Yes, yes, I know it's been 3 months. I have some excuses. Let me briefly list them.
1) We spent 3 weeks out of the country (Australia if you didn't hear).
2) Toddlers are a lot of work. Mine expects to eat and be read to every day! Sometimes multiple times.
3) We're working hard on the yard to install french drains so we basically dig until our arms fall off every day.
4) Computers are complicated and getting all the pictures together was just so much work.
Now that my excuses have run dry, I'll tell you some highlights from the last few months. Moriarty is so much more grown up than 3 months ago. Not only can he speak much more articulately about his surroundings, but he can speak about his needs/wants/curiosities as well. He's experimenting with conjugation and sentence structure. He had a minor event at school where another kid bit his finger and when he got home to tell us about it (I'd heard from the teacher already) he said to Pip "I bite my finger on Calvin". He came up with that. It makes sense, and we got to correct him and he's learning so fast. Other little things like "I eat my milk", no drank your milk. Tense is also spotty but he listens to how we talk and I hear him correct himself regularly. It's so interesting to watch language construction in real time.
He's curious about everything. He wants to see all the slugs. He wants to watch every bird. He asks about every sound. He touches every flower. It's incredible (and tiring). And he's no less obsessed with trucks these days. There was an event we went to called "Touch A Truck". He got to sit in the driver's seat of the fire truck, ambulance, and school bus. He got to go inside many trucks and wear some of the gear. He was beside himself. There's construction going on near our house and every morning/afternoon he asks to go see the trucks. And then asks to get out and walk around. He's so polite it's hard to say no. Pam and Kent really helped reinforce saying "please" so it's always "want to go see the trucks, please". "Want to get out of the car and see the trucks, please". "Want a pink motorcycle, please". I said no to that one, vehemently.
He's even more into pink these days. He wants pink shoes, clothes, toys, stickers. If it comes in pink he wants it. He also wants to do everything Pip and I do. Recently that was learning to use chop sticks. We put a rubber band on some and he did great. We're digging the trenches for the french drain and he wants to use his dump truck and shovels to help us dig. He watches Pip cook dinner every night and often tries to help in some way. Pip's great about involving him. He also wants to help me clean up messes, wipe counters, sweep the floor, put his food in the compost, put away silverware, etc.
It's impossible to compress 3 months into one blog post, but the thing I'm most impressed by is his emotional maturity for his age. Of course he has tantrum reactions. He's 2. I'd be worried if he didn't. But today we were heading to the construction site after school. Yesterday he threw a fit when it was time to leave and I started talking to him in the car about the importance of having a good attitude. I explained that it's a treat to go see the trucks and if he says thank you and doesn't stomp his feet and cry when we leave I'm much happier to bring him back again. I reinforced once we got there and when it was time to leave he started in with the stomping, but as soon as I reminded him we'd agreed that he'd have a good attitude and say thank you, he stopped fighting me. He smiled and got in the car and asked about Daddy and dinner. He was able to process his feelings, and experience them without going ballistic. I'm going to keep using this phrase and see if we can make more headway with it. He struggles with transitions (like all toddlers) but if this will help him feel less anxious and help us deal with less whining it'll be a huge win for the whole family. All in all he's an amazing kid.