite comedy duo. Even when they were still in diapers.

Friday, July 8, 2005

Tonight Mom, Kris, Bun, Jake, Sophie, and I went out to eat at the American Café in Governor’s Square Mall. Jake was so funny. At first he sat in his highchair very nicely and sucked his thumb and we talked about how he was probably going to be left-handed because he sucks his left thumb. I tried to get him to color on his placemat. And he did—but with his right hand and without looking at what he was doing. (He didn’t stop sucking his thumb.)

Kris said, “That’s better than he usually does. He usually colors to the side. Or maybe behind him. He never looks at what he’s doing.”

Sophie was busy filling out a crossword puzzle on her placemat. She solved all the riddles all by herself—she’s great at riddles. And she wrote in the answers, too, with Bunny telling her how to spell each word. I didn’t know she could write. She was concentrating very hard. She also did a word search with Bunny’s help. Bunny would spell the hidden word and Sophie would find the letters and thereby the word.

When our bread came, Sophie insisted on cutting everyone a slice with the sharp knife. She handled the knife surprisingly well. She also insisted on squeezing out everyone’s ketchup.

Jake started acting up. He kept getting out of his highchair and walking around the restaurant, greeting people. He got his own table. He sat across the restaurant from us, smiling, playing peek-a-boo. “Bunny!” he’d yell. “Bunny!”

“Bunny,” I’d say, “he wants you to play peek-a-boo with him.”

Sophie had given us all a very generous amount of ketchup. She was also very interested in buttering people’s slices of bread. I thought this was funny because she hates butter and ketchup. She’s a very fussy eater.

Kris was rolling her eyes. Jake wouldn’t eat his grilled cheese sandwich. Neither would Sophie. Jake walked out of the restaurant and went toddling about the mall. Kris caught him and he cried. He cried and cried.

“I guess I’ll have to get my salad to go,” Kris said. “I’ve got to get out of here.”

“Goodbye, Jake,” I said cheerfully. “You were terrible!”

He smiled at me as though I’d given him a great compliment.

Kris took Jake home, but she left Sophie with us. Sophie refused to eat her grilled cheese sandwich. There was ketchup everywhere. Everyone had a huge side dish of ketchup, squeezed out by Sophie. And if she saw you were running a little low, she’d squeeze out some more.

Sophie finished up her work on her placemat.

“Let’s go to the toy store,” she said.

“Hold on one second,” we said. “We’ve got to finish eating.”

“I want to go now!” Sophie said, pretending to pout—but her eyes were dancing and she was trying to suppress a mischievous grin.

When we finally did leave to go to the toy store, Sophie led the way. She walked way ahead of us, the queen of the mall. She was smiling back at us and looking very cute and sassy in her little terrycloth shorts.

“Soph! Wait!” Mom said.

Later Bunny confessed, “I was really worried Sophie would get snatched by a stranger! I couldn’t keep up with her!”

“She’s so bad,” I said. “Somebody might snatch her, but then they’d be sorry!”