November 17, 2011
Dear Nicky,
Happy second birthday!! And what a fun two years it has been! It’s amazing to me to look at you next to your sister and think that two years ago you were as small as she is now. And now you’re so big and talking so much and running around everywhere and learning new things every day. I can’t believe how much has changed.
This month you’ve been working very hard at your ABCs. You know words and names for about 20 of the letters of the alphabet and can name them on demand and can find them in words on signs and in books. When you see a letter you recognize you shout out the word that you’ve associated it with. My favorite was when we drove by a sign with an older, balding man on it and you yelled out “Daddy!” I had a good laugh at your dad’s expense until I realized there was a “D” on the sign and that’s what you were pointing out, not that the man looked like your daddy. Now we’re starting to work on learning the sounds that letters make and you’re amazing me at how quickly you’ve already memorized a handful of letters’ sounds. Good work!!
You’re talking so much now. Your vocabulary is constantly expanding and you’re always asking for new words. You speak in multi-word sentences all the time and are very good at telling us stories. I love being able to interact with you even more as you understand more and more of what’s being said and can respond so well now. Your coloring skills have progressed a lot this month – before you were just putting color on the paper, but now your drawings mean something to you and you announce what you’re drawing as you go and are proud of it when you’re done. You also love building towers and houses with your blocks and duplos, and you love destroying them when you’re done!
The biggest change in your life this month has of course been the birth of your baby sister. You stepped right up to the task of being a big brother though and have been very sweet (most of the time) to your little sister. You constantly “want to pat it” (still working on saying “her”) and give her hugs and kisses. You’ve been very good recently at not touching her face or tickling her to roughly. You do like to show her what a ferocious tiger roar you can do so we’re working on learning how to whisper a ferocious tiger roar – I think she’ll like that much better. You also love to look at the baby when she’s sleeping, which usually involves touching or talking or climbing up the bassinet and eventually waking her up.
While you’ve been very sweet to your sister, you’ve been taking it out on mommy and daddy a bit. You threw quite a few temper tantrums in the first couple weeks and you’ve been hitting a lot more since the baby arrived, but we’re working through those things and hopefully we’ll be back on track soon. The worst has been your sleeping. Between the arrival of your sister, the return of the cold nights and day light savings time – which all hit in the same week – your sleep (and consequently, ours) has been all kinds of messed up. Even though your room gets down to the low sixties at night you refuse to wear footed or warm pajamas and you won’t touch a blanket. No surprise that you wake up in the middle of the night freezing and can’t go back to sleep! There have been a few nights when you’ve woken up almost as many times as the baby and you routinely wake up before 5:30, sometimes as early as 4:00! Hopefully that will change now that you’re two and such a big boy. We can only hope.
We’re so excited to see what this next year brings. If the last two years are any indication, it will be a fun adventure!
Love you so much!
Mommy