At any rate, I wanted to document some of the things our little man is into these days. He's such a BIG boy now, and it feels like every day he's growing even faster.
His best friend is still his monkey from Mimi, but we've had to take him away a few times because he's now bald. Why? Because for some reason our little man enjoys biting the hair off of him! It doesn't make any sense. :( Sorry monkey!
He's big time into music these days and LOVES singing. His recent favorites (and requests at bedtime) are Here Comes The Sun and Hey Jude - and he also loves the Beach Boys. So whenever we're trying to steer away from Frozen songs, we suggest something by the Beatles or the Beach Boys and he's usually game. But don't even get me started on his love for Frozen!! He loves to sing and dance, and we often catch him in bed just belting out tunes. It's pretty much the cutest.
Here's the beginning to "Jesus Loves Me" before he gets camera shy... (we've yet to catch his better renditions of other songs)
His favorite TV shows are Bubble Guppies, Curious George, Paw Patrol, and Super Why usually... and if he's desperate for TV when we say no, he'll ask for "the news" because he thinks that's the way in.
He loves to say hi to our neighbor across the street. "I need to go say hi to Freddy!" "Mom, I have to say hi to Freddy". He'll stand at the edge of our porch and yell it out almost daily when he sees Freddy.
He's into playing with his cars and trucks lately, usually parking them or racing them. He's also got an affinity for trains and train tracks.
His favorite book for the past two months was one I randomly picked up at the Thrift Store this winter: The Gruffalo. We read it every night for weeks straight, usually two or three times, and he has almost all of it memorized. Thankfully, it's a cute book, but wow, who knew you'd have to hide books as a parent! :) (He also loves Go Dog Go! right now too)
His favorite thing to stay is "No, I do it all by myself" or some version of that phrase. Wheeee.....
Some other funny quotes of his from the last couple weeks:
- "I need my actually monkey." or "I want to use my actually bat." (He uses "actually" to mean real, and we hate correcting him because it's so cute and he uses it so frequently!)
- "Um, cuz I don't know." (when we ask him "why" he did something, like pee in his undies)
- "What a beautiful day!" (when walking down to the beach in Michigan)
- "Benjamin, stop jumping on the couch and sit down." (me) "Mom, I can't sit down." (BWL) "Why can't you sit down?" (me) "Because I'm jumping on the couch." (BWL)
- "You know mom and dad love you," (me) "Everybody likes me, mom." (BWL)
- "That could probably be really fun!" (when we ask him if he wants to do something in particular)
(I think I forgot to ever post about getting rid of the pacifier! Back in February (?), we had a failed attempt to get rid of the paci which involved a long night of screaming and parents who eventually gave in. It was bad timing on our part (Benjamin had just been sick and had only been in his big boy bed for a week or two), so we decided to give up and try again in a week. We also devised a new plan - we came up with a story and told Benjamin that there was a little boy in Florida named Jonah who didn't have a paci and really needed one. We told him how nice it would be if he could send Jonah his paci to help Jonah out. Together, we packed up the paci and put it in a manila envelope, addressed it to Jonah, and had Benjamin put it in the mailbox. Low and behold, it worked! He didn't even cry for the paci that night. We hope it's a sign that his kindness truly does translate into compassion and caring for others. I hope that's something he carries with him his whole life! (And no paci since!) :)
And some other stuff he loves with accompanying pictures:
He LOVES riding his Strider bike. We found it on our neighborhood facebook page last summer and it didn't really seem to peak his interest until this Spring - but wow, he loves it. And he's actually super fast and really steady on it!
He's excited to be a big brother soon! He talks about the baby all the time, brings my belly toys and snacks, talks about how he'll play with the baby, says "good morning" and "I love you" to my belly (and kisses it daily!) - it's pretty cute stuff. (The flip side is that in the past week he's also gotten keenly aware that the baby is arriving soon and now is super clingy to me "Mommy, I NEED you. I just NEED you."... he's reverted to some bad behaviors and we're hoping that this stage doesn't last too long...)
He's about 75% potty trained - we're thankful for that but still frustrated by the other 25% :) I guess we can't be too picky because he's generally pretty good about telling us if he has to potty. Sometimes he even likes being left alone on the toilet to do his business in peace :)
He loves to play games on the iPhone/iPad. This particular game allows him to take pictures of himself. Lucky us :)
He still loves to play guitar! He even plays air guitar quite a bit these days. On this particular morning in Michigan, he woke up and started jamming out for us.
Look how big he is!
He LOVES going to the pool - he loves jumping in (even if we aren't around, which is dangerous!) and doesn't ever mind putting his head under water. And even though Lake Mich was a little chilly, he loved splashing in the water and being pulled out on rafts and tubes!
He thoroughly loves supporting all of daddy's sports teams and went with us to a few World Cup viewing parties at bars downtown.
He loves to try new things, like sparklers!
Just another "look how big he is" pic from the carousel at the zoo...
He loves to be like daddy and even dresses a lot like him sometimes :)
Seriously, I can't get over how much I love this sweet, kind, loving little boy.
