Three!

It's official: Our little man is a little man. Yesterday was his 3rd birthday (surreal) and we spent the day celebrating as a family. Greg took the day off so we could take Damo—and, by association, Nora—to his first movie. It went so much better than we ever could have anticipated.

It all started with some bad food court food and a ride on the carousel:


Then the big purchase:


Three tickets to paradise (or Madagascar 2):


And then the really big purchase:


Sidamo sat in his seat and acted like an old pro—eyes fixed on the screen, hand plunged in the popcorn bag, telling his dad to "shh!":


Nora actually spent much of the film in rapt attention. Just not this part:


We then came home, had nap time, and then shared pizza and delicious cupcakes (thanks again, Maia!) with grandpa. Really and truly, the perfect 3rd birthday.


I have such a hard time believing out little guy is such a grown-up already. I've been scanning the blog from the past year, and so much has happened (not sure why that's a surprise). Here are some highlights, to prevent you from having to scan the past year's blog entries:

• Switched from calling me Mama to Mommy. Today he even experimented with Mom—to my great displeasure.
• Had his first Christmas with us.
• Potty trained. Hallelujah.
  
• Participated in his first presidential caucus.
• Cuddled with pretty much every player on the CU Buffaloes football team.
• Started (and stopped) preschool.
• Played on a soccer team.
• Took the shortest vacation on record (23 hours in Basalt).
• Became a big brother!
• Celebrated his first year home with us.
• Saw the beach for the first time.
• Saw the DNC festivities in Denver.
• Went to his first Rockies game.
• Visited Amish Country.
• Voted for Obama!

I can already tell 3 is going to be a fun year. Not that 2 wasn't fun, but man, it was hard. The tantrums, the defiance, the simultaneous but conflicting desires (did I ever tell you about the meltdown about washing his hands? "I don't want to wash my hands!" "You have to wash your hands." Meltdown. "Fine, let's just go, I'll use hand sanitizer on you." Meltdown. "I want to wash my hands!" "Fine, wash your hands." Meltdown. "Maybe later!" Ugh.).

Just in the past few weeks, as though he knew his birthday was on the horizon, Sidamo has started displaying all the typical 3-year-old characteristics. His imagination is starting to expand, and he tells stories (which could sometimes be interpreted as lies). It's pretty cool to see the mind changing, even when I'm frustrated by the stretched truths. Until now we've loved the fact that he has always acted like he's on truth serum, confessing to his every crime with just teensiest bit of prodding. Now we're realizing that when we aske what he's doing behind a closed door, we can't take, "Nothing!" at face value.

These milestones just remind us how blessed we are that this fantastic person is our son. We continue to fall deeper in love with him as his funny (and brilliant) personality emerges. We're so, so lucky to be your family, Sidamo!