Nolan {Spring 2015}

Size: At Nolan's 3 year old check-up (early in June), he was 37.8inches tall (60th percentile) and weighed in at 31.2lbs (45th percentile). [For a quick 3yr old comparison, Jonah was 39" tall and weighed 33lbs at his checkup.] I'm glad to see that he finally jumped up a little bit on the weight chart but otherwise, he's exactly where I thought he would be. He's wearing an assortment of 2T and 3T clothes (and his closet it exploding) but I'm going to work on weeding out the 2T stuff because a lot of it is getting small-ish on him. Shoes are still about a 7 and undies are 2T/3T.

March:

Favorites: Snacks and treats, Jake & the Neverland Pirates, balloons, purple/pink/blue, milk & water, play-doh, blankets (he's totally commandeered my blue fluffy blanket from Brookstone that Randy got me 100 years ago).

Firsts: He somehow sweet-talked me into buying him "another guitar"--"this one was different"--"then Jonah would have one too". Oh, I fell for it. Luckily it was $5 at a consignment sale. So now he has 2 guitars. And plays them left-handed??

Funnies: It's so not funny but someday it will be--Nolan likes to assert his preference on everything right now. Favorite word is no and hates it when you make him have to choose between option A and option B. It's truly almost comical how terrible he acts when we, for example, tell him he needs to go to bed. It's every stalling technique in the book, up and down and we've resorted to holding his door closed until he gets back into bed. This has somewhat backfired on us though. We have the lever style handle so he repeatedly yanks on the handle while screaming from the other side--to the point that he's given himself a blister on his middle finger. Oops. We just wanted him to go to bed.

Observations: Nolan is about able to get himself undressed and dressed by himself. Sure, he has issues with buttons or the case of the backwards undies/pants, but does fairly well--if he's willing to do it. Nolan is still pretty right-handed and usually only uses his left hand if he's chosen to eat with his fingers on his left hand and hold his fork in his right hand. And he's been pretty obsessed with bugs and reptiles since Ashton's Reptile Wrangler birthday party.

April:

Favorites: Blanket(s), books, bubbles, Papa & Gigi, talking about poopy/pee-pee/diapers, asking questions, listening to music, playing his guitar and/or singing, his cymbals (yes, he has cymbals), honey sticks, teddy grahams, his outdoor playhouse, chalk, riding a big wheel/tricycle.

Firsts: Not exactly first pony ride, but first time petting some farm animals at Jaydon's cool farm birthday party. And not a first baseball game, but first time seeing the Bulldogs play baseball (at KSU). He did start hitting a baseball off a tee this month (don't think he's ever done that). It appears he is naturally right-handed in this area and doesn't swing very hard but connects with the ball every time. Guess he'll develop his power later?

Funnies: Nolan was also quite insistent that a) there was no baby in mommy's belly, b) if there was a baby in there, that he could see it, c) he must also have a baby in his belly. His technique for Easter egg hunting was quite amusing: the pick it up, shake it to make sure something is in it, crack it open, dump candy into bucket, throw discarded egg back on to ground. Maybe he's just smarter than the rest of us? And with the seasonal allergies flaring up around here, I've been giving out a fair amount of Zyrtec these days to keep symptoms to a minimum. If I forget, I'll certainly be reminded by this one: "I don't feel better mommy, you didn't give me my medicine".

Observations: As far as school and basic knowledge stuff: knows all ABCs, can identify basically all of them by sight, can tell you what letter a word starts with it if you sound it out for him, can count to 20 (or so), can sometimes do very simple math (addition of totals less than 5), name all the parts of his body, speaks in mostly sentences (pretty clearly, I think; about the only mispronunciation he still makes is the "v for b" swap (example: grav instead of grab or cavinet instead of cabinet). He's a total gemini in personality (takes one to know one)! One second he is Mr. Independent and wants to do everything by himself or like Jonah and then the next, he's a screaming baby and can't do anything by himself.

May:

Illness: Jonah (delightfully) started with a high fever (103) late one night that resulted in me taking him to the pediatrician the next day (I was worried about strep). Turns out, it appeared viral and my doctor told me that it was likely Fifths Disease and she had seen it going around recently. Assured me he would be fine, might break out in a "lacy" rash on his forearms and have the "slap cheek" appearance on his face. Of course, Jonah never ran a fever again and had none of these rashes. About a week later, seemingly out of nowhere, Nolan wakes up with exactly the rash Jonah had skipped--bright red "slap cheeks" and this horrendous lacy rash all over his arms AND legs. Apparently he had fifths disease but we didn't even know he had run a fever--he was acting completely normal (for a 2-, almost 3-year-old). This goes to show you just how different my boys are when it comes to sickness--Nolan is so difficult to tell because he acts normal and rarely runs much of a fever, but Jonah feels terrible and wakes up in the middle of the night because of "nightmares" only to have a 103 degree fever.

[nice bright red cheeks, eh?]

Favorites: Gigi gave us a humidifier that happens to light up and change colors while it's on and Nolan has started to love this thing. I was so confused one night because he was asking for the "Cumid. Fire" and I didn't understand what he was saying. Eventually I figured it out and told him it was a humidifier and he replied with "however you say it". He loves donuts and bubbles for sure!

Firsts: Somewhere along the line, we've switched to doing a lot of showers for the boys instead of baths. At first, this was going well but Nolan has started to hate it because the shampoo runs into his eyes. Daddy taught him how to play air hockey!

Funnies: I have a blue, lit-up compass on my rear-view mirror that stays on all the time. He took a particular interest in it because it was lighting up "N" which he loves to point out as his favorite letter. He now points out every time we are traveling north, northeast or east and states it's for Nolan or Evans. He desperately wants to play soccer "just like Jonah" but won't actually go out and kick a ball with you. Such a 2nd child, right?!

The pictures below are from a night where, somehow, my child decided to rub toothpaste ("noof-paste" as he calls it) in his hair when I wasn't looking. 

Observations: Nolan has been talking a lot about the baby in mommy's belly and asking a lot of questions, stating what tasks he will do to help, etc. One day he started to recall that he was in Mommy's belly when he was a baby and that it was "too spooky in there" and he "was trying to get out" but he "couldn't use his legs to get out". Kinda creepy, if I say so myself.

Isn't that enough to wrap up spring?! Moving on into summer with a 3 year old!