Samuel's Development - age 2

For Samuel's sake in the future, I like to post about his development every now and then so he can learn about himself when he gets older.  Here's my personal observations...I'm sure they're biased :P

Samuel has been really fun to watch this spring as he grows and learns.  We are amazed everyday at the things he knows and is learning to communicate to us.  He has so many words and is learning how to carry on conversations.  His cognitive skills are blossoming.  He can identify nearly all the letters of the alphabet and is learning the ABC song.  He has mastered all the basic colors, shapes, and gobs of animals and their sounds.  We are working on numbers...he seems to have more difficulty understanding numerical order and doesn't identify his numbers nearly as well as his letters.  He seems to follow and understand picture books like Arthur, Clifford, Curious George, and he loves Dr. Seuss (which thrills Mommy!) - Green Eggs and Ham, Dr. Seuss's ABCs, One Fish Two Fish. 

We're starting to notice lots of imagination from Samuel, which is really fun.  He has been playing fire truck a lot lately, putting out all kinds of fires in our house.  It's a good thing we have him to keep us safe!  He also uses his fire truck hose (which he swings around in circles) to play "Cowboy, Wasso" (lasso).  He's begun trying to build things, instead of just stacking blocks.  Lately, we've been building lots of carwashes out of blocks and stages out of Duplos...granted, his constructions don't usually look like what he says they are, but the point is that he's imagining what things could be.  He's also started pointing out shapes that look like other things.  For example, as he eats his toast, he likes to tell us the shapes he has made - like the toast that actually looked kind of like a horse recently.

We've begun to observe that he can recall and communicate things after the fact.  We came home from the Nature Center one day and I said, "Samuel, tell Daddy what we saw at the Nature Center today."  Samuel said, "Birds!"  I said, "What bird was your favorite?"  He said, "Turkey!  Bye bye Turkey," because we had watched the turkey eat and then turn around and walk away.

Some other fun conversations we've had are as follows...

Samuel: (fake cough) "I want coffee." 
Mommy: "You want coffee?" 
Samuel: "Yes."
Mommy: "Coffee is for grown-ups, not for kids."
Samuel: (fake coughs) "I coughing." 
Mommy:  "You want coffee because you are coughing?"
Samuel: "Yes, pwease."

Samuel: "Mommy, sky."
Mommy: "What do you see in the sky?"
Samuel: "Anmals."
Mommy: "You do? You see animals in the sky?"
Samuel: "Great" 
Mommy: "Do you see birds?"
Samuel: "No, horsie."
Mommy: "What's the horsie doing in the sky?"
Samuel: "Neigh...I see animals in parking lot."


Samuel: "Mom, I want hot dogs pwease."
Mom: "Are you ready for dinner?"
Samuel: "No, two minutes, mom."
Mom: "You'll be ready for dinner in two minutes?"
Samuel: "Uh huh"
(We give Samuel two minute warnings whenever it's time to change activities...looks like this may backfire :P)

Mommy: "Let's get your jammies on and pick out a book."
Samuel: "Jammies, brush teeth, read books, pray, go nap time," thus summarizing bedtime routine.


He's at a super fun age and is sweet, polite, and sociable.  We still have lots of "terrible twos" struggles, though.  He's quite a willful child and lets us know when he's not happy.  We're always on our toes trying to stay one step ahead of him, but more often than not, we're simply learning how to cope at each stage and trying to prepare for even bigger challenges when the new baby arrives.