Letter to my two year old...

Happy 2nd Birthday, my beautiful little boy! I can't believe it has been exactly one year since my last letter to you. Honestly, it feels like it's only been a matter of months! Alas, here I am, once again, wishing you your second heartfelt and slightly bittersweet HAPPY BIRTHDAY! I hope you realize how much joy you bring to our lives and how thankful we feel each and every day for being blessed with the wonderful gift of YOU. My wish for you, now and always, is that you have a long, safe, happy and healthy life... and my promise to you is that, against all odds, your Dad and I will do every-single-thing in our power to provide that for you!

Now, onto the life of you... at two years old, you are still a little co-sleeping junkie, so, every morning you wake with a sweet and very alert, "Good morning!," while pegging a few sloppy kisses on your unsuspecting, still sleeping Daddy and half-sleeping, grateful and giggling Mommy. Grateful for how sweet you are, and giggling because this is your morning routine to a "T" consistently and how I wouldn't trade a thing in this world for this time with you. We all manage to crawl out of bed sometime within the hour, usually pulled by tiny hands, into the living room where your day of full fledged toddlerdom begins! You play around on your own for the most part, seemingly creating your own imaginary worlds, talking, singing, dancing and undoubtedly thinking. You flit from room to room, toy to toy, task to task. Sometime around 1pm and 2pm, you have lunch, and you usually sleep for a couple hours soon after... although, this is not always the case; you've adapted a dirty habit of phasing out this very critical nap 4 days of the last 8 (coined "the nap strike"), which, needless to say, makes for an interesting day for us all! :)

I read recently that the term "toddler" is replaced by the word "pre-schooler" at the age of two. Personally, I think that's just silly. You are still very much our toddler, and coupled with that ranking comes all the bells and whistles, from round-the-clock energy and curiosity that knows no bounds, to your almost shockingly abundant vocabulary and communication skills! Your most common expressions include:

"What are you doing?"
"Oh no! (said event...)" ("Oh, no! Cup fell down!" or "Oh no, pasta all gone?"),
"Oh no! What are we gonna' do?!" (MY FAVORITE!! You are such a funny little character!)
"(Object/place/thing) fun" ("Beach fun!", "Birthday cake fun!", "Friends fun!")
"Thank you much!" (Occasionally "Thank you very much!")
"I sorry 'bout that."
"I okay!" (Thanks to us continually asking, "Are you okay?!" for life's little stumbles and falls.)

As I'm typing this, I'm realizing just how much you actually say that I can't come close to accounting for here... within the last few months, you've also become incredibly descriptive, using words like "big," "tall," "small," "fast," "slow," "high," "low," "happy," "sad," "awesome," "fun," and "very," etc... this list could go on ad nauseam, really. I've mentioned in many of my past journal entries, you've mastered virtually all one-and-two-syllable words, and have since moved on to the big threes, including... "ambulance," "octopus," "al-gator," "dinosaur," "firetruck," "Angelo!!!" (To name a few.) The last one, yes indeedy, is Daddy's name, and the way this came about is actually quite funny. When showering, I tend to almost always forget to grab a towel (terrible, I know), and at the end of the shower I call for your Dad, "Angelo, could you please get me a towel?" So... expectantly, now when I turn off the water, you announce, rather loudly at that, "ANGELOOO!! DAAADAAA!! Towel, please?!" This is incredibly hilarious to both your Daddy and I. We've come to learn you are quite the little comedian and relish in the light of any attention... a trait that very obviously comes from your Daddy! :)

How else could I describe your personality at this moment in your life? Well... you're incredibly affectionate, that almost goes without saying... never short of hugs and kisses to anyone willing to receive them. You ADORE babies, ridiculously so! So much that when you met Chrissy and Andy's new little boy, Avery, you spoke about him for nearly a week following, constantly saying "Baby fun!" and asking "Where baby?" You've already planted a few kisses on two of the three new babies in the playgroup we're apart of. I catch myself wondering how you came to be so remarkably warmhearted at such a young age, but I am FAR from complaining. ♥

Here are just a few snip-its I've written about you recently that I would like to include... I feel they are good mini-captures of your truly unique personality. :)

August 7 at 10:10pm
All day we've been telling Beni, "Tomorrow is the BIG day! Your birthday! You'll be two years old!" So, tonight, he lays down and "pretend" sleeps for about two minutes, peaking a few times while giggling, calms for about 20 seconds, then throws off the blanket and says, "Good morning! NEW DAY!!!", then jumps out of bed and parades around the house screaming "BIRTHDAY CAKE! BIRTHDAY CAKE!" How slick is our little love-bug?

August 7 at 12:24pm
As we were walking out of the house, Beni said, "I love you, Cookie." (Cookie is our Chihuahua.) Sweet angel boy he is.

August 6 at 9:24pm
I am literally laughing my butt off beyond my means of explaining. Beni said, "I have to fart!" which in itself shocked me, but then he actually, ahem, "let one out" and I nearly fell to the floor with laughter. This kid is too much. :) What a boy!

August 6 at 8:37am
Have I mentioned lately how much I adore drive-by morning smooches from a certain 34" gremlin running around these parts? Well, I do!

August 4 at 8:50am
I am so in love with our little boy. I had paper scattered out beside me as I was posting sales online and he came up to my side and pointed to the "jumble" of paperwork and said, "Mess! Mama, messy!" and then proceeded to straighten them up for me, and then thanked ME for letting him! Goofy boy!

See? You are quite the character, my dearest one!

What a year we've had since my last letter to you... in the last few months alone, you've learned all the letters of the alphabet and the sounds they represent, you've learned to count to ten, your vocabulary has grown to several hundred words (go, Beni!!), you recognize basic shapes (star, circle, square, heart) and colors (red, green, blue, yellow, orange, purple). You've learned to build towers and castles, imaginative play, organization, sharing... you've even learned to jump with both feet off the ground! Amazingly, you've also learned compassion, sympathy, and appreciation (I can't can't tell you how many times in a day we hear, "Thank you much!" with a grin to end a ten-year war). You've learned a world of wonderful things in just two years, and I think you are absolutely amazing! My baby boy... :)

Your memory astonishes us at times, or maybe we are still used to thinking of you as the little baby boy we brought home from the hospital 24 months ago. Just tonight, your Dad carried you into the kitchen while dinner was cooking (you were in there for no longer than 5 seconds). Minutes later, you were in the dining room, and Daddy was explaining that you were having "pasta and cheese" for dinner, and you were very quick to add, "and corn, YUM! Mmmm!" There was never any mention of corn, BUT, there was, in fact, a can of corn on the counter when you were in the kitchen earlier. Maybe it sounds silly, but we find these things truly remarkable. It's amazing to me how many little details you take notice to... sometimes you even have me doing double takes just to see what I've missed that you find so fascinating!

Anyway, my little boy... our love, our blessing, our joy... two years ago, I held you in my arms for the first time. Words could absolutely never come close to describing that moment. I can't even find words to express the amount of joy that you have brought to our lives in only two years. You are the rhyme and reason to our every day and we love you beyond what that rhyme or reason could ever convey. Thank you for being everything you are.

I stumbled upon this saying by Maureen Hawkins the other day, and felt it couldn't be more fitting. "Before you were conceived I wanted you. Before you were born I loved you. Before you were here for an hour I would die for you. This is the miracle of life." Or in our case, this is the miracle of you, Beni. I love you!

Love Always,

Mommy