A Snowy Stay in Idyllwild With A Crazy Three Year Old

It's funny, everyone told me that 3 years old is more difficult than 2 years old. And I thought, that can't possibly be. Two was hard. But Three is turning out to have it's own special challenges.

Miles is really asserting his independence and his desire to make his own decisions about what to wear, where to go or not go, when and what to eat, etc. We try to give him choice but usually he wants something outside of what is reasonable and healthy. We're really having to choose our battles.

Like with the snow suit today. I wanted to go for another hike in Humber Park and when we had gone the day before, Miles was is more casual play clothes and froze his butt off. So I decided to assert that he would wear the snow suit we borrowed for him so he would be comfortable in the snow. He was not having it. We're back to feeling like he needs to do what we say because we said so- and trying to decide if it's worth it. In the end we did give in and he wore his regular snow clothes, but we didn't go on our hike. In fact, after a short time of playing outside we put him in the car to go on our hike and he peed his pants. Which almost never happens anymore. So we had to bring him out to change him and he completely refused to put his pants on at all. Seriously, unable to force the pants on him without hurting him or ourselves.


So, we went home instead of our hike, pants-less. It's just insane. The intense emotions and tantrums that overshadow his normal personality. I think he's going through a growing spurt or something though. He naps about every other day. Completely unpredictable. I'm trying to encourage him to wean. There's a lot of change going on for him right now.