Goodbye bananas, his old friend

Brenden has had a love affair with bananas for a few months now. Tim and I have even taken to spelling out the word or whispering it around him so he doesn't go all "Nana!" crazy on us. On the way out to Colorado he ate 3 of them in the car, which is exactly what we expected. However, during our stay in the mountains he suddenly had a change of heart. He'd still point at them and say "nana" but if we offered him one he refused to eat it. Usually we can get him to eat things, like peanut butter or potatoes, by slipping some in his mouth when he's screaming, which usually helps him realize we are offering something tasty. For some reason that tactic stopped working. He snubbed bananas completely, no matter how many times we tried to remind him that just the day before he would have inhaled a whole one in 30 seconds, no exaggeration.

Eventually we figured out his new fruit fondness is grapes, especially the red seedless variety. Grandma Karen had a huge bag of fruit with grapes, pineapple, mandarin oranges, and strawberries and when Brenden refused to eat anything she just held the bag out for him to pick from. His little fingers landed on a grape and from that point on he has been obsessed. I'm pretty sure he ate grapes with every meal for 2 days. He also requested them constantly on the drive home, although since he lacks the sign language for the word "grape" we didn't know what he meant. I really need to look that up on the American Sign Language website. I have a feeling that soon I will be explaining some random sign to strangers as my child runs from one person to the next begging for food. Ah the joys of having a toddler with a grumbling stomach and no patience. Maybe I should look up the sign for those, too.

And speaking of random strangers, Brenden again showcased his ability to get people to hand him things they normally wouldn't let their own mother use. On Monday I took him to the Tulsa Allergy Clinic for a check up and, as usual, he ran around charming people. One person he babbled at was a Pharmaceutical Rep with a very expensive looking laptop, the kind that has a screen that flips around so it can be a tablet. I ended up talking to him for a little while, I found out he and his family had lived near Tim and I's apartment in Colorado Springs and that he had a son near Brenden's age. Then my lovely son started saying "please" and pointing at that crazy expensive laptop....and the man handed it to him. I stood in shocked silence for a little while, watching Brenden poke and prod at it, all the while keeping a firm grip on it myself. There is no way we could afford to replace it, especially since we are still in the process of getting another computer at home. The man kept reassuring me that Brenden couldn't hurt it, but I'm pretty sure if my son tried to he could. I finally pried it from his tiny fingers, handed it back and made Brenden say "thank you", which he now signs and says. (Sounds a lot like "dad-du".) I think I'm going to invest in a shirt that says "Please hand your electronic equipment to me at your own risk." Think it will work?