It's hard to believe that Kate is two years old. She truly is a joy... most of the time. I feel like she's been suuuuch an easy baby, but I'm slowly having to accept the fact that she's hit her terrible twos. It's nothing out of the norm I'm sure, but she is really craving independence. She MUST buckle her own seat belt (even though she can't even do it, she has to make the attempt for at least three minutes before she'll let me help her), she MUST get her own utensil out of the drawer, she MUST get out of the car by herself, she MUST choose the diaper she wants to wear, etc. These things aren't a big deal until we're in a hurry and then things so south quick. She has really perfected the dead fish crumple to the ground.
In most other areas, she's wonderful. Often times I won't know that she's woken up in the morning or from her nap unless I check the video monitor. When she wakes up, she just quietly plays in her bed... on a few occasions when I've been sick she's done this for HOURS.
She is quick to apologize if she's hurt someone.
Saw-wee, Mama.
For a few weeks the threat of time-out worked like a charm. All I'd have to do was say, "Do you want to go to time-out?" and immediately she would stop doing whatever naughty thing she was doing. I need to find a new tactic because now when I ask she says "yes" and happily walks herself to timeout.
She eats like a champion. The other night she asked for seconds of asparagus. She eats raw onions. She loves broccoli. And hummus. And lots of other things that make me scratch my head and wonder where we went wrong with Parker.
Here she is on her birthday eating all of her dinner:
And Parker eating none of his. But I love this picture of him- he looks like such a young man!
She and Parker play really well together. Sometimes Parker gets really antsy waiting for her to wake up from her nap so that they can play again.
She has no problem being left with a sitter. The ladies in nursery are always telling me how laid back she is, though they note that she's not a push-over either. She'll get in someone's face if they take a toy from her.
When she knows she's doing something naughty she'll start to growl. It's often what gives her away if I'm not paying attention.
She really likes babies. (Dolls and human.)
Have you ever seen the show "The Middle" with Patricia Heaton? I think it's so funny, but most of the people I ask about it don't seem to care for it. I think maybe it's a mom show that can't really be appreciated until you find yourself in Frankie Heck's shoes: trying to do the best you can with your kids, but constantly feeling like you fall short, while simultaneously loving them to pieces and thinking they're annoying. Frankie's youngest son is kind of a weirdo and one of the things he does is whisper to himself the last word said by the person he's talking to. Kate does this! She whispers all the time and people ask me about it a lot. I find it to be endearing and hilarious and I hope she keeps it up for a long time.
She loves to color. Because Parker didn't show an interest in it until about six months ago, I didn't know kids this young enjoy coloring. I love that she's discovered a quiet activity, but hate the mess that goes along with it. I bought a bunch of the Color Wonder pages, but occasionally she refuses them. I think sometimes it's not just an unfortunate accident, but she actually
wants to color on herself and her clothes and the walls.
She loves being tickled.
She says hi to almost everyone she sees- even if they can't hear or see her. (Like if it's someone walking through the cross walk while we're at a red light.)
On her birthday we had our friends from down the street over for cake and ice cream.
Kate got a lot of wonderful gifts for her birthday, but maybe the best was that Grandma Trudy came to visit us for her special day.
We love our Kate! Parker has to keep reminding me to not call her "Babe" or "Baby" anymore because obviously, she's a big girl now. Sad, but true.
