If you ask Isaac how old he is, sometimes he’ll tell you he’s two.  Other times he’ll tell me he’s four.  What, we’re just skipping three now altogether??  And then the other day, talking about his neighbor friend, he told me “No, I’m nine and L. is 1!” after I told him L. was older.  Please, dear boy, don’t grow up faster than you need to!  Your mama’s heart just can’t take it.

Speaking of growing though, he’s been eating us out of house and home lately!  The boy has gained two pounds in the last couple weeks and at least an inch, maybe more.  The 3T pants I bought him at the consignment sale in September were long and baggy on him…until one day I saw that the pants’ hems weren’t even touching his shoes, and the waists were tight.  Yikes!  He’s pretty solid around the middle and his legs are so darn sturdy, like tree trunks.  I haven’t measured his height, but he’s obviously grown past his previous 36″.  He was 30 lbs, so I’m assuming he’s over that now.  Guess I should get him back on the scale!

One of his favorite foods these days is pad thai.  He also has his own set of chopsticks, which he’s getting pretty darn good at.  The boy is obsessed with shrimp pad thai and will eat a man-sized portion.  We had to start ordering him his own meals instead of letting him share with Mommy!  I ordered a dozen mussels once, then pretty much sat there watching him eat every single last one.  I think I got one, maybe two.  And then he started in on Daddy’s plate ;).  The next time we went out for seafood, we ordered him a dozen clams all for himself and he ate it all.  Plus half of Daddy’s lobster and some of my crab legs.  Isaac ate so much Chris was still hungry when we left the restaurant!  He loves rice, loves curries, loves “Innian food”.  He’ll put away two fried eggs and a piece of bacon in the morning, then twenty minutes later eat an entire bowl of oatmeal (with another egg cooked in).  He’s pretty much eating non-stop all day.  At Costco this evening, he demolished an entire jumbo hotdog, and immediately after was telling me he was hungry!  He loves kale chips and has devoured almost an entire tray of them minutes after we made them.  When he asks for something, he tells me “I need four” or even better “I need lots and lots, Mommy”.  He loves pretty much all fruit except apples and bananas, which he has to be in the mood for.  He loves olives and pickles, pork rinds and macadamia nuts.  He’ll try anything, which is nice, but I have no idea how we’re going to keep up with his appetite, if this is what it looks like at two years old!!

 

It’s so amazing how much has changed in this last 6 months since I stopped writing his monthly updates.  His personality unfolds more every day, and he has some pretty firm opinions about things now.  He likes some things “just so” and it’s funny discovering more and more of his little quirks.

He is such a silly boy lately, and will crack jokes right and left, pausing afterward to tell me “I’m a silly goose!”.  He’ll tell me something is too hard, then crack a big smile and say “just kidding!”.  You got me :).

One of his favorite silly games is “where’s the goose?”  For some reason, he finds it hilarious to walk around looking for a goose in strange places.  “Where’s the goose?  Is it in the mug?  Noooooooo.  Is it under the pillow?  Nooooooo.  Is it under Daddy?  Noooooooo.”  in his little singsong voice.  I love it so much, but not quite as much as the “that’s not mayonnaise” game.  He’ll poke his finger into the kitty’s fur and declare, “That’s not mayonnaise, that’s Ozzy’s fur!” or pick up one of his toys and tell me “That’s not mayonnaise, that’s a train!”.  Goofball.  I have no idea where he comes up with these things, but it keeps me laughing for sure.

These days when he wants me to know that he really doesn’t want to do something, he’ll tell me, “Not by the hair of my chinny chin chin!”.  The Three Little Pigs was his favorite potty time book for a few weeks (a First Little Golden Books version from my childhood), and he really enjoys using that phrase whenever possible.

He loves telling me he eats different things.  We’ll be walking along and talking about the leaves falling from the trees and winter on it’s way, admiring the sun going down over the horizon, and then he’ll tell me, “I eat sunsets”.  He says it about the weirdest things, and sometimes around other people, and always ends up cracking everyone up.

He’ll be sitting on the couch, yanking on his finger, and look up and tell me, “Need to take my finger off, Mommy”.  He tries the same thing with his belly button, toes, nose, ears, etc.

He puts his hands up over his head, making the “V” for victory sign every time he does something he’s proud of himself for. 

Oh boy, he can get into mischief quickly these days.  And then, every once in a while I hear quiet for a moment and start getting suspicious, only to round the corner and see this:

Lately, he’s been obsessed with what happens when he eats or drinks.  He was nursing the other day, looked up at me and told me “Milk goes down my throat, into my belly.  Comes out my bottom and goes into the potty!”.  Um, yes, you’re right, that’s pretty much what happens, smart boy.

He’s starting to dictate when or where I can kiss him.  I’ve heard “No kissing me, Mommy!” and also “No kissing on the cheek, Mommy, only on the mouth!”  or “No kissing nose, kiss on the forehead!”.  I usually will oblige then grab and kiss him all over telling him Mommy can kiss him EVERYWHERE because I’m Mommy!

He’s started calling me Mama again recently for some reason. I’ve been Mommy for over a year, but he went through a short period last week trying to call me Mom (freaking me out, of course), and it’s so sweet to hear Mama again! He’s also trying out Dada again, which just sounds hilarious coming from a 2 1/2 year old.

He loves categorizing things into Mommies, Daddies and babies.  We had a half gallon mason jar sitting on the counter next to a quart-size, and he scooted them together and told me that the Daddy one was hugging the baby one.  Same with balloons left over from Halloween.  As they were shrinking, he’d find different sizes and then tell me the Daddy balloon was hugging the baby balloon, smooshing them together.  Sometimes the Mommy one is included, but it’s mostly Daddies and babies.  

