Twenty months with Alvie Bean

Amy Cissell
December 9, 2013
Fuck Cancer, Oh, Baby!
512

Dear Alvie,

Yesterday, you turned 20 months old. Today would have been your Grandpa Jim’s 64th birthday. I love watching you get bigger and bigger (and smarter and smarter), but every once in a while, when one of these anniversaries happens, I’m socked in the gut with how much I wish you’d been able to meet your Grandpa.

Grandpa Jim would’ve loved to see the “choo” you built.

You are just developing by leaps and bounds lately. Your vocabulary has exploded!

New words: chuck (truck), nanna (banana), mun (moon), sthnow (snow), ky (sky), skirrel (cereal), tory (story), choo (train), schoo (shoe), cucks (clocks), shox (socks), kaket (jacket), shut (shirt), hello, boo (blue), punk (pink), bow (rainbow), cod (cold), mine, teef (teeth), doddy (doggy), miao (meow), twee (tree), ites (lights), kuss (kiss), hayr (hair), bay (baby, of which you are NOT one)

new phrases: I do, I go, no hep (no help), brush teef,

Also – your rendition of twinkle twinkle is awesomesauce. There are no individual words, just the sounds the way you hear them. You count like that, too, which is hilarious.

You are starting to know what words are on what pages of your favorite books. You’ve opened up your Boynton “Opposites” to the last page and said, “Hello! Buh-bye!” and know which animal sounds go with which animal in your Carle “La Arana Muy Ocupada.” (kikiriki!)

You love reading so much, and that makes me so happy.

You go to sleep with a pile of books and I can hear you reading to yourself long after lights out. Just like your mama. But, in addition to trains (currently every toy you have with wheels is a ‘choo’), you also love building things, and love “helping” daddy on his projects.

When I pick you up from the daycare, pretty much the first question (after car go?) is Daddy? All the way home, Daddy? Daddy? And since we usually beat Daddy home, I have to disappoint you a lot. You want to be just like him, and that finally got you over the fear of your little bike. After watching Daddy go on lots of bike rides, you decided it was time.

And now you love that bike, and we go out for rides every weekend that it’s not freezing cold.

It warms my heart to see how much you love that Daddy of yours.

You are definitely my kid, too, though. Beyond the reading (and the fact that you can take up an entire queen sized bed with just one little body, much like me), you love running. We go for lots of walks, and you prefer to run down the street yourself until you get tired. We had a lot of winter-time play in the last couple of weeks, and you ate it up.

sthnow!

leaves!

You also have a keen fashion sense.

You did your first race Thanksgiving weekend, and you loved it!

Ready at the start line.

Proud finisher!

I think we’re both (knock on wood & any other silly superstitions) healthy again. Which was nice for this last weekend, since we did the tree. You were fascinated with the lights, and helped decorate – for about 5 minutes. We spent the rest of the day trying to mitigate your undecorating.

You are such a strong-willed, mischievous, crazy little guy. You do a little too much hair-pulling and hitting for my liking, but I feel confident that, much like your biting thing, you’ll grow out of it (soon, I hope).

You love to do everything that mama and daddy do.

Big shoes

Buying some apps on the iPad

Helping to pack the ‘bye-bye box’ with old toys

Even when I’m tired and frustrated, maybe especially when I’m tired and frustrated, you find a way to melt my heart. You come up to me and give me one of your big hugs and sloppy kisses and pat my face.