A list about Miles

Things I adore about Miles lately:
1. He is so affectionate. He sometimes grabs my head and turns it side to side so that he can kiss each cheek, or puts his hands squarely on my cheeks and leans in to give me a peck. I don't even mind his runny nose when he does this : ) He likes to press an imaginary button to turn on the "kissing machine." He requests butterfly kisses. He likes to cuddle in bed with me in the morning.
2. He is very imaginative. He regularly tells me that I am the mommy dog, monkey, bird, bear, dinosaur etc. and he is the baby, and then explains to me, "This is our nest," or, "This is our cave," etc. and then asks me for leaves or nuts or whatever food might be appropriate to pretend to eat. He also frequently will ask me to tell him a story, but then will frequently interrupt to tell long portions of it himself that are much more imaginative than what I could have thought up.
3. He is very musical, which I think I must give Benjamin most of the credit for. While listening to music while riding in the car he often will ask "Who's that?" meaning "Who's singing?" and frequently he knows the names of bands and will tell me them. The other day he asked me "Who's that?" and when I told him I couldn't remember the band name, he told me "The Dragons." And I realized he was right--it was Imagine Dragons. He often requests that I turn up the volume of the music we are listening to. He also loves to pretend to play music. He plays air drums, guitar, and bass, often without prompting, but also likes to strum along for real on Benjamin's guitar, and play the drums on the glass lids to my pots and pans (which is amazingly adorable yet frustrating since I worry the glass will break). He likes to sing, and often will sing me silly songs, and when I make up silly songs about our day, such as brushing teeth or cleaning up, he will sing them back to me later. He also has a knack for picking out song lyrics, something that has made me have to put more thought into what we are listening to on the radio. Just today he was asking me about the lyrics to "Ho Hey" by the Lumineers. I was glad it was something positive we could talk about.
4. He is very curious about the world. Today in the car we were listening to NPR and Diane Rehm was interviewing Supreme Court Justice Sotamayer. Miles asked, "Mommy, what is this commercial about?" since talking on the radio is often just an ad. I turned down the radio and explained that it was actually a reporter asking questions to someone very important from our government that is a lawyer like Daddy. After I finished my little explanation Miles requested, "Please turn back up the commercial." Seriously, what two year old wants to listen to a Supreme Court Justice on NPR? He asks questions constantly and actually gets mad if I tell him I don't know the answer to his question, and will tell me, "Mommy knows!" Sometimes if I am trying to explain something to him that is difficult to describe we look up pictures or videos on the internet together. The last funny thing I can remember looking up together was at Christmas I explained that candy canes are shaped like a shepherd's crook, so then I had to explain what a crook was used for, and we ended up watching YouTube videos of demonstrations of how crook is used.
5. He loves to help. He insists on helping cook and clean, though his help often makes my tasks more difficult. Tonight while I was making dinner I turned my back to where he was standing at the counter on a chair, and when I turned back around smoke was billowing from our microwave. He had stuck a slice of bread in it and turned it on for I don't know how long, but the bread was on fire. One of his favorite chores is helping vacuum, and last time I had it out he turned our upright vacuum on its side and was "riding" it saying it was his monster truck. We couldn't proceed to actually finish vacuuming until he was tired of that game.