Thanks to COVID, I’ve spent a lot of time with my youngest son over the last two weeks. My two year old had a COVID outbreak in his preschool class and ended up spending two weeks at home. Since I ended up getting it from him - at least he’s starting to learn to share - I ended up spending a lot of time with him to try to minimize his time with the rest of the family. Over the course of two weeks, I took him on walks, a long bike ride, and spent hours playing with him in the basement, yard, and driveway, and I’m sad to report that he’s not a baby any more.

With our twins, it took a long time to feel like our family wasn’t done and that we would have another child. They kept us so busy that we didn’t have time to think about another child. Once they got old enough and started becoming more manageable and independent, we finally decided we wanted to have a singleton experience and go for another child. I always knew our third wouldn’t be our baby forever, but I didn’t truly know it inside until it hit home during our time together.

Until this time, I would have categorized him as a tornado. His favorite things to do were wander around the house throwing toys and other things around, opening cabinets, and generally testing us to see what he could get away with. That hasn’t completely changed, but he’s at least showing signs of learning and changing now. Before, he would start crying and screaming with no indication of the cause, so we’d have to run around pointing at things and guessing (it was almost always food) until we found what he wanted. Now, he’s learned enough words and can handle his emotions long enough to tell us what he wants which though is often something we don’t want him to have, is still far more helpful than guessing.

Today, he finally went back to preschool for the first time in two weeks and it’s so quiet and calm in the house. I miss him running around yelling at me, though I am at least able to get things done. It was only today that I realized he didn’t open a single cabinet - though he constantly goes into the pantry to look for food - the whole time he was home. His eating habits haven’t improved as he only eats Goldfish and cereal at home, but at least now he tells me what he wants and can go get it. He even tells me that I need more food when I finish something.

Perhaps the biggest sign that he’s growing up is that he actually listens and acknowledges me, even if he doesn’t always listen. He helped me clean up all of his toys in the basement one of the days, and since it was toward the end of his time at home, there was an awful lot to clean up. He’s changed from just throwing all the toys around to actually trying to play with them as designed like building train tracks, putting magnets on the board, and driving cars on their tracks. He even asks me nicely for help now instead of just throwing it at me or screaming. It’s still incredibly time intensive, but it’s the start of him actually communicating and being able to handle things on his own. It feels like it switched on basically overnight.

Beyond just better communicating, he’s showing more and more of his personality too. He still thinks doing things just to get told no is hilarious but now he looks over, gives a demonic smirk, and then does it just to make sure I see it. He even seems to know which of his twin brothers are which now and yells their names when he wants something from them. He’s a terror, but he’s figuring out how to toe the line and be just adorable enough to get away with it. He’s even developed a bedtime routine where he tells me which books he wants to read, when he’s ready to get in his bed, whether he wants any books in his bed to read before sleep, and whether I can leave or he wants me to sit for a few minutes. It’s almost always “sit daddy, sit”, but it’s nice to know.

It’s also been a blast to spend time with him just the two of us. I very rarely got that experience with the twins, so I’ve been enjoying the one on one time. We took a 13 mile bike ride one morning to get out of the house and see some nature. I’d run the route before but this was the first time biking it and probably the longest bike ride I’ve ever done. It was a different perspective on the roads and infrastructure around here, which aren’t great for anything other than a car. But we had a great time together. He wasn’t super talkative other than yelling about every truck, bus, and dog he saw and a brief stretch where he was singing to me, but I every time I turned around to check on him he had a huge smile on his face and was ready with a “hi daddy”.

Our together time even covered the two days I was pretty much knocked out from COVID. We spent the days together in the basement, and I did my best to build train tracks for him while laying on the couch. The trickiest part was building a car track across the room while trying not to sit up. He also wanted to sit on my lap while I continuously ran cars down the ramp, which nearly resulted in my passing out. Still, it may not have been the best time, but it was still time together. Time that I’ll remember later about daddy and son experiences and finally replacing the cries for mommy all the time with at least some for daddy.

Every kid starts becoming their own person and breaking out from their baby shells. It’s incredible how different each kid can be and how unique those personalities become. COVID has made these years fly by so fast and also feel like the time would last forever. But time keeps on ticking by and despite my wishes, my son has grown up and is becoming his own little person. I’m glad I got the extra time to experience it and see him coming into his own, though it would have been nice to have it without the COVID part. I still can’t picture him at five or six like his brothers, but before I know it he’ll be there too.