The boy will be 3 next week. Hard to believe that the bump that felt like it would never be born, who became Marmite and who was that terrifying, ever sleeping, jaundiced scrap of a baby for so long, is now a wild, walking, talking, dustbin lorry loving little boy.
My Timehop from a year ago tells me he was just beginning to gather vehicle words a year ago. Now he’s more or less conversational, at that delicious age where they find ways round what they want to say with the words they have and where the thoughts and words that come out are not the words that or ideas that you put in.
He adores Mr Tumble, Peppa Pig, pirates, all vehicles, stirring up pretend cakes, drawing, endless reading of stories and a large amount of of making willy, bum and poo jokes. And trumps. He does like people trumping.
He never stops bouncing or running and throwing things. He rarely sleeps before 10pm, even if he doesn’t have a nap, which he has pretty much stopped having now. He’s potty trained (but scared of the toilet and of poos!)
He really loves his mummy. He loves us all very much in fact. He’s amazing at please, thank you and asking people if they’ve had a nice day. (“Nice day? Nice run? Nice gym? Nice toilet?”)
He’s clearly going to be a gymnast, since he already does dive rolls off the sofa arm.
Lego is a hit. He’s great at imaginative play actually; soft toys are an unexpected hit with him.His detail recall is remarkable; he clearly remembers our holiday last summer and all the people and animals. He’s gone off jigsaws but can count to 10 and is currently obsessed with nursery rhymes, either me singing them, on an app or to listen to at night.
Just lately he’s started attaching to random objects for a few days. He sleeps in a bed but trots through to me in the night, always with his pillow or blanket or a toy in his arms.
He’s still breastfed, making him the longest standing nurser of all of them. 🙄
And he is very, very loved.
And very rarely like this.
Alarmingly adept at gadgets, for a child with limited access to them.
Really quite mental.
His hair is slightly ridiculous.
He and Daddy are very big mates. Their favourite thing, after throwing rugby balls, is looking at classic car books and seeing who would like which car. He can spot a Bentley and a Ferrari.
He’s just stopped going to nursery 3 days a week (Xmas rush) and gone down to 2 days. He’s going to try out a local playgroup soon because like Fran, he’s really not a big fan of being at home all day. I miss him, but I’m glad he likes it and we have a lot of fun when he is at home.
I’ve tried very hard to make sure he’s grown up in the sun and unencumbered by the shadow of his brother. Last week he sang “Baby Freddie, Baby Freddie, where are you?” and looked at me enquiringly.
It’s hard to know how much he understands of all of that. I am quite sure that he is his own person though.
It’s hard to believe we were ever without him. A few weeks ago the original 6 of us were Xmas shopping at the end of his nursery day. It suddenly hit us strongly how quickly we can drop back into that format of family – and then hit us instantly fiercely how awful that would be.
Love you, Bene boy.
He is one gorgeous boy that’s for sure 🙂