With the cuteness comes the terror!

My son? A terror? Yes! He now has the ability to turn evil in the blink of an eye. The past few days he's suddenly had tantrums. Thankfully, it's only one a day but "my gosh!" It's that crying and screaming business for no reason that I can define -- just that we're not doing what he wants to do.

Yesterday's incident occurred when we were leaving Bed Bath & Beyond. He had just been flirting it up with the cashier and we exited. I stop the stroller to check the weather. I made a decision to walk down the sidewalk to the Starbucks to grab a latte. Out of the blue the boy suddenly goes rigid in the stroller and crying. What the heck? He made his body straight and he wanted OUT! Well, there goes the nice stroll down to the Starbucks! Dang, dang, dang! I walk calmly to the car with the crying child. I struggled to get him into the carseat. I had to put my elbow in between his legs so he couldn't get his body straight. I had to wrestle with him to get him in there! I got the stroller loaded and got in. Yes, he was still having a fit. His crying lasted the entire drive -- about 10 minutes. But those 10 minutes seemed to last an eternity!

Even though this rampaging tyke can come out, I believe my Bear is the cutest little boy in the world. He's a solid piece of muscle with a quick smile (for strangers) that contains a chip on his front left tooth. He'll flash a grin when we meet up with people - especially ladies. It's too adorable to resist! The ladies at the administration office at the Princess' preschool always want to "chat" with him when we're coming and going. The times when my Bear has been asleep (while I struggle to hold his dead weight comfortably), they've been bummed because they've missed an opportunity to talk to him. He says "Bye" to folks when we leave any store too.

The past two days he's been fascinated with a toy that I dug out of a box. It's a Clifford dog about 8 inches tall that's got wheels attached to it and a string attached to its neck. My Bear has been leading that dog all around the house. He'll walk backwards so he can watch it following him. When the string has gotten caught around the dog he struggles to get it untangled. When the dog falls over, the Bear cracks up laughing. Then he carefully puts it back on its wheels.

Then last night he came up with a new move. Actually, last Friday at his Movers&Shakers class the instructors had the kids hop like frogs across the mat. Of course, it was mostly the mommies doing the hopping. The Bear tried but couldn't really do it. All of a sudden last night he did it! He hopped once and I said to him "Are you a frog? Ribbit, ribbit." Then he kept on doing it. Seriously, he's only turning 21 months in a few days. He squated then hopped - without using his hands to push off. He's got some STRONG legs, but I've known that for ages. A few months ago he squated in Gymboree class and stood up. The instructor said "He's got some strong legs!" She expected him to use his hands to push off on the ground to get up...but no! My boy just used those strong knees and solid thigh muscles to get his body up.