Toddler life

 Sometimes life with a toddler can be challenging.  Maren has been throwing more tantrums. Sometimes she wants  to be held by daddy and daddy only for a prolonged period of time, and if Jeff sets her down she screams, but just thinking that he will set her down will start her screaming so sometimes she is screaming loudly in his face.  She is smart, and she has clear wants and desires, but sometimes she doesn't realize that her particular desire is physically impossible.

Maren wants to do more and more by herself, but she is not really capable of doing a lot of the things that she wants to do.  It can be hard watching her struggle, but it is much worse if we try to help when she doesn't want it.

Fortunately, her language is getting better and better, so she is more and more able to tell us what she wants, including when she wants help and when she doesn't.  At the same time, sometimes she asks for something and we can't or won't provide it immediately, which can lead to a tantrum. And if we do provide what she wanted  but we are maybe 20 seconds too late providing it, it is completely ruined and she doesn't want it anymore.

 It is incredible watching how much she is learning every single day, but it is hard seeing how difficult life is for her much of the time.  Being a toddler seems awfully hard.   She knows about so many things, like using the toilet, that she can't do. With teething, constantly falling down, being in a wet diaper all the time,   having tons of colds but being unable to blow her nose, etc.,  she is physically  uncomfortable a lot of the time. She wants to communicate and does her best, but sometimes we have no idea what she is trying to say. It must be terribly frustrating.

 I would say that most of the time things are pretty great though. If not most of the time, then enough of the time :-) Here are a couple of videos of recent fun times: