A 3 Year Old Finn

Finn turned 3 on November 9th. He looks so grown up...

I'm a little bit overwhelmed at the task of writing an update about our Finn at this time in our lives.  That is probably because at 3 years old, Finn is both one of the loves and joys of my life, but also a bain of my existence!  (Gasp, did she really just write that?!?)  I don't suppose I'm allowed to say that about my own child but wowee,  it can be frustrating to take care of Finn! At the same time, he makes us laugh every day, entertains us, makes us feel loved, makes us marvel at his fine mind, and satisfies our souls in a way I suppose only one's children can as we watch him when he is utterly happy.  He is the greatest person in the world to be around when he is in a good mood. And he says the most hilarious things daily. So our relationship is getting more complex, but writing this and trying to capture the essence of him at this age is important to me...I know I'll want to read it down the road, and I think he will too.

He's still that kid that experiences emotions to the extreme, and luckily, most of the time he has a giant, toothy smile spread across his face; almost like it is his baseline facial expression. He can be jubilantly happy with laughter, wide smiles and shrieks, terrorizing the house/Oscar/us in anger/tantrum/frustration, or shedding giant tears of heartache.  He's a passionate guy and we get to experience both the hilarious and wonderful parts of that, but also the challenges as he goes through this emotional toddler stage, replete with big changes for him. He's got a lot of feelings coursing through his little body, and is trying to figure out how to express them.  He's also practicing his independence very well! He makes limit-setting and responsible parenting exhausting! 

His acting out is amplified when he doesn't feel well, being sick, hungry or tired (like most of us). Unfortunately he hates taking time out from play to eat, so it is always a big project for us to get him nourished so that he has some fuel on board. It often involves stories at the table; anything to keep him entertained (and I have to say, it's getting old!). Without enough to eat he's dreadful to be around (hey, me too!), but he doesn't want to stop going to eat and allow himself to feel better. 

Being entertained at the table

He is a stubborn, strong-willed little man who is also sharp as a whip.  He knows exactly how to be naughty and executes his plans with perfectly horrible (for us) timing.  My brother Michael recently told my mom that he reminds him of the cartoon character Calvin, of Calvin and Hobbes.  I'd say that's pretty accurate.  He's a little ball of energy with a vivid imagination, always seeking out ways to use both, demanding our involvement along the way. This is a pretty typical scene at our house; we let Oscar be his muse as long as Oscar is enjoying the interaction too.

Finn vacillates between sincere affection for Oscar, and jealousy/frustration. He's not sure how to express his feelings for Oscar, either way, and is still figuring out how to interact with him.  He often knocks him over, bounces him aggressively in his bouncer, or snatches toys away from him.  He's also been hitting him a bit, which he does lightly, like he really doesn't want to hurt him but he doesn't know how else to express his feelings, that's he's hurt and mad. So we're struggling with how to best help him. With Oscar around, Finn's talking transforms into an obnoxious babytalk, which goes something like this: "Wiggy Biggy. No geengy!" So we're also trying to get him to revert back to real words. We also have some great times, with group hugs/snuggles, and all laughing together watching Oscar do something silly. Finn is getting better at helping get toys for Oscar to play with rather than just taking them away. He still is anxious to see him when he wakes up or when he comes home, and runs to find him.  So we have a definite love/frustration relationship going on here. Typical of siblings? Probably. 

One thing that helps Oscar's case with Finn, is that Oscar absolutely loves Finn. He pretty consistently watches him with this expression on his face, and we like to point that out to Finn, which makes him feel pretty good.

We've been spending a lot more time indoors lately, with Oscar needing his naps. 

Finn's high energy antics recently scored him a big mid forehead/ upper nose lump one week and then a nice black eye the following week that got the preschool asking us questions.  Of course after both incidents he was jumping on the furniture again the very next morning.

Look at that sweet face, even with the eye makeup!

