Charlie, Charlie, Bo Barlie!

Charlie is hilarious these days! He'll be three in February, and is at that incredible age where he's bursting with imagination and personality, totally unchecked by inhibition. His vocabulary is exploding, he's potty training, and he lives in his firefighter outfit. I keep a running list of the things he says and does throughout our days together. Here are some fun ones:

• Sometimes when he bursts through a door from outside, he yells, "Ta Da!!!! I'm here!"
• He wore Rob's tie to Publix yesterday. It practically dragged along the floor in front of him.
  
• We recently went to a pirate-themed birthday party; Charlie came home with a pirate patch, hat, sword and hook. Now he asks me for his "Arr" stuff when he's looking for his pirate gear.
• At the end of a playdate, Charlie wrapped his arms around his pal Grant and said, "You're my best friend."
• Charlie sings and performs his own original songs on the guitar. Check it out.

• Charlie ran around the house with one of my purses and told Rob, "This is my race car purse." Poor kid. He's 100% boy, but heavily influenced (and a little confused) by his accessory-loving mom and big sis.
• It's been months since he slept in a bed. Every nap and bedtime, he sleeps on a blanket spread out on the floor. At night, I always pop my head in each of the kids rooms to see them sleeping. Sometimes his limp body won't even allow the door to open more than a few inches. Or I'll find half of him tucked under his rocker with a monster truck in his hand.
• He regularly tells his mama I'm "bootiful" and reminds me to put in earrings if I forget. The other day he told me my lips were beautiful when I wore lipstick. Keep that up, bud, and you'll make a girl very happy one day.
• At Costco, he tried to hand something to our checkout clerk, and said, "Here you go, Person!" He also tried to get the attention of our clerk at Publix and said, "Hi, Man." (We're working on addressing people as sir and ma'am. We have a little ways to go....)
• Charlie and I sometimes go to Starbuck's for one-on-one dates. He pulled at my neckline one day and said unexpectedly and quite loudly, "John's food!"
• One afternoon at Barnes & Noble, he was having so fun playing and got so caught up in the moment that he ripped off his shirt. Then later, while he was having a cookie at the cafe, he told me his feet were playing while he kicked and tapped his chair.
• New friends came over for a playdate. Charlie was being a little gentleman/host and said, "You want some crackers? That's how it goes!" with the cutest hand gesture I've ever seen. 
• Charlie said he wanted John to be a turkey for Halloween. Later he told Rob he wanted a turkey for a snack. We both thought he was getting really into the Thanksgiving spirit until we realized he was actually saying cookie.
• He's picking up expressions, but doesn't always know how to use them. Me: Charlie, do you want socks under your rain boots? Charlie: No. That's not the reason. Or he'll say, "I blessed" instead of "I sneezed." The sheer adorable-ness makes it impossible to correct him.
• He's also still pretty confused about units of time. Everything's always "two days" or "three minutes." 
• At breakfast, Charlie swiped my egg right off my plate. He told me his cut up pieces of egg needed an egg-mommy.
• In one of my favorite videos of John, Charlie is telling his baby brother how much he loves him.....as he hugs him so violently that John starts crying pretty hard.
• Charlie clears his plate after meals whenever he remembers (or I remember to remind him). But instead of putting them in the sink, he usually just throws everything in the trash -- fork, cup and plate.
• I tried to start a tv show for the kids, and like usual, I couldn't find the remotes. Not expecting an answer, I asked them if they knew where they were. Charlie told me they were in my rain boots in the garage. And they were.
• He pretends to read things. He looked at Rob's Illini shirt and said (while running his fingers over the letters), "I love Daddy to the rescue!"
• And the checkmate. He's figured out that he can come out of his room during nap-and-bed-time if he sits on the potty. He knows that when I find him stripped down naked, doing a Number Two, I can't do anything but praise him, even though he's supposed to be fast asleep.