Owen Is Three!!!!

Oh man... it happened. My "baby" officially left the baby phase, and even the toddler phase behind... he's officially a "kid" now!!! 

Weight- 34lbs (only 1lb up... doctor was a bit concerned and we need to focus on getting him to eat more!)

Height- just under 3.5ft.

(Pictures are from his birthday!! Tidbits are observations from all throughout the year)

-So.. his weight. A few things factored in and we think he lost weight over the summer due to... 1) getting his back molars and his mouth hurting 2) getting HFM and going almost a week barely eating anything other than applesauce and ice cream and 3) Austin eating really fast and being done with his meals, which makes Owen (a slow eater) want to be done too so they can go play. He went from our little piglet who ate ALL THE FOOD to barely eating anything. We need to work on getting him to eat more. 

-We enrolled him in cooking class at daycare, which will hopefully help him be more interested in a bigger variety of food. 

-His talking is better, but if you aren't used to how he talks, he can still be a bit confusing. He mixes up his consonants, mostly. "Cooking" is "tooking" and "again" is "a-den".... the "d" sound gets substituted for a lot of letters when he talks. 

-He loves talking though, and hardly ever stops. He is starting to get the sequence of things, and how things work and are connected in life, and likes to tell you about those things... "first we do this, then we do that" type scenarios. He also repeats everything that comes out of Austin's mouth. 

-He is surprisingly great with numbers already (did NOT get that from me) and can count to 10, can count to almost 20, and does basic math. He counts on his fingers to 3, then on his other hand to 3, then says "Mommy! Free and free make six!!" Maybe he has just a natural ease with numbers. 

-He sings a lot, which Austin never did. Owen is always singing songs to himself, or making up songs, or just making singing-type sounds. 

-He will lip sync to songs in the car and he closes his eyes and scrunches his nose and lip syncs so passionately, moving his head back and forth.. it's the cutest thing.

-He is still a bit pigeon-toed and is clumsy. We call him our drunken fly because he can literally fall over, tripping on his own feet, while standing still. Not joking. He's super clumsy and falls down ALL THE TIME. He also hits his head constantly. At least once a day he's hitting his head on something. A chair, a table, the wall, the floor, his brother, the bed, a toy, something... His body/spacial awareness isn't that great apparently and he just doesn't "get" where his body is. 

-He is emotional and our snuggler. He'll come up and say "Mommy, I wan nuggle" and he'll just want to be in your lap and watch TV, or read a book, or lay against you. 

-He is very touchy feely too. The nights I put him to bed (Neal and I alternate nights) after his lights are out, I'll lay on his bed for a bit with his glow-worm toy lit up and he'll look at me and touch my face... running his hands on my cheek, over my forehead, down my nose. It is the sweetest thing. He just likes to touch and be touched. 

-He ADORES his big brother and MUST do everything the exact same, all the time. We have a lot of talks about how he can do something else, he can find something he's interested in, and how he doesn't have to copy Austin... but so far, to no avail. If Austin is doing it, Owen is too. If you've seen the movie The Sandlot, the two brothers... Timmy and Tommy... where one repeats exactly what the other just said... that's my kids to a "t". 

Austin: hurry Mom we have to go get the bus!

Owen: hurry Mom we have to doe det da bus!

Austin: Mom, is it raining?

Owen: Mom, is it waining?

etc, etc, etc, etc, etc,

-These two fight like cats and dogs, yet love each other to death and never want to NOT be around each other. They always want to play together, or just be around each other. 

-Owen is the pestiest pest of a little brother though, and quite the instigator. He'll poke and tease and annoy Austin to get a reaction out of him, and then laugh and run away. 

-Owen likes sports, but not quite as much as Austin seems to. He's definitely left-handed in every aspect of his life... eating, writing, sports. He gets a little frustrated because he'll try and mimic whatever sports-thing Austin is doing (like playing baseball) but doesn't get that he needs to mirror him and do it with the other hand. 

-When Owen is on his own, he is the sweetest little guy, and plays so well on his own. He talks and uses his imagination and loves to build things. 

-He loves to dress up in costumes too, and play pretend that way. He also likes to play with the play food and make us all dinners and take our orders. 

-So far, he doesn't respond well to discipline. We've tried everything and he just laughs through it all, or runs away from us, or pretends he doesn't  hear us. We are still trying to figure out how to really make him understand when we have to discipline him. He's had his hearing checked and all is fine there, so he CAN hear, he just chooses not to. Ha. 

-He can be very pensive and a bit withdrawn sometimes. I'll catch him "zoning out" or staring out a window deep in thought sometimes. I'm so excited to see what kind of kid he'll grow into. Maybe he'll be really introspective and thoughtful. He definitely has ingrained sympathy, and immediately says he's sorry if he did something wrong, or if he hurts someone. He's cried at sad parts of movies, and calls out if a character in a book or TV show is sad. One day on the way home from school he was in tears and crying while telling me about how I left him in a house alone in his dream. It took me awhile to make him feel better, and convince him dreams aren't true and that I'd never leave him alone like that. It was so heartbreaking.

-He loves sweets, but not as much at Austin. He'd only eat half a popsicle over the summer, or part of an ice cream. He still loves fruit most of all, and then carby things like popcorn. He's not a huge fan of meat or dairy, but loves spaghetti and tacos. 

-His favorite shows are Blaze and the Monster Machines, Team UmiZoomi, and PJ Masks. For books he loves I Love You, Stink Face, his pop-up Christmas book, and The Mitten.

-His favorite superheroes change a lot.. but he seems to gravitate to Superman a lot, or Batman. 

-For movies, he loves Moana, Finding Nemo, and Sing (he likes to pretend he's the gorilla named Johnny and every time Johnny is in the movie Owen will say "dere me! Dere me, a-den!)

-His nicknames continue to be BoBo, DoDo (not sure how that came to be) and BooBoo (because he's constantly getting hurt)

-He's just the funniest, naughtiest, sweetest little kid. The perfect baby of our family. He tugs at a special place in my heart, and I just couldn't love him more. 

Happy 3rd Year Owen!