Ethan, Age 2 1/2

Ice cream, ice pops, sitting on a step with mom, reading stories (with a snack), "What Daddy doing?", trains, pretend boats, "visiting" Grandma and Grandpa Choo-Choo or "Kisti" or Josh and Angie, silliness, becoming more brave and more curious and more independent, "run, run, run", "I do it," parks (whee!), praying before bed, Imagination Movers, drums, trumpets, singing, and marching, are all favorites of Ethan right now.

I've taken my time getting this post ready because Ethan is such a complicated soul and I want to get it just right.

I'm pretty sure Ethan's love language is quality time (or food, except that isn't one of the languages). He loves to have me sit and play with him, and often says "mere" or "mon" (Come here or Come on) motioning for me to follow him or join him playing whatever he's playing. I love it. It was especially noticeable in the first week of summer, but now he will spend time playing on his own in the backyard or with his kitchen or with Kate's toys or whatever.

Ethan loves to pretend he is cooking and will bring us breakfast and cookies every morning. Tim will ask, "Is it French Toast?" and Ethan will emphatically reply, "No!" Then Tim will ask, "Is it eggs?" and Ethan will sweetly respond, "Yeah-es" with a long, slow head nod.

Ethan also loves to pretend he is going on a trip to visit his long-lost loved ones. Sometimes he flies, sometimes he drives a car, or sometimes he rides his pretend boat, as we did today while out on the driveway. The base of the basketball hoop serves as the boat. One day recently our three-year-old neighbor down the street, David, stopped by on his bike with his mom. I heard Ethan showing David his boat. David looked confused.

Our Mr. Cautious has become Mr. Curious and Independent. I keep telling myself this is a good thing.

Several months ago this lady at Shopko gave Ethan a sticker because she was so impressed that he walked around the entire store holding onto Kate's stroller the entire time I shopped.

Times have changed. Now I have to watch Ethan like a hawk. At least more often than I used to. Of course going shopping with Tim totally throws the whole routine off, so last weekend I was lugging a sleeping Kate in her carseat on our way out of Home Depot, and naturally assumed Tim was holding Ethan's hand. Next thing I know I see Ethan strolling around the rain-drenched parking lot, peaking between his eyes (thunder still scares him) so he could tromp through the biggest puddles. Thankfully, the passing cars slowed down so I could grab his hand and smile a thanks, although they didn't look happy about it.

Friday night Ethan rode his "motorcycle" (really a Diego three-wheeler, but he won't let me call it anything but a motorcycle) up to the park with Kate and me. It took forever to get up there. Either Ethan was really tired from pedaling and pushing up that big hill, or he was hugely curious about each yard we passed. But we had a blast once we were there. Ethan can manage most of the ladders, slides, and tunnels all by himself, and Kate and I chased him around and everyone was giggling and it was awesome.

Of course just as we got there, we noticed that a storm was passing across the valley, so we wouldn't be able to stay long. As the storm approached, I gave Ethan the warning. . . two more slides, one more slides. Okay, time to go. He started walking with me to his bike, I mean motorcycle, and then. . . He darted! He ran away and took a couple more trips down the slides! I wasn't going to give him the pleasure of me chasing him, so I loaded up Kate and calmly waited for him to reach the bottom of one of the slides, took him by the hand, and made him sit on my lap in time out for a few minutes, trying to think what I was going to do.

This whole not listening thing has sort of become a problem lately, and I knew this was the perfect time to get the message across. . . because next time it could be a truly serious (dangerous?) situation, like in a parking lot or on the street, or in church. ha ha ha. That makes me laugh. Not that running away in church would be dangerous, exactly.

When the time-out was over, I told Ethan that he was going to have a more serious consequence, like we would take away all his bikes, because I did not listen to me, blah, blah, blah, and that I might have to talk to Daddy about what the consequence would be. Then Daddy drove up on his motorcycle. Wow, now that I think about it, that was pretty good timing, and probably really impressed Ethan.

So Tim and I briefly talked and he ended up putting the motorcycle (the Diego one) on the back of his motorcycle (the real one) and we made Ethan walk home.

It's actually been a good thing, because Ethan was so darn slow on that bike and now he helps me push the stroller. Today he and I walked all the way to our church (over a mile) so we could play on the playground there. Kate napped in the jogger stroller on the way, and Ethan rode with her on the way back.

By the way, Ethan has three bikes (two three-wheelers, one of which will soon be Kate's, and one two-wheeler with training wheels, which I guess makes it a four-wheeler), and a Winnie-the-Pooh train, which he keeps in the house. Since it was raining by the time we got home, I figured I better take away an inside toy, too, to heighten the impact.

Anyway, I think Ethan has actually understood why his bikes were taken away. On the first day, he made a move to find his train, but then turned around and said, "Oh. Yeah." and went to look out the window instead.

I have given various reminders in the past few days, asking "What happens when you don't listen?" and he has slowly gotten better, and today I definitely noticed an improvement.

Tomorrow I plan to give one bike back.

Times with a two-year-old are really quite delightful, and I really mean it when I say it. Last summer I was ever-thankful to get the kids in bed at the end of a long day. Maybe it was because I was exhausted, or maybe it was because a 20-month-old is difficult, but this summer I feel like I have a companion each day, and I love sitting on the steps with Ethan and Kate, enjoying our ice pops or ice cream cones, learning new words, explaining how we're feeling, thinking, asking questions, laughing, and teasing.

Ethan is a bright spot in every day, and I am thankful for a boy like him.