Henry at age 3

Hard to believe that our little man is already three years old. Wow, has he changed a lot over the past year!

Henry definitely went through a very classic "Terrible twos" phase. Mr. Independent would dig his heels in many times during the day with respect to his actions and words and wound up spending a LOT of time in time out. Thankfully this stage has mostly passed and he is much more consistent in his behavior and just seems calmer overall.

Even during his Terrible Twos Henry has always been very affectionate and will come over to give us hugs or tell us that he loves us without prompting. He loves to snuggle and sit in your lap to read books and watch movies.

School is going better and he is about to transition to the older 3-5 year old class. He will not be in the same class as Samantha but they will be following a similar curriculum. We are adding an extra day (they will now be going Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday), in hopes that the consistency will help him transition to the older classroom. We still struggle with him happily saying goodbye at drop off but it seems that the less than desirable behaviors of knocking over other childrens' work, putting pomegranate seeds in his nose and throwing toys over the fence may be in the past.

Henry is OBSESSED with Star Wars! We have a random cup from Target with many of the main characters on it. If he is using that cup for a meal he will talk about each character on the cup and why they are his favorite. He also has a Star Wars ABC book and can recite the character associated with each of the 26 letters without seeing the page. Thank God for the pool noodle light sabers! It gives him the opportunity to attack his family members, cousins and dogs with reckless abandonment (as long as he asks and no hitting in the face).

Henry LOVES to read! We are so proud of his love for books. He is a super active kiddo but he will sit for 30-45 minutes with a stack of books utterly content. We are lucky to live walking distance to a library with great story times and a vast selection of children's books. Henry also loves puzzles and can do a 100 piece puzzle pretty much by himself.

Henry continues to amaze us by the variety and amount of foods that he will eat. Among his favorites are tacos, mac and cheese in bug shapes, pasta in any form and pizza. He will eat just about any fruit but will only eat certain veggies: carrots, broccoli, brussels sprouts and peas. He is a tough sell when getting him to try something new but there are very few foods that he truly doesn't like.

Henry and Samantha are practicing having "sleep overs" with each other in the bunk beds. We took a loooong break after it became obvious that Henry needed to work on sleeping in a big boy bed solo before he could share a room with another child. After a tough 2 week period he is doing much better. We usually separate them on school nights so they will get enough rest but they both look forward to sleeping together on non-school nights. Samantha has been very sweet and has let him have her top bunk and pink fitted sheet. He LOVES the pink fitted sheet! He also has a posse of stuffed animal buddies to keep him safe in bed including Pooh, Jack-Jack, his puppy baby, elephant baby and snuggly dog. It can be hard to find the boy in all of the stuffed animals!

He also is in a pajama loving phase. He never sleeps in clothes for naps; always comfy PJs. His current favorites are shark PJs handed down from Mom & Dad's neighbor.

Fortunately, the amount and duration of his upper respiratory illnesses seems to be slowing down. I hate to even mention it, but he hasn't had an ear infection in quite a while. So happy for him.

Boy has my Henrys put some gray hairs on my head in the past year but he is such a sweet little guy and he keeps our days from getting boring!