How time flies! It only seems like yesterday when we were welcoming N to the world, the day I became a Daddy, and now he is two. Two! I will quite often take him to nursery where he is already in the third classroom, and just be amazed at how quickly he has grown.

I figured it would be a good time to try and capture what he’s like at two, plus I can cover his birthday and his party!

Speech

It’s so weird to be having proper conversations with him. For so long you’re just having one way chats with babies/toddlers but ever since he started talking his speech has developed quickly. He just loves to copy us like a parrot. Anything you say he is likely to just copy you (so you have to be very careful what you say!).

He knows hundreds of words, to the point where you can hardly keep him quiet! Our little chats have moved on so much from simple one word responses. Clearly his responses are quite short, but 4-5 word sentences are quite common now.

Friendly Boy

He’s also making some good friends in nursery and at swimming, well pretty much anywhere we go. He will just walk into a room and say “hello” and start waving at random people.

Before Christmas we went out for afternoon tea at Wentbridge Hotel. You go into a waiting room before your meal to wait for your table, and on walking in to the silent waiting room he just shouted “hello” and the room just lit up! Everyone wanted to chat to him, to the point where the room all said “bye” when we left!

He has lots of friends in nursery too and can usually be found playing with them. The same after swimming too. We go for a coffee afterwards (which most of the class seem to do!) and the kids are often running around playing together and giving each other hugs (or “huggles” as N calls them!).

Interests

This boy LOVES Paw Patrol! He can often be found singing the Paw Patrol theme tune when lying in bed (sometimes in the middle of the night!). He got some Paw Patrol presents for Christmas and his birthday (scooter, bike, Marshall’s fire engine, Rubble’s bulldozer, amongst other things) and is barely away from them!

He enjoys football too. Quite often we will just go in the garden so he can kick a ball around. He also goes to football coaching sessions on a Friday morning and we watch Footy Pups before that (which he also loves). It’s our weekly routine. It’s unfortunate as it does mean I have to be up early on my day off but that’s life with a toddler I guess! He doesn’t always get involved in every activity as he’s a bit young and sometimes just wants to run around, but I don’t care as long as he finds it fun!

He’s really into trains too, like Thomas the Tank Engine. We’ve been on to the Kirklees Light Railway a few times and he really enjoys it (especially when the train goes through the tunnel!). “Choo Choo Train” he often shouts.

He has a similar response to planes too. Although we are on a flight path the planes are still quite high but he loves looking at them as they fly over, and even points at the ones that are really high at the end of the white condensation trails in the sky. It’s like he has some sort of extra sensory perception, knowing planes are nearby before we can even hear them or see them!

Birthday Weekend

On the Saturday we had a birthday party for him. It was all themed around Coco, the film with the Mexican boy in it. I have to give lots of credit to Clare for sourcing some Coco decorations from China as they don’t really do them over here.

We had all the family over and N really loved playing with his cousins. He barely gave us a second look the whole day as he was enjoying playing with them so much.

Clare even got a piñata and we stuffed it full of sweets. The kids absolutely loved it! They loved whacking the thing, well the slightly older ones did. Not sure the younger ones knew what would happen really. N enjoyed it though and didn’t want anyone else to have a go!

On his actual birthday we went to Flamingo Land and for the first time ever he went on a ride by himself. I made sure to strap him in tight so he couldn’t get out even if he didn’t like it, but he loved it! Clare didn’t though, she was very nervous!

More Presents!

Having only just had Christmas little N certainly knew what to do when handed a present! We limited the amount of physical presents he got from relatives as he didn’t need anything because he was so lucky at Christmas.

Some of the things he got included:

• A workbench
• A pirate boat that he can sit in
• Play doh
• Marshall Fire Engine and Rubble bulldozer (from Paw Patrol)
• Clothes (including some Spurs T-shirts!)
• Books

Plus many other things.

It’s a tough time having your birthday so near to Christmas. We do what we can to separate the two (like take decorations down) so they feel distinct from each other, but there’s only so much you can do.

A Great Birthday

He has had a great birthday weekend. He loved his party, the visitors (and the cake!) and presents. Then having a run around Flamingo Land where he bought “Fredigo” (Freddie the Flamingo) and went in loads of rides. He was such a happy boy!

It’ll be interesting to see how he develops throughout 2020 and what his next birthday will bring!