Two. Years. Old.

Happy Birthday, my sweet Violet Christine! 

Violet is such a joy. She makes us smile a million times every day with her wonderful personality. It will be very difficult to sum up all the ways that she delights us, but I will try.

Violet is very verbal. She started talking a lot around 18 months and her vocabulary is just amazing. (Our current favorite thing she says is, "I have a hypothesis.") She can certainly hold her own in a conversation and she plays alongside of Sebastien and Eden without missing too much. We have joked that she is our parrot, because she mimics everything she hears. She likes to start her sentences with "Maybe..." or "Probably..." or "I think..." 

She loves songs, and she often sings to herself in her crib or while she's playing. We noticed this already around 19 months or so, she was easily singing 5 or 6 songs regularly and could sing even more when prompted. Back then, her repertoire included "God is so Good," "Jesus Loves Me," "This is the Day," "Happy Birthday," and "Jingle Bells." But now I couldn't even begin to list all of the songs she sings. She knows the words to most of the songs on the CD's we listen to in the car, and at night when I am rocking her, she sings along with the words to her Praise Baby CD. 

Violet has earned another nickname: "Me too." This girl wants to do whatever the twins are doing. She wants to try everything and she is quite brave. She is good at making us all laugh. She is also thoughtful. We do highs and lows at the dinner table, and while we sometimes get vague answers from the twins ("what we're doing right now" is the typical answer), Violet would often say "going to the playground" or "when Daddy came home." Note I say "would," because currently her favorite answer is to look down bashfully and say "nothing," and then peek up to see if we are smiling at how cute she is. Which we generally are.

Even with all of this mimicking and "me too" stuff,  Violet likes being the littlest and the baby. Sometimes I will ask her, "Are you a big girl or a baby?" She always answers "baby." Sometimes when she doesn't want to try something she will tell me "I too little." (Which is interesting because we very rarely tell her that.) Of course she likes getting bigger...When people ask her "How old are you now Violet?" She proudly answers "Two Years Old!"

Violet is a good sleeper; rather, once she is asleep, she sleeps like a champ. We are almost never up in the middle of the night with her, unless she is sick. She has become a bit of a monkey when it's bedtime; she likes to bounce around and sing and play games, like throwing all of her puppies and blankets out of her bed and then calling "Mommy, where are you? I need my puppies!" or something like that. Speaking of, she sleeps with four or five beanie-baby size puppies, two blankies and currently (only) two pacis. (Down from 4.) Oh, and baby Jenna. It's quite a party in her bed. Last week we moved a toddler bed into her room so that she could get used to it. Just this week I took the bumper out of her crib. We'd like to keep her in her crib for awhile yet, but she is already trying to climb out, so we're preparing ourselves for what is ahead.

Nap time. Crib isn't quite so full in this picture.

Violet also loves to draw and color. She has had a great artist's grip on her writing tools since very early on. She colors well and can draw some shapes. Violet knows almost all of the letters of the alphabet, though she confuses "K" and "X" sometimes. When she gets to "V," she says "V for Violet!" She likes reading, but honestly does not get the same amount of time with books as S & E did when they were two. She just gets distracted by her brother and sister, and often would rather follow them around than sit with me and read.

Violet can play well by herself - she loves to sit and play people or animals or cars, and she will just sit and talk and tell stories, making things talk to each other. She also plays well with Sebastien and Eden. It's very interesting to watch these relationships develop. She has a very sweet and affectionate relationship with Sebastien. She will let him approach her at any time, even when she is very tired and grumping at others in the family. And he will let her kind of "tackle" him and he's such a good sport, he just laughs with her. Often he will read to her. Violet and Eden also get along, but they do have more moments of butting heads, though mostly it's around sharing issues. Even with that, Violet asks for Eden, walks around calling for her, and asks me to get her sometimes. Violet loves to say "Look at me" and very often she is saying "Look at me, Eden!" I think she likes to have her sister's approval. 

I also just really love that all three of them play together well. I have always worried that Violet will feel left out or excluded because of the twin bond. But so far, it seems that (once again) I am worrying over nothing. Or over not much. They get along well and I often feel very proud of their budding relationships.

Truly nothing I write is feeling adequate to describe my sweet little sunshine. The light and the amusement, the pure joy that she brings to our family every day has been such a blessing. I'll let some pictures do the talking, though they don't seem to do her justice either. 

Sweetest little 2 year old!

Happy Birthday Sweet Girl! 

I love you so much!

Having just woken up from a nap, she wasn't so sure about this homemade "Slip N Slide"

Violet's "focus" face

Hugging her "2" candle

A birthday cupcake