The conventional wisdom shared by most folks I know is that small children understand more than we give them credit for.

I'm not inclined to agree. Three and a half years of up-close-and-personal observation convinces me that satire, irony, regret, and other somewhat complex concepts are simply not ready for primetime in the small child's world.

But memory? That's a completely different kettle of fish. Kids have an amazing memory. This stands to reason, of course: how else can they seem to learn language overnight, other than by storing away what they hear until they can figure it out, then pull it out and use it for themselves?

Alex recently showed a profound demonstration of just how sharp his memory is. The parents were otherwise occupied, and Alexander was looking for something to do. He slinked off and found his step stool from the downstairs bathroom and carried it over to the kitchen. There, he pawwed around the higher cabinet shelves until he located the face paint we'd bought for his halloween costume (and hadn't used).

But did he remember what it was and what it was for? Oh, yes he did. He took the face paint into the bathroom and proceeded to paint his face. And his hands. And his arms. Well, and the sink and the walls, too, but I don't think that was as intentional. He applied the paint so thick on himself, it looked like he was wearing rubber gloves up to his elbows.

After one parent noticed -- Hey! I've been having a nice long phone conversation without any interruptions! Hey! Wait a minute! -- Alexander was pretty much standing around waiting to be caught. There wasn't much mess to clean up aside from the child, himself, but the trick was to take advantage of the photo op without laughing and making Alex think it was all okay.

I'm guessing he understood.

Another recent event for the little guy was paying a visit to Mr Rogers' Neighboorhood. There is apparently a touring exhibit from the long-running television show, and it began a four-month long stint at the local children's museum. Among other things, they had a main room modeled after Mr Rogers' living room, complete with sweaters that the kids could try on. (They also had one of the original sweaters that had actually been worn by the late Fred Rogers, behind glass.) Alex tried on each of the sweaters in turn. In this photo, the maroon sweater looks more like a Hogwarts uniform on Alex than a sweater.

Alexander watches the show on a fairly regular basis. Aside from a few DVDs in our collection, the only television that he's allowed is Sesame Street, Mr Rogers, and something called Between the Lions. He already loves the children's museum, so this new exhibit was tres cool. Opening day events included a visit from Mr. McFeeley (sp?), a longtime resident of Mr Rogers' Neighborhood.

Now, I recall that the show was popular back when I was a kid, so that autmatically means the show has had a very, very long run. But they were showing an episode recently that came from the early seventies, and the letter carrier (postman? mailman? whatever they called him then) dude was on the show and talking about his *grandchild*. So, the dude was already getting on in years even then. And this guy is still making personal appearances thirty-plus years later. Pretty cool.

Mr. McFeeley still seems spry, and still has a boyish grin. Alexander enjoyed meeting him, although it's quite likely that the older generation got more of a kick out of seeing the Speedy Delivery guy than our child of the 'aughts.

[Nolan was there, too, but he's not so big on television just yet.]

Our oldest son continues to amaze with his ever-expanding articulateness, his increasing autonomy, and developing personality. He has a mind for mechanics, as he demonstrates by taking apart his toy airplane with his toy tools (literally -- the plastic bi-plane was designed with big plastic bolts so that it could be taken apart and re-assembled) and, occasionally, even putting parts of it back together. He likes to pull out his toy tools and mimic me when I work on projects around the house. His play, in general, continues to get more complex.

And as always (so far), he continues to look out for little brother.