TWO!

Tommy, you're two! Two!

TREE!

Two, Tommy. See, here are are two fingers! Today is your birthday!Two!

TREE!

You want cereal for breakfast, Tommy?

NO. COOKIE!

C'mon, cereal is so tasty.

COOKIE. COOKIE AND A BOBBLE!

Okay, since it is your birthday...and since those WERE 5 words you put together for me. Not five different words, but still. Cookies and milk for breakfast, it is.

Now, our Tommy isn't a verbal prodigy, but he can really throw a ball (any kind), shake his booty, climb like a spider monkey, and play with match box cars for hours. He enjoys long, warm showers ('shows') and walks on the beach.

He also likes pina coladas and gettin' caught in the rain.

He does not enjoy watching any TV. Which is kinda hard on me.

He is one dang cute baby.

Before Tom was born, I knew he was dark-haired, and dark-eyed. Which wasn't the most likely genetic combination, since babies 1,2, and 3 were blondies. But there he was, with a little cap of dark hair, born just a little after midnight, to his wailing, drugless mom, who hadn't had a LaMaze class in 7 years. I don't THINK I said the F word (I never have before, but if ever there was a time to start...). I can't be 100% sure, though. Jake is legally bound to back me up, I think. So you'll have to ask my Mom. She'll tell it like it was.

I would not go so far as to recommend epidural-less labor to anyone I actually like, but Tommy was so ALERT at birth! I was so alert! His dark eyes followed my voice even as he got passed from the doctor's big hands (not my Doc; he was at Les Miserables that night, and was planning to come induce me at nine the next morning), onto my belly, to the nurses with the needles who swaddled him into a tight little burrito, to Jake, to my Mom, and back to me. He looked so familiar, you know? Not a new acquaintance, but a family reunion.

He smiled at us that night. And again the next day. And then a few days after that. He never stopped the smiling.

Now, if only he'd start the talking. But I guess I can't complain. My Mom (who is a speech therapist) told me he's got the T-R blend of an 8-year-old.

And if you ask him, he'll gladly show it off.

How old are you, Tommy?

TREE!