Carter Update

Carter Man is still my little spitfire as well as my mini shadow. I don't know if he came late to the terrible twos or if threenager is a thing, but his favorite word right now is no. Lucky for me he's usually quick to follow it up with a hug or a kiss. He follows me from room to room when we are home and needs to be in the same room as me. When we are out and about he is fine to run off with his friends and only occasionally checks in with me. But at home if I'm on the toilet, he's in the bathroom doorway if not in the room. It's rare for him to be in a different room than me other than when he's running hot laps through the house. He is coming up on 3.5 years old and that is hard to believe for me. Now we just have a few months before he starts his pre-pre-k/mom's morning out, whatever you want to call it!

He really is the sweetest and most cuddly little guy. The other day he woke up while Ty and I were still awake and was really upset and couldn't fall back to sleep. He asked if I would rock him so I did. We hadn't rocked in so long and it felt so nice. While we were rocking he asked me if we could do it every night. His favorite place to be is sprawled out on my chest. I love it. When we were going on a trip I had him pack his buddies and he was very careful to also pack Pandy, his panda, for me. I didn't realize it and when we got to our hotel he pulled it out and told me he had packed it for me. It was so cute because when I lay down with him at naptime I usually hug his panda bear to my chest while I lay there and he had noticed that. He still plays with my hair and is always noticing whether my hair is up or down or how it smells. He doesn't miss a thing and always comments on it. If I have my hair in a ponytail when we're out and about I usually take it down on our drive home. He always notices and will yell from the back, "Mommy your hair is down!" It's so funny. He is also sweet with his friends. He will share his food without them even asking. One of his friends we usually see at Bikes and Balls. He loves to let his friend get on a toy car and then he pushes it around. It is comical to see his friend riding it with his legs lifted straight out in the air because he's a bit older than Carter. But man, if Carter has a bad first playdate or meeting with someone, it's pretty much game over for them. There are a couple little girls in our weekly playdate who weren't nice to Carter at the first playdate, taking toys from him and not sharing. Ever since then, they've been nice to him, but he is not interested. He's just now coming around to one of the girls months later and will play with her sometimes.

Carter is such a sweet big brother. He adores Elise and loves to play with her. His favorite is playing chase and he enjoys it even more now that she is walking. He loves having her chase him up and down the hall. When she wants a toy, he will hand it to her. He also gets her drinks and snacks when he thinks she wants them. He'll even take food off his plate and put it on her high chair tray if she runs out of food. He knows how to unbuckle her from the stroller and will do that for her after our runs. He also likes to unclip the top part of her car seat. When he's finished unclipping her, he'll say, "All done, there you go Elise!" One day he told me, "You know what else starts with sissy's letter? Elephant!" It cracks me up that he associates certain letters with certain people and I love it. He still has his moments where he knocks her down on purpose or pulls toys away from her, but they have become less and less frequent. Although I know the mean moments will continue for the rest of our lives, I do love that the sweet moments are so much more common.

Unbuckling Elise's car seat for her.

 

 

 

Our biggest struggle this month was with getting dressed. It didn't matter how much before we needed to leave I started him getting dressed, it never failed we'd be running out the door with shoes in hand when it was time to go. It was definitely the worst part of my day and I would feel my stress level rising as I helped him pick out his clothes for the day. It didn't matter if I set a timer, if I explained where we were going and it was somewhere he really wanted to go, it didn't matter what I did, he was hell bent on making it difficult. Finally one day I actually had to leave the room to very expressively mutter curse words to myself. That's when I decided enough was enough. There was no reason for this ridiculousness to occur. So I decided from then on out, Carter would get dressed first thing in the morning before eating breakfast. The first day he tried to fight it and I told him, okay no breakfast. Since then, I have had no trouble. Thank goodness he likes to eat!

Something else he does that drives me nuts is pretending he can't find things or saying he's too scared to go in a different room by himself. Typically it's when I've asked him to go potty. He'll claim he can't find his potty chair or that it's in the other room and he's too afraid to go by himself. He still doesn't go on his own accord very often. I have to remind him to go potty quite frequently or he has accidents. If he has to poop, he goes running to the potty chair. If he has to potty, he occasionally goes on his own. Most the time when I ask him why he had an accident he says he didn't know he had to go. I don't know if he just doesn't feel the sensation or if he gets busy and doesn't pay attention to it. I asked the doctor about it at his 3 year well check and he wasn't concerned saying it is rare for a boy to be ready to potty train before the age of 3 and some aren't ready until they are closer to 4. I'll definitely be bringing it up again at his next well check if he is still struggling. We have days with no accidents but usually that just means that I was on point with reminding him to go. If I forget to remind him it usually results in an accident. The most surprising thing is that he doesn't seem to mind. He will be walking around wet and it's not until I ask him to get on the potty that I realize he is already wet. It blows my mind just a bit, but I know he'll get there at some point as long as there isn't anything medically causing the delay. I'm just thankful he has pooping down!

His favorite game to play is kitties or doggies, usually kitties. When we are kitties we crawl around meowing and he likes to rub his face on me. Sometimes we hiss at Harper when she walks by. He also likes to put a pillow and a blanket in a laundry basket and pretend it's his cat or dog bed. Then he wants me to put another laundry basket on top to make it like a kennel. Any game we play, I'm the mommy and he's the baby or brother and Elise is the baby. He loves to draw and has started not just drawing faces, arms, and legs, but also adding hands with fingers! The first time he drew hands on a picture was the picture he made me for Mother's Day. I told Ty it was worth the wait to have him draw hands for the first time in my picture. I had worked with him to get pictures drawn for his Oma, Gma, Gigi, and great grandmas. Then when we got to mine, he refused to make one for me. When I asked him to make mine he told me, "I don't love you, I just love daddy." Finally about 4 days later he made mine and a few days after that he told me, "I love you again." As much as I knew it would come at some point, it still really hurt to have him say that to me. I just told him, "Well, no matter what, Carter. I still love you." But I may have cried a little bit after he went down for his nap. I told Ty next year he needs to help Carter make my present so I don't have to do it.

Something he does that is kind of funny is that he covers his ears when he sees something he thinks is scary. Not necessarily something that will make a scary noise, just anything that looks scary. He has a pair of white Nikes with a black swoosh that he calls them his golf ball shoes. He also likes to write stories by scribbling on paper and then reading them to us. He is my goofy, sweet, stubborn, and loving boy. I told Ty the character trait of his that drives me nuts is how stubborn he is, so of course Carter inherited it. Thankfully the thing I love most about Ty, his big heart and love for others, Carter also got. So it all balances out. I love him more than words could ever describe and spend so many naps laying in his bed after he's fallen alseep staring at his beautiful face! 

Pretending he's a kitty in his cat bed.

Telling me he is 3.

Counting his fingers.