872 days ago

this teeny furry little kid literally almost fell out of my body. In those dark, scary first days, we never dreamed we would be where we are today. I didn't believe he'd ever leave the hospital, we weren't even sure he'd live.

But now, 2 years, 4 months, 19 days after that wild day, we have this strong-willed, smart, handsome little guy that dictates our lives.

Since we're so far away from many of you, let us fill you in with this little blog post.

LA-LA-LANGUAGE
Maximo LOVES words, books, letters - a true product of English teachers and avid readers. He is always reading. His favorite books right now are: How a Dinosaur Says Good Night, Dinosaur Roar, Brown Bear, Brown Bear, My Truck is Stuck, and Blue Train, Green Train, to name a few. He can recognize some letters: A, B, C, D, M, O, P, T, U, and X and he can recognize 1, 2 and 5. He loves finding these letters and numbers everywhere in his books, on the sides of buses, in stores, and on his clothes.

He loves finishing (or repeating) the last few words or word of a sentence or verses, it would be annoying if he was an adult doing this, but it's cute for now.

He always uses the words two and too. "Two Os, Two apples" or "Daddy poopy too" for example.

When we ask him to talk like a big boy/nicely besides using please, he changes his intonation and his voice goes up about an octave which is a crack-up.

THE PHYSICAL
He is the happiest outside. If he's inside too long, we're just asking for a meltdown. He loves to climb and jump. He walks on his tip-toes like I do, especially when he's tired. He's replaced his "telling everyone he loves them when he's happy" to galloping when he's happy.

He loves putting his hands in his pockets. He also loves stuffing his pockets with junk. I can't tell you the amount of crap we find in the bottom of our washing machine - acorns, yen, rocks, stickers.

He has boycotted sweaters and John and I have decided not to fight this battle (anyone want cute 2T boy sweaters?) after a huge blowout one morning this week. Even though it's cold out, he is going out with a long sleeve t-shirt. We can get a jacket on him, so he should live through the winter.

THE EMOTIONAL
Let's just say this is not his strong area.
Maximo is a very sweet, loving boy when he is not overtired or hungry. He gets really frustrated when he can't get what he wants. He is getting better about sharing, but again, he's not consistent with his willingness to share. He has not totally let go of biting. He bit a kid this week at daycare. It seems to happen more at daycare because he's around more kids and I'm not sure his Japanese is where it needs to be to try to share. We hope he grows out of this soon!

He has recently (past 2 months) started to full-out scream. This is horrible in the middle of the night. Since we live very close to our neighbors, we have a hard time letting him scream it out, so he doesn't get the response of us running to him when he does it. During the day, we're trying to ignore him and tell him that we won't come see him if he screams that way.

He seems quite smart, but can't seem to put some of the emotional-concepts together like, biting your friends is bad and it gives them an "owwie" or throwing your markers all over the floor is not cool. We're hoping this stuff will all end on or before August 28, 2010, since that will be the end of his Terrible Twos (ha).

Between the meltdowns and full out tantrums, he is sweet and loves to give kisses and hugs to everyone. He wakes up and usually has a "Good Morning, Mommy" and he'll just randomly come up and give us a "tight squeeze" which is quite different from a hug, because it also includes a grunt.


MAXIMO'S CURRENT COOLEST-THINGS-EVER! LIST

Maximo loves cranes, trains, big boats, tractors, backhoes, buses

Maximo loves dinosaurs

Maximo loves expressing cool things by saying, "coo-all" or "W-O-W" or giving a thumb's up.

Maximo loves saying "I did it!" whenever he does anything, and many times when he didn't even really do it!

Maximo loves Japanese food - especially sushi and miso soup

Maximo loves the T.V., but not to worry, we make sure he doesn't sit in front of it all day - he enjoys Dinosaur Train, Bob the Builder House Building, Thomas the Tank Engine the most!

Maximo loves big kids. He is totally enamored with Kai and Luka (below) and Riley and Tess. And it's great for us, because the big kids are patient with him and since he's so in love with them, he hasn't tried to bite them yet.

Making gingerbread with Shina, Kai and Luka!
Everyone left covered in flour!