Two and a Half

Two and a half

2 1/2

2.5

Six months until three!

No matter how I write it or see it, I still can't believe it. How is my baby two and a half years old?

I remember a conversation I had with my SWA friend, Gwen, when I was pregnant with Coop. She was telling me that the baby stage is difficult, but it gets more and more fun as they grow. My thought was that the baby stage doesn't scare me. I know what to do with babies. But what in the world do you do with a two or three-year-old boy?! Gwen smiled and just told me that by then I'll know exactly what to do with a little boy. And now that I'm at that stage, I realize that she's so right. As long as it involves tools, trucks, making trash piles or animals, I've got a happy camper on my hands!

This is a really, really fun age. However, the last couple of weeks have turned this into a challenging stage. Every time Coop has hit a milestone age--1, 1.5, 2--I feel like we go through a couple of difficult weeks. It's like he knows he's just taken a step closer to being an independent big boy and begins to test his limits. Right now we are definitely working through letting him discover and explore and be as independent as a two and a-half-year-old can be, but not letting him cross the line into controlling the situation. Therein lies our challenge! Some days his listening ears are completely turned off and somedays he is the sweetest little guy and best listener around. I understand that it's also a matter of communication. There is so much he wants to say, but just doesn't have the words to say it all, so he gets frustrated about that. I've really been trying to work on acknowledging his feelings and helping him understand how to communicate those feelings. It's a work in progress, but we'll get through it!

On to the fun stuff! All about Cooper at two and a half:

• He loves, loves playing outside. He doesn't need toys outside to have fun, either. Brooms, sticks, rakes, balls, his lawn mower and leaf blower, towels, dirt, or any tool from Daddy's tool room are all this little one needs to stay entertained.
  
• Making trash piles is a daily activity. He will gather anything within reach, pick a spot around the house...our bed, the couch, in a laundry basket...and pile everything up and proudly proclaim, "Look my trash pile! Here come trash man!!"
• Every day we open our front shutters and look around the neighborhood for any lawn mowers in action. He will sit in that front window and watch until the lawn crew is completely finished with their work. And, he loves to tell me each step along the way...mowing, leaf blowing and weed eating. My little man loves it all!

• We still go to Gymboree once a week, and Coop still loves it. Every week we get to pretend to be construction workers, firefighters, farmers, errand runners, mailmen...you name it, we use our imagination to take on that role. Plus, he still gets to climb, bounce, slide, and run under the parachute.
  
• He LOVES music. Coop can rock out at the drop of a hat and have a blast with his own little dance party. He can pick out a guitar when a song is playing and loves to grab his Handy Manny guitar and play along. He knows a lot of instruments and is genuinely interested in knowing how to play them and what they sound like. I LOVE that he has an ear for music and an interest in it. I hope this sticks around! Some of his favorite songs right now are Rocket 88, Country Road, and Country Boy.

• Favorite books these days include Things that Go, Trucks, Chugga Chugga Choo Choo, Llama Llama, Big Blue Train, and any Little Critter book. A retired woman in our neighborhood created a children's library in her home and she opens her doors three days a week for several hours. Coop and I love, love walking to the library every other week and picking out new books to bring home. He gets to pick out five new books each time and even gets to check them in and out with a scanner...big fun! Coop has his own library card and library bag and gets so excited about library days!
  
• Cooper still sleeps in his crib and still loves his crib. He is showing absolutely no signs of climbing out or wanting to sleep in a bigger bed. I've already bought the bedding for his big boy bed and we talk a lot about his big boy room, so hopefully once we have it all ready, he'll be excited and ready to make the change. He falls asleep completely on his own in bed. And he always plays in his bed for 15 minutes to sometimes over an hour before falling asleep at night. He talks, sings, makes truck or car noises, and just has his own little conversations with Big Elephant. I love to listen to that sweet voice on the monitor! He still sleeps for about 12 hours at night and close to three hours each day for a nap. Who knew he would grow into such a great sleeper?!

• Some other favs at this age: Jackson (his best bud, for sure), Handy Manny, Clifford the Big Red Dog (aka: Cliff Dog), Curious George, Toy Story, trucks, robots, tools, cooking, trash trucks, lawn equipment, dinosaurs, wearing his cowboy boots with anything and everything, helping Mommy cook and Daddy fix things, Drake (Cooper says Drake is, "my puppy dog.").
• Every day Cooper picks out little treasures and carries those around EVERY. WHERE. WE. GO. His treasures can be anything...his play tools, one of Philip's flashlights, a pencil, a small dog leash, a stretchy wrist band, a sunglasses band, a small empty box, etc. Think of the most random objects and those things are typically Coop's "treasures." And even thought he knows the real name of all the objects he chooses to be treasures, when they are his daily treasures, he calls them as such. This is maybe one of my favorite little quirky things about Coop. I love it and it makes me smile every single day.
• Potty training...we're not there yet. He goes through phases where he wants to try the big potty and phases where he wants nothing to do with it. If I ask him about going on the big potty, he very politely declines with a, "no, thank you." I just don't want to force it and I want him to be able to tell me that he needs to go. I just think that's really important from talking to other moms who've gone through this. There is a difference in me taking him all the time and him actually knowing when he needs to potty. It will happen in time...right?

• And my favorite aspect of Cooper is his sweet personality. He's got a huge, huge heart. He is concerned when people (or even characters in a book) look sad, and he cheers for people when they do something that's exciting in his eyes. I love that he has such a kind and loving spirit at such a young age. He's also independent, determined, stubborn, and persistent. :) He doesn't like crowded activities--he usually keeps off to one side when it's crowded. He's funny, creative, inventive, playful, giving, silly, genuine, spirited, and I have to go back to it, he's full of life.

I love, love this age. Wish I could bottle it up and record every second because it's going by way too quickly.

03.16.2011