Okay so Prince Benjamin of Reading doesn’t quite have the ring of Prince George of Cambridge but our little Prince will forever share his birthday with the future king and although I shouldn’t live long enough to see Prince George of Cambridge on the throne, my children will and that’s pretty cool. Of course, we were rather hoping that the Prince would have been a Princess but that would have been too much of a fairy tale ending.

Anyway, Benjamin turned two last week and our little two year old has certainly hit some milestones over the last few months or so…

• He can recognise opposites such as hot and cold, on and off, open and closed and push and pull.
• He knows most parts of his body, including his belly button which he is finally able to see more often, now that the winter vests have been removed.
• He knows when something has fallen, been broken or dropped and says ‘oops daise’.
• He has excellent manners and has learnt that he doesn’t get much without a ‘please’ and a ‘thank you’ and will say ‘excuse me please’ if he wants you to move out of the way! He has also learnt ‘I want’ but usually follows it with a please. We are working on ‘Please may I have…’. Our 4 year old still has trouble with this!
• He knows when something hurts and says ‘ouch’.
• He wants to be first for everything and will now say ‘me first’.
• He can pull his own tops off yogurt pots, as well as removing the thermostatic valve from his radiator!
• He can drink from an open cup, although this often still turns into wet play when he considers himself finished!
• He can walk up/down stairs holding onto the wall.
• He can turn the telly on/off.
• He can count, well sort of…1,2,3,6,7,8,9,10.
• He has a brain, well at least he now knows that he has a brain, as he often says ‘I think’. We’re still not sure what he’s thinking but then again do we ever know what another person is thinking?
• Finally, he mimics everything (apart from his own name which he just says ‘me’!)…I am somewhat regretting my choice of words when we got lost in the car the other day!

No birthday would be complete without cake and a very smiley little man…

Eagle-eyed readers may notice that the cake is a bit of a recycled effort. The chocolate cake is the same one I made for my father’s birthday (https://ididitmummy.com/2013/02/11/happy-birthday-grandpa/) and I have stolen George off Ava’s 4th birthday cake (https://ididitmummy.com/2012/10/05/mrs-p-stars-in-her-own-version-of-the-great-british-bake-off/). In my defence, I did make George and he is one of Benjamin’s favourite characters, plus chocolate cake is a firm favourite for our rather fussy eater (next time I may add a little spinach to the cake!)!

‘I Did It Mummy’ fundraising for BIBS – https://www.justgiving.com/IDidItMummy