Ian @ Two

Ian had his two year old doctor's visit this week. He continues to be a big boy: 95th percentile for height, just below that for weight (he's now over 3 feet tall). Kids on the opposite end of the spectrum (5th percentile) could be over 5 before they weigh as much as Ian does (and I'm sure their parents don't sufficiently appreciate the benefits this has for their backs -- carrying a 33 pound boy is rough). He's just starting to get his 2 year molars. He's now done with shots for a few years, and also had his last lead and anemia blood tests (if both are clear now, we won't continue doing them).

Ian appears to be growing and developing very well. I'll try to summarize:

Motor Skills

Ian seems particularly adept at fine motor control skills -- he likes working with mechanisms and figuring out how to put things together. He loves Legos. He now understands all of the major Lego Duplo connections, and will inspect a piece to figure out how to connect it in a new way. He sometimes imagines things that he wants to do, but can't with the pieces he has (like attaching a lego trailer to his non-lego car transporter). He asks for help when he needs it, but will persist in practicing a skill like this until he can do it himself (he worked a long time on getting the garbage can to attach and work properly with the Lego garbage truck and can now do it easily).

Emotional Development

Ian can now verbalize his own emotions much of the time, and also has compassion for others. He can say that he's scared, will miss us, is angry, is sad, is tired (or not), or is frustrated. A few nights ago, while we were talking about Ian's day before bed, we were telling the story of a walk through the neighborhood. Ian said he wanted to get out of the stroller and walk, but soon after, wanted me to carry him. I told him he could ride in the stroller or walk, but that I couldn't carry him all the way home, and he had a big tantrum on the street corner. An old lady across the street yelled, "Come over here little boy, I'm gonna find my switch!" (shockingly, this did not motivate Ian to come her way.). We talked about this and I said, "That woman seemed kind of angry." Ian said, "Woman angry. Ian angry too. I feel better now."

He recognizes emotions in other people too and wants to comfort them. ex. Zrbrt got scared of a bus on a walk downtown and didn't want to cross the street (once we were in the middle, of course). For the rest of the walk, every time we saw a bus Ian said, "It's okay Zrbrt. Don't be scared. It's just a bus.". Today we were watching the zoo episode of Curious George together (we've been watching this almost every day, as Ian is trying to come to terms with the scary part where the angry rhino at the zoo chases George. We usually eat popsicles, hold hands -- apparently this keeps him from being too scared -- and watch "the monkey" together). When George was upset after he accidentally let all the animals out and didn't know what to do, Ian said, "Poor monkey!".

Social Development

On a related note, Ian has also had increased social interest outside of the family. He likes to play with other kids much more than he used to. He seems to particularly like 3-4 year olds (Michael and Hannah at church), and slightly younger kids (Madeline). In these cases he is either learning about new things or teaching what he knows. He was very sweet this week when Madeline came over, showing him all the important things he knows. He nearly tackled her to the floor trying to keep her out of the kitchen while I was cooking pasta, "No Madeline. It's pasta. It's hot!". Today we had the home visit from the teachers he will have at preschool starting in a few weeks. We think he's ready to enjoy this expanded social environment.

Language

The most exciting thing for us lately has been Ian's rapidly developing language abilities. Every day he uses language in a new way. He has begun using rather big words ("frustrated"), and complex connectors ("actually","instead"). This reminds me of a comment in Doug's baby book: "Doug likes to use big words like fascinating, and always uses them correctly".

Sometimes we have conversations with Ian that end in irreconcilable differences:
- Me: "Ian, look it's a pigeon". Ian: "No, it's a bird!" Me: "That's right - a pigeon is a kind of bird." Ian: "No Mommy, it's not a pigeon, it's a bird."
- Me: "Ian, see the police car?". Ian: "It's a taxi." Me: "They both have lights on the top, but this is a police car." Ian: "No Mommy, it's a taxi!"
- Ian: "It's Daddy?" (wanting to know who I was talking to on the phone). Me: "No, it was Grandma." Ian: "No, actually it's Dylan (neighbor)." Me: "No, it wasn't Dylan on the phone, it was Grandma." Ian: "No, actually Dylan."
- Ian: "Where's Mr. Quacky?" Me: "He's outside in the blue car. I can bring him in to you." Ian: "Not in the blue car. Dylan took him. Dylan and Mr. Quacky took a bath. Dylan put him away at Dylan's house." Me: "You think Dylan has him? Hmmm, I think he's in the car." Ian: "No, Mr. Quacky at Dylan's house."

Usually these conversations are interesting, if a bit bizarre. Sometimes they're more frustrating, like:
- Me: "Ian, do you want some tomatoes?" Ian: "Yes, tomatoes." Me: Washing grape tomatoes and putting them on his plate. Ian: "Cut them up, Mommy." Me: "You want me to cut them in half?" Ian: "Yes, Mommy." Me: Slicing them in half and putting them back on his plate. Ian: "No cut them up!!!!!!!!! No tomatoes cut up!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Me: sigh.

So, Ian is now routinely using 5+ word sentences and must have a vocabulary in the many hundreds. This means that he can get his point across in almost any situation. He also apparently has a backlog of things to say. He told me the other night about our trip (in May) when he was sad that Daddy's bike had a light and Ian's bike had no light. Perhaps we will be hearing about all his accumulated frustrations, which he apparently remembers but was not able to express . . . until now.