What is a “shop-a-dot”? (written by Chris)
One night during Sarah’s pre-bed routine of reading her books she began to read to me. She will usually look at the pictures and then try to explain what is happening. On this night, she was thumbing through the pages saying “the shop-a-dot did this” and “the shop-a-dot” did that. I said “Sarah what are you trying to say? A lot? A polka dot?” Since I was unable to decipher this word, I called in Anne-Marie to help. We both continued to guess without success. Sarah gave us a look like we were the dumb ones since we couldn’t understand this word that she was saying to clearly.
Needless to say as this went on, we got a bit hysterical and Sarah was laughing right along with us. I finally asked if the “shop-a-dot” was in the book and if it was to point it out to us. I asked her if there was a shop-a-dot in daddy’s car. The answer was no.
Then finally Sarah explains that a shop-a-dot is a blue dot. Not only that, but it’s a purple dot and a pink dot also. So we said “oh- you mean a polka dot”. Sarah looked at us again and said “no, shop-a-dot”. (she knows what a polka-dot is, so how that differs from a shop-a-dot is beyond me)
So, now that we knew the definition of the ever-elusive “shop-a-dot” we continued to finish reading and had a great time to say the least. One of the biggest thrills for me as a father is to watch and enjoy my beautiful little girl grow up and learn, as well as to teach us knew things. On this night, we learned about a shop-a-dot. Priceless.
