the two year mark.

the big boy on his birthday: 16 december 2008

i know all mother's think their child(ren) is amazing. i am no exception.
seriously.
elijah has got to be one of the smartest, funniest, most athletic two year olds i've ever seen.
seriously.
can i just brag for a bit?

here goes:

my little guy is stringing four to five words together into sentences. the typical amount for a two year old? two to three words. yup. like i said. genius. he's also a little walking parrot so you've really got to watch what you say around him. with us, that's fine...most of the time. i caught myself calling something "stupid" the other day and realized i probably shouldn't say that word again if i don't want to hear it coming out of my little man's mouth. on the other hand, this parrot-ness is quite fun too...i got him to say pepperoni the other day when we were making pizza and it's the cutest thing in the world. the way he say avocado is pretty cute too. he is a little chatterbox; he's always talking or singing about something. i'm finding myself having to make a conscious effort not to tune him out! i'm also trying to use words he doesn't already know in order to increase his vocabulary. he picks up on the new words pretty quickly too.


elijah has moved beyond simple kicking and throwing. now he's on to dribbling (the ball with his feet...think soccer, not basketball) and catching. he catches a ball thrown to him more than half the time (closer to three quarters) and probably a little less than half the time when he throws it up in the air himself. big stuff, i'm telling you. he's also jumping with both feet (something he's been doing for a long time now) but not just up and down. he can jump over things as well as up onto a step or down off a step (like the curb). this is generally something they don't start doing for another 6-12 months. something else he's doing (and has been for about three/four months), is riding a two-wheeled bicycle (it has training wheels of course). this even surprised his pediatrician. according to her, pedaling a bike is typically mastered by three year olds.

also...at his two year old check up, his pediatrician commented (after asking all her questions about typical developmental stuff) that most people would be thrilled to have a two year old like elijah. and we are. thrilled and blessed to have such an incredible little man in our midst.


he's learning to recognize colors and letters. if you ask him what color his car is, most of the time he'll tell you it's orange but in the past couple weeks, he's been branching out into other colors when i ask him to try again. he recognizes the letters O, E and J everytime and most of the time gets Z, B and A. he can count to four in english and sometimes to five in spanish. he's beginning to recognize shapes as well. he always gets moon, star and triangle right but a circle can sometimes be a moon (which is totally understandable) and a square is pretty much always another triangle.


you getting the picture here? this kid is smart AND talented (and pretty darn handsome).

the only thing he/we struggle with is sleep. he refuses to nap most days but he's still just stinkin' tired. when he does nap, it's not for very long and he always wakes up sobbing. not sure what that's all about. nighttime isn't much better. though he goes to sleep on his own now, he inevitably ends up in our bed sometime during the night. this does not provide adequate sleep for any one involved. starting on monday though, when john goes back to his normal work schedule, we'll be moving him into his big boy room across the hall and there will be no-more-mister-nice-guy from mom and dad in the middle of the night. it will probably mean a couple weeks of really crummy sleep but in the end, we'll all sleep better. plus we won't have to deal with it when the baby comes.

speaking of baby, just these past couple weeks, elijah has really begun to acknowledge the baby. he says hi to the baby now and kisses or pats my stomach. that probably has something to do with the fact that i'm showing now; it makes it more real to him, i suppose.

a cute story from a couple weeks ago: elijah and i had just sat down to dinner. john wasn't home yet but since we were hungry, we were eating without him. elijah asked to do "amens" (he loves to pray! especially at dinnertime and bedtime). i told him that since daddy wasn't here to do amens, either mommy or 'lijah had to do them. he said, "no mama. 'lijah.". so i said okay, grabbed his hand, bowed my head and waited for him to begin. here's what came out of his mouth: "Jesus. Tanks. Food. Amen." so stinkin' sweet.

that's all i can think of for now...i'll leave you with his height/weight stats.

height = 34 inches tall
weight = 27 pounds (though he feels MUCH heavier)
he's an average weight for his height but he's in the 30 percentile for both on the charts. not surprising considering his lineage.

oh...and one last thing. we have finally sucessfully given up the pacifier. hallelujah!