Violet at 35 months

This is Violet's last month as a two-year-old.  When Jack was her age, I had a lot of people tell me that their children didn't go through the terrible twos, that three was a lot more difficult.  That was not at all our experience with Jack, but I have a sneaking suspicion that may end up being the case with our Miss Violet.

Don't get me wrong, she is generally a joy.  She has lots of friends and is usually very happy.  One of my favorite things is when I get her up in the morning.  She typically wakes up in a great mood, although the first thing she usually does is point imperiously to the door or tell me, "I want to go downstairs.  I want to eat and watch TV."

I am a little embarrassed to admit what a terrible couch potato she is.  She does fine when we are out of the house.  She plays great on her own and with her friends.  But when we are out our house, all she wants to do is sit on her spot on the couch (formerly my spot, then Jack's, now hers), and watch her favorite programs.  She is currently very much into Curious George, Cat in the Hat, Elmo (still), Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood, and Word World.  Dinosaur Train will do in a pinch.  Right now, she mostly watches the same Curious George DVD that we got from the library over and over again.

I do try to get her to do other things in the house.  She likes to paint with both water colors and finger paints.  She likes books and drawing.  She enjoys playing with her My Little Pony toys and jumping in the trampoline.  She likes to play "check up," where she is the doctor.  Each "appointment" has her looking at my eyes and ears, listening to my heart, taking my temperature, removing my splinters, giving me a shot, and applying a band-aid.

When we are in the car, she frequently pretends that she is the mommy and I am the baby.

"Baby?" she says.

"Yes, Mommy," I reply.

"What you doing, Baby?" she asks.

"I'm driving," I say.  "What are you doing?"

"I'm just sitting," she answers.

There is really very little variation from this script.

She really likes listening to the Beach Boys in the car.  "Fun Fun Fun" used to be her favorite, but now it's "Help Me, Rhonda."  It's fun to listen to her sing along with classics like "California Girls" and "Barbara Ann."

She inherited the tendency to replace lyrics to songs with words of her own choosing from her dad.  There was one time that Tom had to learn this song called "Put Your Hand in the Hand" for a church program.  The chorus starts off, "Put your hand in the hand of the man who stilled the water."  One morning, Violet wanted me to make her a breakfast burrito.  She started singing, "Put your cheese in the cheese in the cheese in your tortilla," which Jack thought was hysterically funny.  That one took on a life of its own for awhile.

When I was pregnant with Jack and found out that we were having a boy, there were only two rooms that could possibly be his nursery.  One was right next to our bedroom, and the other one was at the end of the hall.  I told Tom that we would put Jack in the room at the end of the hall.  When Tom asked why, I said it was just in case our next child was a girl.  Girls are a lot sneakier than boys, and I wanted her bedroom to be right next to mine.

I am already seeing signs of it in Violet.  She's not sneaky per se, but she's definitely wilier.  If I tell her no when she asks for something, she often yells, "Please? Please!" whereas Jack would just automatically go into tantrum mode.  While I rarely change my mind, I have to admit the begging does give me pause sometimes.

She pushes the limits of what she will be allowed to do. I remember a friend of mine telling her child not to go in the street, and he would stretch his toe out just past the sidewalk while looking back at his mom for her reaction.  That's totally the type of stuff that Violet does.

Bedtime is still kind of a nightmare.  She does all that she can to delay delay delay.  "Sing two songs!" "Sing three!" "I want water!"  "I want chapstick!"  If we do something once, she expects that we will do it again for every night after.