Vincent's 2 Year Update

Vincent Paul turned 2 years old on March 7th! Boy, this birthday was almost harder than his first! He has changed, grown and learned SO much in this past year and really started talking right around his birthday. Then just seeing how big he is in comparison to his tiny sister - it's so surreal! I remember coming home from the hospital with him like it was yesterday and now he is talking to me :') I am so proud of the little boy he is becoming!!

Height/Weight: Part of why I am posting this so late, is because he didn't have his 2 year well exam until a week ago and I wanted to get his accurate measurements! Vincent is 35in tall (59%), 28lbs (47%) and his head circumference is 52.07cm (98%)

Daily: Vincent wakes up every morning between 8 and 9 AM. He has breakfast either at the table (but in his highchair) or sitting in front of the sliding glass door, so he can watch the birds, planes and clouds go by. He also likes listening to vehicles pass by! We still have Musikgarten on Wednesdays at 9:45 and usually go to the park or have a play date afterward until lunch. We often run errands on other days; he likes riding in the car and also really enjoys riding in the shopping cart at the grocery store! We are nearly always at home from noon until after his nap. He thrives on his routine and tends to throw tantrums and act out when he doesn't eat his meals or nap at the times he is used to. After his nap (I get him up at 4 PM if he is still sleeping by then) we will often go out to the back alley on a walk, where he LOVES to collect rocks and put them in a pile. He just loves being outside! As a matter of fact, he will point at the back door and yell "WALK! WALK!" when he wants to go out! (Which, if it were up to him, would be all day every day.) I've been trying to limit his TV time considerably, to encourage his creativity and teach him to entertain himself without the constant background noise. Now it seems that when I do put something on, he will actually sit and pay attention to it, as opposed to it just running non stop in the background. We dug the alphabet mat back out just after bringing Samantha home from the hospital, so we could do tummy time and Vince has really been learning his letters and numbers since then! He loves listening to music and singing songs, although he doesn't sing along just yet, he will dance along :D

Changing Buddy's diaper and giving him a bottle!

Sleep: About a week and a half ago, we got Vincent his pirate ship toddler bed! :D He was super excited, I was a bit worried about trying to get him into it right now, especially since I am up and down with Samantha all night and not getting a lot of sleep as it is. But he has actually done pretty well, considering he has not been used to this kind of freedom! The first week was a bit rough, but it has gotten a lot better. It takes him a little while to go to sleep, but once he is out, he sleeps through the night. The only time he gets a binky anymore is at nap- and bedtime, but we plan on weaning him from it soon.
As I mentioned above, he wakes up between 8 and 9 AM; usually right around 8:30. He takes one nap in the afternoon, from 1:30 to around 3:30, but will often sleep until 4, in which case I wake him up. It's always a nice treat; he likes to pull the blanket back over his head and play games when I go to wake him! xD Bedtime is still 8 PM. If we have something going on or we are out, I try to shoot for him being in bed absolutely no later than 9:30, but it's very rare. The bedtime routine has changed a little, especially since Samantha arrived. We will often do a bath right before bedtime, which he really enjoys! If any of us says the word bath, he will repeat the word "BATH!!" like a broken record until I either find a way to distract him or give him a bath. xD And I've found a way to make the end of bath time go much better, sans tantrum: I give him a warning ahead of time, then have him help me clean up all his toys and let him watch the water drain. He will say "All done!" and wave bye-bye to the water. When Mike is home, he changes his diaper and puts his pajamas on him, then I sit or lie next to him in his bed and read him his stories. Lately his three favorites have been "I'm a Big Brother", "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" and "The Going to Bed Book". When we're finished, I turn off the light, sit on the edge of his bed and hold his hand, while singing a few songs to him. If we attempt to leave anything out of his routine, he will tell me!! If I leave out a book, he will say "Book! Book!" and if I start singing to him without turning off the light, he will point to it and say "Light!" xD

