30 Months

Dear Madison and Jackson,

Madison is starting to tolerate more physical play now and you love to chase each other around. You are definitely interacting more now which is something people always ask me if you did but I always had to answer that you really didn't even pay attention to each other...unless one was stealing the other's toy of course. You both love to play outside. We a T-ball T and you both like to hit the ball with a bat. You both just learned to climb up the rock wall on the play structure. You got real good at it real fast. I love all the time we get to spend together even if a lot of it is dealing with your WHINING!!!!!

You had a breif experience with toddler beds. You did OK in them at night in that you stayed in them and went to sleep but nap time was NOT happening so the rails went back on. We're still trying to decide what to do because even with the rails up you are both continuously climbing out of your crib no matter how many times I calmly put you back in.

Your new trick this month is to open the drawers of your bureau, pull ALL the clothes out and throw them all over the room. Then to top it off you BOTH will climb into the open middle drawer. We really need to put stoppers on the drawers so you can't open them! You both get a time out followed by putting the clothes back in the drawers.

You are really responding well to "Do you want to have a time out?" "No" "Then you need to pick up the clothes you tossed out of your drawers". It seems the time outs are making an impression and you know you don't want one so you are willing to do things you don't want to.

Dear Jackson,

You are seriously starting to assert your independence. "No" is now your word of choice although "Stop" comes in a close second. You are not shy about doing something naughty. You haven't figured out yet that you should try to hide what you do wrong so you don't get in trouble.

You absolutely amaze me with some of your sports ability. You are able to hit the ball off the T pretty consistently and it goes about 30 feet. But the thing that is just incredible is that we can pitch a ball to you and you make contact every time as long as it's a good throw. If I do throw it badly and it lands at your feet you will swing the bat like a golf club to hit the ball back to me. In the last week we've been places that have little basketball hoops and you LOVE them. You also love to mow the lawn. We visited Gianna and Michelle yesterday and you used her play lawn mower for a half hour straight!

I got pants that are size 3T but they are way too big. The next smallest size this store has is 24 months and I know those won't fit you through the winter. I got you 3T shirts too and they're a tad big but will work just fine.

Dear Madison,

You are a coy little thing. You really know how to act innocent after doing something naughty. You're so cute!

Daddy has some games on his iphone that you are able to play. It's so cute to see you sitting there touching the screen and knowing what you're doing. One game you like is soccer and the other is meant for kids. It asks you to touch a particular thing on the screen for instance there will be a screen full of letters and it will ask you to touch the "B", or there will be 6 stars of different colors and they will ask you to touch the blue star. You get it right 95% of the time.

The other day you were walking around the house talking to yourself saying "Can you do me a favor?"

You enjoy hitting off the T too. You mostly hit the pole instead of the ball but the cool thing is that you can hit it lefty or righty!

I just went shopping yesterday for some fall clothes. I got you size 24 month pants and even with the adjustable elastic as small as it can go they are still too big for you. I want them to last through the winter so I think we may have to make them work. The shirts are 24 months and they are a tad big.