Ode to Charlie

How can I say enough about how I feel about Charlie right now. What a gem of a kid. Seriously. I love this guy. He is easy going, full of himself, kind, easily distracted, easily reasoned with. I think I won the lottery with this little stinker. ("I'm not a stinker, I'm Charlie Jane Eyre Shumway!").

Mostly lately I'm relishing the fact that my 2 year old communicates so well. He seriously says everything Hazel does. I love it that he can communicate what he needs and understand what I can or can't do for him, but even more, I LOVE having a window into the mind of such a little guy.

Here are some of the things he has said lately:

-After denying him peanuts various times (they give him mean diarrhea) he says to me: "Mom I NEED some peanuts! Please! There is a baby in my tummy and it's crying and it NEEDS peanuts!" I still didn't give him the peanuts....that's your very own large tummy charlie, not a baby. And I'm not cleaning up that poop, not right now, not with my pregnant nose!
- about 29 times a day he states very seriously, "I have a question for you." Then he either states some kind of nonsense incorporating the word "bump"(which he thinks is the funniest word in the world) or he says very quickly "When i got born I popped out of your tummy and plopped right into the bath and that doula snatched me out." I am not exaggerating, he really does say all those words and puts together all those sentences. Should I be amazed or was Hazel just really verbally slow?

- "Don't not look up in the air Mommy, I will tickle you!"
- To Jeff the second he comes in the door: "Lie down, let's wrestle." He idolizes Jeff. He's always telling us "I can't, I have to go to work!" and packing up his things and walking importantly around the house.

- "I'm not Charlie, I'm a doggy." Then he proceeds to pant and crawl around the house.

-Charlie is easy to adore, and LOVES to be adored. He'll cuddle with me and read and kiss me and let me squeeze his little bum. You can see how comfortable he is with adoration in the picture below:
-He LOVED spending time in You Nork City (that's not a typo, that's how he says it) with his cousin McKay and his parents Noah and Kristi while I was on my cruise. Then McKay came and stayed with us for a week while they went on a cruise. These two guys would just laugh and laugh all day and I couldn't for the life of me figure out what was so darn funny!
-He loves Hazel. He also fights with Hazel all the time. My favorite fight so far happened in the car on the way home from a BBQ last weekend. Here's how it went:
Charlie: (at the top of his lungs) "I AM STUPID!!!"
Hazel: (at the top of hers, in kind of a disgusted voice) "You are NOT STUPID!!!"
Over and over and over and over again. Man, I wish I had that one recorded.


- People, this kid asks to take a nap and sleeps for 3 hours. It doesn't get much better than that. AND he can go without a nap if we're out and about for the day.....motherhood is treating me right right now. I'm loving these kids.