Phone Etiquette

Like most little kids Andrei likes talking on the phone. When we first introduced him to the phone he didn't realize you actually needed to talk back when someone said something to you. He thought they could see you. So someone would ask him a question and he'd shake his head "yes" or "no" instead of saying the word. However after a couple of times he got the hang of it, although until recently he would almost whisper the words rather than saying them in his normal volume.

Also like most kids he loves to push buttons. He's pretty sharp when it comes to figuring out which buttons do what and remember which ones we tell him to press and which ones not to. So he knows which button hangs up the phone and Stef calls us during the day, usually to see how things are going and then always once she's left and on her way home.

And of course I usually let Andrei "say hi to Mommy". She'll ask him a bunch of questions (mostly "yes" or "no" ones) and then she'll say "goodbye" at which point I tell him to "say bye-bye and then press the button." However, he's so focused on the fact that he gets to press the button that most of the time he neglects to say "bye-bye" and instead just hangs up on her.

So when talking to relatives I have to prep them by mentioning that when you say goodbye to Andrei you're not going to get a nice "bye-bye" back and instead just hear a click so don't take it personally. We'll be working on phone etiquette later.