Dylan at Two

When you wake up in the morning, I never know what to expect. Some mornings you wake me up by standing in your crib and shouting "mooooommmmay" "daaaaaaaddday", and then other mornings you wake up and play quietly in your crib with your stuffies and your blankies. You line up whichever stuffies are currently in your crib, and you carefully tuck them all in under your favorite cozy blankies. Sometimes I can hear you singing them songs over the monitor or giving them lots of loving. Then there are the mornings when I go into retrieve you and you have thrown out all of your dear stuffies and blankies onto the floor, and you are just standing there waiting to be retrieved. I just never know what kind of morning it's gonna be!



You are incredibly sweet when it comes to looking out for your big sister. If you get a snack, you insist that Holly gets one, too. If you get a drink, you insist that Holly gets one, too. When you and Holland are rough housing with daddy and playing "one for the money", climbing up his legs, or being swung all around to high heaven, you make sure that Holland gets equal amounts of turns. You tell daddy, "Holly's turn, daddy. Holly's turn." And when you both are in the bathtub, you insist that Holland gets a bucket of water dumped over her lathered up hair, just like you!



When Daddy or I return home from work, you insist that we take our coat ("toat") off immediately and stay awhile! You say, "toat off, mommy. toat over dare, mommy!"



One of your favorite things to say right now is "No Funny!". If daddy or I laugh at you at what you think is not an appropriate time to laugh then you point your little finger at us, and yell, "no funny, mommy. no funny". Then we just laugh louder and we get more finger shaking and more yelling!



You are really developing a love for music and you have been for a few months now. The only problem is that you acquire love for songs, one song at a time, and then you only want to hear that song - over, and over, and over, and over again. Seriously, you would listen to the same song 30 or more times if I let you, and the reason I know this is because Grandpa did let you!! Your first favorite song was the "hello song" from your music together CDs, and other favorites include: "Zoom Zoom Driving in the Car", "My Friends Tigger and Pooh Theme Song", "Song in My heart", and the most worn out of all (the grandpa song) is "Baby Beluga".



Your favorite TV shows right now are Dora the Explorer, My Friends Tigger and Pooh, and the Little Einsteins.



You love school, and every morning (m,w,f) when we are getting ready, I will say (in a sing songy way), "who wants to go to schooo-ul?" And she shouts, "I do, I do!" while doing a tippy toe balerina dance in a circular motion and chanting "too-ul, too- ul".



You also love water. You always have and I'm afraid you always will. You could stand and play at the sink for hours. You especially love it when I give you a cup or two of water to play with in your kitchen area. When I turn the water on for you to brush your teeth, you like for it to come out of the faucet with a pretty strong force. I tend to have just a little bit of water flowing out, but you immediately tell me, "Louder, mommy. Want water louder!".

On school day mornings when we are driving to school, you eagerly await driving through the tunnels (the freeway and train underpasses). You have a little routine to say, "Mommy, tunnel tumming (coming), tunnel tumming!" Then when we pass through it you shout "TUNNEL!" "TUNNEL!". And then once we are a block away, you say, "all done tunnel, mommy. want other tunnel".

You are in a phase right now in which reverse psychology works wonders on you! I think we have gotten you to eat whole meals by saying, "Don't you take another bite. No, no, no Dylan! No more bites! Noooooo! Don't do it!". And then you laugh hysterically, slyly open up your rmouth with a little sneaky grin, and hastily eat more bites and insist that we say it again. "uh-den Mommy, uh-den!". or insist that we go around the table. "Don't you eat that salad, Daddy". "No, no, no Daddy". "Holland Olivia, no more bites for you either! No, no, no......" And the cycle continues. We also use this reverse psychology for getting you to say "Ahhhh" while brushing your teeth. I do remember this phase wearing off with Holland so I'm sure our days are numbered on this one!

At night time when I am putting you down, we have a routine of rocking in the rocking chair and singing songs. I use to have a set playlist that I would sing - the same songs every time. You have outgrown those songs though. I think you started to lose interest a few months ago when you caught on that they were actually aiding in the process of you falling to sleep. There were a couple of months of you fighting the sleep process, but now you have fallen back into a nice, little routine. The basic rocking and singing is the same, I just never know what songs I will be singing. You like to tell me which songs you like to hear. Some of your favorites right now are: "the ABC song", "Five Green and Speckled Frogs", "Old Macdonald", "Goodnight Song that we adapted from the Hello Song", "You are My Sunshine", and the "Rockin' Up and Down in the Rockin' Chair Song". I usually sing a variety of songs or variations of the same song, adding characters like Pooh, Dora, Mickey, etc and then I give you a warning. I say, "Okay, Dylan, just one more song and then crib". You do an exceptionally good job with this. Usually immediately following the stipulation (one more song, three more characters, etc), you sit up, point to crib, give kisses, say, "I love you, Mommy", and then get all nestled into your bed with stuffies tucked under each arm, bottom in the air, and blankie covering your head!

Such a delightful, girl! Thank you Dylan Grace for putting a smile on our face! : ) (taken from a line of daddy's birthday song for you)