Ten Things I Love About Having A Two Year Old

1.  We spent the better part of our morning skipping stones at Spa State Park, the cheerful October sunshine keeping us warm despite the chilly air.  Harry has learned to look for wide, flat stones, and he delights in chucking them into the water.  It has been years, if not more than a decade, since I spent a morning skipping stones, but there we were.
2.  He makes me SEE things, rather than just look at them. "What's that?" he asks about anything and everything.  When I try to give him a lackadaisical answer about what I think he has questioned, he calls me on it and demands that I see what he has pointed to.  Today he picked something brown up off the ground.  I told him it was just a leaf, but he immediately stopped and made me look to see it; it was a dried up branch from a cedar tree, and he was satisfied when I finally gave him the correct answer.  Sometimes I think he knows what things are, but demands that I pay attention to the world around me, as if it is of the utmost importance to him that I experience the world from his point of view.  That is special.
3.  His affection is shared carefully and abundantly with those he loves, including me.  Today he was walking past me in the kitchen and stopped, turned around and grabbed my hand.  He looked me in the eye and said "I really love you, Mama".  Then  he continued on his way.
4.  His exuberance for life is not yet outweighed by his caution.  He climbs to the top of the castle at the playground, not worried at all that the ground becomes ever-further away with each step.  He runs through the grass without thinking about his feet getting wet, or slipping on the damp grass.  If he falls and gets dirty he gets up and falls again on purpose, because it was fun. 
5.  At his first ever-parade experience this weekend, he delighted in seeing the trucks, motorcycles, floats, and characters.  He clapped and cheered with enthusiasm; he was so mesmerized by the parade itself that he barely gave a thought to the candy that the parade marchers were tossing to him.  But he was horribly afraid of the army tanks and the Star Wars soldiers (you know, the ones in white, Darth Vador's guys), so much so that he grabbed the legs of the stranger standing next to him to hide his face.  For some reason it made me feel really good that he knew, on some instinctive level, that machines and soldiers of war are scary.  I certainly think they are, whether they're on our "side" or not. 
6.  He is old enough to know when to turn on the charm and his manners.  We were told over and over this weekend that Harry has great manners, great self-control, and that he is a joy to be around.  I love that he knows how to be good company when it matters.
7.  Singing.  I will never get tired of his two-year-old voice struggling to get though an entire song's worth of lyrics and melody.  He sings out loud, clearly and passionately, without a care as to whether or not anyone can hear him.  Please please please let him always feel that way about his voice (and not just his singing voice).
8.  He is almost always excited about things that we, as adults, have lost our enthusiasm for.  Cooking dinner is a science experiment.  Raking the leaves is an adventure in sound, texture, and movement.  The lawn mower is a treasured machine which possesses amazing skills.  Doing laundry is an exercise in ' shooting hoops'.  He helps me see beyond the mundane chores of my daily life.
9.  He is appreciative of the smallest gestures and the simplest gifts.  You could hand him a paper airplane made from the day's junk mail and he would thank you as though you had handed him a pirate's treasure.  Lending him your hand as he gets out of the car grants you a heartfelt "thank you" and sometimes a kiss for your trouble.  Letting him go outside to play is his most favorite of rewards. 
10.  I love it when he sleeps.  Seriously.  Harry is movement, a force of nature.  When he finally tires out, stops the high speed chase of toddler-hood and relaxes into a good sleep, I find great joy in watching his repose.  I love the way his long eyelashes brush the tops of his rosy warm cheeks.  I love seeing his little chest rise and fall in calm, measured breaths.  I love seeing his baby fingers wrapped around the fringe of his blanket.  When he is asleep I am reminded that he is really only two, still a baby in so many ways, even though his awake self demands and pushes and tries to break into boyhood every moment of every day.  Only when he is asleep am I allowed to be still and appreciate him in full, and once I do my heart's reaction is to want to wake him up, to bring the animation back to his face and once again be surrounded by his boundless energy. 

I Think This Will Finally Work: Last Night

We are nothing if not silly.



What do you do after dinner?

Sears Photos Today

Firsts

There are moments in parenthood that are so brilliantly good that they cause the sleepless nights, diaper changes, and whiny days to melt entirely away.  These moments cause love to surge through my veins the way adrenaline does in an emergency until I am so full of joy and overwhelmed with happiness that I want to burst, or at least jump up and down.  We had a stellar day here at the Sullivan house yesterday.
It started with a trip to Target, where I thought Harry could use some art supplies to make Halloween decorations.  We bought safety scissors, glue sticks, and a big pack of construction paper.  Once home I set out to teach my boy how to cut for the first time, but it turns out that he is a natural when it comes to art and crafts (be still, my beating artist's heart!).  He took the scissors from me, held them properly, and proceeded to cut for the next hour and a half, all the while yelling in fits of glee "I'm cutting, Mom!  I'm really doing it!"  he was so delighted and proud of the cutting that I had a hard time getting him to glue the pieces he had cut onto another sheet of paper, but once he understood the concept of the glue stick there was no slowing him down.  He would have happily glued little confetti-like bits of paper all over the house had I let him.  He made a picture for Brendan, and the excitement and exuberance with which he greeted his dad last night was something that, if bottled, would run all of the cars in the nation for a year.  We could not help but giggle and be excited with him as he told Brendan all about scissors and cutting and glue, jumping up and down as he spoke, and pointing at the picture he had created for Brendan to take to work.  And every time we reminded him of the picture he'd made we got the same reaction, exuberance and excitement that were barely contained.  We had another scissors session last evening after an early dinner, in which I showed Harry the techniques for accordion style paper dolls, crown making, and paper airplanes, all of which he promptly cut into little pieces, starting with the heads of the paper dolls.  At first I was concerned, because that seemed a little gross, but he assured me he was only giving them haircuts.  Harry's imagination is alive and well, and I foresee many art sessions in our near future.
After we cleaned up the confettied floor (which both Emma and Harry helped to pick up) we migrated to the living room, where Emma proceeded to take her first steps!  She would plunk down on her knees after the fourth step or so each time, but she was definitely walking!  We cheered her on, she laughed incredibly cute belly laughs, and eventually sat right down to clap for herself and say "yay!"  I jumped up and down, clapping myself, quite unable to control my excitement as my daughter went from baby to toddler before my very eyes.  Brendan was clapping, our friend, Liz, did a happy dance, and Harry cheered and clapped, too, yelling "Go Emma!"  I wish we had it on film, but we were so captivated by her sudden progress that none of us thought to grab the camera. 
My heart is full today. 
As an aside, I am wondering is anyone else's kids make their big milestones when they are overtired?  We have noticed with both of our kids that when they miss their naps or are up later than usual they make leaps in their development, whether it be language, walking, etc.  Just curious.