My little cheese monster loves water melon too, and lots of it!
Typically, coming home from school or after his afternoon nap, he will ask to watch Signing Time and somehow that goes very well with some cheese. I will break a string cheese in half and, after saying "thank you", he toddles off to the living room, flopping down into his little chair right in front of the TV. Two seconds later he is back to ask for more, at which point he gets the other half and off he goes to his chair once more. No worries about him missing anything from the particular Signing Time dvd that is playing; he has seen all of them at least 450,000 times already!
Two more seconds pass and there he is, back for more 'cheese'. "No baby, cheese is all-done but you can have some melon if you want?". "Yeah, melon", and he heads to the fridge trying to pry it open which, thankfully, is a skill he has yet to master. I fill a bowl with 3 or 4 big pieces and hand it to him. Before he heads off to the living room he tries to lick the melon, and I tell him "no Zander, first go sit, then eat the melon". He knows, but it is a ritual we have established lately. Off he goes, and reappears a few minutes later, asking for more. I ask him: "more what?", and he dutifully repeats after me. He hasn't quite gotten it yet, that he is supposed to say "more melon". We complete another little routine where I say: "more melon, please", and he says "yeah". I say: "say: more melon, please", and finally he says it. And he always says "thank you". The other day I had to get something out of the bedroom and had left the melon container on the counter. I remember hearing him ask for more, but it didn't register right away. When I got back to the kitchen he was just about to walk to the living room, having helped himself to more melon. Now, he could have taken the whole container, but he didn't. Instead my little boy had taken only 4 pieces, neatly stacked in his own bowl, the same amount he gets each time from me...Thank you, Zander!
