jealous

Last night as we were playing with Ada, we were all seated in a triangle with our legs pointing towards another person. Elliot was against the closet door with his legs towards Ada, I was against the chair with my legs towards Elliot and Ada was sitting with her back to Elliot's legs and her legs towards me. What a cute isosceles family.

Elliot decided, and I agreed, that it would be nice of him to rub my non-broken toe foot - so he started to rub my foot while we watched Ada play. She was really into her goalie stick and mini-ball and didn't notice what Elliot was doing right away. But as soon as she spotted him giving my foot some loving treatment she immediately moved towards him and took his hands off of my foot. We didn't know what to make of this, and Ada moved on quickly so Elliot went back to rubbing my foot. Well, as soon as Ada saw this she much more emphatically removed his hands, AGAIN. Having made her point very clear, Elliot decided that the foot rub was over. We weren't sure if she thought Elliot was hurting me, if she wanted him to pay more attention to her, or if she was just being her naturally quirky self.

It wasn't until later that night when I was putting Ada to bed that I think I figured it out. I put Ada into her crib while she was still awake and was stroking her face, and her hair (which she has little patience for) to calm her down. I moved down to her foot and then thought that that might tickle so I moved up to her back. That's when the revelation happened. As soon as I moved away from her foot to her back, in a state of semi-consciousness, she extended her leg towards me and waved it around until I started rubbing her foot. A few moments later she was out for the night. A-ha! The motivation for her earlier behavior was crystal clear - she wanted the foot rub, not Mommy.