Zayden has never been a big fan of personal grooming. You know the kid with the perpetually runny nose? The one with a little bit of his lunch still stuck to his face? The kid that you see and think, “Why can’t his parents just wipe his face?” That’s my kid. We try to keep his face clean; we really do, but it is hard because he hates having his face wiped. He screeches, cries, and violently slaps our hands away whenever he sees a cloth or tissue coming towards him. He also puts up a fight when it comes to brushing his teeth, changing his diaper and putting on his shoes and coat.
Apparently this is a common toddler issue as they begin to assert their independence and their new found love of the word no. But we have finally found something that gets us a little extra cooperation when it comes to cleaning his face and hands: The Alligator Song.
It is a song I made up on the fly one day while struggling to clean him up after a particularly messy lunch. Zayden loves music, so he responded well and we now sing it whenever we need to clean him up from a meal. He’s so familiar with it now that he will, on occasion, hold out his other hand to be cleaned at the appropriate point in the song. He still turns his face away when we clean his face, but at least he doesn’t cry anymore.
So if you’re like us and have tried everything to get your toddler to cooperate with basic personal grooming, here’s one more thing to try: The Alligator Song (to the tune of The Wheels On The Bus).
(While washing his hands)
The alligator goes chomp chomp chomp
Chomp chomp chomp
Chomp chomp chomp
The alligator goes chomp chomp chomp
And eats up all of the crumbs
(While washing his face)
The alligator goes lick lick lick
Lick lick lick
Lick lick lick
The alligator goes lick lick lick
And cleans up your dirty face
Aiden loves to listen to music. We have music playing all the time when we’re at home and most of the time when we’re in the car. He prefers kids music, especially songs that have hand movements. This is a kid who could Roly Poly before he could point, so I’m not surprised.
We have recently completed one 10-week session of a music class, the Sunshine Song Time class that is basically a paid version of the free Mother Goose Program classes, but at a more convenient time for us. We learned some new songs via the program, and had lots of old favorites. Though Aiden spends most of his class walking around, he does absorb the songs and the movements.
Above is a video showing Aiden doing the movements to “Zoom, Zoom, Zoom” and “Criss Cross Applesauce”. It’s on my to-do list to put together some YouTube clips featuring movements & lyrics to some of the best songs for kids under 2 – I wish I’d known all these songs when Aiden was little!
As I already shared, Aiden really enjoyed listening to his Uncle Josh play and sing for him while we were in Edmonton. Here are some videos we took to capture the memories:
Once or twice a month, the mommies from our prenatal group (+ a few others) have been getting together for a social and song-group. There are some fantastic music programs that you can join – Parent-Child Mother Goose – and one of the moms came up with the great idea to create our own informal “class.”
A group of 7-10 moms seems to make it out to each social, which is spent in part just socializing and in part doing song-time. We sing songs with actions, led by some of the moms more familiar with certain tunes & movements (thanks, you know who you are, gals!!). The babies – and moms – seem to enjoy the time together.
If you, like me, always wanted to go to Mother Goose, but never could because of nap time overlaps, consider getting some friends together for your own social. To help out, there’s a very handy PDF of Mother Goose songs.
Poor farmer MacDonald. Not only is he old, but he seriously has some noise issues on that farm of his.
I have to wonder if farmer MacDonald ever gets any sleep what with feeding his huge and diverse farm and with all the animals mooing and chirping here, there and everywhere.
I hope farmer MacDonald has help with all those animals. I sure wouldn’t know how to take care of cows, pigs, bees, and lions all at once.
Zayden has never been a big fan of personal grooming. You know the kid with the perpetually runny nose? The one with a little bit of his lunch still stuck to his face? The kid that you see and think, “Why can’t his parents just wipe his face?” That’s my kid. We try to keep his face clean; we really do, but it is hard because he hates having his face wiped. He screeches, cries, and violently slaps our hands away whenever he sees a cloth or tissue coming towards him. He also puts up a fight when it comes to brushing his teeth, changing his diaper and putting on his shoes and coat.