I don't think I realized how much an almost 2 year old can understand and communicate. We have to watch everything we do or say because he is a little sponge. For a few days last week we were locked in a battle of wills about cutting his fingernails. After him scratching himself (and us), it was time to seek alternative measures. We all sat on the bed with the dog and Brad entertained Sam while I cut his nails. Brad sang "the Wheels on the Bus" and acted out the motions (wheels go round and round, wipers go swish swish siwsh) by playing with the dog's ears and moving them in circles, etc. Sam thought this was HILARIOUS and laughed and laughed - without even realizing I was cutting his nails.
However, we did not think through the ramifications of this entertainment. As soon as I was done with his nails, Sam of course went right for the dog's ears and began pulling them in circles and singing - except he is not so gentle and was yanking her all over the place. Parenting fail. Oy vey.
My favorite part of this stage is the explosion of Sam's language. He is beginning to put 3-4 words together and speak in sentences. He can truly express what he wants - although his favorite word is still NO! I'm still waiting for him to learn the word "yes." But he can say things like "Mommy, I want crayons" which is SO helpful in figuring out what he wants.
He is literally learning 3-4 new words per day. Just this past week he learned these words: car, hat, coat, bowl, cup, spoon, love, night, me, mine (we are not loving the MINE declarations), water, one, two, door, why, blue, yellow, tissue, hurray, up, down, juice, crayons, color, book.
He knows the names of many of his friends: Sasha, Andrew, Noah, Tommy, Ayana, Caitlin, Kylie, Neal, Eyob and loves to tells us their names. However, Neal continues to dominate our house and Sam still enjoys joking around that his name is Neal (see my blogpost about Neal taking over our house)
We are very proud of the manners he has learned. He knows how to use the words "please" and "thank you" - although they sound like "PSSS" and "TYOU" - but he uses them appropriately and knows what they mean. He covers his mouth when he coughs by coughing into the inner part of his arm and says "bless you" when someone sneezes. Can you tell we all have had colds here?
He is learning his numbers - right now he can count "One, Two" and tells us that he is 2 years old (which he is almost!). He loves the song "One two buckle my shoe, three four shut the door." He yells out SHOE and DOOR. We sing this song every time we go up and down the steps.
We are also working on colors and have started with yellow, red, and blue. He knows blue and sometimes knows yellow.
He LOVES music and is enthralled when Brad plays the guitar. Brad even gave him a mini guitar lesson the other night:
He has learned to face some of his fears and overcome them. He has very few fears - in fact sometimes I wish he was more afraid of things that he should be afraid of - like the HUGE slide at the playground that I even get nervous on because it's so high!
For some reason, he has been scared of riding on top of the parachute in his playclasses - for 6 months he would cry each time we put him on it, so we stopped putting him on it. It really wasn't necessary for him to learn this, was it? And then this past week we tried again to see what he would do and what do you know - he LOVED IT in Gymboree and in soccer class with Brad He laughed and laughed so hard that all of the soccer parents cracked up watching him.
He has an amazingly deep, hearty belly laugh that is contagious. You can't help but laugh when he laughs. His laugh is probably one of my favorite things about Sam.
He has become SUCH a big boy and changes every day, talking and learning, exploring and destroying, laughing and cuddling. We are excited to see what the next chapter of our family life will be when Sam becomes a big brother.
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