two!

Our Philomena Rose is now TWO.

Last year I was a bit pig-headed and was determined to have her birthday party with our family on the actual day, which is Christmas Day…so, that was a tad overwhelming. Thankfully, this year I lowered my standards a bit, and we celebrated a few days later. This was undoubtedly the better option. It spread out the presents and celebrations, plus I wasn’t stressed Christmas morning trying to get a brunch together.

We served our family an Italian feast, complete with an antipasto spread, lasagna, homemade tiramisu [!!!], and limoncello.

Philomena walked around all day saying, “Paaar-dy! Bir-day paaar-dy! Cake! Happy Bir-day to Meeena!”

It was a delightful celebration. We truly are blessed to have such amazing family near us.

adorable cake made by my sister

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I wish I was more systematic with my Philomena updates like Elizabeth is with sweet Evie, but alas I am far from methodical. Nevertheless, I will try anyway [complete with pictures that have nothing to do with the text around them].

My daughter, we are enthralled watching you grow and learn. You have such a gentle heart. You are so affectionate with us and with other loved ones. You are quite nurturing with your baby dolls. You constantly wrap them in blankets, sing to them, rock them, and put them down for “night-night.”

You are almost-definitely an introvert. You are not scared of new situations, but you are definitely hesitant and quiet; it takes you quite a while to warm up to people. You are still very even-keeled, a quality you definitely did NOT get from your Mommy. You still haven’t thrown a “major” temper-tantrum, although you are starting to become much more strong-willed. However- at least for now- you actually listen to reason and can be talked down pretty quickly.

You finally got your “word explosion” these past couple months. You are putting together sooooo many three-word and four-word phrases together. I can’t believe I used to worry you would never do so. [Your daddy is always reminding mommy of this important parenting technique.]

Your favorite activity in the whole world is reading books. And your attention span for them is l-o-n-g. Like, longer than your Mommy’s. Every book I think might be “too long” for you, you prove me wrong by sitting attentively through all of it, and then asking for it again!

A close second favorite would be dancing. We have at least four or five dance parties every day. [See the end of this post for a “Philomena Playlist.”]

You are counting fairly well, but you always, always, always skip the number 7. Every. Time. And you can recognize and identify probably two-thirds of the alphabet. And you know all of your basic colors.

You have an analytical mind. We just love watching you try to figure out puzzles and other spatially-manipulative toys. It’s as if we can see the wheels turning in that head. Also, you are going through this weird phase in which you are obsessed with circles. You find them all over the house, talk to them, and draw them. Circles weirdly have become your friends. [Maybe you need a tad more socialization? ;)]

You are finally figuring out that food is awesome. You have gained about two pounds in the past three months alone. Now, you are up to the 15th percentile in weight. Wahoo!

Most of the time you still need to be rocked to sleep, but are getting a liiiiittttle better about falling asleep on your own. The reality is that rocking you and cuddling you before nap and bedtime is our favorite moment of the day, so we want to keep doing it at least a little while longer.

Oh, Philomena, you are certainly the light of our lives. We love watching you grow and can’t wait to see the woman you will become, but for now, we are relishing the little girl who you are.

p.s. For P’s birthday party, I made a playlist of all her favorite songs from this year. Most of them are just fun songs to which she had a particular affinity for dancing purposes. A few are songs we started singing to her at night, for whatever weird reason [“I Need My Girl” (Ryan) and, embarrassingly, Lisa Loeb’s “Stay” (me).] And a couple are just ones she was drawn to for no apparent reason [“Jolene” anyone?]. Be warned that there are a few obnoxious toddler songs that we just couldn’t avoid. 

Disclaimer: I don’t *think* any of these songs have bad words, but I haven’t read all the lyrcis, so listen at your own risk. Also, you need Spotify to listen, but it’s free and a great program. So there.

p.p.s. Here is her one year reflection, in case you have forgotten.