I’ve long stopped counting weeks and honestly I forget what month we are in by the time the beginning of the month is here. These girls make me do a double take on the daily, just to make sure these are actually MY children standing in front of me.  They are no longer my BABIES.  They are growing at rapid speed, but they still most definitely need their mama.  

And for that I am ultimately thankful.  

I long for those times when I hear the pitiful whimpers over the monitor or the thud against the closed nursery door – almost as if thats my cue to go in and soothe whomever back to sleep. 

When I am running around like a busy bee, and Parker pops her head over the couch and tells me “Mama, sit!” 

When Jolie walks into the bedroom where I am folding laundry and causally asks

“Hey mama, what are you doing in here?”

I can legit have a full on conversation with my toddlers, and while they have understood what I say to them for months upon months, I can actually understand what they are saying to me. 

I love this age.

Emotions of a Two Year Old

While I can’t say that I have 2 year old toddlers that take responsibility in living up to the ‘terrible two’ namesake, I do have a drama filled life on occasion.  

Cat fights, whining, crying, and defying– especially the latter.  These two really know how to punch a button or two of their daddy and me, but thankfully a few minutes in time out will force them into getting their mind right to apologize and make up.

..and the word ‘sorry‘ out of either little girl’s mouth is worth the pains and cries of time out enough in my book.

It might be surprising to some of you, but Jolie is the most hard headed child on the planet, and occasionally will refuse to apologize without one or two trips back to time out.  

The look on her face as if to be saying ‘mom.  you’re crazy!’

Makes this mother want to pull out her phone and snap a picture.

I remind her about 17 million times a day to keep her hands to herself.

At just about 26 pounds, she is a scrappy little bit.  Parker, who out weighs her by at least 2 pounds, so much as gets in her way, looks at her wrong, or takes a toy that she’s deemed as hers for eternity, there is no stopping Jo Grace until shes got her hands on her. I can literally be holding her back and threatening spankings, time out, or even so far as taking away Puppy, and it doesn’t phase her one single bit.

Parker, on the other hand, just lets out the ugly cries when she’s mad.

Actually, Parker cries over almost everything these days.  This last month she has been going through some kind of emotional change where everything is upsetting and I find myself questioning the entire situation when she loses her mind all over my shoes.  It has taken a lot of patience out of me and her daddy to make it through some days.. and some days has us simply waving the white flag.

Thankfully, I think we can see the light at the end of the tunnel of this phase.. and doom and gloom should hopefully be just a short lived thing.

Learn

These two are oh-so smart.  I was once worried about their vocabulary (or lack their of), but not anymore, thats for sure.  When they are with their BB they discuss every nook, cranny, color, animal, number- you name it, she quizzes them on it. 

Parker will sit in my lap with her favorite puzzle (one that is of numbers and animals) and count to 10 as she pulls each number out of its place, only to effortlessly put it back where she found it. 

Jolie will go through the entire set of wooden alphabet blocks (these are our favorite) and name off the colors and animals/objects on each side. 

We do this about 6-7 different times a day, and it is fantastic to listen to her sweet little intelligence beaming through her tiny voice.

When its time to move onto another activity we have been working hard on making sure our toys we played with previously are picked up and in their place before bringing out any thing else.

The works about 80% of the time.  Parker is my awesome cleaner-upper, while Jolie finds herself with renewed interest in the toys and starts to play what we are trying to put away.  

Looking back over the last 6 months or so, things have drastically changed for these two cognitively, emotionally, and physically.  Its amazing how such a short amount of time can make such a huge impact.

The Potty Talk

A big milestone started for us, give or take, about 6 months ago with introducing potty training to these girls at 20 months (HERE & HERE).  while the Three Day Method worked well to get us going, we still had a ways to go before we were fully trained.  Parker took about a month before she would even attempt number 2 on the potty, and then one day it clicked for her.  3 months after that, she decided that number 2 was the scariest thing on the planet, and she refused.  Jolie.. it has taken every bit of 5 months before she  would even attempt.  

After making rounds of insane celebration any time there was a poo-poo success, they both have decided that it is OK to use the potty for number two. 

A huge game changer was the fact that these two could actually TALK to tell us that they needed to go potty.

The words “I need to tee-tee” or “I need to paaattee” work much better than the whole walk-up-to-mama-and-grab-your-crotch thing. I mean, we definitely figured it out and made it work, but I think we as parents can both agree that we prefer verbal communication over anything else.

It is rare that we have accidents these days (aside from the panic tee-tee while playing and we stop ourselves only to immediately demand we got potty RIGHT THEN), and the most common concern we have of the entire morning is what color panties will we wear, and should they have Minnie Mouse or Elsa on them.  Parker always goes for the pink, and prefers Olaf, whilst Jolie is more of a purple & princesses on her panties kinda gal.

It is amazing to me their decision making abilities. 

We do still wear diapers (size 6) at nap time and bedtime.  There is the occasion that they wake with dry diapers and we go potty after the fact, but I’m just not sure how I want to transition to that yet.  We would have to change how much we let them drink at lunch and dinner (seeing as those two events are so close to nap and bed), and we would have to be aware that there will most likely be accidents in the middle of the night. I will say that they no longer use the diaper as an excuse to go potty. If after bath and diaper before bed one of them needs to use the potty, they refuse to go i their diaper and they request to go on the potty.  So, they are not associating that with it being okay to go potty in their ‘pants’.

My greatest challenge with these two over the last couple months have been “patience”.  These ‘2’s’ are just a challenging period for all of us and my never replenished energy does not do me any good nor count in my favor at all. Despite the challenges we have inherited, while I must say they are minimal, these two are so much fun to hang out with, spend my days with, and be a mother to.  

Those things outweigh the rough afternoons or grumpy refusals at meal times, am I right?

Going through my phone after they are asleep at night, I can’t help but miss them, worry about them, and have this immense desire to just wake them from slumber just to ask for a sweet shug from the both of them.  Man, I’m a lucky mama.