Check it out

I have a two-year-old and it is delightful.

Well, not always delightful. If I’m honest (and why shouldn’t I be) there are moments of genuine frustration built into every day. He doesn’t want to put his socks on, or take a bath, or needs to watch another video of garbage trucks, but not that video of garbage trucks, he really needs to watch the blue one. Blue one! Blue one!

But overall, he’s awesome. His speech is amazing. Today, his daycare teacher sent me a message:

We were reading a book from home*. Evan told me that “daddy uses that.” What is it? “A crane.” What is it for? “Beams.”

Evan also really likes to “check it out.” Whatever it is. We’ll be in the living room reading a book and hear the back door open. He’ll look up and say, “Daddy home. Back door. Evan check it out.” and then run over to the back door.

His dramatic play has expanded. The other night Chad lounged side-lying on the couch and Evan pretended he (Chad) was a garbage truck. Legs extending off the couch are a door opening. Climb up, inside the cab. Legs closed, door shut. Make motor noises. Pillows tossed on Chad’s head are garbage bags and his long arm squishing them down is the compacting arm of the truck.

He’s out of diapers. Few to zero potty misses while with me and Chad, usually 1 or 2 a day at daycare. I’m not going to write a giant potty training description here, I’ll just say that we made an attempt when he was 17 months old, and it was too stressful for me to continue. This time, I intentionally relieved myself of the pressure of “success” and it’s been awesome. Also, the book Even Firefighters Go to the Potty was probably instrumental.

These days, Evan goes to a small  home daycare four days a week. There’s a baby there (she’s 6 months old now) and a couple afternoons a week, another toddler. The transition was hard for us all. Evan still strongly misses his grandma and grandpa (he hugs the phone when we talk to them, kisses their voices enthusiastically) and for the first week of full days, there were tears at drop off. Real, big tears on both sides of that door. But it was short-lived and now he trusts that I’ll be there to pick him up at the end of the day. He’s happy to arrive there, and sometimes too busy dancing or playing to get ready to leave. The teacher has somehow helped him learn how to fall asleep on his own (!) and now for naps, they draw the shades and my son willingly lies down on a cot by himself and falls asleep. I am still sort of stunned by that. I’m hopeful he’ll keep this skill when B&C return this summer.

In December, Evan got sick. Early to mid-December, a good 13 days of high fever, lethargy. He wouldn’t eat, just wanted to nurse and sleep constantly. He didn’t play for many days in a row. Went to the doctor twice, nothing to do but wait it out. In moments like that, I can’t help but think of my mom, of everything she went through with Eve. How to watch your child, your baby, be so sick and in so much pain. To, ultimately, watch your child die. To be genuinely helpless. It has to be something I think about, I have to let my mind go there – because my mother went there in real life, with her body and her child’s body. My mind goes there often, truth be told — and once I arrive, I don’t know what to do or think.

*It’s this Richard Scarry book, one of his favorites.

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Here’s some stuff I want to remember:

-For his 2nd birthday, Chad and I took Evan out to Ann Sather’s for Breakfast and then to the Chicago Children’s Museum for the first time. (I’d contemplated having a party, but he’d been so sick in December, I just couldn’t fathom preparing for it. And by the time Evan was better, Chad’s mom was sick, too. We had a lovely day, and I think he liked having us both around all day for him.) He loved the firetruck with the hoses and nozzles and traffic cones, Kids Town with the bus you can drive, mail you can deliver, car you can gas up and wash.

-A couple weeks ago, we had the little girl from Evan’s daycare over for dinner with her parents. Evan was over the moon to have her at our house! “Do this!” he’d say, and lie down on his tummy. She’d copy. “Do this!” he’d say, and he’d roll on his back. I loved to watch them interact. That night, he had a hard time falling asleep, just out of sheer joy. He’d be almost asleep, them pop up and say her name.

-Super Bowl Sunday was day two of naked potty learning. Friends L&T came over for the game and got to celebrate with Evan when he peed in the pot. You know your child-free friends are good ones when they cheer for toddler pee and don’t mind a potty in the living room.

-“Mama do it.” (pulling up his pants, opening a pouch of applesauce, reading a book)

-He plays with my hair while he nurses, small chubby fingers winding, winding, winding.