Eating: Eating is really hit and miss - sometimes he will eat just about anything and other times he refuses even the things he seems to like the most. He has gone through a LOT of phases in the past year; the past 6 months in particular. We still do oatmeal every morning (peaches and cream is his favorite!) and some sort of fruit; usually a banana or one or two tangerines. For lunch, he has a cheese sandwich and a yogurt, as well as some grapes, an apple or one of the two fruits he didn't have for breakfast. He really loves fruit! For dinner, he often eats what we eat and if we're running late with our dinner, I will make him some noodles or a grilled cheese. We haven't completely gotten to the point where if he doesn't eat what's on his tray, he "goes hungry", but if he won't eat what's on his tray and he is still hungry, I offer him a fruit or a veggie. His absolute favorite thing is pizza (go figure haha), which he always goes to town on. For snacks, we do goldfish crackers and raisins, pretzels, teddy grahams and "cookies" (honey comb) or cheerios. Meat is a HUGE battle to get him to eat and he has become pretty picky about vegetables as well. He was okay with holiday ham around thanksgiving, but anything else has been a no-go. He is baaarely starting to like hot dogs and chicken again and has recently taken a little bit of an interest in hamburger meat again, but I'm not getting my hopes up! It seems like he started rejecting meat around the same time I got pregnant and had morning sickness with a huge meat aversion...part of me wonders if it's because of that, but I'm feeling more like it's just a phase. When he has done really well with eating, we reward him with a little packet of sixlets! He loves them and they've helped him learn his colors. But if he doesn't eat his dinner, he knows he gets no sixlets and we put our foot down with that rule.
He STILL dislikes regular milk, unless it's in his oatmeal or daddy makes him a cup of chocolate milk, so we still do soy. Other than that, he LOVES water. As a matter of fact, he will not go to sleep without his sippy cup of water in his bed, which is likely going make potty training difficult, but we will cross that bridge when we get there.

Sizes: Vincent is mostly in 2T clothing, but we recently got him 3T two piece pajamas, since I've noticed they run a tad smaller. They fit him great! He wears a size 5 shoe (will be in 6 soon) and is in size 5 diapers. A lot of the time, I think some of the clothes we bought a size bigger in advance are going to be too big on him, then I put them on him and they fit just right! :( And folding his clothes and Samantha's at the same time nearly puts me in tears! It amazes me how big he has gotten!!

Milestones and Changes:

• Vincent's vocabulary grows more and more every week! He went from saying only a handful of words to about 30 within two weeks and since then, I've lost count of how many he says. So many people warned me that it would happen overnight and boy were they right!! He is now slowly building sentences and learning about posession: Mommy's drink, Daddy's nanas (he still calls food nanas haha!), Oma's shoes etc. If he wants attention and we are all busy running around, he will point at the couch cushion and order us to "Sit!!" xD He is also getting really good at naming his letters and numbers and is getting better and better at counting to 10!
• First time at Chuck E Cheese's for his 2nd Birthday :)

• Vincent became a big brother! And what an amazing big brother he is; he ADORES his baby sister. He is so gentle and sweet with her and I am so happy that there really hasn't been much of a jealousy issue; I make sure to include him in every single thing I do with her, whether it's feeding her, changing her diaper or doing tummy time! I will go as far as to "accidentally" let the wipes and diaper fall on the floor, so he can be a bit helper and fetch them for me. He loves to give her kisses, hold her hand and he will come up to me with his arms outstretched when I'm holding her and say "Hand? Hand?", so I have him sit next to me on the couch and help him hold her for a minute. When she cries, he says "Oh no! Fussy..." xD 

•  First taste of black coffee with Great Grandma Mary

• Second trip to Fiddlesticks Farms

• Second Halloween :)

• Meeting Santa for the second time! We weren't too sure how we felt about him xD

• Tooth update: Vincent has his four front teeth, four incisors, top canines and his first top and bottom molars

• I'm proud to announce that we are still rear-facing! Vincent won't grow out of his seat until he reaches 40lbs and we plan on keeping him that way until then if we are able!

• First drum set and first trike!!

• Second time meeting the Easter Bunny!