2 1/2 Year Old Meo

Our little boy is two and a half this month and becoming less baby-like too quickly. He still has chubby, dimpled hands, and a cute little baby belly, but he is stretching out, growing stronger, and is more and more graceful in his movement everyday. He can snowshoe, he can hike, he can stand on one foot to do tree pose, and he loves being held upside down in shoulder stand. Recently, I introduced the concept of wrestling to him. We either have him try to get past us and reach an object, or have him pin us down. He thinks wrestling is the best thing.

Meo always speaks in complete sentences now. His grammar isn't always spot on and he may not be completely clear (especially to people besides Robbie and I),  but he is now very good at expressing himself and talks almost constantly. He is still a big goof, and his latest jokes involve playing around with the inflection of his voice. He's noticed that there is meaning to the shape of his phrases and loves fooling around with it regularly. But even more than speaking, Meo loves to sing. He makes up his own songs sometimes (they even make sense!), but also has an incredible ability to remember song lyrics. His favorite song to sing right now is "Don Alfredo Baila" which is a Spanish song about dancing. He sings it all the time, and has us listen to it in the car on repeat (it's a song from our music together class). He also loves a classical piece called "And God Created Whales" by Hovhaness, "Puff the Magic Dragon" and the soundtrack to the movie "Frozen" which he fondly calls "Anna Music".

My favorite new Meo development though is how much he loves fantasy play (aka pretending) now. At dinner time his spoon is a bird, his bread is a tractor or a cow and his bowl of soup is a whale peeing. He makes his trucks and cars talk as he drives them around the house, his knights save each other from harms-way and climb really tall mountains, and his dinosaurs roar. He spends most of his independent time (like when I am cleaning up or busy with chores) easily entertaining himself be playing make believe. We also play together, and I try to follow his lead usually. It amazes me the complexity of the different types of stories and scenarios he comes up with. He is so observant and has already learned about so many things in his young life and this knowledge as well as a vivid imagination is evident in his fantasy play.

Little Meo is now exactly three feet tall and starting to wear 3T clothing. He wears a size 7.5 shoe and a size 8 boot. He loves going for walks in the woods, helping daddy feed the cats, painting pictures, reading books, hearing made-up stories at bed-time, and watching movies with snacks. His current favorite books are "The Dinosaur", "Owl Moon", "Dinosaur, Dinosaur" and "The Knight and the Dragon".

Playing with the special stegosaurus and allosaurus that we got him (the dinosaurs in "The Dinosaur")

He has become a relatively great listener again, and is often my little helper wit Link throughout the day. He loves his baby brother SOOOOO much!

He loves to snuggle and to nurse and to sleep with his little arms wrapped around my shoulder at night. He tells me he loves me at least hourly, if not more, and I'm not sure he will ever understand how wonderful that makes me feel. He's my little love, and I'm so proud of the little boy he's growing into.