At the pumpkin patch
Halloween Spider
Playing with a REALLY gross grub
Today is Max's 3rd Birthday. I just can't believe that he has been here for 3 years already. The time has flown by. I feel so blessed to have him. He is such a delightful child. He is so happy and fun. He's hilarious ( I think he gets it from daddy). He loves to sing and listen to music, he has definate taste in music to. He'll let me know when he doesn't like something and if he finds something he likes he listens to it until he has every bit of it memorized. One of his current favorites is Rust Monster, Nate's Pirate Band. We both have every song memorized. Max even has the order on the C.D.'s memorized. He'll run around the house humming pirate music into whatever he can find and pretend it is his trombone. He currently air plays the guitar, drums, trombone and piano. He'll play on my arm or the couch or whatever he can find. He thinks every thing that is long and straight is a drum stick. He is constantly singing songs or humming songs or playing songs on his instruments. Our home is filled with music all day long.
Max loves to play with cars. He has a box of random cars that he has gotten over the years and we pull it out about every day. He picks the cars he wants to play with and runs around the house driving his cars and carrying on conversations. I have always been able to bring cars to church with us and they will keep him quiet for a while. He'll pull them out, line them up, drive them all over the bench, talk to them, have them talk to each other and he'll be good during sacrament meeting.
He also loves sticks. Those aren't as easy to take with us. He either wants to use them as drum sticks and bang on things or use them to sword fight. He also loves to just get a stick and drag it behind him. He calls it "vrooming". He'll vroom his swords or his pool sticks or random sticks he finds outside. He just likes to have a stick in his hand.
Max loves to play and laugh and get really wound up. Some of his favorite things to play right now are the alligator game with daddy. Nate made it up one night. We have this blue tube, meant for crawling through, and they pretend it is an alligator that eats them up. Before it eats them it sings "scary" music, similar to the jaws theme. We now have an "alligator" living at our house that randomly sings scary music and eats us. He also loves to get eaten up by myself or Nate. We play the "I love you so much I'm going to eat you up" game. Its pretty simple really, you just hold the person your going to eat and say; "I love you so much.....I'm going to eat you up!" and then you pretend to eat them. Max LOVES it! He laughs and then he eats me up. He also loves to be made into a sandwich/hamburger between 2 pillows and again be eaten up.
You'd think with all the games we play that involve eating he would eat really well. He doesn't. He can't be bothered with eating, he would much rather play. He sits down twice a day and eats a reasonable meal. I feel like that is a huge accomplishment. He seems to be growing all right so I think he's getting enough food. He pretty much lives on chocolate milk and peanut butter and honey sandwiches although he will actually eat pretty good food if I can get him to sit down long enough. He loves corn, peas, green beans, asparigus, cooked carrots, cooked broccoli, bananas, apples, grapes. He likes chicken and turkey, tomatoes, yogurt, toast. He loves whole grain pancakes and has eaten as many as 4 in one sitting. He likes juice. He doesn't love drinking out of regular cups. I think he hasn't figured out how to chug it yet so he gets frustrated that he can't drink as fast as he wants to. He's still uses sippy cups for most everything. He can use silverware but prefers to eat with his hands. He doesn't like chocolate AT ALL. He won't swallow just plain chocolate (i.e. M&M's, candy bars, chocolate chips, etc). He likes to try it if everyone else is eating it, but he just spits it out. He just recently started eating chocolate chip cookies, I think the cookie is enough to cover up the chocolate. He definately loves fruity candy. He likes to put jelly beans in his pocket and run around and snack on them. He likes skittles, starburst, fruit snacks, sour patch kids, mike and ikes and the list goes on. Sometimes when he's being funny he'll tell me he wants some sort of candy for "dinner" (every meal is dinner, no matter what time of day it is) and then wait for me to say; "You can't have (insert candy name here) for breakfast, you silly!" Then he'll laugh.
Max is such a good boy. He just doesn't get into stuff. I can leave him down stairs and go take a shower and I know that he'll be fine. He'll just play or watch a show, he'll come in to the bathroom to check on me when he gets bored. He rarely gets into trouble when I let him just play like that. He spends most of the time singing to himself anyway. He is getting really good about going shopping, visiting friends, whatever errands we have to run. I've found that if he just knows where we are going and what behavior is expected of him he is an angel most of the time. He is of course 3 and still finding his boundaries and he gets pretty grumpy when he's hungry but for the most part he is a really easy kid.
Some more of his favorite things right now. Bugs, all kinds of bugs but especially spiders. He was a spider for Halloween, Nate was a bumble bee and I was a lady bug. Max LOVED that! He thought it was so great that we were all bugs. He still asks where our costumes are. He loves Mount Rushmore. We went in June with my family and Max hasn't stopped talking about it since. He still prays for it on a regular basis. He talks about it all the time. He "sees" it everytime we get in the car and asks me if I see it to. For about 2 months after we went he would ask me if that was where we were going, everytime we got in the car. He thinks George Washington's name is Mount Rushmore. He'll name all the presidents starting with Mount Rushmore. He has a friend named Lincoln and he tells me whenever he talks about Lincoln, "Mom, Lincoln and Abraham Lincoln!" Max loves Toy Story, Incredibles, Thomas the Tank Engine, Clifford the Big Red dog, Mickey Mouse, Elmo. He loves watching musicals and singing all the songs. He loves to watch youtube music videos. He loves to read and really loves going to the Library. So many books to choose from. He loves to do puzzles. He loves to play with friends. He loves to go for walks, especially when he gets to decide where we go. He loves slides. He is an energetic, smart, happy, fun boy.
I feel truly blessed to have Max in our family. I know that he was sent to our family for a reason. He brings us so much joy. I treasure every day that I have with him. I love I have been able to stay home and just be his mom. I get to watch him grow up and discovery the world and develop his personality. I get to play with him and teach him. I get to hold him when he's sad and kiss his "owwies" better. I get to fly him into bed and listen to the sweet prayers that he says. I get to be his mom for forever and I couldn't be more honored.
I love you Maximillian Omer Peck! Happy Birthday Kiddo!
