Happy Birthday Jack!!

photo by michelle enebo

I can't believe you are 2! (Although according to you, you are 6!  Slow down!)  You are such a funny little guy.  We can't believe how smart you are - you are talking in full sentences and learning new words every day.  You watch us so carefully and remember everything!  You are big on testing limits, figuring out what is okay and what might get a reaction from us.  We have so much fun playing with you everyday!

Some things about you as a 2 year old:

*You love books and have many books memorized that you will read to us and the many friends in your bed.  Several times at naptime you have fallen asleep with a book open over your face.

*Recently, playing "store" at a playground you offered me a "no-fat mocha - no whip".  I was so surprised - you are a good listener!

*You love your new "choo choo table" and any opportunity to see real choo-choos.

*After hearing it in a book, you have started saying "sweet dreams" to us whenever you go to sleep.

*You like to do everything yourself!

*We have recently had some "sitting out" adventures with you.  To help you remember to have gentle hands, we made a sitting-out spot in a pack 'n play.  You immediately:  learned how to unlock & open the french doors next to you, learned how to climb out, put books inside the pack 'n play and then came and hit me so you could climb in to read them.

*You love music, singing, dancing and instruments.  We're not sure yet what your voice is like, but you sing with gusto!  You know almost all of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and Old MacDonald.  (I love this one because you have abbreviated EIEIO to EIO (very fast!) )You don't sing it often yet but it seems you also almost know the alphabet song.  You love to sing the Happy Birthday song and occasionally request that we sing it to you.  You lead regular family jam sessions, trading everyone's instruments every few minutes.

*You are fascinated by the Bumble from the Rudolph video.  On Christmas Eve you watched the video with Daddy and Grampy - I walked in just as you saw him for the first time - your eyes were HUGE. We spent the next few days convincing you that the Bumble was friendly.  Now, over a month later, you bring up the Bumble often. "The Bumble is friendly, too."  "Bumble peeks out of mountains..."  "Hear a Bumble?"  We just keep explaining that the Bumble is on tv or at the North Pole with Santa, helping to put stars on Christmas trees.

*Whenever you are going somewhere, you are going to "Nana and Grampy's house."  Every airplane is going to "Namy and Dadad's house."

*You love to look at/sit on forklifts at Lowe's or around town.  You have an incredible mental catalog of trucks and can easily identify excavators, tractors (you even named a bailer!), front end "yoders" -  garbage trucks and fire trucks are some of your favorites.  You were thrilled to see a "car transporter" on the freeway recently.

*You are a very social guy.  Wherever we go, you chat with everyone we see, telling them where we are going and what we are doing.  Half the time, you don't get an answer as the friendly stranger doesn't realize you are talking to them.  But this doesn't stop you - you just repeat it louder until they clue in!

Happy Birthday - we love you!!