26 Months

Dear Roper,

You are now twenty-six months old and you are at least twenty-six kinds of awesome. This past month has been a blast. You’re good company, Little Bear.

However, your mama is in the middle of her NaNoWriMo project and is a little short for time. As in, I’ve had to go to the bathroom for the past five hours, but a break hasn’t presented itself. I’m going to start wearing your diapers soon.

I hope your future classmates aren’t reading this.

So…this will be an hasty and abbreviated letter. A shame, because it was such a big month filled with fun activities.

You: wake up full of awesome every day, started riding your bike and adore it, sometimes fall asleep with your helmet on, still wear your pumpkin Halloween costume every day, think the answer to everything is “fire truck!”, miss The Outlaws who went back to California for the winter, point and say “oh, look at that!” over and over as clear as a bell, can jump off of things backwards, show no intention of potty training even though you love sitting on the potty, would be happy riding around the property on the tractor for hours, learned how to put the tractor in gear (yikes!), got to “help” your daddy hunt during The Great Steere Hunt, have three pairs of Carharts that you love to wear because you look like Daddy, keep yourself entertained at the property by “painting” with a dry paint brush, playing with trucks, trying to start the tractor and jumping over rocks, decorated your first pumpkin, fell in love with karaoke, and have decided that you no longer need naps (you do).

Your Daddy: is indescribably proud of you for learning to ride your bike so well and so fast, likes to see you in your Carharts and have you up at the property helping him, misses you all day at work, wants to crawl into your crib with you when we check in on you at night, is chomping at the bit to buy you a dirt bike, and hopes you don’t get too tall (I don’t know – I think he’s bummed that I sullied the gene pool with so much Cooper-ness. Mwahahahaaaa!).

Your Mama: didn’t know it was possible to love you this much, adores listening to the baby monitor as you sing “happy birthday” to your trucks, boots, books, and doggies in the morning, is thrilled with your ability to entertain yourself, is exhausted from trying to keep you alive, enjoys your company immensely, can’t stop kissing those beautiful lips, and takes joy in every little adventure we go on.

Little Bear, I hope you understand that I would much rather spend my limited free time playing with you instead of writing to you this month.  Time with you is far more valuable than time with my computer, so let’s go play!

Love,

Your Mama