Mitchell at Two!

Having recently celebrated your second birthday I want to remember that

 At two you:

• Love cars, trains, boats – anything that goes VRRRROOOOMMM

• Love watching Mighty Machines, Diego, Fireman Sam, I Spy
• Love bananas, muffins (up to 4 or more a day if I’d let you!), yogurt, milk, cucumber, carrots, mommy’s water, strawberries, apples; basically you are a great eater. You don’t always want everything when it is served but I don’t worry about you not eating enough as a whole.

• Love the dog and other animals. You like to pet, hug, lie down with and call them “tssss” (I thought that was supposed to be “pee-pee” – not sure what happened!) Unfortunately you also like to hit the dog on occasion. We are really trying to curb this. You also want to put the dog in his house and let him out. No one else!

• Love to play at the park. In fact you get quite upset if the plans change. You love the swings, the slide, and playing in the sand with the sand toys.
• Love going on the trampoline. We have to make sure whoever is on with you is careful but you love to run around and fall and laugh.

• Always find animals that make the ROOOAAARRR sound (probably ‘cause it is the only sound you’ll make). So this includes lions, dinosaurs, tigers, sharks etc.
• Are not a fan of the vacuum, even though we use it almost every day (thank you Harvie)
• Go to bed well for us as long as you are nursed down. Yep. You reap what you sow. One day I’ll figure out how to change this! This works for bedtime and naptime. You will also fall asleep in the car but do not transfer. This works okay depending on what we are doing. When you are ready for bed you will grab my hand, rub your eyes and pull me toward the bedroom. You love nothing more than jumping into a bed and pulling up the covers and waiting. Even though we don’t nurse much in bed anymore you look sooo content! You also love to destroy the bed and have a great time throwing yourself all over.

• Are 'sort-of' potty trained. You do best when you are nakey-butt around home. You will poop on the potty and are even initiating pee (yey!). You wake up 5 out of 7 nights dry but do not like to go on the potty first thing unless you have food or have had time to 'wake up'. When we are out that is a different story and I am not sure how to start to change this. We still cloth diaper which is going well.
• Love to nurse still. The “desire” is slowly weaning. We have successfully stopped during the day except for naptime. We have pretty much stopped at night (after going to bed) although you want to when you wake up unexpectedly. You want to first thing in the morning which is hard if you came into bed with us. If you didn’t, you are usually easily distracted.
• Wake up regularly with a good case of bed head (do you need another haircut?)
• Say “hhhh” for hot; “tsss” for dog or other animal; “roar” for animals noises; “vrrmmmm” for any transportation noise; raspberries for transportation noises too (you do this really well!); “da” for dad; “mum” for mom. You sign “eat”; “please”; and we HOH/sign “milk”, “more”, “car” and more as they come up.  You fold your hands to pray when asked.
• Clearly capable of letting us know what you want. Thankfully you also listen to negotiation and/or calm down fairly quickly when you won’t be able to have your own way.
• Love to snuggle with mommy still (yey!). You give hugs and kisses WHEN you want to. And clearly let us know when you DO NOT want to! You usually give “high fives” and “props” when asked. 

• Love your siblings. Not always showing them love but you love the attention from them or when they pay attention to you (which is a lot of the time). You want to be where they are.
• Wrestling and tickling is a fun pastime. You have a great laugh!
• Have some great looks! You do 'mad' really well. You also have a great cheesy smile when we 'get' something you are saying. 
• Love to do puzzles – especially ones with transportation.
• Alternate between loving daddy and mommy more. Depending on the activity, ONLY the right person will do.
• Settle well for others. We don't leave you much other than with family, at Sunday School or at MOPS but you get right into the activities there. On the rare occasion that you don't want to leave, you settle quickly after I go.
• Take us by the hand to show us what you want. So cute! This is probably because of your limited speech but we aren't overly worried. We know it will come. We will most likely look into speech therapy soon but we know that we love you no matter what.

ARE LOVED SO MUCH! We couldn't have asked for a greater kid. You are so fun to be with and we are so glad you are in our family! I worry a bit about how you will take to being a big brother but I hope that you will take it in stride as you seem to do with most things. We pray daily for the boy and man that you will become.  We love you!

Love Mom

A few words from your dad:

You are what I call a boyish boy if I ever knew -You love to climb and be independent - run all over - play with the dog - rough most of the time with him, but sweet sometimes.

 

Over all you are a very rough and tumble boy that can take a lot of abuse from your older
siblings-and you are not afraid to defend yourself or tell through actions 

or limited words what you want and don't want. Then there are the times

when you give me a hug and squeeze your arms so tight around my neck and I

just want that moment to last.

I can truly say that with you I have had a new appreciation for being a

father- maybe cause I am older-maybe cause I am a little wiser and maybe

because I am not so afraid of messing up anymore.

As for physical- you are built ford tough and I see sports of some kind in the

not too distant future involving a ball.

Love Dad