As birthday season, in our house, winds down, I thought it might be time for a life update. I’m going to share milestones, sleep schedules and how I’ve been dealing with the Terrible Toddler Years. Yes, I believe it goes waaaay beyond the Terrible Twos.
Let’s start with Miri (3 years old on 1/03/2019).
Milestones:
Miri has been potty-trained since June 2018, but I know this is right in the “normal” time range for a child to “get on the potty train”, as Miri likes to say.
Verbally, she’s much more able to express herself, even though she’s been speaking in full sentences since 1.5 years old. I find that a lot of what she says is strangely similar to things that I say. It’s like she’s paying attention to every single move I make and say these days. Weird, huh?!
She’s still working on getting the hang of the balance bike. Instead of sitting on the seat, she straddles the seat and just walks with it. I hope that she’ll get it by Spring so she can ride it to the park.
Miri is more than halfway done with her first year of playgroup! The things she has learned are truly amazing. She retains so much of the information, even when you think she isn’t listening. They’re currently doing a color unit, and Miri can spell the colors red, blue, green and orange. It’s crazy! She also recognizes her name when it’s written out. I hope that she’ll learn how to write it within the next year.
Behavior:
There’s a lot to say here. Miri is definitely in the thick of threenage-hood right now. And it’s pretty hard to be the parent of a threenager, to say the least. For better or worse, Miri is a lot like me. So we also tend to butt heads a lot. I think the biggest thing right now is this independence she’s gained, how she tries to express that and the power struggle between parent and child that ensues.
Our whole day basically consists of me asking her to do something, Miri saying no, me trying to be calm and rational, then I realize there is no rationalizing with a toddler, me losing my sh**, and someone ends up crying (usually me). Sounds fun, right? But really, we’re trying a number of different tactics with Miri to help her feel like she has complete independence, while still maintaining control as the parent.
One of the ways I try to keep things in line, is with a “Sparkle Jar”. It’s basically a clear container that I decorated and pom-poms from Michaels. She has two opportunities throughout the day to earn “sparkles” — in the morning before school and in the evening before bed. Since our morning and bedtime routines are often the most difficult times, I thought those would be good times to offer her opportunities to listen better. When the jar is full, she gets a small prize. This works most of the time. I simply remind her about the sparkles, and she starts to follow directions.
I will say that more recently she’s been defying the sparkle jar and continues to push alllll the buttons. We’ve just started the “I’ll wait until you can…get dressed, go potty, eat your lunch, etc” tactic, and that seems to also be working. It seems that this helps her to feel like she is the one making the choice to do something, even if I was the one who asked.
Just this week, we’ve started doing a 3-minute timeout for hitting and pushing. She DOESN’T like timeout. But for some reason, she still keeps hitting her brother. I’m hoping she’ll catch on soon.
Basically, it’s really hard to be the mother of a three year old. We’re definitely going through a tougher time right now, but I try to hold onto the moments when she’s so witty, loving and hilariously like an adult, to get us through. I find that Miri is much more likely to have a “good” day when I take her out for mommy and me dates, even if it’s just a trip to the store.
Relationships:
Miri has definitely come into her own these past few months. I see and hear about her little friendships at school. And she’s beginning to actually play with kids instead of just parallel playing. It’s really cute to see. Obviously, this means more conflict, but she’s actually becoming a real kid!
She loves to be the mommy of her baby (Azi), and she especially loves to tell him what to do. She’s not bossy at all ;). Azi enjoys it for the most part.
Sleep:
We’ve come to this dreaded place in the world of naps. Basically, if Miri naps, she’s up until 9 pm or later. And if she doesn’t nap, it could be WW3 between the hours of 4 and 7.
I’m definitely not ready to give up the nap altogether. So some days she naps and some days she just rests, but I’m a big advocate for quiet time every day. Mama needs some alone time during the day. So if she doesn’t nap, she still has to be in her room and quiet.
Clothing:
This is basically just a disclaimer that Miri picks out every.single.outfit by herself. Meaning, when you see her wearing two different colors and sizes of polkadots, that means she thinks she’s “matching” by wearing all polkadots. Bless her. I actually think her mis-matching is pretty cute. It’s just another place where I can let her have her independence. It’s totally not worth the fight. Picking and choosing battles are so important with toddlers.
