Your Cup (Doesn't) Runneth Over

Dear Connor,

Two days ago, I switched you over from bottles to cups. I'd read that some toddlers are very attached to their bottles and don't want to give them up but you were eager to start drinking from a cup. You were a little too eager, actually. During the first few attempts, you grabbed the cup from me excitedly (spilling milk all over yourself), brought the cup to your mouth too fast (spilling milk all over yourself) and tipped it up too much (again, spilling milk all over yourself--thank goodness for big bibs). 

But then this afternoon--success! When I handed you your cup, you carefully took it with your left hand and used your right hand to shoo me away. You even turned your body away from me a little bit because you really wanted to drink your milk on your own--and you did! You slowly brought the cup to your lips, tipped it up just slightly and expertly drank all of your milk, this time only spilling a few drops into your bib. I was so proud of you! And from the smile on your face, I could tell that you were proud of yourself, too. Yay!

Love,

Mom

New Tricks

Dear Connor,

Man, you have recently learned to do a lot of new things:

-When I say, "Cheers!" you tap my cup with your bottle or sippy cup.

-When you hear the song "If You're Happy And You Know It," you follow all of the commands and clap your hands/stomp your feet/nod your head whenever the song prompts you to.

-If I tell you to rock your stuffed animals, you cradle them in your arms and sway back and forth.

-You and I make deals sometimes, i.e. if you hurry up and finish your breakfast, we can go for a walk, deal? Now when I say, "Deal?" you shake my hand and say, "Deal!"

-When I say "Surprise face!" you widen your eyes, make an "o" with your mouth and put your hands on your cheeks.

-You learned how to walk on your tiptoes and seem to really get a kick out of doing it. You tiptoe around the house pretty often now and always say "a-toe, a-toe" while you do it. 

-When you want what I'm eating, you ask for it by saying, "try" or "some" because when I'm eating, I always ask you, "Do you want to try it?" and "Do you want some?"

-You've discovered the fun in spinning around and running in circles until you're dizzy.

-You love to dance and recently started doing the crazy A Night at the Roxbury head-bopping dance whenever you hear an upbeat song.

-You also love to sing and enthusiastically sing along to the songs on your Fresh Beat Band, Mickey Mouse and Elmo CDs. Your favorite pop songs right now are "Starships" by Nikki Minaj, "We Are Young" by Fun., "Marry You" by Bruno Mars, "I'm Glad You Came" by The Wanted and "What Makes You Beautiful" by One Direction and you love singing along to those, too. You're usually off-key but that's okay; I think you inherited that from GongGong!

-Your newest words are: trumpet, work, che che (Chinese for car), peen peen (Chinese for diaper), rain, owl, aboon (balloon), march, song, mote (remote), aceball (baseball), juice, engine, phone, chicken, building, oshun (lotion), fast, button, hot dog, cheek, beach, oameal (oatmeal), shirt, shorts, pants, chirp, shoon (Chinese for boat), arm, finger, elbow (you think your armpit is your elbow, though), street, school, more, ameal (animal), beyah (better), paw, mess, play, teemo (piano), camra (camera) and mail 

Pretty impressive, little guy!

Love,

Mom

Sesame Place

Dear Connor,

If Disney World is supposedly the happiest place on earth, Sesame Place is a close second. You're a huge fan of Elmo, Ernie, Cookie Monster and the whole Sesame Street gang so you, Daddy and I took a trip to hang out with all of them this past weekend at Sesame Place. We watched the parade, saw a couple shows and even had breakfast with Elmo, Big Bird (or as you call him, "Burger") and The Count (btw, you do the cutest impression of The Count's cackle).

The weekend was not without a few tears (your friend Hailey accidentally pushed you onto the ground when she hugged you too hard) and a few tantrums (yes sweetie, I know there were a lot of toys in the gift shop but you're not allowed to sit in the middle of the store and play with all of them) but overall, it was a wonderful trip, especially when Daddy and I saw how much fun you were having.

Love,
Mom

Hello There!

Dear Connor,

I was washing dishes in the kitchen this afternoon and you were sitting on the couch in the living room when you called out to me. Here was our conversation:

You: Mommy!

Me: What?

You: Mommy!

Me: What?

You: Mommy!

Me: What?

You: Hi!

Love,

Mom

Word Master

Dear Connor,

At your check-up on Friday, the medical assistant asked me if you know more than six words. I laughed at her because in just the past month, you learned how to say the following new words:

scared, snow, trees, tall, high, fun gow (Chinese for sleep), coming, sticker, coin, splash, cloud, train, tunnel, purple, jia jia (Chinese for dirty), spoon, nunu (noodle), dog, cat, tiger, che che (Chinese for car), syril (cereal), ago (let go), try, spin, dizzy, slide, swing, noise, pack pack (backpack), Gong Gong (Chinese for grandpa), petul (pretzel), baguh (bagel), bayee (berry), stawbee (strawberry), track, toys, efant (elephant), boken (broken), pen, chow chow (Chinese for smelly), chaht gnah (Chinese for "brush teeth"), sai gwah (Chinese for watermelon), park, squirrel, work and slurp (you exclaim this whenever you eat noodles and slurp them into your mouth)

You also learned the names of many of the Thomas & Friends train engines and can identify each of them when you see their picture (Thomas, CeeCee (Percy), Gordon, James, Toby, Emily). 

More than six words? Woman, please. 

Love,

Mom

Love Bite

Dear Connor,

Our dog Mochi is half German Shepherd and half Labrador, so he is a BIG dog. He is pretty gentle and laidback for the most part but he can be aggressive from time to time so even though I'm not afraid of him, I have always been a tiny bit afraid that he might bite me one day if he gets too worked up (you never know with dogs, no matter how friendly they are). But it turns out that I should have worried less about Mochi and more about you--you bit me today!

I was standing at the kitchen island cutting grapes in half for you and you were hugging my leg. You began nuzzling your face against my thigh and then--ouch! I felt a sudden sharp pain in my leg because you had sunk your little vampire fangs into my thigh! I screamed out in both pain and surprise, which scared you so much that you burst into tears (I had to hold you for several minutes before you calmed down and found it extremely ironic that I had to console you after you bit me!).

I wasn't mad at you because I know you didn't bite me out of anger. You just did it for fun but it wasn't fun for me! When I lifted my shorts to see the damage, I saw blood and your teeny, tiny teeth marks on my leg. Geez, Connor! Good thing you got all of your shots!

Love,
Mom

Keep On Truckin'

Dear Connor,

Today was an exciting day for you--Daddy turned your car seat around so that you now face the front of the car. No longer are you limited to staring at the sky through the rear window! Now you can see what we see, from the iconic Manhattan skyline as we cross the Williamsburg bridge to the crazy man in the Honda swerving into our lane without signaling (yeah, don't do that when you drive). You also have a full view of the many vehicles we pass on the streets and highways and were so excited to see them all today that during our entire 45-minute drive to Manhattan, you kept exclaiming, "Truck! Bus! Bus! Taxi! Truck! Car! Bus! Truck! Truck! Mommy, TRUCK!" 

I'm sorry, sweetie, what was that? Did you see a truck? I couldn't tell! 

Love,

Mom

Good Catch

Dear Connor,

You know you're a mom when your toddler throws up and you use your hands to catch the vomit. 

Love,

Mom