They've Learned So Much

Jack and Ben on their 2nd birthday (and our 4th wedding annivesary, May 5th)

My thoughts have been very retrospective during the past few days. Remembering, celebrating, observing and wishing there was a way for me to bottle things up just as they are so I can enjoy them again in the future. I want to freeze a few moments in time. Bottle up a few laughs. Store up some toddler twin talk. Savor these precious moments. Perhaps that's why I take so many pictures!

It occured to me yesterday how much the boys have learned in such a short time.

They sleep through the night.

They walk, run, jump and climb like nobody's business.

They love to color with crayons, pencils and pens, but especially markers and paint.

They babble quite a bit, but have a little more than a dozen words they use all the time.

They can imitate almost any animal. The elephant is my favorite.

They like to imitate my mom's Italian hand gestures.

They love to read.

They feed themselves.

They drink from a cup.

They cover their mouth when they sneeze. Well, Ben does anyway. Sometimes.

They will eat any type of fruit, any time of day.

They ask to sing certain songs by doing the motions.

They pat their brother on the head to say "I'm sorry."

They can point out the letters "S" and "O" from a mile away. "J" and "B" too, but not as predicably.

They can draw a line, a circle, dots and squiggly lines on command.

They say "woah" and "bus" and "tree" constantly during carrides.

They hold our hand when we're walking.

They fold their hands when we pray. And then they say "Amen."

They are a joy to parent.

Some of the things they've learned are things we had to work for. Others, they learned naturally on their own. It occured to me how overwhelming parenting was when I realized how much they would need to know. Gosh, I know how to hold a spoon, but how do I teach someone else to do the same? How would they learn that they're not supposed to touch outlet covers, jump out of the crib or run away from mommy in public? How do you discipline? How do you get them to sleep for an extended period of time?

But as more time passes, you learn. You research, ask other moms, experiment, you fail, you do a search in Google, you try again, you succeed. Some of these skills are things we had to teach. Andy and I would talk extensively about what we hoped for them and then came up with a plan. We tried it, tweaked it and tried it again. We've made many mistakes. But thankfully, the boys didn't know any better. We grew more confident and tried our best to stay consistent. We tried to give them some space, respect and some structure. They watched us, mimicked, copied and depended on us. And somehow - in spite of ourselves - they've done extremely well.

Happy Birthday, Jonathan and Benjamin. I don't know who has grown more in the past two years: me and your daddy... or you guys?