Charlie- 24 months

John made this little pillow recliner one day for Charlie and he LOVED it!

Showing off his cute little scowl in the sandbox in the backyard

Charlie's talking so much more and doing the funniest things. Man, I love that kid and he is at a great age.

He loves things that are big. He says it the cutest way, "Beeeg!" So as we're driving around town, I hear "beeeg tah" (big truck) or "beeeg bus" (big bus) from the back seat. The other day he said "That's a big bus."

He loves when he hears an airplane in the air. He stops everything, puts his hand to his ear and says, "Lissen. A pane!" (Listen, airplane!) Then we have to search the sky until we see it and then we wave to the plane and say goodbye. Now that the weather is heating up, he gets confused by lawn mowers- they sound like airplanes you know.

He loves to point out the mama, dada and baby in groups, pictures, books, on tv, wherever. If he's playing with two toy cars, the big one is the mama or daddy and the little one is the baby. Then he'll often point out his Mama and Dada, which we love. This weekend for the first time, he recognized that he's the baby and said, "I baby." So darling. (Just in time for him to be dethroned as the baby in a few months.) Luckily, if I ask him if he's big or little, he loves to tell me he's big, so hopefully he'll still think it's cool to be big in September.

Right now he's playing a game where he falls down, then looks at me and asks, "Otay?" to which I'm supposed to reply, "Oh, are you okay?"

His favorite food recently is french fries. He loves them (let's be honest, who doesn't?) He can now ask for them and often will. He calls them "foof fies".

I taught him how to be "soft" and he'll take his little hand and rub it so softly across my cheek when I ask him to be soft.

He loves to be in the backyard. Despite new sand (thanks to Grandpa Mark) and new toys (thanks to the Easter bunny) in the sandbox, he still prefers digging in the dirt garden beds most of the time. We're trying to train him to pick up rocks and put them in his bucket (might as well put him to work, right?) The other day, Johnny was helping him and came across a big rock and said, "That's a big guy" which Charlie repeated every time word for word after that.

I've been visiting a chiropractor (whom I LOVE) for my pregnancy related aches and pains in my back and hips. It helps me so much and I really believe that going often will prevent other health problems. I've been meaning to get Johnny and even Charlie scheduled for that same kind of preventative care but just hadn't gotten around to it. Then last week, Charlie fell off the couch right onto his neck. It was really scary and I knew that he'd need to be adjusted by the chiropractor. So the next day, Charlie had his first visit to Dr. Kristina. It was so interesting to see how she adjusted his little body- it was so gentle! She just adjusted him while he played with toys in her office and he was so still and good for her.

Charlie loves the wonderful people in his life and has certain games he likes to play with each grown up when he sees them. For example, when Grandpa T gets home from work, Charlie grabs him by the hand and says, "C'mon! C'mon!" and takes him downstairs to the treadmill. He wants to watch Grandpa walk on it and walk along with him for about a minute and then he's done. But he will not give Grandpa any peace until they've performed this little ritual.

Johnny bought himself a bunch of Rokenbok (it's a combination building/marble run kind of toy- click on the link if you can't envision it) in college. Yes, college. He has had fun playing with it every now and then but it's mostly been in storage for years. But one morning John got up with Charlie and when I woke up, I found them building towers and ball runs. They build and play with it almost every morning. It's so cute to see them building and working on it together and Charlie loves it! It's a little too old for Charlie so we mostly just have the ball run set up for him.

He's starting to understand sharing and being kind and taking turns. He's still learning but I'm proud of his progress. I'll ask him which truck I (or Sam or James) can play with and he'll choose one out of his toys. If he wants something another kid has, he'll try to offer a different toy before he takes it. And a few times, he's given toys to other kids completely unsolicited.

He's our little pal and we love him a lot!!