Our Little Buddy Is Two

Everett had a birthday a few weeks ago. We had a fun, but not too crazy celebration. We made a cake earlier in the day. Everett and Claire were very "helpful"... I'm glad I had enough batter after their help to still make a cake with. :) It was Claire's idea to make a monster cake and Everett was pretty happy about it. We had hot dogs for dinner (Everett's favorite) and then opened presents. I love how Claire was totally hovering over him as he opened his presents. She wanted to open them all for him. The kids (and Daddy) all enjoyed playing with the presents for a little while before we had cake. I think it was pretty successful. He went to bed happy that night. :)

Now some facts about Everett...

1. Everett is now 35.5" tall. He's getting taller, but sadly not quite tall enough to ride the ferris wheel at Scheels like we found out the other day.

2. He still has a funny fascination with his belly button. He loves drinking from his bottle with one hand while his other hand is playing with his belly button. It was hard when taking his 2-year pictures to get any with his hand not on his tummy. :) 

3. Like I mentioned earlier, one of his favorite foods is hot dogs. He's thrown plenty of tantrums because we didn't have hot dogs for lunch. :)

4. He always wants to be like Claire and do whatever she does. If that means putting on dresses and necklaces, that's what he wants to do. If she plays little baby doll games on the ipad, he wants to also, etc.

5. Since Claire got a bike for her birthday, we decided Everett needed one too or we'd have issues with them fighting over the same bike. We got him a smaller little tricycle which he loves to push himself around on. He hasn't gotten the pedaling down at all, but he still has fun and is pretty fast just pushing himself around with his feet.

6. He loves to tease Claire. He really knows what bothers her and I see him doing things specifically to see her reaction. I wonder sometimes where kids learn these things or if they just come naturally, but he's a big tease.

7. He can be a little comedian. He's so silly sometimes and he loves to make us laugh.

8. In an attempt to see if we could get him interested in more boy-related things, we got him some cars and a dinosaur for his birthday. He really likes playing with his cars on ramps and things and he always points out airplanes and loud trucks he sees when we're out. He likes roaring for his dinosaur and he has a black stuffed monkey named "Bounce" that he likes to sleep with. I like seeing him get interested in more boyish things or just not the same things that Claire likes. :)

9. I can't remember how much Claire talked at this point, but it seems like Everett's talking more than she did at this point. He's pretty much talking in full sentences and I love that he can communicate with me. I may be biased, but I just love when he talks and tells me something. It's so cute. :)

10. With Claire being home and me trying to teach her a little here instead of sending her to preschool, Everett joins us for all our activities. I don't know how much he understands but he's picking up stuff I'm sure. He can almost count to ten... it usually goes something like this though: 1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 7, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10.