and he likes loud music, too

i've always thought that the 2 - 4 years are the puberty of childhood—you rebel, you assert your independence, you've got a bad attitude, you tell your parents how things should be.... just like the sweet 6th grader who loves cats and anne of green gables is suddenly the megabitch door-slamming 7th grader in blue eyeliner, the darling giggling little baby is suddenly the screeching toddler marching around the house giving orders and loudly protesting all challenges to his authority.

so wile is in the "tween" stage—not a full-on teen-baby, but showing the warning signs. oh-ho-ho, yes. definitely showing the warning signs.

i mean, look at this picture:

"dad. come on. leave me alone. seriously. god."

one of wile's favorite games is stair ball: we sit at the bottom of the stairs and i throw the ball up the stairs and we watch it bounce down. sooooo fun. the other day, he picked up a ball, led me over to the foot of the stairs, pointed me to sit on the bench, and then handed me the ball and pointed at the stairs. okay, fine. but when i threw it up, he turned around and walked into the living room. i thought, "okay, he changed his mind" and got up to do something else. he saw me get up and yelled at me ("eehhhhh!!!"), pointed me back to the bench, and pointed at the stairs again. then turned back and went into the living room again, turning, when he got there, to look back and make sure that i was playing. as if to say "look, mama, i have some stuff to do over here, so you play stair ball so i can get it done, okay?" i threw it a couple times. when he heard the thud, bounce-bounce-bounce stop, he looked over at me and pointed and yelled again. okay, fine.

changing wile's diaper used to be cake—he liked laying on his changing table, watching the ceiling fan spin, or listening to me sing to him.... now it's like wrestling a monkey covered in motor oil. a howler monkey. and getting the clothes on and off him? nearly impossible. the only easy wardrobe change i've had in the past two months was the other day when, after i'd finally managed to get his pants over his big ol' butt and zipped and snapped, he went over to the dresser, emptied out a drawer full of overalls, picked out a pair, and brought it over to me, clearly saying "take those dorky pants off me and put my rad overalls on, woman." i did. he stood stock still, only moving to obligingly lift his fat little feet up to step in to the overalls.

other signs of baby adolescence? he's made out with two girls in the past two days. today he tackled poor luella to the ground and planted one on her while she cried. yesterday he fared much better: he and gwen were pretty much making out at her birthday party. mona and i were like "um, do you guys wanna go in the other room and turn the lights down and 'watch a movie'?"



ps - that picture up there is actually a few weeks old—we've been cast-free since december 14th! check it:

there are more pics of the big day on wile's site.

pps - yes, i put clips in his hair. no, i don't want to cut it; i'm waiting for it to get long enough to tuck behind his ear. no, i don't think it makes him look like a girl. anyway, his nana told me that all the hot european soccer stars wear clips in their hair, so it's cool.

ppps - happy new year!