Jude: 10 things

1. I've mentioned before that Jude is a bit of a yeller. Not in an angry way, just in a his normal talking voice is extremely loud way. Well, I recently got a progress report from his preschool in which his teacher said Jude's so soft spoken and quiet in class that she frequently has to ask him to speak up. Of course.

2. Jude will melt down at the drop of a hat. It's extremely frustrating for me. Eleanor loves to get his goat by teasing him to induce these meltdowns. She'll say something like "You don't like trains!" And he'll immediately run to me crying, "Eleanor says I don't like trains but I do! I do like trains!!"

3. Numbers are very interesting to Jude. He'll say things like, "How long do we need to do this for? 17 minutes?" "Mom, it's only 68 days until Valentine's day." "I just need to play for 6 more minutes!" It's always random numbers, though he does seem to be favoring 68 and 17 lately.

Jude explains that he can't get his shirt on because "it's dark like a midnight zone."

4. Jude loves strings, ropes, ribbons, anything of that sort. He's always tying things together or stringing things across the room. I can just see his little engineer brain at work.

5. Jude seems to have inherited my chronic worrier gene. He's always nervous about doing things wrong or getting in trouble for being in the wrong place. Over Christmas, we went to go see some Christmas lights and he was very nervous when I told him to get out of the car to look at one particularly good house. While he cautiously looked, the next door neighbor's garage opened and it spooked him. After that, he insisted we get back into the car immediately, worried that we weren't supposed to be there.

the kids playing Disneyland at the park. they insisted I take their picture "with Belle."

6. My big boy is also very sensitive. Jude is very cognizant of "bad guys" or scary situations in movies. He refuses to watch Ariel because Ursula is too much for him to handle. When we watched Frosty the Snowman at Christmas, he ran out of the room crying and declaring it was bedtime when Frosty melted.

Jude worked hard to earn a dollar by cleaning all the baseboards. this is a game changer!

7. Jude has really developed a good little imagination, even more so than before. He constantly comes up with little games or scenarios to play and it's super fun to watch. More and more Jude is able to get Ellie to join in on the action. They other day I walked in on them playing "baby" where Ellie was sitting in the bumbo with her binkie while Jude pretended to feed her and read her books.

one day they got into the makeup.

8. Jude is a wonderful big brother and he really does look out for Eleanor and Lucy. When we are in parking lots Jude becomes extra protective of Ellie and starts to pull her close to him so she won't go out in the street. It's really sweet, but also frustrating because Ellie hates it and starts screaming and hitting him. But every once in a while, I can convince them to hold hands in the parking lot and it is adorable.


paparazzi.

9. Those Langlois genes must be stronger than I thought because Jude is turning into quite the little card shark. Peter recently taught him how to play "go fish" and he's becoming quite good at it. Maybe soon we'll learn "rummy 5?"

10. Jude doesn't seem to understand (or maybe simply refuses to acknowledge) that when I tell him no or we don't have any of x, that crying and begging won't magically change my mind or make more fruit snacks appear. I think this is my biggest struggle with Jude right now; just trying to handle the constant crying and begging after I've already told him no. I know that's typical and he'll grow out of it, but still, very frustrating as a busy mom.

he really loves his stomp rocket from santa

Bonus story: Jude loved seeing all the nativity scenes at Christmas time. He was, however, very convinced that since every nativity had a wiseman, it also needed a foolish man. Apparently, we really need to get some foolish men next year for ours.