Sweet November: Jace

My little man is now 22 months! This age is so fun for me as a mom. He has turned into such a person with a totally developed personality, specific interests, and likes and dislikes. Everyday he picks up some new phrase or cute habit. Well ok, let's be honest... they're not ALL cute new habits. ;)

I used to worry about Jace's speech and that it was a little delayed in my mind. He's definitely picked up way more talking in the last couple of months. He's at the point now where, if in the right mood, he'll repeat every single word that we say and speak on his own in short phrases. It would be impossible for me to estimate how many words he says now, because he at least tries to properly say pretty much everything. His pronounciation is still not great with some words... such as "ball" which is still pronounced without the L's. Which is sort of silly since he says plenty of longer more challenging words clearly. I think some of that is just habit.

He has a couple of repeat phrases that he says all the time like "Where did ___ go?" when something or someone is no longer around. And the less adorable phrase he's been saying is "No, get away! Mine!" when he's around other kids. Sigh. I'm hoping that as he gets older the concept of sharing and being nice to our friends becomes more clear.

I definitely have my moments of struggle with how to handle Jace when he's either speaking to other kids that way, or being rough with them... which usually happens when he gets overly excited and gets a little hyperactive. I try to teach him to be respectful and to keep his hands off other children... but without being too "helicopter parent" like. It's hard to find that balance. I don't want to constantly be scolding him, but I also get anxiety when he's being a bully and possibly upsetting other kids or their parents.

Jace has become obsessed with Winnie the Pooh recently... he has a Pooh plush that he sleeps with everynight (Tigger too!) and he loves to watch the only Pooh dvd that we own. He wakes up every morning asking "Pooh dvd?!" It's cute, but I try not to let him watch it THAT often otherwise he turns into a total couch potato. He's also obsessed with Winnie the Pooh books... or any book for that matter. He loves to read, and will continually bring us more and more books to read to him. Alot of mornings when I go into his room once I hear that he's awake, he's already on the floor with a big pile of books that he's reading alone. (He knows how to turn on his light, so almost every morning he has "quiet time" that he enjoys before we realize he's awake.)

I've noticed that Jace has become more aware when he is watching a dvd or tv show these days. He is actually paying attention to what is going on and being said, and not just zoning out. Oftentimes, I will be in the kitchen while he's on the couch watching TV and all of a sudden hear a big belly laugh come from him when there is a funny part on the show. It's so cute to hear him enjoying the simple things.

Jace has a pretty active social life these days. He's with other kids about 5-7 times per week, between our moms group, preschool, or just having friends over. He has started saying other kids names, or at least trying to. His friend Logan is referred to as "LoLo". He loves playing and interacting with other kids, and will often mimick exactly what they do until they're both imitating eachother and giggling over it. Sometimes when he's around others he'll get really excited and start running, jumping, diving, screaming, breaking things... etc. In those moments we usually have to take a little "time out" to calm down. Like this morning at the park, for example, when Jace decided blowing boogers out of his nose and smearing them into his mouth was hilarious in front of his friends, and then decided to sprint away from me laughing hysterically as he continued to eat his snot. Yea, those kind of excitable moments. :)

Jace is good at saying "please" and "sorry" these days and seems to understand the concept. But we're still waiting on "thank you" to become a routine phrase. It's very seldom that he thanks anyone for anything. He is very sweet at bedtime and naptime with giving lots of kisses and hugs and saying sweet things. He just recently started calling me "honey". I tend to absentmindedly call him honey throughout the day... so just recently he started responding to me with "ok honey" or calling me "mommy... honey". It's probably the sweetest thing I've ever heard come out of his mouth! We're still waiting on "I love you" though. Nothing yet.

Jace seems to have stalled out on growing lately. I feel like he's been in the same size clothing for several months now. I'm sure he is still growing at a normal pace, but he used to be the really tall kid for his age... and now I think he looks a little more average height-wise. He's still a very picky eater, but we're managing just fine and working with it. I have faith he won't be picky forever, and hopefully by the time his two year molars come through a little of the picky-ness (that is teething related) will disappear. Hopefully! He eats any carbs, sandwiches, and fruits, and any type of beverage: smoothie, almond soy and whole milk, and V8 juice. But that's about the extent of his diet. Very few vegetables or meats entire his body unless they're hidden. I used to feel bad about it, but after working with toddlers at preschool I realize that there are plenty of kids WAY more picky than he is that won't even touch a sandwich or a fruit. So it's normal. Some kids are picky, some are really picky, and some will eat almost everything they're offered and it's not that the parents are necessarily doing anything differently. It just is what it is.

Jace's second birthday is not that far off, so we've started planning dates for him to have a "friend" party here in South Carolina, and a little family gathering while we're back in Minnesota for a while in November. Now that Jace is a little older, I'm really excited about throwing him a little party. I never really got birthday parties as a kid, especially since I share my birthday with Christmas. So it's always been important to me to give my kids birthday parties every single year... childhood passes quickly and a young childs birthday is a really special thing that after a few short years you can't get back. His first birthday party was special for us as parents, but he didn't really understand it, this year I'm sure he will enjoy the whole process alot more and I'm very excited for it!

I haven't actually taken a ton of pictures recently... but here are some randoms from the past few weeks. :)