  

               

More time inside has also allowed Finn's imagination to take flight and his make believe-play is pretty great. Some of the things he loves to play/ pretend right now include:

• "sast truck" in which his bed becomes his fast truck. He likes to pack it with snacks and other supplies before we all pile in to be driven somewhere.
• "sursing and swimming" for which he lays out a blue blanket on the floor and we pretend to put on our "supe-supe" (wetsuit), get our board, paddle, surf and get knocked down by a wave. He always throws his stuffed animals in the water so they can go swimming too
• "delizering packages" during which time we all become characters from the Thomas the Train stories, and he packs up things and relocates them to different parts of the house. Finn is usually Thomas, I am Percy, Jeremy is either James or Salty, and Oscar is Sir Topham Hat
• "worker guy" during which we dig up the old road and build a new road. He wraps around his waist his long stuffed caterpillar or a ribbon he found laying around to be his "worker guy belt." Don't know how he figured that worker guys have special belts, but somehow he took note. We roll his empty laundry hamper down the hall to be the steam roller.
• relocating items in our house, usually creating piles on the couch or bed, often interacting with the pillows somehow. Still not sure what he is playing with this one, but when we were missing a puzzle piece the other day, I somehow knew I would find it underneath one of our pillows or down the back of the bed. Sure 'nuff!
• still loves creating orderly parking patterns around the house with his cars or making mountains and caves for them in the bedding or couch cushions.

Finn has always appreciated order, routine and patterns. He gets upset when we give him food (a cracker, bar, etc) that is broken. From a very young age he would straighten something that was out of place as he walked by. He gets devastated when playing with something and it comes apart.  He becomes frustrated when trying to put something together or "six it" but can't get it just so.

Finn loves to do jigsaw puzzles, pieces that when put together create a picture. He's kind of bored of the puzzles that involve just putting a shape into an empty space.  He's getting good at figuring out which pieces go together and how to connect them. 

He still loves being read to, but perhaps even more so, now he loves being told stories without books, that require him to use his imagination to picture what is happening. Some of his favorite stories we've made up include:

•  various adventures of two squirrels named Nutty and El Gordo who along the way have various encounters with friends Pedro the pelican (who is spanish-speaking), Rocky raccoon, and Timmy the turtle. 
• the story of the digger and tractor who both work at the farm, get in each other's way but figure out a way to both get their work done and be friends in the end
• the story of the fire on the mountain and a helicopter who picks up buckets of water from the ocean to put out the fire (with the help of a big boat who squirts water in the bucket to fill it)

One of the rare moments I've found Finn entertaining himself in a tame fashion

Finn still has funny ways of saying things and we really love the way he talks.  Here are some of our favorite Finn-isms (or "savorite" as Finn would say....he still replaces the letter F with a S or H sound):

• Bernilla=Vanilla
• Hor=for
• Juss hor case=just in case
• Luz=Love
• Hog horn= fog horn
• Skuck= stuck
• Wobble juice= guava juice
• Gigger=Digger
• Movember=November 
• Stuss=stuff
• Libba bip=little bit
• Robop=robot
• When people ask him his name he replies, "Sin." I think it confuses him that people always react strangely. They get a puzzled look on their face and say, "what was that?"
• Supe Supe= wet suit
• For a few weeks recently, at bedtime, before papa would take him to bed Jeremy would say, "Say night night to mama."  Finn would scurry over and announce,"I'm gonna giz you three. little. kisses. and three. little. hugs." He would then proceed to give me three of the briefest, tiniest kisses and barely-there hugs you've ever seen. Quite hilarious. How he comes up with this stuff, I'll never know.
• Sumping=something
• Delizering=delivering
• Mence truck= Cement truck
• Six=Fix
• Duh=the; Dat=that
• Sarm=Farm
• Airperlane=airplane

Finn demands social interaction constantly; this is both a challenging thing about him, and is also one of the best things about him.  He gets jealous when attention and love is being showered on his little brother. It's a hard transition for any kid, but especially a boy like Finn, whose "love language" has so far developed to be quality one on one time (he's never been a cuddler). Sometimes I feel bad that Finn is suffering from this life change, but I remind myself that at some point in life it is important to learn that one is not the center of the universe, and that's probably most easily engrained at a young age.  And learning to share toys etc involves much less than learning to share love/attention from the most significant people in one's life. I'm fairly certain that this time period of heightened emotion and jealousy is also compounded by multiple illnesses and not feeling well. In addition, mama went back to work and he realized that he also has to share attention from some of the other loves in his life who have historically cared for just him, including Nana, his nanny Laura, and grandma. He really, really, really loves the people in his life, and he fills his life with them, always seeking out new friends.  This is one of his greatest qualities. 

Finn looks for, and makes friends wherever he goes; paying no attention to age, race, gender, handicaps or other differences from himself.

