{word.}

It is a word explosion in our house these days...very exciting stuff.

This boy...



wants to repeat everything Mom and Dad say...and I mean everything. Definitely keeps us in check (most of the time.) Did you know that toddlers can hear a whispered naughty word from across the room?

And my favorite that I know he learned from his Dad..."shut up cats!"

Oy. Melvin and Chloe don't have a chance.

A few weeks ago he was looking through their barn toy like this...(yes, I recreated the moment and technically Ben is looking through it...but whatever)

And he said "I see Dad." His first sentence!

We were just a tad excited.

And over the weekend he said "I love you" for the first time. Cue teary momma eyes.

Last night he was looking through one of their favorite books and said a phrase from the page he was looking at. Now, I'm not going to say that he read it...

(my kids are pretty darn smart but I'm be that naive)

But the fact that he knew that phrase came from that page just blew me away!

Now this boy...

is just a little bit behind his brother but that has been the norm so we aren't worried.

He is DEFINITELY talking, just not in sentences like Landon. He has put together lots of two word phrases and lately they have both been into picking up two like things and saying that he has two of them, like "two cars", "two browns (brown crayons)" and even "two Woodies" (again...who decided to name that character Woody?!)

I love how they are picking up on counting things already. Just amazing.

His favorite two word phrase, however, is...

"no *insert any word here*"

as in "no dad", "no mom", "no teeth" (when he doesn't want to brush his teeth)...you get the idea.

The funniest example of his love affair with no was the other night when we were over at their Gigi's house and she made pie for dessert. Ben didn't want any pie and went to the family room to pout, all the while saying "no pie", "no pie"...over and over again. At one point he stood up on the couch, peeked through the pass-through at us and said "NO PIE!".

He is quite the entertaining kid.

I know I'm leaving out a huge list of words and phrases but this could go on for a long time, and if you have stuck with me this long I don't want to punish you further. ;)

This is probably snooze-ville to most of you, but for a parent this is the realllly good stuff, and I want to make sure I document it somewhere so I don't forget. They are growing so quickly!

And yes, the 2's can be terrible, but they can also be pretty darn terrific.

I love these boys.