Ginkle Bells

Hayden wandered by me the other day, smiling to himself while he tunelessly sang Jingle Bells to no one in particular. Because he is 2 1/2, and most likely has no concious memory of hearing the song before a week ago, it went like this: "Ginkle bells, ginkle bells, ginkle bells, ginkle bells, ginkle bells, ginkle bells, ginkle bells, ginkle bells, ginkle bells." At that point, just when I thought he had some sort of robot-like short circuit in his brain, he unstuck, and launched into a verse that went something like "fun ... ride ... horse ... sleigh." In addition to finding this damn cute (seriously, like 10 times cuter than I have been able to convey here), I was also struck once again how awesome it is in some ways to be two.

Less than two months ago, the twins left behind a summer that was chock full of two year old fun and adventure and were immersed suddenly into Halloween culture - a blur of costumes and parties, pumpkin carving, and scary but fun decorations. They often insisted on wearing their costumes parts of each day leading up to Halloween, merrily following Owen in whatever crazy game or monster related fun he was cooking up that day. On Halloween itself, it took a total of about two houses to master the concept that if they said trick or treat and held out their bags, they would be handed actual CANDY - score!!

Then, before the sugar high had even worn off, everything was about turkeys and pilgrims and horns o' plenty, culminating with a giant party at our house attended by all of their favorite people on earth.

Two days after Thanksgiving, life changed abruptly again and we were hauling 14 bins full of Christmas wonder down from the attic. Suddenly, everything is Santa and lights and Christmas trees and Baby Jesus and songs and reindeer and stars. One day they are reading about snow and not really understanding it, and the next they are standing outside in the real thing, laughing delightedly as they attempt to pelt me with snowballs (I say attempt because to actually be pelted by a two year old, I would have to literally stand six inches from them). One day, they see lights on a tree in someones yard and go nuts. A week later, and we are, crazily, bringing a tree INTO THE HOUSE and putting lights on it. Madness, genius, ecstasy!!!

They accept these constant changes to their lives without question and with a good natured enthusiasm that is, of course, infectious. And really, why shouldn't they, as life at this point is a wonderous series of costume changes for the house which is essentially their world at this point, each more awesome than the next (actually, it is pretty debatable whether Thanksgiving is literally more awesome to a two year old than Halloween, but you know what I mean).

So, while being two has its downsides, a limited ability to fully express your wants and desires and our quite obviously unfair and onerous household policy of demanding children go to bed being chief among them, it seems, overall, like a pretty damn fine existence. Ginkle on.