Jana: 2 years, 2nd month

I always feared 2 because of the title of "the terrible twos". While there are the terrible fits, there is also the emergence of an amazing little personality.

Her vocabulary is amazing and we're floored by what her little brain comes up with.

When she's trying to think of what she wants, she'll say "How be bout...." (How about)
She makes all the sounds, without help and in perfect rhythm, when we read "Mr. Brown Can Moo."
When I come home from work or when she gets up from her naps she says in this voice that melts my heart, "I missed you so much."
We're finally getting "I love you so much."
If you ask her to be quiet, she puts her finger to her lips and says in the cutest whisper, "Shhh. ___ is seeping (sleeping)." Most of the time she says Maiya, who's always sleeping, but if she knows anyone else is sleeping (Kara, Mommy, or Daddy), she'll use their name instead.
She still pronounces her name "Gee naa" (with the g pronounced like get)


While Jana hasn't been an overtly cuddly girl, she is such a sweetheart. When she loves people (and her stuffed friends), she loves them so much. Here she is loving on Arianna during our visit.

She's very interested in what big people are doing, so she's wanting to "help" with anything we're doing. Here she is helping me cook by playing with the spices.

If left to her own choices for activities, I think she'd be playing with water until her pruney little fingers hurt. She loves to "wash a hands". We've been trying to incorporate her into our daily chores, so she helps us wash dishes sometimes too.

She's also becoming a master of stairs. I know at 2, she should be having no trouble with stairs, but when the stair height is the same as the length as your shin, going down stairs is a bit of a challenge. She loves to show off how big she is by walking up the stairs.

She's still eating pretty well despite becoming two (knock on wood). Her favorites are yogurt, grapes, strawberries, Cheerios, "Dilla" (veggie quesadilla), "cheese sandwich" (grilled cheese), hot dog with ketchup, or anything bread. "Pizza Steve" (pizza, with a reference to the movie Multiplicity - thanks Dada) is still a top choice and pasta is rarely turned down. Heres' my little messy marvin with a pasta sauce smile.


She is less tolerant of sitting while she eats and wants to eat on the move now - who are we kidding, she just doesn't want to stop moving for any reason. And she wants to eat "big" food. This means that things can't be cut up as small anymore or she gets upset. "Big hotdog" means a hot dog not cut up, and "big cheese" means the whole stick of string cheese. Here she's cramming in a third of a banana.
And now that she can reach the counters, we're having to rethink our baby-proofing strategies. She didn't believe me when I said the banana was all gone, so she's checking the peel.


Occasionally we get treated with some fabulous cuddles. She asked if she could climb in with Daddy. It was short-lived, but who doesn't love some cuddles from your favorite toddler?!?!
All these pictures are from the same day (the pink shirt and overalls day). While the overalls were on their first wear, we discovered that they aren't going to work for Jana. Why do you ask? Because she can get them off and after a few quiet moments, this was how we found Jana. "Nakedy Girl" and "Nakedy Bunny".

We've been trying to spend more time getting Jana's energy out during the day, so we took a trip to the indoor playground. The cutest part of this picture is that she's playing peek a boo with Kara - who I was sitting by me.

She's finally decided that she likes the sandbox again. It's been a while since she's played in there.

Oh the joys of the bouncy house! She LOVES to play in it. She hasn't gotten the hang of jumping and being able stay on her feet, but she loves to try to run/jump until she falls over.

Running across the bouncy house.

We had a beautiful 80 degree day over the weekend and Jana did not want to spend any time inside. Her shopping cart was in the garage, so she walked around the neighborhood with assorted things she found, placed in her shopping cart. She found my water bottle, "a mommy bottle" and it needed to ride in the seat of the cart.

Her favorite thing to do is to go to the top corner of our backyard, yell "ready, set, jump", jump off the blocks, yell "a-run, run, run" as she runs down the grass and down the ramp for the lawn mower.

And here is the silly goose bear-crawling across the lawn.