Dear Eliza, 37 Months Old

You can be the most talkative person in my life on a given day, but over the last few weeks you’ve become a bit tongue-tied.

You struggle to get out words that begin with “wh,” the start of your many questions. You’re often able to get the sentence going after 4-8 stutters on the first word. It’s too early to tell if you are developing a lasting stutter, but there’s certainly a “vocabulary burst” where your mouth seems to get stuck behind your thoughts since you are learning so many new words and building your vocabulary. Your buddy Bridger had a similar challenge.

You’ve been a good sport but must be frustrated at times. Even if it takes you a little longer to get your words out, I’m still excited about what you have to say next.

Your Mom relayed a story that at preschool you tried to tell her the name of your new friend, Grant. But you couldn’t get the words out and gave up. “I can’t say it,” you finally stated, confused.

I felt the same way your Mom looked when she told me about the occurrence. It’s a little heart-breaking to see you go through this phase. I can relate. I had my own talking-out-loud issue that didn’t show up until high school.

And then there will be times when something is simply too over-stimulating and exciting that you can’t get a word out. That happens to everyone. You experienced this when your Mom and Aunt Courtney surprised you with a “Disney on Ice” date a couple weeks ago. There were too many princesses and too much ice skating for any young mind to process that kind of life-altering event. If you weren’t hooked on princesses, ice skating and ballet, you sure as hell are now. We’re doing a lot of ballet dancing around the house.

Of course, you can’t dance without commanding my every dance move, too. There’s no hesitation in your marching, ahem, tip-toeing orders. Funny how that works.

Love always, Dad

Dear Matteo, 16 Months Old

Today we got in a boys’ day running errands at the hardware store and rebuilding some garage shelves (I did the building while you did the napping). Typical father-son stuff. You rode in the hiking backpack at Home Depot and squealed every time you saw a dog in the store. It was always the same dog, but who’s counting?

You’re fighting sleep in the other room as I’m typing. You’ve had a tough time settling down these last few nights. You were in a good routine, downing a couple almond milk bottles and happily crashing. Some early evenings you would come to me or your Mom with Rocky in hand (your favorite stuffed animal, a raccoon a.k.a. trash panda) and say “Night night” or “Ba ba,” both indicating you were ready for the night routine. Maybe it’s the molars coming through or another phase because the days of your self-selection to sleep seem to be over.

You’ve become more opinionated, correlating with growing two-syllable vocabulary to make your points. For example, yesterday you asked for food and I offered you a banana. You usually love bananas and initially indicated you wanted one. When I handed it to over you immediately said “No no!,” chucked it across the room and gave me an angry face before stomping off mumbling some baby-talk complaint. You became all Gorden Ramsay in the kitchen. You gave me a 1-star Yelp review. I enjoyed the act and moved onto successfully offering you RItz crackers in my servitude.

I don’t know how else to describe it, but you turned a corner from taking anything given to you — food, clothes, even shoes to deciding whether or not you like it. You were very disappointed in my shoe selection the other day after making you wear real shoes instead of Crocs on a rainy day. Never mind that you were only wearing a diaper with those shoes because you wanted to wear nothing else. So you ran around the house in high-tops and a diaper for most of the morning.

It may sound like I’m complaining. I’m not. I’m truly enjoying it! Your mannerisms are becoming more pronounced and it’s all so entertaining. You’re also a really smiley kid and just like to laugh, so these examples are the exceptions of the day.

When Eliza gets frustrated with you and pushes you around, you think it’s all fun. You constantly want to name people in pictures, flip through books and play hide and seek. You haven’t figured out that the seeker needs to stay in place while the hider hides, so I just run really fast ahead of you to hide. That will work while I’m still faster on the move, but I don’t expect it will last long. You’re nearly able to run and have a little jog-strut thing going.

I think you’re finally asleep in your room and I’m ready to turn-in myself. I’ve had a bit of a cold this week and the drugs are kicking in.

I look forward to playing more tomorrow.

Love, Dad

Dear Eliza, 36 Months Old

Hey there, THREE-YEAR-OLD!

I have to admit my eyes leaked a bit last night as I was tucked you into bed. I thought about the time we won’t get back in this stage that I’ve really come to enjoy. I’ve also realized that while things don’t actually change overnight, in hindsight they sort of feel that way.

Stop growing, stop right now… Nah, keep going. It’ll be fun to see the next stage of parenting you lead us into.

You are already looking way ahead. You mentioned several times these past days what the future looks like: “I am going to be a woman when I grow up. I will have a baby. I am going to be really, really tall and have long, black hair like Mommy.” That sounds like a good game plan to me.

You’re on your way to growing up. In just weeks, you went from crying for us at your new outdoor preschool, nervous about your new teachers and surroundings, to asking to stay when we pick you up. That’s some fast adjustment. You are improving your dance moves around the house, often in a somewhat restrictive Frozen character ballgown. You often request to go by the name of whatever Disney character you’re dressed as. When you play with your friends, you love to imagine and get occasionally demanding that they stay on track with the story in your head.

