Are You Suggesting Coconuts Migrate?

Well, he's not afraid of bubbles anymore. In fact, he's become quite a fan. Every time we go into his bathroom, he eyes the tub and his bottle of Mr. Bubble and requests a bubble bath.

My darling Precious has turned into such a big boy. He'll be 2 in less than a week. Amazing. Here's the latest on his bigness:

We've had our off days, but overall he's doing super with his potty training, especially now that we're back and home with a more regular schedule.

He has decided to ditch naps along with his nappies. It is a rare day when he'll sleep during the day no matter how sleepy he appears to be. Often after I've given up and gone in to rescue him, he breaks into a big smile and proudly announces, "poopy pieper!" I keep hoping that it's just a phase, or that I'll figure out the magical sequence of events that makes him drift off, or that I'll learn a way to re-train his bowels. No luck yet.

His expressions are killer. Everything from the "Mom, you're really wacky" look to the furrowed brow of concentration just make my day.

The most dramatic thing has been his language development. He's been understanding me just fine for a while now, but hadn't been nearly as interested in actually talking back. Lots of grunting and pointing and signing "please." Over the last month or so, however, he's been exploding with new words. It's fascinating and wonderful! Phil and I will be talking across the room from him and notice him repeating words from our conversation. (Thus we've decided to take the swearing down a few notches.) He's constantly coming up with words I had no idea he knew, and he's become obsessed with letters, numbers and colors. I now spend most of my time trying to follow what he's telling me. Here's a snippet of what I might hear while in Kroger (translated into our adult dialect):

"Go potty? Go potty? Go potty? Wipe wipe. Flush. Flush. Flush. Go potty again? Three. Three. Three. Nine. Six. List. List. Orange juice! Orange juice. Orange juice. Orange juice. Orange juice. Orange juice. Orange juice. Light on. Orange juice. Orange juice. Orange juice. Three. Ten. Light on. Broccoli. Broccoli. Avocado! Avocado. Avocado. Avocado. Avocado ...."

Not surprisingly, I'm the only one who understands most of this (though Phil catches a lot of it), and I find his special pronunciations endearing. Here of some of my favorites:

• nahn duice (orange juice)


• atatoo (avocado)


• beeden (blanket)


• Hahoo (Shiloh)


• pay Mommy adein? (play with Mommy again?)


• bree (three)


• E I E I adein? (Mother dearest, I'd really appreciate it if you'd replay Old MacDonald for the 500th time)

Every day he's more of a real companion. Candy Land is right around the corner, I can feel it.

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