He’ll tell me several times a day, “Mommy’s a lady, Daddy’s a man, Isaac’s a boy.”  And then he’ll include “Mimi’s a grandma”.  She started out as grandpa, but our giggling each time told him something was up and he started correcting himself :).

He went through a phase where he was saying “yessir” to everyone, man and woman alike.  Now he tells me that Daddy is a sir, Mommy’s a ma’am and Isaac is a sir.  He’s putting it all together!  And he loves using the right phrases at the right time.  He’s learned to say, “Have a good day Daddy” when Chris leaves in the morning, and will tell me “Excuse me, I burped”, although half the time he’ll tell me “I burped like Daddy!”  I find it particularly hilarious, because Chris rarely burps, but Daddy gets a lot of credit around here – “I’m wearing a belt like Daddy” and “I’m dancing like Daddy”, etc.

He really is a polite little boy.  Even when he’s being stubborn or ornery, he’ll tell us “No thank you!” (okay, maybe it’s more yelling, but that thank you really takes the sting off of it).  When Mimi tries to help him, he’ll tell her “No thank you Mimi, only Mommy do it!”.  He loves saying please and thank you.  He’ll say excuse me when he’s trying to pass, even if it’s to the cat or my crutches, haha.  He loves mimicking and when we’re out and about will parrot what anyone around us is saying.  It makes it easy to teach him manners, because if we speak nicely to him, he speaks nicely back to us.

Just like any toddler, he’s also pretty quick at picking up phrases and things that we say that aren’t necessarily appropriate for a two year old.  We stopped for a Five Guys burger the other day, which just happens to be located near the store where we buy alcohol.  He headed in that directed, looked over his shoulder, and told me “Going to go buy booze, Mommy”.  Ahhhh, I shouldn’t have laughed as hard as I did, but I’m only human ;).

He’s still rearfacing in his carseat, so as we drive up the driveway to leave, he’ll start shouting out, “Bye bye Daddy’s truck!  Bye bye Isaac’s house!  Bye bye trees!  Bye bye yard!”  and then as we turn onto the street, “Bye bye neighbors!  Bye bye L.’s house!  Bye bye cars!”.  The other day, he kept yelling bye to different things for nearly 3 miles.

He still prefers to be outside more than anything.  He can spend hours trying to catch the leaves falling from the trees, “hunting” squirrels, collecting sticks and rocks and climbing trees, or taking Gabby for a walk.  He loves running up and down the hilly driveway, or better yet, coasting in his little red car.

He’s recently become obsessed with cowboys.  He has a favorite book called Cowboy Dreams that I picked up off of our library’s sale shelf, and fell in love with saying “Yippee tee-yi-yo little dogies”.  I taught him a few more cowboy phrases like “Ride ’em cowboy”, “Yeehaw”, “Howdy Partner” and “Giddyup”.  One morning, he woke up and told me “Yeehaw Mommy, I need a cowboy hat and some boots!”  A couple days later, and Amazon had brought him a little bit o’ western gear :).

He soon after told me he needed a rope, so I fashioned a lasso out of some nylon cord.  He already had a horse, and he’s spent hours roping his toys and “tying things up”.

I went searching for cowboy cartoons, remembering a couple from childhood, and found this gem:

Now, he’s telling me he needs “shiny spurs”, haha.  I’ve been looking for more cowboy books, but it seems that they’ve fallen out of favor.  Barnes and Noble had not a single cowboy or even western themed book for the younger crowd, and all they had for the older kids was a book called “Cowboys and Aliens”.  What the what?  Isaac’s getting too old for board books and will sit still for long books now with a decent amount of story, so if anyone has any recommendations, let me know!

Our little guy adores music.  He still loves the Beatles, and Hey Jude is still his favorite.  Lately, though, even though I swear I haven’t played a single Christmas song (I wait until after Thanksgiving every year), he’s fallen in love with The Little Drummer Boy, and makes me sing it to him every day.  He also loves the song “Follow Me Boys” from the old movie with Fred MacMurray, and demands that Mimi and I sing it and march around the house with him.  He knows almost every word to every song that I’ve ever sung to him since the moment I first held him.  He has always loved music but has never been much of a singer until now.  Now, he’ll sing The Star Spangled Banner, or Rock a Bye Baby, but he also knows all the words to Hit the Road Jack and Hounddog.  He loves Frere Jacque and This Old Man, and can sing every word to Shortnin’ Bread.  I love it so much!

I love watching his face when he hears something new.  You can see the wheels turning as he processes the information, and am always amazed at what he comes out with afterword.  He’s so darn quick, too.  He has an answer for everything.  I asked him the other day what cats like to hunt, and he answered, “Alligators.  And dinosaurs.”

I love listening to his observations.  We’ll go for a walk on an overcast day and he’ll tell me “The sun is sleeping.  Gray clouds make rain come down.  I want to splash in puddles!”

He told me tonight that the moon was shining bright and that meant it was sleepy time.  Then he told me that he wanted to fly to the moon in an airplane or like Peter Pan.  And then he said he wanted to eat it, haha.

My little man is still the sweetest thing ever.  He tells me he loves me all day long, mostly unprompted.  When I tell him I love him, he’ll now tell me “I love you, too Mommy!”  He’ll grab me for a hug and tell me “squeeze me really hard” as he bear-hugs me with his surprisingly strong arms.  That boy can give a serious hug!  He’s always asking for a “hug and kiss”.  He climbed up in my lap to nurse the other day, looked up at me and told me, “Mommy loves her baby”.

Yes, yes, I absolutely do.  Except that you aren’t a baby any more, are you?