Kaden is Two and a Half

Kaden recently went to his two and a half year checkup in mid February 2015 and I wanted to update about some of the things he likes/does right now. He is 37 inches tall (almost 80th percentile for height) and weighs 32 lbs (40th percentile for weight). He is such a silly boy with so much personality. 

Some Kaden fun facts at this age:

• He is very much a two year old. He is still a very picky eater and will hardly touch anything that resembles a bread product (bread, bagels, rice, rolls, etc...) or a vegetable.  (I trick him and puree a lot of stuff into our meals, muahaha!)
• Sometimes Kaden is really sweet and polite, other times throwing massive tantrums on the floor for very random reasons.
• Kaden is developing quite the little imagination. Several times a day he'll switch what we all are. "Mommy you are a monkey and Kaden is a fish."
• He always talks in third person. We've tried to correct it, but he doesn't care. Plus, it's kind of cute, so we don't correct it too much...
• Any word that should begin with "S" always begins with D instead: he rides his dooter, he eats "Dittles", he is a "dary" monster, the kids ride on "dool" bus, etc... It's pretty funny.
• We say, "Kaden we'll make you a deal" a lot when we're trying to get him to do things like eat his food or get ready to go somewhere. His response if he doesn't like it is always, "That is not a deal AT ALL!"

• He loves having multiple bowls and cups at most meals, even if the stuff could all fit in one bowl or plate. Good thing our landlord finally decided to buy us a new dishwasher after many months of not having one that worked, aka hand washing all of the many dishes many times a day.

Some of his favorite things right now are:

• Playing instruments- he uses my kitchen funnels as his "flute" and he usually has a kazoo in his mouth.  He loves going to our weekly music class that I lead on Fridays at the church because he gets to sing/dance.  (Well on days that he decides he feels like participating that is.)
• Kaden loves to play "bakery" behind his rocking chair in his room. He makes ice cream for Curtis & I every night before bedtime prayers. 
• Curtis' Hans and Franz impressions. This obsession with Hans and Franz began a few months ago with a local commercial from Volkswagon South Towne.  "A double down payment waiting for you... A double down payment from Volkswagon South Towne." Kaden thought that commercial was hysterically funny and would ask us to sing it all the time.  The song/voices were with Hans and Franz, so we pulled up a YouTube clip of the SNL skit of Hans and Franz and Kaden has loved it and requested it daily ever since.  We use it as a reward for eating all of his dinner that Daddy will do Hans and Franz. 
• Sword fights, or sticks in general. He usually finds many everywhere we go and has to carry them around and gets very frustrated when he can't bring them home in the car or into the house.

• Daniel Tiger- He loves the PBS show, he got a stuffed Daniel Tiger that sings songs from us for Valentines Day.  He takes it everywhere and likes to talk to his Daniel. 

• Tumbling- We go to a tumbling class once a week in Farmington with Ryker, my friend Alli White's little boy. Kaden loves doing the balance beam, rings, and bar and loves trying new things with Miss Missy his teacher. He really looks forward to it every week. (These pictures are pretty awful since they were taken with my crappy camera phone, but at least it captures the memory.)

 Ryker, Kaden and Elle

• Trying to make us laugh. He loves to make really silly faces and say silly things and then have us say, "Kaden you are so funny." 

• Climbing, playing, running. He is all boy. 

• Riding his bike and his "dooter" (scooter) with the kids in the neighborhood. He is getting faster every day and loves it.

Kaden has been potty training. He's filled up 3 Potty Charts so far.  He gets a sticker every time he goes on the potty and 2 "Dittles" (skittles).  He has earned a new puzzle, a fort/movie/popcorn/treat night with Mom and Dad and his latest prize "Big Boy Underwear." Unfortunately as soon as we put him into real underwear he decided he didn't like going on the potty anymore and requested to be back in diapers.   I put him back in diapers for a week and he still doesn't seem that interested in going potty anymore. Sigh... I guess we'll keep trying another time.

Kaden had been in the "toddler bed" conversion of his crib (aka a crib with only 3 sides), but we finally moved him to his "big boy bed."  We want him to have a few months to adjust to it before we stick the babies in "his crib" and he's sad. We took him to Lowe's a few weeks ago and let him help us pick what color we painted the bed.  He wanted a green bed.  I painted it, Curtis put it together and voila! The new big boy bedroom with a new dresser for Kaden. 

Making silly faces for us to laugh at

This boy is such a fun and challenging (at times) little boy with a big personality. At the end of the day though, we just adore him and wouldn't change anything about him.