Happy Birthday, William!

My dearest William,

Today you turn 2 years old. On one hand, Daddy and I are amazed by how much you have really changed as we looked at some older posts on this blog from when you were one. But on the other hand, I do not have any trouble believing you are 2 because you do all kinds of things that assure me that you are not a little baby. You are like a sponge, absorbing everything around you. Every day, you surprise your daddy and me with something new that you know how to say or do. Its something I really love about this age. (For example, we have been reading a little Christmas book about Jesus and the manger and the animals and people around him. It doesn't actually say that the baby on the last page is Jesus - just something like "I am the baby and the reason for Christmas" or something. But you pointed at it one night and said "Baby Jesus." )

And, you can count to 10 on your own (without missing any numbers or mispronouncing them), and yesterday - you showed us that you know those numbers are for counting as you counted the raisins on your tray during lunch time. Not perfectly - but you counted there were 5 of them (when there were actually 4). This morning, when I asked you how many balloons you had, you proudly said 3 (which was right!).

You are very outgoing, even with perfect strangers ... which could develop into a problem, young man! But for now, it makes me happy to see you quickly adjust to new situations and new people. It doesn't take you long to let go of me in a loud, noisy setting to get down and play and explore. Your great Uncle Paul visited over Christmas - whom you never met - and you kept pointing proudly at him and saying Paul! and gave him a hug after you'd known him only a short while.

You can sing the ABC song pretty much by yourself, although you muddle over some of the letters as you sing a long. And singing has become your new favorite thing to do - just in time for Christmas carols. The other night, you woke up around 10pm and you were just sitting in your crib kind of talking to yourself. Daddy and I were eyeing the monitor when you started to sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star (you know that whole song perfectly). It was the cutest thing! Especially because you went right back to sleep afterwards...

Elmo has pretty much moved off of your favorite list - something just 3 months ago I didn't think was possible. Instead, you seem to like Cookie (the Cookie monster) better as far as Sesame Street goes. And you new favorite character, hands down, is Nemo! I can't possibly guess how many times you have watched Finding Nemo now. But you often request it by saying "Nemo Shark!" - which I think is what you think the name of the movie is.

I love to watch how funny things really make you laugh. You have the cutest little belly laugh when you get tickled by something. And it catches me off guard how sometimes you'll be watching a cartoon and you get the joke or silly thing they are doing and laugh and giggle. I love that you are beginning to really understood humor.

As far as food, I think you would be perfectly content to eat turkey-dogs and ketchup for every meal, and you practically do because its easy to fix and you usually won't eat whatever we are eating. I'm afraid I've got a picky eater to pay me back for all the casseroles and meals mom fixed that I would turn my nose up to. And raisins!! Oh dear, Will. You love raisins. I think you might turn into a raisin if I'm not careful! I have to buy them by the tub now because you go through them so quickly. You also love to eat grits, Nutrigrain bars, hotdogs, peanut butter (scooping it off the bread because you don't like sandwiches), pizza, chicken diced and mixed in with rice, corn, carrots, applesauce, cheese, fries, oh - and birthday cake, which you call "pancake".

Now...keeping it real ... every moment with you is certainly not perfect! I do wonder what the rest of 2s will be like (and many say that 3 is harder than 2) when you can already throw an amazing tantrum before you are 2. Sometimes, the looks you give me are more of an 8 year old than a 2 year old. You are definitely testing limits - in fact, sometimes, when you are about to do something you know you are not supposed to, you will say "no, no, no" and then proceed to do it! But trying to maintain our cool and wait until you calm down and then talk to you about why you can't do something or what you did wrong seems to work best for you. I try to remind myself that you are just very curious about everything and don't understand why you can't do certain things. I definitely hear my mom talking through me already though when I say "listen to me!", "don't tell mommy, no", etc. I can already see the response "because I said so!" coming ... one I know I hated when my mom said it ... but now I know why she did!

I know you won't remember your second birthday in years to come, but I think you had a really good time today. I am struggling with making your birthday "special" because it is only 2 days after Christmas. People are traveling to and fro on this day - everyone has opened presents of their own - Christmas decorations are everywhere (I haven't even posted about Christmas yet) - and everyone is pooped from the Christmas season. But your birthday party is next Saturday - to which I hope some of your friends will be able to attend! I only hope that one day, when you do read this blog and reach this post, that you will agree that you never did feel slighted on your birthday and that you know how very special this day is to your father and me.

So, to celebrate your birthday, Daddy and I took you to EdVenture this morning. The difference between this time and what you could do when you turned one is pretty amazing. Then, we had lunch at ChickFilA. I let you watch Cars on the DVD player on the way back home and you were dead asleep before we got home and napped for about 3 hours. Then, we went to a favorite pizza place for dinner, came home and had a little cupcake, Mommy & Daddy presents and, of course, ended the day letting you watch "Nemo Shark!". Below are lots of pictures from the day. (Mommy & Daddy took good ones this time because we got to play with our own Nikon SLR from Bapa and Grandma that we got for Christmas! YAY!!!! I am SO excited about that.)

I love you so very very much William. So much that it makes me literally tear up to think about it. I thank God so much that he gave us you - an adorable, sweet-natured, hilarious little boy!