Birth Day

Nick was born on June 8th, two years ago, at 2:55 P.M. Eastern time. We are in the Central time zone now. As I am posting this, he would have been 25 minutes old two years ago. It does NOT seem like two whole years ago, but when I see the pictures of those days it is amazing how young the children look.

From birth (and before), Nick was our thumb-sucker. We have an ultrasound picture of a cute snub-nosed little one sucking his teeny tiny thumb. At two years old, he still uses his thumb for comfort and sleepy times and you can tell. The thumb is red and calloused, poor thing. Nick doesn't notice so it must not be painful. If we say, "You don't need your thumb!", he takes it right out, but it is his crutch in stressful times.

He was born more cautious than Xander, but with Xander's exciting example for two years he has become almost as fearless and almost as active and almost as injury-prone.

He knows how to count to ten and every time he points to a number or letter and says what it is, he is correct. I haven't tested him to see if he really knows all the alphabet, but from what we've seen I think he does.

I have sung him the same lullaby for naps and bedtime for one and a half years. He now sings along with me, very loudly and not quite correctly. He goes down to sleep happily and every once in a while will ask for a nap.

He loves stuffed animals. He also loves cleaning up and having me "pu' 'way" what he has cleaned.

Just today I learned that he can sing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" and the ABC song. He also sings a little bit of "The Farmer in the Dell."

We are celebrating his birthday on Saturday when Erik can be here all day. Today we are just letting Nick do whatever he wants (within reason) and this is what he is enjoying so far:

1. falling down on purpose and saying, "I fall down!"

2. screaming excitedly

3. eating (breakfast bar, cinna-biscuits, apple slices, hot dog with mustard, ice cream cone...)

4. running around with his balloon (one of those little supermarket silver ones - and it may mysteriously disappear during naptime b/c this is not the safest of activities)

5. showing me cars one at a time and saying, "Car! Car!" or "Monster truck!" until I repeat.

6. playing stuffed animals with Xander