When we are out and about it is common for Finn to start talking to random strangers, or just walk up to them and hold their hand, or bend his face right up into theirs to get eye contact, giving them a big smile.  He really brightens a lot of peoples' days, making random people feel loved. It is pretty heart warming to watch.  After such interactions he'll say to me, "Mama, dass my friend!"  Jeremy was walking home from the store with him the other day and they passed an elderly Chinese lady who was shuffling along.  Finn paused, went over to her and grabbed her hand, then continued to walk with her, hand in hand. They smiled at each other in silence. Jeremy felt a little awkward, having to break up the party eventually to get him home!

This is kind of typical of what Finn does to get someone's attention; a person or a goat

Of course Finn really loves his little friends that are closer to his age. He gets so excited to spend time with them and we love to see their relationships develop and change as they get older.

Finn and Berkeley have a sweet bond, having received care together while the mamas are working since 15 months and 5 1/2 months respectively. Finn has started to tell me that he thinks she's pretty, and tells her the same. "Gerkeley, you're so pretty." "I like Gerkeley. Her so pretty. Her hair is so pretty." " I wanna eat eggies with dat pretty girl," he said when I picked them up from school and asked about lunch. Sweetest thing ever.

Finn and Charlie

Finn is always really pumped about getting to play with Charlie and they just laugh and shriek the whole time they are together (occasionally having dramatics over toys).  They share a love of sand, trucks, diggers, trains, and making loud, obnoxious noises.

Finn has always had great admiration for his friends that are older than him, Henry and Ella.  He thinks they are soooo cool and is always thrilled to get to run around with them, go to their house, play with their toys, or have them over to our house.  As he holds them in such esteem, his feelings get so hurt if they ever play a little bit mean (as is totally normal for these young ones).  He cries like his little heart is broken.

Finn and Henry

Finn reeeally likes watching shows.  He could probably watch them for hours on end if we let him; he completely zones out.  We try to avoid using the TV to "deal with him," to encourage other play (we just love that his imagination is developing so much right now), and because we can so easily see him becoming addicted.  But we do have special movie nights, or he enjoys sesame street podcasts while Oscar requires extra attention and Finn is in a "challenging" mood.  When he's down and out with a fever, laying on the couch with a show helps him relax and get rest (this is how he recently was introduced to Thomas the Train, which made quite the impression!).  With Finn's wiley little mind, he'll try to sneak in use of the ipod or ipad to be a little bit cheeky; he knows how to use those gadgets to find games and shows no prob.  

Finn started attending a Spanish immersion preschool two mornings per week. He's has transitioned into this really seamlessly; not surprising considering his comfort level with new people. When he first started they asked me to attend the first 3 sessions with him, and then leave half-way through the morning with my cell phone on hand, so he could get practice being left in a new situation without his parents and so they could call if he needed attention. That first time the teacher was so impressed that he just jumped right in with the activities and didn't perseverate one bit on my departure. My cell phone never rang, and I have to say, I really didn't expect to hear from them. I just knew he'd do well. Thereafter she told me to go ahead and leave him the whole time and he never had an issue.  He's done well with the Spanish, helped by the fact that he was exposed to it one day per week with his nanny since he was 5 1/2 months old.  Since he took a break from her with my maternity leave for six months, we weren't sure how it would go.  The teacher reported that he understands what is being said, and now he's started to say a lot of things in Spanish.  He even busts it out at home sometimes, "Mas pintura por favor!?" he asked me the other day when we were pretending to paint with a giant paint brush (actually mopping) on a giant medium (actually the kitchen floor).

Finn was really excited to get his own "pack-pack" like papa takes to work

Besides Spanish another thing Finn has picked up from starting school:  being sick.  We've had a lot of back to back colds and other random viruses since starting preschool. Oscar usually catches them too, so that's no fun.  I've been very impressed by the amount of mucus that can come out of one kid (photo below is awesome, except for the giant boogie starting to drip out of his nose)

                           

You would be hard-pressed to find anyone that loves the beach more than Finn. This also means there is nobody better to go to the beach with than him. We are lucky enough to live very close to some beautiful beaches. Finn is equally content playing in the sand or the waves, with or without clothes for either. We got him a wetsuit about 6 months ago and now he can play in the water much longer before he turns blue. 

Finn dove under some waves for the first time about 2 weeks ago. He loves jumping over the waves, running away from them, or splashing people. Finding seaweed to drag around is always a treat. 

He can dig holes, play diggers, or build castles for hours. He is never fazed by being completely covered in sand, as evidenced by the naked pictures below. 

