Closing on Two Years

Still the baby
Sam, letting us know he's ready for a nap
Enjoying his jumping practice
An enthusiastic leap

Samuel is approaching two. Today is a Friday, although not much like the day he was born two years ago. The sun is out in Taipei. I’ve been watching a “five colored bird” out the window and finishing up afternoon projects.

I thought it would be a good time to share Sam’s development. Today he is an exuberant toddler. He has a toddler’s delight, a toddler’s will. He is still a mostly happy child, only veering into anger when he is hungry or tired. He was seriously irking his mother this morning. Emily woke with him—because of him—and after breakfast he refused all of her planning. He says “no” especially to the diaper change, which is especially annoying to Emily. Through my sleeping I heard interjections of “you stink,” “just let me change your diaper,” and “you can’t go out unless your diaper is changed.” Unfortunately, Sam has some serious toddler jujitsu and Emily never did change his diaper. (I tagged in around 8 and forced the diaper change.)

It turns out that Sam was just sleepy again, and even fell asleep [see above pictures]. This is part of his new schedule, where he wakes between 5:45 and 7, often turns mean around 8 and sometimes takes a short nap. At 9 he gets to school, where he usually naps for 1.5-2 hours (we get daily reports from the teachers). Sometime after 3:30 he heads home for the day. We get another 4 hours or so with him, usually including dinner (sometimes more grazing than sitting down to eat) and a bath.

He’s found some new ways to exert his will in the last weeks. He sometimes “bye-bye’s” people, sweetly smiling all the time. It’s his way of say, “I’m happy now—you go away.” He doesn’t do it so often, but we’re still not sure how to react. He also sometimes says “no” to Emily when she tries to read to him or to sing to him at bedtime.

His words are growing. Often if we say something once now he can repeat it, and he’s getting harder words like “butterfly.” In Chinese his teacher says he understands a lot and I think he’s getting more words there also. If I had to guess, I’d say Sam can say around 20-30 words in English and about 10 in Mandarin. We’ve heard that doing two languages can initially slow some language growth, but is good for kids in the long run.

He is a sweet child most of the time. He likes to play. He’s very ticklish, especially if I hold him on my head or if Emily tickles him with her hair. His jumping has improved (the pictures of him jumping are from around a month ago) and he’s really accelerating on his running, chasing, and climbing.

For Sam’s birthday we’re planning a zoo trip tomorrow, a new tricycle, and a homemade cake. We’ve been wanting to go to the zoo for a while, so I’m pretty excited about that. Two years—it’s pretty exciting to have a two year old on our hands. More pictures to follow…