{this moment (with special thanks to Darah)} – A Friday ritual. A single photo – no words – capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment.

Dear Miles,

Can you believe this is your last Monthly Miles Memo for your second year?  Crikey.  In less than a month (because I was a little pokey getting this posted), we’ll have a three-year-old in the house.

You’re a pretty fun guy to have around.  The other morning, you woke up early and were lounging around in bed while your dad and I got ready.  Out of nowhere, you started laughing your head off.  I asked you what was so funny, but you never articulated an answer.  You just kept laughing and laughing, lying there in bed.  Later that day, I recounted the story to Mubby and Skittergramps, and you said, “I saw two dogs wearing sweaters.”  Sure enough, the previous day you had gotten a kick out of a couple of winter-outfitted dogs on the walking path, and I guess it stuck with you through the next morning.

Speaking of I, your pronoun use is almost flawless now.  You’ve got the I/you/he/she/they/we thing covered.  In fact, the only time I hear you regress to your old ways is at bedtime, when I ask you, “Do you want to walk, or do you want me to carry you?”  Then, in your sleepy little voice, you almost always say, “I want Mommy to carry you.”

Your language has improved in other aspects, too.  You consistently pronounce letters like f and s that have been hard for you, which is helping us decode the mystery song.  There’s this song that you sometimes sing, always the same with the same intonation and rhythms.  We don’t remember hearing it in any of your favorite YouTube videos, and Beanie doesn’t know what it is either.  It goes something like this:  “Oh-ay, oh-ay, jumping oh.  Jumping over the ee-ah-oh.”

We hypothesized that the “ee-ah-oh” might be “airport,” but you nixed that idea.  You kept singing it, and we kept straining our ears and memories to figure out what it was, but nothing.  Then, a few days ago, you sang, “Oh-ay, oh-ay, jumping oh.  Jumping over the sea floor.”  Sea floor!  See how much difference an s and and f can make?  We still don’t know the source of the song, so if any of my fair readers have a clue, please help a mama out in the comments.

Usually you’re pretty good at explaining things, so I know eventually you’ll just tell us the whole story.  I’ll wait.

We had a really good visit to Willowwind School a couple of weeks ago.  That’s where you’re probably going to preschool next summer or fall, depending on your personal development (most critically, your use of the potty, which has been pretty much nil to date).  They held a story time for little kids, and you had a wonderful time.  It was much better than our last visit, which happened to coincide with a really unpleasant phase for you in which you screamed and cried and clung to me in the face of anything even a little unfamiliar.  This time, though, you joined in the activities and had a good time exploring the classrooms.  The people running the place were really warm and caring, and it seems like a great place for you to start school.

You’ve done some other pretty great things this month, too.  We had an unseasonably warm fall, so we got more outside time later in the year than in the past.  You’re a master of the playground.  Twirly slides do not scare you anymore, as long as they’re not too big.  We even got to play at the Roosevelt playground after Thanksgiving with Mubby and Skittergramps.  Your favorite thing there is the rubber bridge, which you crossed about forty times.  You bounced on it, you ran back and forth, you made outrageous faces.  You make a lot of nutty faces, which makes you a good portrait model.  Your dad seems to think you inherited this proclivity from me, which I guess is probably true.  At our Willowwind visit, a shocking part came up in the story, and the leader looked at me and said, “Great facial expression!”  I can’t help it.  The world is interesting, and my face shows it.  You’re just the same.  I love watching your face light up when you make a discovery.

Photo by Gary Clarke

You really enjoy figuring things out, like words that rhyme or somehow related.  Yesterday, we got a holiday card with a picture of your cousins Paige and Olivia on it.  It’s been a while since you’ve seen them, so you held the card and studied it as I told you their names.  After I said Paige, you puzzled for a few moments.  Then your eyebrows went up, you smiled widely, and said, “Hey, just like a page in a book!”  I hope you continue to delight in language, because it’s one of my favorite things too, and it would be fun to share that with you.  We’ve been watching the French-Canadian kids’ cartoon Caillou a lot lately, mostly in English, but now and then you request the Spanish version.  I haven’t been speaking as much Spanish with you as I should.   I keep promising myself I’ll get on that, but in the meantime, I’m glad you like “Caillou pasea al perro” just as much as “Caillou Walks the Dog.”

Another fun thing for you this month was your first trip to the movies.  While Daddy and Skittergramps went to see Uncle Tyler in Lincoln, you and Mubby and I hit the theater.  We saw Tangled, which is a Disney reinterpretation of the classic Rapunzel story.  I wasn’t sure how you’d do.  I made us sit near the aisle so it would be easy to get out if you were too loud or squirmy.  At home, you almost never do anything for more than ten minutes at a time.  You watch YouTube videos, yes, but you’re always jumping up and running to find a toy, then taking a break to color, then stacking a few Legos, then back to the video.

At the movie theater, though, you were entranced.  We got there kind of early, and even through all the ads and previews, you sat sit and watched.  You ate some chocolate during the movie, but you probably wouldn’t have needed the distraction, because you just sat on Mubby’s lap for the first half and mine for the second, and watched the action.  When we told Skittergramps about it later, he reasoned that it was consistent with other times you’ve been in a performance environment.  At the Justin Roberts concerts we’ve attended, for example, you prefer not to dance in the aisles with the other kids.  You’d rather just sit and focus and pay attention.  At those concerts and at the movie, it almost seemed like you weren’t having fun, because your brow furrowed and your face got so serious, but I’m pretty sure you liked it a lot.  When I commented days later that your hair was getting long and you needed a trim, you said, “Just like Rapunzel!”  And when you got to choose a balloon in celebration of some good behavior when I know it wasn’t easy for you, it was the Rapunzel balloon that caught your eye.  Your favorite characters from the movie were Maximus the horse and Pascal the chameleon (which you call a frog).

The twos really haven’t been terrible at all, my little Miles.  I love you a hundred thousand units, and I’m excited to find out what your third year will bring.  Maybe some potty use?  Maybe a rediscovery of the foods you used to like but are suddenly no longer into (I’m looking at you, Cascadian Farms Organic Vegetable Medley)?  Maybe finishing every book Robert Munsch has ever written?

I’ll meet you there, Scoop.  I love you like doggies love sweaters (unless they don’t actually like them, which I don’t know).

Mommy