Jesse 2.5 Years

Sporting his big boy underwear.
He told me he was headed to "school
and work".

Two and a half is such a fun age.  I don't even remember the last time I did an official update, but I figured 2.5 is a good time. This is all off the top of my head, so I'm probably leaving out lots of other things I want to remember, but this will have to do for now.

• 34.2 pounds and 37.3 inches at his check-up yesterday (both 80th percentile).
• His sleeping is not nearly as predictable as it once was.  I try to have him down for his nap between 12:30 and 1:00 and have him awake by 3:00 (otherwise he takes forever to fall asleep at night).  However, he fights his nap a lot these days, so sometimes he will refuse a nap for several days in a row (though he is expected to stay in his room until 3:00) and then he will nap like a champ for a week.  If he naps, he usually doesn't fall asleep until 8:00 or so, although he is usually in bed by 7:30.  If he doesn't nap, he will fall asleep almost instantaneously at 6:00, although it's tough to get him fed, bathed and in bed that early, so it's usually a bit later. He still typically wakes between 6 and 6:30, although we do have occasional spurts of 5:30 and if we're really lucky he'll sleep until closer to 7:00 (but then he likely won't take a nap, so I'm not sure if it's worth it!).
• Has quite the imagination these days. He always has specific descriptions of everything he builds with his duplos.  He is usually building things like fire houses or building sites, and if you ask him about a specific block on his building he will quickly tell you exactly what its purpose is. He's also pretty obsessed with food and is always pretending like he's cooking, even when he isn't playing with actual food toys.
• LOVES sand and water. He could live at the beach. Most of the parks here have water fountains and sand for the kids to play in, so he is usually a dirty, sandy mess by the time we come home from the park, but that's what summer is for, right?
• His favorite shows are Curious George and Bob the Builder.
• Sings all the time and loves to change up the lyrics to his favorite songs or just make up his own songs as he's playing.
• As of last week he is (mostly) potty trained. I expected it to be a maddening process, but he definitely seemed to be ready and interested which made it pretty quick and painless. I also expected that we would pretty much be cooped up in the apartment (or at least have our outings confined to the downstairs playground) at least for several days, but we were able to be out and about right away and he has quickly grown accustomed to using public potties.
• He is so much fun, but we have also come to understand the phrase "terrible twos" much better.  He definitely has his moments, but he does thrive on a routine and has fewer "moments" when we keep to the normal routine. Right now our biggest struggle seems to be this habit he has picked up of changing his mind over and over and over. He will clearly want to go play at the park, but when he finds out he has to put on his socks and shoes, he decides he doesn't want to.  If I say "ok, then let's stay home", then he wants to go again.  This could potentially go on and on, back and forth for eternity if we allowed it to.

I've also been recording some of my favorite Jesse quotes to share.  He is always saying something funny.

At lunch one day...
Jesse: Mommy, I want some monster (commonly known as muenster) cheese!
Me: We don't have anymore.  We're all out.
Jesse: We have buy some soon. When we go to store. Then we eat it ALL up!
Jesse, a few seconds later, cracking himself up: This a funny story!

Walking home from the park one day:
Me: Look at all those pretty flowers!
Jesse: Mommy no talk to me! I talking! Jesse talking! (He had been talking my ear off and I guess he wanted to continue).
Jesse (a few seconds later): Mommy, I have 2 questions (this often means something more like "requests" in Jesse language).
Me: What are your two questions?
Jesse: Mommy no talk to me about the flowers.

One morning when Jesse woke up a bit early:
Jesse (yelling quite loudly from his room): Ding! Ding! Ding! It's a fire! Ding! Ding! Ding! There's a fire in my room, Daddy!!!
He went on to repeat this multiple times until James finally responded, thinking maybe he should go check it out just in case.  I mean, we would feel pretty bad if there had been a fire and we ignored him.  But now we know...

One morning after Jesse woke up and had been laughing hysterically in his sleep the night before:
Me: Jesse...last night you woke us up because you were laughing really loud in your sleep. Did you have a funny dream?
Jesse (after thinking about it for a minute): Yeah. No, I have a happy dream.
Me: What was your dream about?
Jesse: My pants fall off! Then I put them back on! (Giggling)

One night after Jesse was in bed I was cleaning the bathroom (right next to Jesse's room) and was probably making a lot of noise. Jesse kept yelling quite loudly: "Mommy!!! Shhhh!!! Be quiet! My baby is sleeping! (He refers to Curious George as his baby these days).  Mommy! Have be extra quiet! Shhh!!!  My baby trying to sleep!" I told him that he better talk a little softer because his yelling might disturb his baby, so he proceeded to quietly tell me all these things over and over again, but he eventually just began screaming them again.  I think this went on for at least 15 minutes, when he told me that the baby woke up and was upset because it was hungry.

James: Jesse, did you have any dreams last night? (I'm not sure if he really remembers his dreams or not, but he always has a response and it's usually humorous and quite random).
Jesse (immediately): Yeah. I dream about a kiwi.
James: Really? What kind of kiwi?
Jesse: A red and blue kiwi.

Yesterday at breakfast:
Jesse: Mommy, I have a baby in my tummy. It's a different Max. He's six months old. His name is seventy.

One night when I was watching a friend's three girls, they were back in Jesse's room with him. I went back to check on them at one point and Jesse ran up to the door and before slamming it shut, exclaimed: "No Mommy come in here! This room for big boys only!"