Dear Baby Lola (hereinafter “BL“):
I’m trying not to be pissed at you.
You see, for the first 2 years of your life, you were dreamy. You were the sweetest of the babies. Your smile was an infection everyone wanted to catch. You were good with new acquaintances. You were good at restaurants. You were good on long plane rides. Your potty training was an easy weekend in which no one contemplated suicide.
For the past 2+ years, I called you “my baby” when talking to your mom about you. As in, “My baby and I are going to the playground. Your baby just took a shit on the new area rug and is dancing on it!”
But all that changes on your birthday tomorrow when you turn 3.
3 is the age all children spend a year firmly entrenched in the Will of the Devil. 3-year-olds argue. They’re insolent. They may get such euphemistic descriptions for their behavior as “being willful” or “acting cranky-pants” or “talking back,” but any parent of a 3-year-old knows that what you’re really doing is “replacing all feelings of affection that have built over the past 2.9 years with feelings of desperation, frustration, indignation, and resignation until you turn 4.” Or, maybe that’s just your mom and me.
Please don’t act like your older siblings did when they were 3. We really have a good thing going here.
So tonight, on your last night as a 2-year-old, I’ll say this: happy birthday, sweet BL. Hold onto 2-years, as long as you can; changes come around real soon, frustrate women and men.
Such words, all in an honest plea by a father to not have to put another child on the naughty list. All my best Muskrat. You’ll need it.
Jason
The Cheeky Daddy
thanks! i hope she bucks the trend.
“Will of the Devil.”
Yup. Sounds about right.
not what i wanted to hear, buddy.
Terrible Two’s were nothing. Three and four are when they figure out how to push your buttons. Godspeed!
3>4>2 in my experience, where “>” = “sucks harder than.”
that concludes our math lesson.
Yep. You’re screwed. Good luck! 😉
thanks. 🙁
But she’s so pretty!!
very!
Yup, that about sums it all up. My kids are 5 and 7 now, but the three-year-old in them still makes an appearance time and again.
And nice call-out to John Mellencamp at the end.
as long as it drastically tapers off with each passing year…
I think if you’re still calling her your baby after two, you’ll breeze through three.
Three might be awful, but two is when it begins.
Crap. It’s suddenly occurred to me my kids might just be assholes…
i doubt it! they look so sweet in the instagram pictures!
Happy third. I miss the twos. On the other hand, now my kid’s potty-trained, so there’s that.
it helps, for sure.