I'm trying to develop a young character but I have never written a baby MC before, though she won't show up for a few chapters. I need tips on how to work with this and some antics that a baby could get into that I could then tweak for a baby with the (currently uncontrolled) ability of flight. Anything you could say should be helpful. Thank you for reading and I hope you reply.
Babies are strange creatures; they laugh at the oddest things and cry at almost everything else. Their main interests seem to be finding where the next meal is, sleeping and being mightily pissed off that adults are mucking with them. They also take perverse pleasure in peeing on (if male) said parent the moment the nappy/diaper is removed and giggling about it. They also have a foot fetish and spend hours trying to capture their feet. If feet are boring them, any grabbable object will do: pull cords, pet tails, electrical cable. Finally, everything has to be experienced by tasting it, which includes a package that said pet has left around as a result of being upset that baby pulled their tail. Once we get past the immobile phase, they then start crawling (well shuffling initially) and seem to be hell-bent on ending up at the edge of precipitous drops (tops of stairs, crawling between bannister bars) and pulling everything that they can lay their now mobile hands on down towards their level, especially heavy and fragile items. We are now at the ankle biter stage where the new teeth are irritating them and chewing on anything, including ankles, is great relief to them and pain to everyone else. The final stage is when they gain walking mobility and become toddlers. Imparting adult feelings onto babies has been done before, but has to remain consistent with actual baby actions, so squeezing whatever adulty thoughts onto baby to arrive at the same baby end result. Good luck! Gurgle.
Can you be more specific? I have a 3 year old, so I could probably help, but I'm coming up with blanks right now As soon as they learn how to walk, you'll realise they will manage to get just about anywhere. Imagine a ledge that's at the height of your forehead, and pulling yourself up with just your arms. For an adult, you'd need to be a gymnast or an otherwise good climber, maybe someone who's been trained. For my daughter, who at the time was 2 years old? Easy peasy. Up and away and onto the window sill, where the window was wide opened. Oh and did I mention we live on the 4th floor?
Gods, I bet you were scared witless when that happened. Anyway, book one in general deals with pregnancy to age one or two I'd say, it depends on the length, of the novel.
Pregnancy sucks and you need a lot of air. You do not do well in heat. You get tingles in your leg when you sleep sometimes due to the foetus pressing on the wrong nerves. You can only sleep with the help of a gigantic pregnancy pillow (a U-shaped sausage that curves all the way around you). My 1 year old was not your average one year old. Most children start to walk probably some time between 14 months to 18 months. Mine started walking at 10 months when most other babies are just learning to pull themselves up on furniture. So I can't comment on the average baby experience. When she was 1 year old, she was climbing ladders whilst little 3 and 4 year olds were whizzing all around her and climbing the ladder beside her and I was terrified someone would push her off because there was simply no other children as small as her on equipment like that (it was a slide). As a mum, you're obviously proud when your baby learns to walk. You're almost counting the months till they take their first steps and you just can't wait. And then they do, and you realise how much better it is if they walked a little later than this!! Because then they start running away without a care in the world
Oh fun. And the one in this tale definitely isn't normal, I can just imagine Stella (the mom) or Benjamin (the dad) turning around and realizing she's crawling... midair. XD Poor parents. And parks? Oh no... "Um, Star... please come down..." "Nu!" She crossed her arms. Stel and I frowned. "Star... please..?" "Nu!" She was louder. "Star Everburn-Blake, come down. Please." She shook her head. I groaned and formed a forcefield around her. "... MOMMY!!!!!" Stella started laughing as I lowered Star down to us, soon holding her. Star stuck her tongue out at me. LMFAO
Not realistic. Your toddler Star would probably rather be giggling as she shot away fast as lightning. But for an emphatic refusal to do as told, you could have little Star come down glowing over a little egg she'd found in a bird's nest, and when told she must return it, she can now say Nu! like you wanted I was told by my daughter's grandparents once, when she was maybe 1.5, she saw a hopping toy bunny in a shop - one of those that makes noises and hops around and it's been turned on for show - apparently, grandma watched her look left and right to make sure no one was looking, and then she literally grabbed the bunny and ran for her life She got it for Christmas that year. Unfortunately the following year, she decided to throw all her toys out the window, including that hopping bunny, down our 4th floor window. Broken beyond repair. Thankfully she was too young to understand what she'd done. I can imagine if it'd happened now (she's 3), there would be a lot of tears. Which brings me to another story. This was recent - happened maybe last month. She was standing on the tram seat and looking out the opened window going "Wooooow". She had a lollipop in her hand and she told me, "Ne lollipop out the window. Lollipop falls. Don't put out the window." And I said, "Yes, exactly." Then I looked away for a second, and the next moment I know, my daughter was looking at me wide-eyed and without her lollipop. She'd dropped it out the window. "Ting-Ting dropped her lollipop," she said (Ting-Ting is her nickname). "I'm sorry." And then she started crying like the entire world had ended. "Get another one? Go to shop and get another one?" I said no. Even after we got off the tram, we stood by the curb for at least 10 minutes while she wailed, all the while saying, "My lollipop! What happened? My lollipop!" I found her "What happened?" the cutest thing ever. Poor baby was so bewildered. On a different occasion a similar thing happened to her ice cream, except this one was a genuine accident - one of those typical occasions when the ice cream fell off its cone and onto the floor. She'd literally got it just 5 seconds ago, and the poor baby stared up at me with teary eyes completely silent, her mouth down-turned and her entire face about to break. We rushed back to get her a second one - we got lucky too, because my husband told me just a second ago the ice cream lady had said the machine was supposed to be empty, but it turns out there was one more serving left. (the child after us was turned away) The lady was kind and recognised us, since we'd literally just been there a moment ago, and realised what must have happened, so she gave us a new ice cream for free.
