Two and a Half

Oh my goodness, little man. I cannot believe you are 2 and a half years old today. I can't even begin to explain how much love I have for you and how much you have changed my life.

You are a sweet and strong boy. You have recently become a Mamma's boy, big time. You choose me over Daddy frequently and demand my undivided attention. You frequently tell me you love me & you give me lots of kisses and hugs. Just the other day while I was giving you a piggy back ride, you hugged my neck so tight and without any prompting, said "Mmmm. I love you SOO much mommy". I melted.

Your vocabulary is incredible. You can and will repeat anything I ask you to, and occassionally I can't understand you, but for the most part...you speak as clear as can be. One day I asked if you could say "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious". You shook your head and replied with a simple "Nope". So, I guess there are limitations. Otherwise, you understand pronouns, you know all the words to a dozen or more songs - songs that I had no idea you knew, you have known your abc's and the abc song since long before you turned two and you still love to say them and to sing the song, you count to 16, you have memorized several books, you know a lot of colors and many shapes, and you love to tell daddy all about the things you and I see and do when we're out and about. Especially if we see contstruciton equipment or a train.

You are ridiculously outgoing and love to talk to everyone. When kids don't speak back to you, you tell me they are "sad". You have been known to ask them what is the matter, or you ask if they are sad. It's a little embarrassing. You think the lobsters are the grocery store are sad too, and I agree. A parent at a halloween party last month thought you were 3 1/2. He said your vocabulary was amazing and was surprised that you know so many different shapes (really?). He also said that mommy was doing a great job. That made me proud.

Aside from your incredible smarts [beaming with pride], you are incredibly fearless when it comes to playing on jungle gyms and the like, but are terrified of things like the "shower". You love to take a bath, but if I tease that I am going to turn on the shower...you look at me, terrified, and say "No Mommy, No, not the shower". It's really bizarre. You have recently started talking about monsters. The dining room light was off the other night and you told me there was a monster in there. You then tip toed into the bathroom and whispered "come on mommy, let's hide from the monster". So, we hid in the bathroom for a while before sneaking into the dining room to confront the monster. He was a silly monster, not a scary one, so we were ok.

You are incredibly S T U B B O R N, too. Last week after we got home from the sitter, you discovered the remainder of your blueberry muffin from breakfast (yes, it was left out all day - sue me) and ran over to it, grabbed it, and said "yummy". You took a bite and threw the rest of it across the room and said "YUCK!". Your dad and I told you to pick it up. You said "No!". So, we sat you on the floor next to the yucky blueberry muffin and sat on the floor with you instructing you to pick the damn thing up. You refused. We put a bowl on the floor for you to put the muffin in. We instructed you to put the muffin in the bowl. You went thru phases of tears, pouty lip, looking around distracted, flicking the muffin, scooching away, etc. After over 10 minutes of sitting there NOT picking up the muffin, we decided to give you a timeout. After 2 1/2 minutes in timeout, we plopped you back on the floor next to the muffin, where we went thru another round of your phases. After another 10 minutes, your dad took your hand, put it on the muffin and instructed you to pick it up and put it in the bowl. He put your hand on every piece of muffin and you picked it up and put it in the bowl, while sobbing. After all pieces were picked up and in the bowl, you jumped up, grabbed the bowl and exclaimed "I will throw it in the garbage!" Your dad and I looked at each other, puzzled. Wasn't that what we have been trying to do for the past 22 1/2 minutes?

You eat. Boy, do you eat. Everything. There are very few things that you dislike or won't at least try. Although you are starting to pretend that you don't like certain things, but I ignore your protests and you end up eating said things. We don't eat out often, but El Camino is your favorite restaurant! You love healthy stuff like fruits and veggies - you especially love salads, you drink gobs of milk, but you are also a junk food junkie. I think as long as we make sure you are getting more healthy stuff than junk, it's ok. And hopefully you have your dad's metabolism. You can't sit for long, so dinner often consists of you in and out of your chair. You have never had juice or pop and have never asked for either of them, and I'm going to try to keep it that way for as long as possible.

You love cartoons and will sit and watch your favorites, but you are also on the move a lot. If you sit for 10-15 minutes at one time, it's amazing. But you love Scooby, Wubbzy, Thomas, Bob, Mickey & Word World. I refuse to pay big bucks for cable, so we have accumulated a nice stack of dvd's. Sometmes these dvd's are as important to me as they are to you. I'm not ashamed to admit that I encourage you to watch them when I need to get lunches packed in the morning, or get dinner cooked, or do any other sort of chore that's difficult to do with you underfoot. If there is something other than cartoons on the TV, you don't particularly care. You rarely demand to watch anything. You ask, but if I tell you no, you're usually ok with that. You would rather "vroom" your trucks around the house or cook something up in your kitchen.

You're wearing 2Ts, although most of them are too short, and sort of big around. You weigh around 31 lbs and are about 37 1/4 inches tall. You're tall and thin. It's funny, you are so thin in the morning but by the end of the day - after all you eat eat eat - your belly is round and bloated. You wear a size 8 shoe. One of your friends who is 3 months older than you wears a 5, and another friend who is 5 years old...wears a 10! So, uhm, I think you're going to have some mighty big feet! You don't like clothes or shoes, so you spend most of your time running around in a diaper. You love to wear my shoes though...and especially my Harley boots or Ugg boots, because they are big and clompy.

You have 3 "loveys"...a ratty old burp cloth that you call "tag" because you love the tag on it, a blanket that used to be silk on one side and flannel on the other, but the silk is long gone - this is your "blankie", and you have Bubbles the Blabla kitty - called "kitty". You are also still addicted to your pacifier - "ninny" - but we really only let you have it at nap time and night time. And you are usually ok with that. I keep telling you we are going to give all the ninny's to the babies soon, and you tell me "no, we're not giving the ninnys to the babies".

You love trucks! The bigger the better. And if it makes sounds and/or lights up, it's even better. You know that when we go to Target, that I will buy you a new truck. Probably not a great habit that I started, but I enjoy making you happy. You have a little bit of interest in coloring...but you usually can't sit long enough. You do like to paint...probably because it's so messy. You are the king of messy. You like dinosaurs and other animals, and you frequently take them for rides in your big trucks, your shopping cart, your wheel barrow or for piggy back rides. You still won't "pedal" your bike. You prefer to be pushed around in it.

You are extremely exhuberant in all that you do. You love to push mommy's buttons, and trust me, you know every single one of them. You are very sweet and equally sassy. (It's ok for a boy to be sassy, right?) You are quite possibly the cutest child I have ever seen. I'm shocked that you don't have an agent yet.

We bought you a piano for your 2 1/2 birthday. You are drawn to piano's immediately upon entering a house or business that has one. So, mommy found one on ebay. The best $35 I ever spent! You love it! And we love you. Happy Two and a Half, big boy!