Owen at 2

Stats
At his two year old appointment on June 13, Owen was 29 pounds and 37 inches. He is a busy, happy guy.

*Motor skills-kicks, throws, catches, walks up and downstairs,blows bubbles in water
*Language- when you explain something, he often says "that's why." Last week the garbage bag left some liquid on the floor and he said "It's leaking." He often says "My ___ hurts." to describe a body part that's bothering him. He has said nearly all the body parts in this context!
*Cognitive development-What he knows: counts to ten (except 4), the names of letters in his name, how to make an O, most colors (yellow, orange, green, blue, pink-he mixes up black with white and vice versa)
*Potty training (exploration stage)- he has earned 28 stickers on his potty chart and uses pull-ups in place of diapers. He often sits on the potty after meals or first thing in the morning/last thing at night. Next week we are thinking of trying the two day potty training.
*As a big brother-loves to run in and say good morning, when she cries, he says "It's Ok." Once Laney was frightened of the vaccuum cleaner so when it's time to vaccuum he runs over to her and says "Don't hear it, Laney. Don't hear it." When others come near her, he runs to her side and says "That my baby."
Owen enjoys music, yoga, bathtime, and playing garbage trucks. He loves to watch garbage truck movies on youtube and never misses watching the truck come to pick up his garbage on Friday mornings. "Garbage truck pick up my garbage, momma."
He likes a variety of toys including his bike, balls,trucks, instruments (ukelele, piano) and new baby doll.

what he loves: garbage and garbage trucks, getting the mail, keys, cords, tools, fixing things, cooking

He sometimes takes a 90-120 minute nap either around noon or 4 pm but other days goes without naps.
He is a great eater and still loves fruit in any form. He also loves broccoli, eats green beans and peas, carrots and will try almost anything at least once. If it's a no-go, he will simply say, "I don't like it."

Owen we love you at two!

Two Years Old!

*This pic is from the day before his bday, at his friend Victoria's princess party!













Owen hit two on Sunday and hasn't stopped. He is 29 pounds of love and curiousity, wrapped up in a 37 inch body with mischievous eyes and a gleeful smile. Owen loves all things with wheels, garbage trucks and buses topping the list. He has been very aware of and careful around cars for the past several months, always moving out of the way on the cul de sac and noticing cars (or cars similar to those) of loved ones and neighbors while driving out and about. He comments on trucks and if we hear one outside while at home, everything stops and we go running for a view. He has seen several up close, and we decided to celebrate his big day with cake in our newly remodeled garage on Sunday afternoon. A cake-making friend made a garbage truck cake, and daddy made "dirt" and "sand" cake in a couple of toy dump trucks. Several friends and neighbors joined us to share O's special day!

Owen is talking up a storm. He has a vocabulary of probably 80-100 words (or more) and speaks in 3-5 word sentences like "Help me clean this up." and "I eat now." He uses phrases like "over there", "I go again" and several words are spanish only, including "agua", "uvas", and "dos" When you ask him how old he is turning, he says "dos". I am going to make a concerted effort to use at least 80% spanish with him this summer because he is just at the right spot for it, repeating words and phrases all the time to hear how they sound to him. He is always listening, which daddy and I need to remember! Haha! We love you big boy Owen and are excited for a fun summer with you.

Easter! and Owen gets a big boy bed

We had a lovely if busy day today. Starting with a 10 AM Easter Egg hunt at Central Park, where we met up with Hannah, Matt, and Liam and ending with Owen going "night night" in his new "big boy bed". The bed is a toddler bed my parents found at Goodwill several months back which has been at their house and used intermittently at naptime for the last few weeks. We will see how the night goes. The plan is to let him settle in to the new routine for 3-4 weeks, and then move Laney into the crib. In the meantime, I have a few projects going as I transition his nursery to "their' room. I got two mobiles for her crib (we didn't use any with O) I plan on having him give her one as a present for her crib and her giving him something for his part of the room too. I want to get a crib tent (mesh covering) in case he decides she needs a blanket at some point. hmm. I am hanging name letters for both of them. His are done except the clear coat which I am painting tonight. I found the W,E, and N at a $1.00 clearance bin over a year ago and picked up an oval shaped wood picture frame from Michael's for the O. I painted them brown and plan on hanging them over the head of his bed under the tree mural on the wall. For hers I have been looking on Etsy, envisioning beribboned fancy letters with striped, polka-dotted patterns in sage, turquoise and brown on white letters to spell out Delaney over the crib. Since she doesn't get her own nursery designed for her, at least she could have a fancy name, right? But then I think what if her big girl room is a totally different color scheme and she can't use them after just a few years? Should I just get white letters and use the colors for the hanging ribbons? My last project is creating a family tree on the tree mural by adding bird and owl templates in turquoise and orange that will be labeled with family members the kids can interactively move around like a family tree. You can see the project here. We are also looking for a few more touches to help make the room functional for two.

Schedule of our weekend day today:

9:07 left for Central Park
9:57 countdown begins for Easter Egg Hunt
10:30 head to Western Bagel with Hannah, Matt, and LIam
12:00 head to Grandma and Grandpa's to pick up big boy bed
12:40 momma and daddy set up bed while O. plays at G/G's house
1:11 momma and Laney head to baby yoga class
2:30 momma and Laney back to Grandma and Grandpa's to meet everyone
3:15 daddy comes by to pick us up but Laney is napping so we hang out
4:00 head for early dinner at Jasmine Thai. When we get to the car daddy has a surprise! It is freshly washed, detailed, and filled with gas! yay! (car is now momma's ride as we bought a sonata last weekend and daddy drives it to work. unbelievably, momma has not ridden in new car yet. ever.)
4:30 enjoy chicken satay, pad thai, broccoli with oyster sauce at Jasmine Thai
5:30 when we get home, O is on the stairs saying Owen's bed, Owen's bed. we go upstairs to check it out!
6:15 start boiling eggs for egg dying!
7:00 Laney is fed and happy in Baby Bjorn (facing out first time), Owen is in pj's and daddy has cooled eggs and set up dying cups.
Fun!
7:45 Owen helps make his bed with a fresh sheet, goes to brush teeth, momma realizes Laney has fallen asleep in the baby bjorn, puts her in the bassinet, then adds a blanket, a pillow, an Easter bunny on the pillow, and an Easter library book "The Easter Egg" by Jan Brett to the bed, and waits for O.
7:50 We add a new step to the bedtime routine, saying our prayers. We kneel by the bed and I model "Now I lay me down to sleep" , then Bless everyone in the family. He falls asleep within five minutes of lying down (after basically falling out once and not napping longer than 20 minutes today of course.)
8:05 momma has two sleeping kiddos on the night before Easter and energy to get a few things done! (blog, paint O's letters, fill the kids Easter baskets and maybe see if the dress she wants to wear to church actually fits?!)
Tomorrow we head to church at 9 and then over to Grandma and Grandpa's for Easter brunch and a relaxing afternoon.

Happy Easter everyone. ( I will add pix of the Egg hunt and new bed soon! check back later this week.)

I have no predictions about how this will all play out. Wish us luck.

Getting dressed

Asked Owen to go pick out his clothes and he came back with a bunch!
He has been practicing zipping. The outfit pictured was selected from the pile of clothes.