Play-doh and the alphabet

Matt and I gave Theo some play-doh on his actual birthday. What a hit. First he was mostly interested in organizing it, but over the next few days, Theo has become really, really into it. He mostly wants Matt and I to make things with it for him, but he is slowly learning to shape it himself. His favorite parent play-doh game is making letters.

In the past several weeks, Theo's language skills have exploded, and he now makes sentences like "I want cracker" and "Mama make letters play-doh." This spike, corresponding with his receipt of the Dr. Seuss A-B-C book from Grammy Betsy has made for quite the little alphabet learner. The child has learned his letters faster than his bird species! He almost knows all of them now, and knows what many of them stand for, such as "C for Cat Meow" and "P for Pop". Between this and his memorizing sea life and mammal species on his flash-cards Great Aunt Carolyn gave him, he is showing that he has an incredible memory. And we're not pushing this stuff, these are the activities he chooses!

2nd Birthday

Theo's second birthday was a joyous romp of toddlers and sharing our new home with friends. We had a dinosaur theme, with little grab bags of dinosaur tattoos, skeletons, and other little items for the kiddos. Our cake came out looking more like a dragon and had cavemen on it, but hey, it was delicious and still very cute. We ordered chocolate, hoping to cash in on Theo's newfound love of chocolate cookies to get him to try the cake. Alas, while he helped himself to some frosting before we even got it cut, he would have no part of tasting the cake itself. Fortunately, Matt picked up some chocolate cookies at the bakery as a back-up, and Theo was able to happily munch on one while the rest of us had our cake.

Theo playing "fast car" in the new house

One of the reasons we knew this would be a great house to raise kids in: circular floorplan on the main floor. Theo LOVES running around playing fast car, or sometimes even fast kid!

Christmas part three: the Nelsons and a big truck

The Christmas fun continued when Grandpa "Pop" Gene and Grandma Janet miraculously made it out of New York before a big blizzard to see their grandson December 26. Theo received a giant scoot-around black pick up truck, which was of course, a huge hit. A Christmas present for both Theo and Grandpa Gene was watching a few minutes of football together on TV. Theo almost thinks that football is all there is on TV, and especially enjoyed learning that there is a lot of "crash" and "boom" in football, two of his current favorite things.

Christmas part 2: Elmo and reading

After Theo got to open all of his presents with Mom and Dad, Theo got to have Grandma Betsy, Great Aunt Carolyn, Grandpa Steve AND Grandma Linda ALL over for more presents! Highlights included a baby tickle-me-elmo from Grammy Betsy, which Theo calls "Elmo sing" and dances along with, and a four-pack of plush birds from Grandpa Steve, the duck of which went to bed with Theo that night. He has also tremendously enjoyed the animal flash cards Aunt Carolyn picked out and has already memorized most of the mammals and several of the sea life series. Theo enjoyed some quality time reading Go Dog Go with Grandma Betsy and primate books with Great Aunt Carolyn during their visit.

Christmas in the new house

OK, let's face it, the chaos of moving into a new house during the holidays with a toddler has taken its toll. One thing that didn't get done: blogging. Things have been a little crazy around here, but we did have a lovely first Christmas in our new home. Theo really got the act of getting presents this year and thought it was pretty awesome. Here are the highlights from Christmas morning.