I appreciate the moments of articulate English, even if shouting orders. In contrast, the last couple weeks have been more like baby talk… and potty-training regression. Not good. You’re clearly seeking attention and working through some sibling jealousy. How do I know it’s sibling jealousy? The hip-checks and outright shoving of your barely-walking little brother are key indicators. So are the mimicked baby behaviors well beneath you.

Here’s the thing, you’re not ignored. You’re on our minds. We see you when you’re not looking. (We know when you’re awake.) We talk about you when you’re not close enough to listen. You have our attention constantly, even though it’s sometimes shared. You are loved, my kiddo!

Happy birthday. You’ve been practicing holding up three fingers to show people how old you are, and now you can declare it to the world: “I’m three!”

Love always, Dad

Dear Matteo, 15 Months Old

You are a walking, talking, eating-everything-in-sight little monster.

You have fearlessly practiced walking since nailing your official first steps. That effort paid off as you transitioned to walking as your default transportation mode over the past week. You take a wide stance and shriek with delight when your Mom mimics your movements.

You almost immediately wanted to start playing soccer. I use the ball of my feet to move the ball around the house, and you curiously took to that instead of outright kicking. The results are some brilliant-looking footwork combined with hard falls when you try a step-over move over a full-size ball that your inseam can’t clear.

The talking is starting to improve and you’re pronouncing more two-syllable words with caveman oration. You can say apple, balloon, walk, up, cracker, bye, Liza, Mama, Dada, wawa (water), and Greta (really just “grr” when you see the dog).

You don’t say but most often scream “baba!” for the bottle you demand before and after a nap or night’s sleep and occasionally the hours in between. Because of your dairy allergies these are rather expensive almond and oat milk bottles. But hey, they’re cheaper than the “adult bottles” people order at Starbucks.

You are a very good eater and probably have the same calorie intake I do. You demonstrate some fine motor skills using a fork or spoon to eat your food. It’s funny to watch you eat your morning Cheerios now with a spoon. You look like a toddler trying to impersonate an adult, which I guess is what growing up looks like.

While in many ways you are a raucous, wild child trying to find your way to the water table or nearest patch of dirt – often in that order to get muddied – you also find a balance and can be incredibly sweet and cuddly, which we love. Especially in the morning, you are content staying in your sleep-sack for a while on the couch with us and burrowing your head into the nearest neck. You don’t stay there long, popping up your bundle of blonde hair to listen to the airplane that flew by or reacting to Greta’s bark. But for that moment, life is good and you’re still our baby.

Love, Dad

Dear Eliza, 35 Months Old

I just got the text from your Mom about how the first day at your new preschool is going.

First days are hard, and you’ll have plenty of them. You want to be yourself. You want to fit in. You want to find comfort and create familiarity. I don’t have the full story from your Mom yet, but it sounds like you made it through the first two hours (out of three) before shedding some tears. A teacher asked if you were feeling sad, and obviously you were. I bet you bit your lower lip a few times before that.

I am proud of you for working through those tough moments without us. There are plenty of cliches about dealing with adversity. The punchlines are all the same: you’re better for it.

Before I left for work today you expressed some concern and asked, “Will you come back to me?” Like Daniel Tiger says, grown-ups always come back.

My heart aches that you would feel sad, alone, scared or abandoned, but you’re learning that those are the feelings associated with gaining a little more independence. I don’t take for granted that in coming years you won’t consider if your Mom and I are going somewhere with you and will probably wish we don’t.

You’ve already worked through a lot of discomfort gracefully. Your third international trip in as many years has proven you’re a pro at traveling. There were some rough moments traveling to Italy a few weeks ago, but we didn’t have to worry about you much at all. You did a great job on the plane with your potty training and sat calmly watching your movies, taking breaks to snack and nap. You’ve been great at helping Matteo, too, and sweetly reach to hold his hand when you’re sitting side-by-side in the stroller. Sometimes you’re not so sweet and snatch toys from him, and he retaliates by pulling your hair. You will have grow-out bangs for years at this pace.

You show flashes of maturity, asking intelligent questions and jumping in on conversations where we don’t expect you to. You love watching Taylor Swift videos, falling under the spell she has cast on millions of little girls. Whether her songs are playing in the background or not, you ask me to dance with you. I never say no to the opportunity to spin and jump around.

And for everyone of those growing-up moments, you like to pretend you’re a cat and meow — probably inspired by the farm cat neighbors we had in Italy and watching too much Daniel Tiger. I’m hoping that’s a phase that passes quickly.

I’m sure the anxiety at preschool will be a phase that passes quickly, too. I plan to take you to your second day of school on Friday. We’ll get donuts on the way to pre-funk. You’ll be on your own again for just a few hours, but don’t worry — I’ll come back for you. Grown-ups always come back.

Love always, Dad