Conversations with a Two-Year-Old

I want to remember what Leo was like in these early days of learning how to have a conversation. He's very verbal and very social and we chat all day long.

Some things I don't want to forget:

--

"Mama, school bus go beep-beep!"

Yes, Leo, that's right, the school bus goes "beep-beep" when you honk the horn. Someday when you are older you will ride a school bus to school, would you like that?

[eyes widen] "Ok, go school bus!" [pauses, then gently pushes me away] "No Mama, Mama go. Mama too big."

--

Leo, time to go home for dinner.

"No dinner, more park."

One more slide and then we have to go.

[climbs onto platform, veeeeeerrrry slowwwwwly inches his way towards the slide]

Leo, one more slide, it's time to go.

[grins and stops on platform, reaching out to the slide] "Oh no, can't reach."

--

Leo's very into talking about things he remembers right now. He'll start his story with "Remember...?" which sounds like "momo...?" Some examples.

"Remember Leo fall down?"
"Remember choo-choo train?"
"Remember Leo puked?"
"Remember cousins? Remember Uncle Al?" [Christmas in Texas made a big impression]
"Remember Papa catch the ball? Hahahahahaha!"
"Remember carwash, kinda scary? 'Sokay, no big deal."

Side note. He talks a lot about things that are "kinda scary." He has a book about Thomas the Train being scared in the woods at night (it's a five-page board book and ends happily) and it was the first thing that was "scary" to him. We talked about it a lot and he seems to understand that if something is scary it's good to talk about it and it makes you feel better. We recently went to a park that had a huuuuuuge tornado slide and I told him that it scared me a little bit (um, truth yo) but that I would go up there with him. He seemed really surprised that I was "scared" by something.

Sometimes very little things are scary. Tonight in his bath he found a bottle of Matt's body wash. It has a picture on the label of a large, dark splashing wave. "Kinda scary. 'Sokay." We looked at it for a while and talked about how it was big and dark but it was just a picture of a wave so it was okay.

I love him so much.

we do faces

An afternoon stroll through the botanic gardens

Yo yo yo, the Pavelkas are now card-carrying members of the South Coast Botanic Garden, thanks to a sweet Groupon that I found. We love this place. In the concrete madness of LA it is so nice to have a green, tree-filled space where we can actually escape traffic noise (for the most part). Leo loves it here and though we've visited several times already we have yet to see it all and have much still to explore, since they close at 5pm and we're usually racing to get there after Leo's nap.

Today's garden adventure focused on the banyan grove. We only had about 45 minutes.

(there is something vaguely "naked human" about this wacky fig tree, right? it kind of makes me uncomfortable)