Portrait of my son as a small boy

Bax calls me to get him up from his nap quite a while after he wakes up. I go in and he's standing there wearing a sunhat and holding up his shorts both of which he has taken out of his top drawer. He can reach it from his cot. I pick him up and he shows me that he wants to wear the shorts "Short-short" he says trying to get them on himself. I pull the blue hawaiian shorts over his camo pants and leave the sun hat on and we go into the kitchen for lunch.

Bax eats a plate of bits and pieces: oro (his word for orange), apple, cheese, cracker, bikkie; and drinks a centremetre of juice carefully from a cup. The whole time he tells me what he's eating interspersed with random words like "shoes" "cup" "teddy" "izzie" "daddy" "sweatshirt" "book". Bax likes to read at the table but gets frustrated because his favorite Richard Scary Picture Dictionary is too big to fit on the tray. He most read page is Transport: "Bus" "Truck" "Car" says Bax.

After lunch Bax plays with a box of toys - either dress ups or blocks or musical instruments or cars. He likes to put on his soldiers hat and his tutu and a bib and prance around the house. He is very proud of his jumping and often goes out into the hall to practice: "Up" "Down" "Stop" "Go".

Bax loves Izzie and likes to squeeze her tummy and she laughs at him.

Bax is a bit of a show-off, a real amateur dramatisist, throws too many tantrums when he doesn't get his way, but when I push him on the swing and when we're driving somewhere he sings lovely little hums and somehow all of that comes as a bundle, doesn't it?