Dear Jude: 22 months

Dear Jude,

Happy twenty second month birthday, sweet boy!  You continue to grow and change at such a rapid pace, I'm glad to be able to look back and watch your growth!

Everywhere we go people are surprised that you are not older than you are, you are a strapping little boy!  You are talking really well and are really into identifying things you see!  You tell me all about the dogs and cars and flowers and trees we see when we take brother to school in your raspy sweet voice.  You love to read books and will back up into my lap with one and say, "I want this, read it."  My current favorite phrase of yours is when you lay by the door during nap or bedtime and say, "momma, where are you?!" Between that and saying, "momma, get me" when you want to be held, you sure know how to work me. 

Confession: I am not very good at teaching my children things. I am working on it, but I am not likely to put flash cards in your face anytime soon. Despite my bad parenting, you amaze me with all of your knowledge. You can count to ten and know a few shapes and colors, as well. You must be picking things up by listening to Liam, or Yo Gabba Gabba is more educational than I realized!

Judesy, I'm pretty sure you are going to eat me out of house and home. I feel like you never stop eating!  You love popcorn, apples, strawberries, bread, and oranges. You eat big meals and lots of snacks. 

You love music and dancing, you are a rough and tumble little boy and often initiate wrestling matches with your big brother. You are pretty dramatic and will cry and throw yourself on the ground at the drop of a hat!  If you fall down, or dramatically lay yourself down slowly, you will loudly proclaim, "I'm oooooookay."  You are quite opinionated, and very good at letting us know your likes and dislikes. You love to give high fives and to blow kisses. 

Baby Jude, you are incredibly charming and a little stinker a lot of the times. Your love of life is contagious and encouraging, I love to see you greeting strangers, they are always surprised and enchanted. You have stolen our hearts with your grubby, chubby little hands and they are yours for the taking. 

Love you forever, and ever,

Momma

Dear Jude: 21 months

*once again, my blogging app failed to post this blog that I wrote almost a month ago!

Dear Judesy,

 You turned 21 months old on the 25th of August!  You are very grown up for your age and we often forget that you're not quite two.

Judes, you are so big!  You seem older than you are because of your size, as well as your behavior.  You are wearing 18-24 month clothing, some 24 month, and a size 6.5 shoe.  Eating is your love language.  If you are grumpy a snack goes a long way in turning your mood around.  You adore sweets and routinely beg for cookies and suckers.  You also love grown up food...you want to eat what we eat, but you want to eat before it is ready.  So you usually have a snacky dinner at 5ish and then eat again with the adults.

Your personality is an absolute hoot!  You are funny, charming, sassy, hot headed, and a born flirt (clearly you take after your parents).  You love greeting strangers and have to say goodbye to everyone when we leave a restaurant.  You also fall apart at the drop of a hat and can cry for no reason whatsoever.  You are also the sweetest, snuggliest, busiest little toddler I've known.  Basically, you keep us on our toes all day, every day.

You talk really well, you aren't always 100% clear, but we know what you want.  You've recently started loving books, which makes mommy and daddy so happy, you love to read and often take a book to bed with you.  You love to be outside and you really love playing with anything that Liam doesn't want you to touch.  You boys love each other, and love fighting with each other.  You love to climb and jump and often scare us by jumping from something high.  You think it's funny to fall, you are a very tough little boy.

Sweet Judesy, we just love you to bits.  I'm not sure what we would do without you and your sweet hugs and kisses.  You love to love things: stuffed animals, dogs, people, and we are grateful to be on the receiving end of you love.  Thank you for being such a precious, strong-willed, little love.  You are deeply cherished.

Love you forever, and ever,
Momma