Almost Not an Only Child

Kekoa is just ...a week? ...2 weeks? ...heaven help us if 3 weeks away....from being an older brother, and he has No Idea what's about to hit him. In the meantime, he is developing his newly 2-year-old personality. So this is a post for Kekoa, on Kekoa, about Kekoa, before 90% of my pictures are of a sleeping baby.

Josh and I like to say that Kekoa is a man of many passions. He wears his heart on his sleeve, which provides plenty of both challenges and heartmelts in parenting. For one thing, he's extremely affectionate and always wants to hug, kiss, hold hands, or just snuggle. It can be a problem with other kids who aren't quite so touchy (which is all of them. He's a serious snuggler, y'all), but hopefully Ellie will be okay with it.

One of his favorite post-nap activities is to schmooze whoever's home into snuggling with him. Usually it's just 15 minutes or so of having your eyes, ears, nose, elbows, and toenails generally harassed and examined, but sometimes he falls back asleep for another 30-45 minutes. But forget about tiptoeing away - he's a master of entanglement. I've been savoring these last few mini-naps with him before there's another kiddo calling.

Post-nap snuggles with Dad

Part of his passionate nature means that he gets very strongly attached to ideas, concepts, and even words. Each night before bed, his cars and trucks have to be lined up just so before he can brush his teeth, but then when he actually climbs into bed they all join him for a good night's sleep. He also is obsessed with clocks, dice games, numbers, and the letter K (which stands for "Koa").

Can't pick just one best friend to cuddle at night

Kekoa is also a man of few words, but very distinct ones. He's a type-A perfectionist who doesn't like to try new words until he's absolutely sure he can make the proper sounds, and then hilariously overexaggerates them. It can be frustrating for all of us sometimes because he understands far more than he is willing to say, but I do love to hear him say "ReaD, Puh-LeaSe" in that very careful way he has.

Josh's hat has been christened "Tut Tut" (like Christopher Robin's umbrella) because it's so big on him

My mom always used to say of me that I was always rushing ahead to get to the next stage of life: as soon as I could crawl, I wanted to walk, as soon as I could walk I wanted to read, as soon as I could write I wanted to go to college.  Kekoa seems to be the same way. He shows absolutely zero interest in typical toddler things like learning colors and shapes. But he wants to be an independent adult NOW (as long as independent adults get to snuggle, that is).

This helps a ton in areas like moving to a big boy bed and potty training, not so much in areas that involve us making decisions on his behalf and then forcing them upon him like "You must wear pants today."  Throw in his passionate nature and you've got a recipe for lots of new milestones and family drama. It always seems we just cruise through the big changes with just minor hitches, and then some little thing takes months to resolve. Life stays interesting around here. :)

RoboCow (the only way we could get him to wear the ears) for free Chik-Fil-A. I made the mistake of taking the picture after dinner...most of his front spots had been peeled off.

On the other hand, he's developing a pretty good ability to self-regulate. I rarely bother to put him down for naps anymore...I just listen for his door to close, which is the signal that it's nap time. I hear him throughout the day saying to himself, "No no, Koa!" whenever he's about to do something questionable. I think it's hilarious when his trains tell him "No no Koa!" as he crashes them together. :)  As long as we're in agreement about the rules, he's pretty good about keeping himself in line. It's just those pesky non-agreements....

So that's a snapshot of Kekoa as he is right now - I know that we will face a lot of changes in the next couple months.  But for now we're enjoying the last few days of being able to give him our full attention and snuggles.                           

Gratuitous pregnancy picture from last week.