I was excited when The Boy turned one. So big! Lots of things on the horizon! He's learning every day, I'm so excited to see his personality and watch who he will become! I feel the same way about BeYoYo, but there's also an added sense of.....something. I'm not sad, really. Surely, I want him to grow and develop and eventually launch and be a productive member of society. But I'm also really aware that he's my last baby, and I want to soak him in. Today he cuddled up and let me rock him for a few minutes before he began his usual eye poking and necklace pulling and crawling up me to examine what's behind the chair, and I savored those few minutes like the last drops of sunlight on a summer night. I smelled his baby head and put my cheek against his head. I listened to his breathing and I studied his fat little toes. My brain replayed the first time I saw him, and fast forwarded through dozens of memories up until that very moment.
Having The Boy has given me such perspective on how fast babies grow up, and how anything that happens for good or for bad is just a phase to outgrow. My friend Jill asked me if I thought the year had gone by fast or slow. "Both" I told her. "Fast, because it was easier than when The Boy was a baby. But slow, because I knew to hold onto it." She has three boys, so I think she knew what I meant. Lard, I bet you really get sentimental with that third one. Or, by then maybe it's all survival, who knows?
Here's how he's grown this year:
BeYoYo....
Says (consistently): Mama, Ball, Bye bye, More (inconsistently): Dada, Bubba, Meow.
Loves: Baths. Crawling away faster when you ask him to come. Throwing all the things on the floor. Shoes. His brother. Prissy. Balls.
Hates: Being in his high chair one second longer than he thinks he should. When his ball rolls away. Black beans.
Signs: light, fan, more, all done, and milk.
Favorite food: All of it. Spaghetti and bbq are two he can't get enough of.
Here he's eating and then signing "all done" at the end.
Nicknames: BeYoYo, but mostly Roo.
Biggest joys: Plastic bags. Cabinet doors. Balls. Real animals.
Biggest disappointment: someone shutting the door to the bathroom when he is on a mission to get to the trash. Food being all gone.
Life goals: Getting in the dishwasher. Eating an iPhone. Getting in a fireplace.
Career objectives: taking clothes out of drawers, taking food out of a pantry.
Laughs at: his brother, hands down. Also: being tickled, animal noises, being told "no".
He also waves, patty cakes, gestures wildly and screams at something he wants, climbs stairs, dances, crawls, gives big slobbery kisses and can take a few steps. He is happy and curious, and determined and fun, and largely go-with-the-flow. He would rather be exploring than sitting still.
I didn't know what having two kids would feel like. I knew that having one kid was a lot harder than I had thought it would be, and I figured having two would be the same. My fear was that everyone would scream at the same time, and that it would be too much for me and I would melt in a puddle of paralysis in the floor.
What I didn't prepare for was how these boys could be so different, and yet each feel like they were what we'd needed. The last year has been easier than I'd expected in a lot of ways. Sometimes it feels like he's always been a part of our family, and then sometimes it feels like he was the piece that completed it. The Boy tells us every day "I LOVE my brotha!" and we know the feeling. So far, the only puddle of paralysis I've melted into has been self-inflicted in an effort to slow down to enjoy these guys together. Happy, happy birthday, sweet baby boy. We're so glad you're here.
He'll be driving before we know it.
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