Activities:
Miri does ballet once a week, and she loves it. It’s a cute little class, and I’m happy to keep sending her as long as she’s happy. It’s nothing over the top special.
She is also still in swim lessons at Goldfish Swim School of Evanston. We are SO SO SO happy there. She can swim 10 ft. unassisted, and is the happiest little fish.
Other extracurriculars include making up songs, davening (praying), coloring and lining up her little people in a straight line.
Now all about Azi…(2 years old on 1/17/2019)
Eating/Milestones:
As you all probably know, Azi has been in Feeding Therapy for almost a year and a half. He’s come a really long way, but we still have a mile to go. He’s still drinking 12-14 oz of Enfamil Formula a day, per doctor’s recommendation. He simply isn’t eating enough to get the nutrition that he needs without it.
His favorite foods are fish sticks, chicken nuggets, and hot dogs. He also eats bananas, cheese sticks, cheerios and grapes when he feels like it. We’re working to increase the variety of foods he eats. Oh, did I mention that he’ll eat any cookie he can get his hands on?? Yeah, I think it’s becoming behavioral…He’s lucky he’s so cute!
On the plus side, he’s weighing in completely on the charts! So he’s growing and is meeting all other milestones. He can even walk up and down the stairs just holding the rail. Which is a big deal, because he could barely roll over at 8 months. We’ve been in Physical Therapy since then as well.
We’re going to an ENT next week to discuss his raspy voice. It’s been this way his whole life, and we want to make sure that nothing is going on that could be affecting his eating. Will update!
Sleep:
Well, we’re tired. I sleep train my kids, and I’m a big advocate for sleep routines and schedules from a young age, but my dear, sweet, baby Azi has neglected to get the main idea. He goes to sleep okay, but is consistently waking up between 4 and 5:30 every.single.morning. Did I mention this has been going on FOR THE LAST TWO YEARS?! Yeah, we’re tired.
After his 2 year old checkup last week, we’ve decided that we aren’t going to go in his room anymore until after 5:30 am. Why have we been cutting him serious slack until now? Well, with all of the feeding issues, I thought there was a pretty good chance that he was hungry. And he might be. But if he’s eating 200 of his 800 calories a day in the middle of the night, he’s going to stay on that same cycle. And mama needs some sleep. So we’re giving this a try. Fingers crossed for us!
Other than the big sleeping through the night issue, Azi pretty much naps every day for 2 hours, and he goes to sleep between 7 and 7:30 pm.
Milestones and Behavior:
Besides eating normal people food, Azi is now hitting and/or beating all of his “milestones”. He was a bit delayed when he was younger, so this makes me really happy. He’s advanced in his speech, just like Miri. He’s speaking in 6-10 word sentences, and you can understand most of what he says.
Azi has a hard time sharing and not getting what he wants, but I’m pretty sure that’s typical two-year-old vibes.
Azi and Miri play nicely together most of the time. He’s at an age where he can be fun to play with (and boss around). I love seeing their relationship blossom. When I see them loving on each other, it makes having them so close feel worth it.
Activities:
Azi is still in Feeding Therapy and Physical Therapy one time a week. He was discharged from Occupational Therapy a few months ago. I still miss our OT. You can read alllll about my love for OT here.
Azi also started swimming at Goldfish! We just finished week 3, and he’s finally a happy swimmer. There was definitely that screaming transition period for a couple of weeks. But by his third lesson he was SO HAPPY and didn’t want to get out at the end.
I love that both of my kids are in the water now. They’re learning important life-saving skills, and it’s such a fun activity we can all do together.
Azi also goes to My Gym in Skokie once a week, and he LOVES it. He got moved up to the older toddler level a couple of months ago, and he is thriving. I can’t say enough positive things about My Gym.
I’m really looking forward to spring coming and getting outside with these stir-crazy kids! I think it’s going to be an amazing season with them. I forgot to mention that Azi is starting camp in June, so our day-to-day lives are really about to change. Don’t worry, we’ll still have Martha, our nanny. I know, that was my first concern too!
That’s all for now! Hope you enjoyed. xo
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