Andy turns 2

It's hard to believe but it's true. My young Andy turned 2 years old. I don't know where the time goes. Next year he'll be 3 and going to preschool. What's going on around here?

It's so funny to watch kids grow up, especially in the toddler years . They learn so much inside a year. Last year Andy had never had cake and now his favorite word is "chocowit". A year ago, he was the youngest child and he still slept in a crib in New Jersey. Now he's the middle child and in a big boy bed in Ohio.

He's become obsessed with dinosaurs, seemingly out of the blue. One day I tried to get him dressed to take Emma to school which means taking off the dino jammies. It was never a problem before, but this day he had a leg-kicking, arm-waving, eardrum-busting tantrum like I have never heard. He kept yelling something indecipherable, or so I thought, until Emma came in and said "He says he wants to be a dinosaur". From then on it's dinosaurs everyday. Don't ask me how this came about. I don't know.

I made him a Blue's Clues birthday cake because, even though he just runs around when it's on, he always asks to watch it. Blue called Andy on the phone and talked to him about his birthday. "Bow bow bow". Andy and Emma both got a giant kick out of this.

For his birthday we went to the Circle S farm, a family friendly place with a hay barn and a pumpkin patch. It was the perfect day. We walked through a sunflower maze and a corn maze, the kids climbed bales of hay to the top of a slide an came rushing down. We stopped for lunch and apple cider and the kids climbed on giant pumpkins. We took a hayride out to the pumpkin patch and enjoyed looking at about 100 pumpkins before we settled on our 4, which are now on the front porch.

And now our young monkey is 2. An exciting year is ahead. He will learn to use the potty, peddle his tricycle and learn to be more independent. I look forward to these new accomplishments only slightly more than I feel sad about him leaving behind his baby days .