Happy Birthday Joshua or in other words...where did my baby go?!

My brother-in-law, Jon, recently sent me this blast from the past.

This is Joshua at about 6 or 7 months playing out in my sisters backyard. And here he is on his birthday. My baby is growing up.

I have been playing up Josh turning 3 for almost a year now. Mainly because I made the mistake last year of telling him that he could keep his bottle until his next birthday. Yes, we let our son have a bottle until he was three years old. I was mainly okay with this becuase we let Nathan keep his till after Josh was born, so to about the same age, and it was really great for relaxing him at night so bed times were super easy. Jessica put her foot down a while ago so Joshua had been going without a bottle easily over there. Richard tried a few times before his birthday, but usually just when he was frustrated with Josh about something, so as soon as Richard felt better, he let Josh have the bottle back. But I had been playing up Josh's birthday for months, always including that "when you turn three, you will be a big boy and you won't have a bottle anymore."

Well, he turned three, the bottles went into the recycling, he is a big boy and he doesn't use a bottle any more. He did ask a couple of times for his bottle but I think it was just to check if I was serious. I do feel a litlle bad because he loved his bottle so much and he looked cute drinking from it. I would guess though that he wouldn't appreciate it if he was still using it in middle school.

My baby is growing up.