Wow. XD Kids are hilarious. And yeah, I can see that. And with the egg... worst case scenario she gets a pet. Oof. Good luck. XD
I tend to find babies quite annoying and I am definitely not a kid person. But it depends on the age of the child. Some people argue personality takes time to develop but other mothers argue their babies personality was with them the moment they were born. I can't help much as I tend to avoid the odd creatures and stick to baby animals.
Technically you could argue both are true. With brain development, personalities emerge, but then the way your brain develops will to an extent be wired in your DNA, so... And besides, it takes time for the parents to see the child's personality. It's a brand new person you've never met before in your life - you need time to get to know your baby. Not every parent, mothers included, bond "instantly" with their baby.
The only experience I have with babies are with my sister and my cousins (I'm the oldest girl in my family). When my sister was a baby, we had this bird and we'd put his birdcage up on the highest shelf so my sister wouldnt stick her fingers in the cage and get them bit. So one day the bird starts SCREAMING. we run into the room and my baby sister was scaling the bookshelf to get to the bird. 2nd story: we had a baby gate to block the stairs. my sister as a toddler would push it and rattle it and lean on it. the gate was screwed into the wooden banister but had plastic sides. one day she pushed it so hard, the plastic broke on both sides and she body surfed down the stairs on the baby gate screaming. she wasnt hurt, just extremely surprised by what had happened. 3rd story: she wanted something in the store and my brother and i said no. we were watching her while mom went into another section. she starts screaming and throwing the worst tantrum. we went to pick her up and she'd turned her body limp like jello and slip out of our arms to the floor. I wasnt strong enough to cary her horizontally in my arms, and it was so embarrassing the way we struggled with this jelly toddler
XD Thank you, this is hilarious and informative, I can just imagine Star ending up doing stuff like this, especially if she doesn't start floating for a while.
You just made me think of something. Star on the windowsill. Window open. Baby falls. Then floats. Parents are screaming. She's giggling. Maybe someone faints (not necessarily one of the parents either, just imagine if company was with them or they were at someone else's house). Daddy uses a forefield a few moments later to pull her back in. XD
Certainly. I'd cry. I cried that time when my nanny was late home with my daughter but didn't have her phone on her. My nanny was horrified - she'd only been downstairs feeding ducks with my little girl! (mind you, she was also 30min late!)
Why? Surprised how paranoid mothers can get? Don't be. Very normal reaction actually Another story I got - from a friend this time. Her daughter loves to play hide and seek (most children do) and she went hiding inside the clothes rack in a shop. Only she was in one of those circular racks, so she was completely enclosed. She even lifted her feet so no one would see her standing there. The only reason why my friend found her was because the girl couldn't stop giggling My friend tells me she had to leave the shop, sit down, and get a drink right after because she was so terrified.
By about 18-24 months, babies morph into toddlers-whiny, clingy, adorable, totalitarian dictators. They are developing their own personality, and boy, will you know it. My younger son is about to turn 3, and while is is still awesomely adorable, he is vicious. He wants what he wants, and he wants it NOW. He will insist that you answer him, to the point where he will stubbornly repeat whatever he's saying until you acknowledge him. In the car the other day: *This is all happening while I am attempting to talk to my husband.* "Mommy, tree." "Mommy, tree" "Tree, Mom." "Mommy, see tree?" "MOM! TREE!" "MOOOOMMM!" Me: Yes, I see the tree, Nicholas! "Tree green." He is also (mostly) incapable of sharing, and not afraid to gut-punch his older brother (7 years old) over a toy. Or, just because. Whenever he is eating, when he says he's done, he's done. No amount of pleading, cajoling, threatening, or asking will get him to change his mind. The cool thing is, he has a very active imagination. (Either that, or he really can see things we can't). He's always pointing out the car window and telling me "Look at the dragon!" and other random imaginary things. Also, very obsessed with Batman. Actual conversation I had with him: He was playing with a stuffed toy. Nicholas: Cute. It's cute, Mom. Me: No, you're cute! N: No, I'm Batman.
