Jonathan at two

So, my sweet little boy is now a big 2-year-old.

He is entering a new phase of willfulness... go figure. All of a sudden he is falling apart and screaming when things don't go quite the way he wants them to. It has been a little challenging for me, but at least I've experienced this before with Leesi... so it isn't a huge surprise.

But the willfulness isn't all there is to him. He is still a sweetheart. He loves to snuggle and be held. At night he gives me a hug, a squeeze, and a kiss. He lays his head on one of my shoulders and says "huuuuug", then switches to the other shoulder and says "squeeeeze", then last a kiss complete with smacking sound.

He is beginning to be quite the talker. He has gone about learning to talk in a whole different way than Leesi. He repeats everything. Now, I think he understands everything we say to him. But even before he understood, he would repeat back whatever you said. He strings long sentences together (even like 8 word sentences sometimes!). Leesi didn't repeat things as much. She thought a lot more before saying things. Jonathan has been an experiential learner. He likes to pray. He starts by saying something that sounds sort of like Jesus, and then he says a long string of nonsense words, and then "Amen!"

Jonathan loves to sing. Some of his favorites are Itsy Bitsy Spider, ABCs (with letters... but not necessarily in the right order!), Jesus Loves Me, My God is So Great, Old MacDonald etc. The last few nights, right before I leave their bedroom, I've been singing "God has smiled on me" which is a song I used to sing to them when they were babies. A couple nights ago they both all of a sudden started singing along. It was a sweet, sweet moment to hear Leesi and Jonathan's little voices singing, "God has smiled on me; He has set me free. God has smiled on me; He's been good to me."

In some ways he is such a boy. He loves trucks, trains, and things that go. When he's riding in the car he is content just to look out the window and watch the cars go by. He comments on any big trucks we see. And he always points out trains or the Max, and then says "Toot, toot!" He loves playing with balls. He has taken a particular interest in basketball, quite apart from anything we have done. My parents sometimes hang a bucket on a nail from a post on their deck and Jonathan goes to town "making baskets". He also has a fairly deep little voice. And is quite pushy (literally), which my mom says is kind of a boy thing.

But in other ways he breaks the gender stereotypes (which I think is fairly normal). He likes to wear little clips in his hair, and he likes to put on bracelets and necklaces. He sees Leesi getting her hair fixed and wearing jewelry and he wants to get in on the action too. Today I took him to Bible study with two little clips in his hair. I'm not quite sure what his teachers thought of that when I dropped him off... but all I can say is that some days I just have to pick my battles, and today that one wasn't worth fighting.

So here are his stats at 2:

Height: 37 1/4 inches (97%)

Weight: 28lbs. 9oz. (59%)