Finn's pretty consistent in a lot of things; not only his love for the beach but his love for papa as well.  These two usually get along fantastically and time with papa is always a big treat.  That's actually one great thing about me also leaving home to go to work a couple times a week--Finn is always so excited to see me when I get home and it's nice to feel like I'm the treat every once in a while!
But most days, papa is the thrill.
  

As much as I love Finn's smiley exuberance, I also thoroughly love watching him take things seriously. He gets in his pensive, observation mode and I love to watch the wheels turn. It's also nice for him to slow down so I can have a chance to just look at him.

 At 3 years old, Finn:

• hasn't started writing letters yet, per se, but loves to try to create their form with his pretzels, blocks, packages of wipes, diapers, or any other kind of medium!
• knows his left from his right (which caught me off-guard, since I feel like I still have to stop and think about it a bit)
•  listens intently to music and distinguishes the different instruments he hears. We never coached him on this. One day he just pulled it out, "I hear the piano, drums, and the guitar!" We now point out other instruments and he has picked up on cymbals, violins and trumpet.
• plays a "Memory"-style matching game on the ipad completely independently, and has come up with his own strategy to find the matches. The game involves matching up cards that have pictures of different construction vehicles.  The strategy that he devised is that he picks the same first card repeatedly until he finds its match.
• is really into farms, and everything related (tractors, hay, animals)
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• gets excited and feels so important to push his own baby shopping cart and help with the shopping at Trader Joe's. He arranges and rearranges the items in his cart, fitting them together just-so, tetris style. He likes to hand the checker items from his cart and never forgets to pick up stickers to put on his cheek or shirt. He also helps fill the baskets at the produce shop, and can be relied on to disappear at intervals to rearrange and re-stack various grocery items as he has observed the employees doing. He calls the guys who stock the shelves his friends, since he sees them regularly and always exchanges smiles and small talk. I like to imagine their reaction when they come accross his "work" (today he balanced round packages of cookies, one on top of each jar of jam--I love that he thinks the employees are doing similar things)
• loves, loves, loves being outside to climb, scurry and explore.
• has transitioned into a twin bed, which we always called "big boy bed" but he heard, and calls it his "good boy bed."
• when excited about something he has to say, but just can't quite get it out fast enough, he jumps up and down as he's talking.
• loves to cheer for mama and the "runner girls" at my races. 
• enjoys going to the zoo; particularly the "family farm", carousel and train    
• is so observant as we are driving. He has really learned to identify where we are within our city, and what we are near. After my mom dropped us off to go to kinder gym recently, we afterwards decided that I would rush up ahead to get the car, since it was parked right next to a favorite playground but we didn't have time to go there. He was still a few blocks away and reportedly said to my mom,"Hey we're right by dat playground! Let's go dere!" It's really getting hard to pull one over on him...
• still sucks on his lovey (aka "Nano") wrapped around his thumb to go to sleep. He demands his "yucky Nano" for sleep and comfort.  The yucky Nano is one of the two that have been used (we have a third, known as the nice Nano, that was purchased to replace a lost one, and it was never an acceptable replacement), and that is already wet and stinky from use.  There are always dramatics when yucky Nano has been taken to the wash.  We tell him he just needs to suck on the other one to make it yucky.
• still takes 1 nap/day, usually between 1 and 2 pm, for a couple hours. He usually sleeps 10 hours at night, and is getting more and more difficult to get to bed. We may be nearing dropping his nap...just a little hesitant to deal with evenings with an exhausted boy.
• is really good at singing a lot of different songs; getting the words right and carrying the tune.
• can swim a good ways under water without floatation device; can tread water.  He got a ribbon for his achievements and came home saying, "Mama!  I got a ribbit!" 
• still rides that "momo" but is practicing learning the Skuut balance bike.  He likes to pretend he's filling up his momo with gas, stopping at a particular tree every time we pass it. He also checks and airs up the tires. 
• is still bothered by finding stray hairs in the bathtub. Still calls it "ga-ga" which was his baby work for "garbage."
• says awesome things and makes the greatest associations all the time.  

I wish I could capture his personality in my writing. He has such personality. What a funny guy. I need to be better about blogging the things he says day to day.  They often show up on my facebook status as I like to share my daily chuckle courtesy of Finn. Some day maybe I'll get better at blogging more of the day to day to get a chance to paint a better picture of life with Finn.

 Look at that face...you'd never guess he was up to anything but pure innocence!
 
This boy has perfected joyfulness. We love him so much.  All of him.