Two

Today Charlie is two. On the second day of his life they wanted to talk with us about "removing support." and yet here he is, two years later, continuing to grow and thrive.



For his second birthday I wanted everything to be low-key. I told only family to come by any time after noon. Still, pretty much everyone showed up at once and it was too noisy for Charlie. We let him play in his room for most of the party and when we took him out into the noisy crowd, he had a two-year-old quality melt-down. I think the lesson for next year is that Charlie can stay in his room as much as he wants on his birthday.



Two is a big age for a kid with CP--if your child is sitting up by their second birthday, then chances are good that they'll one day walk. Officially, Charlie can get his hands off the ground for about two seconds. I have no idea where that puts us on the spectrum. Charlie's PT and I both feel pretty certain that Charlie will one day walk with assistance--this could be canes or a walker. A wheelchair isn't out of the picture by any means--but it's not a guarantee either.

Despite his physical limitations, I can see Charlie getting smarter and more inquisitive by the minute. His favorite thing to do is crawl around on the floor of his room playing. He's figuring out how to get himself into some silly predicaments and I'll find myself running to keep him from crawling under the bed or wrestling things away from him that I placed too close to his high chair.



He will eat almost anything you feed him. He doesn't care for carbohydrates unless they come in the form of spaghetti-ohs. He loves anything with marinara. He also loves eggs, green beans, fried chicken, and beef enchiladas. We still feed him most of his his meals, but he's good at picking up things off of his tray and feeling them to himself. Things in bowls are a different story--he drops his spoon, picks up the bowl, and throws it back like a drink. Food goes EVERYWHERE! He's getting pretty good and drinking out of a regular cup, but he really likes to splash the water, so that's a bit of an issue.



As far as toys go, I think he owns every toy for his age range that they sell at Target. He's great with buttons and levers and switches. If it doesn't light up makes music, though, he finds it boring. His new obsession is the Baby Signing Time DVDs, which we watch on my lap top while I'm doing therapy on him. These videos do bring out a bit of the terrible twos in him, though. If he sees anyone looking at the laptop he is convinced that they are watching Baby Signing Time without him and major whining will ensue. If he's tired, he may even cry about it, which is very un-Charlie. He seems to like videos that are mostly music and songs, so I'm thinking about investigating the Wiggles too.



He's a big boy now, and I'm going to have to stop calling him "the baby." I know this next year is going to be full of exciting new stuff--I can't wait!

PS: I'd like to put up some cute birthday pictures, but I haven't gotten a chance to put them on the computer yet.