Baby Bear’s 2nd Birthday and what he is like at 2 year’s old

Baby Bear is now 2 years old (his birthday was a few weeks ago, but we’ve been real busy). TWO! How did that happen? It seems like only yesterday that I was blogging Baby Bear’s birth story and wondering, “Will I be able to love a new baby as much as my existing children?“ I am so so happy to report that not only do I love Baby Bear as overwhelmingly abundantly as my three girls, but it feels like he was the missing piece of our family. I always tell him that he is the most beautiful baby boy in the whole world (yes… I know… every mum thinks this of her own children – that’s the beauty of motherhood).

Baby Bear is very clever, funny and has about a million different facial expressions which he loves to practice on us when he wants to get his own way. He is very advanced for his age, which is the opposite to the twins, who have always had a developmental delay. By their 2nd birthday, the twins could only say “Mama” and “Dada” and nothing more. Baby Bear already has a vocabulary of over a hundred words and can put two to three words together to form an almost-sentence. He also likes to copy random words he hears us say and learns about 3-5 new words per day. He can count to three, help to dress himself, feed himself and is so imaginative at play. He loves playing with the girls toy kitchen, to make us cups of tea and plates of food. He loves building towers out of Duplo and has known the correct order for his stacking cups since he was 18 months old. Bear loves being outside, running around, riding bikes, cars, scooters, playing on the swings and chasing his sisters.

Bear loves pointing at cars he recognises and tells us whose car they are. He also knows the way to Nanna’s house and Grandad’s house and tells us where we are going when we are still a few streets away. He is such a chatty, bubbly little toddler, but he goes quiet when he is somewhere new, or we are with someone he’s not hugely familiar with.

He worships his sisters and loves to copy anything and everything they do. It’s so cute seeing how he looks up to them and runs across the playground to greet them at school pickup as though he has truly missed them in the six hours that they have been gone. But Bear’s biggest idol is Daddy Bear! He follows Daddy around the house like a little sheep, copying everything he does. He has an obsession with cleaning, because Daddy enjoys cleaning, so we have to lock up the dustpan and brush, the vacuum cleaner and the cleaning cloths, because otherwise Baby Bear would choose to play with these over his toys! He also has an obsession with the hairdryer, because he likes watching Daddy dry his hair.

Clumsy, does not even begin to describe Bear. He falls over every single day, to the point we are considering taking him to the doctors. It’s hard to know whether it’s simply a case of him trying to go too fast on his chubby little legs and being a normal toddler, or something to worry about. He constantly has grazed knees and has banged his head so many times that we’ve started removing furniture from our living room. It could be partly down the fact that Bear is an absolute daredevil too. Nothing scares him. He throws himself at the sofa, climbs on anything he can and jumps off of things too. I guess this is what having a boisterous toddler boy is like, in comparison to my cautious little girls.

So for Baby Bear’s 2nd birthday, we got him a remote controlled ride on Mini Cooper S. Daddy has a Mini Cooper S himself, so as I’m sure you can imagine, Bear was OVER THE MOON. Sadly we couldn’t get it in the same colour, but still… how awesome do they look parked side by side?! Bear has been out in his little car every day and I think if he had his way, he’d drive it everywhere.

As we had a full day to spend with Baby Bear the day before his birthday, (no work commitments or other inconveniences), we celebrated his birthday a day early. He loved opening all his presents, seeing some of his favourite people and driving around in his new car. As he loves Paw Patrol and Despicable Me (he asks to watch Despicable Me 2 nearly every day), most of his presents were Pup or Minion themed. We even got him a minion birthday cake and to our surprise, he knew exactly how to blow out the candles. He blew them out in one puff and shouted “MORE!”. So we lit them again and he blew them out again. And in the end, we ended up lighting them about five times as he kept shouting “MORE!” and seeing him blow the candles out was just too cute for words.

We also bought Bear a circus tent play house, which he has now filled with toys and loves to keep as his own little space, and a football. Every time we go in any sports shop, Bear dribbles a ball around the shop, so we bought him a football of his own and took him to the park for a birthday kick around.

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I can’t believe how fast Bear is growing, but it is such a pleasure seeing the clever, cheeky chap he is growing into. He makes us proud every single day and absolutely fills our lives with joy and laughter and cuddles and cuteness.