I bought some pom-poms and pipe cleaners.

I’m definitely not the craft mom. But, yesterday morning, after Ishu woke me up at 2:30am screaming “dump truck! Miracle!” and all the other words that were clearly on his mind in the middle of the night, I started Googling toddler activities. Before I even rolled out of bed, I had scheduled a delivery from Michaels through Instacart.

I was out in the living room when the order arrived so before I signed on to my next meeting, I hung out for a few minutes. Watching Ishu push pom-poms into the milk carton. And then watching him use plastic tongs to put them in separate containers.

It was a longer-than-usual day for me. My last meeting ended at 5:30.

So, when we waved goodbye to Auntie Bella, I turned around and got to work. I needed to clean up a little bit and do a load of laundry before prepping dinner.

As I moved from room to room – getting distracted, stumbling upon things I needed to take back into a different room – Ishu carried the pipe cleaners, tailing me every step of the way.

He’d carry them, set them down, and then look up and realize I had left the room.

So he’d collect them all again, set them down in the room he found me in, only to realize I had left the room again.

When he caught me in my room, I noticed the big pile of laundry on my bed. I looked down at Ishu and said, “Pipe cleaners on bed?”

“On bed,” he responded.

I picked him up – his arms wrapped around the pipe cleaners so tightly – and plopped him on the bed. Just as I was about to pick up a towel to fold, Ishu said, “Mama on bed toooooo.”

I sighed.

I had so much I needed to do.

But it was so clear that he wanted to spend time with me. I was busy whooshing around the apartment getting things back in order. And he was like, “HELLO MOTHER, SIT WITH ME. BE WITH ME. STAY STILL.”

So, I threw the towel back down onto the bed and fell back on the pillow.

Satisfied, he busied himself with the pipe cleaners.

He didn’t really need me to participate in the activity. He just wanted me to stop moving and see him.

So I did.

I watched as he started picking up pipe cleaners one at a time. Saying the color out loud.

I asked him, “Do you want to give me all the green ones?”

“Geen,” he responded as he picked up a green pipe cleaner and handed it to me.

“Thank you!” I exclaimed.

He then handed me another one.

“Oh, another green one. Now I have two green ones,” I said.

He reached into the mess of pipe cleaners and detangled a third. And then a fourth. All while counting each of them.

But lemme give you some context here.

These pipe cleaners were ALL TANGLED UP TOGETHER after being carried from one room to the next to the next. Each time he picked one out of the pile, it took a few seconds for him to untangle it.

So each time he’d say a number, he’d turn back around, keep that same number in his brain, search for a green one, take the couple seconds to untangle it, and turn back to me while saying the next number in sequence.

WHAT?

WHAT???

That’s some damn good working memory right there.

HE DID THIS ALL THE WAY UP TO 15. And I don’t even KNOW if he can do more than that because there were only 15 green pipe cleaners.

Honestly.

Kids are incredible. We’ve never sat down and taught him that 4 comes after 3 comes after 2 comes after 1. Sure, we’ve counted. We count steps when we’re walking up them. Sometimes I’ll count blueberries unknowingly. But I’m not sitting there explicitly TEACHING him these skills.

Kids just pick up these things.

I can’t understand how their brain is so damn sticky.

But my God it sticks. Everything sticks.

It really makes you think.

Our kids are learning something in every moment – whether we are explicitly teaching it to them or not.

They’re learning their letters. Their numbers. Their colors.

They’re learning that sometimes Mama can’t be bothered. And she needs to be whooshing around the apartment taking care of things.

But, they’re also learning that there are times when Mama will quite literally throw the towel down and watch as they count green pipe cleaners.