A few days ago, Gatito was in his room and we heard some general grumbling and complaining. A called up to ask what was going on and he replied, “I’m! Cleaning! Up!” A turned to me and said, “Jeez, these terrible twos are really awful, aren’t they?”
I realize he’s only just two and there’s plenty of time for all hell to break loose, but man, I really think we have an awesome kid. No tantrums yet to date. Doesn’t mean he doesn’t get frustrated and kick and scream sometimes, but it never lasts more than a minute and I definitely haven’t seen any of that lying down on the floor kicking and screaming stuff, which is lucky, since I don’t have the slightest idea how I’d deal with that.
He recognizes all of his letters and is starting to get the concept that they spell words. For a while he’d been saying “G-A-T-I-T-O spells… taxi!” I found this highly amusing, but he’s already figured out that it actually spells his name. The grow up so fast, man!
He insisted on carrying around the box of Chanukah candles a couple of weeks ago, and then started begging, “the red one! the red one! the red one!” So we took it out and gave it to him, and he promptly took a bite. (Candles, candy, I get the confusion.) He wasn’t that quick on the draw, though: after the red candle was a failure, he begged, “the blue one! the blue one! the blue one!”
Ever since his birthday, he and my younger nephew, who is 4.5, have been getting along great. At his birthday party, Thanksgiving, and our family Chanukah celebration, the two of them went off and played together, sometimes loud games and sometimes quiet. My nephew taught Gatito to run around singing, “I am a monster– with a horn!” before throwing himself onto the couch. Gatito followed my nephew around and by the end of Thanksgiving, my nephew realized gleefully, “I can make him do whatever I want!” (We’re totally in trouble now, aren’t we?) Even still, t’s a complete joy to see them together.
Life is good.
