Simon is 27 Months Old!

Dear Simon,

Today you are 27 months old. Not quite ready to be called 2-1/2, so 27 months it is.

This month you jump and gallop and run and kick and swing the bat and hit the ball and throw and catch and ride bikes and swim and are there any verbs I haven't used? You are just nonstop!

This has also been the month of odd fears. What's really fun is that your fears are almost entirely different than the ones Ben had at your age, so I can't use ANY of what I learned with him to help combat them. In no particular order you are now afraid of:
* your bath
* public restrooms, particularly REALLY echoey ones and ones that don't have the light on when we first go in
* Strange places... no real criteria here as far as what constitutes "strange". Every part of the library except for the kids section you have deemed to be strange though, and worthy of blood curdling screams. Awesome.
* Feathers, like from our craft box. Uhh....
* pooping (see below)

Things you just plain don't like, but aren't necessarily afraid of:
* wet or dirty hands
* wet face
* wet hair
* the bottom buckle of your carseat ("It tickles me!!! Want it OFF!!" it's nice when you shriek this ALL the way home from somewhere)

You have also, just since last week, decided that you don't always like your big brother. You often don't want him sitting near you, touching your stuff or going the same places as you. You had a fit last weekend when we said we were going to Nanee and Pap's and you realized Ben was coming to. All the way out the door you cried, "No! Don't want Ben to come with us!" For real. WHAT has gotten into you this month? Is Ben pinching you when I'm not looking or is this just the start of the competitive sibling thing?

Otherwise, you are still our sweet, gentle little Simon. Always ready with hugs and kisses and giggles, even for Ben some of the time. As I type this, the two of you are dressed in superhero outfits. You are running around the upstairs shouting, "I am Superbaby! And Ben is Superjango!"

In typical Simon two going on five fashion, you decided about a week ago that diapers were for babies. Until now, you have dabbled in the whole potty thing and I kept you in a diaper most of the time to preserve my sanity. But last week, there was an all out revolt against the diapers.

Initially, I put you in underwear with a Pullup over it, but after two days, it was obvious you didn't need the extra layer. So yeah, you pretty much potty trained yourself. I credit Ben for this. Big brothers are very useful! There's only one catch... the poop.

You are deathly afraid of pooping in the potty, but it's generally only once a day and manageable. You go into an absolute frenzy when you have to do poop. If you weren't so upset about it, it'd be hysterically funny. For a couple days you asked for a diaper to do it and that worked well... but now you just run back and forth near a potty, stopping to sit every two minutes, but then getting off and declaring you are finished, followed by more running back and forth and grabbing your backside all the while yelling, "I have to POOP!" and eventually pooping in the underwear and getting VERY upset about it. I hope this part clicks before preschool starts, only because I don't know how I'll manage your poop window with the school schedule! I can't imagine going through the poop frenzy routine at school. Oy.

You sleep well, you eat well. You are still napping and for that, I am grateful!

You're such a fun little dude and we can't wait to see what the next few months bring. I think you are just going to love school! :D

Love,
Mommy