Having another kid

I think I might have seen a glimpse of what the future could be. Yesterday, my wife helped a friend out by baby sitting her 18 month old little boy. Now, I've kind of figured out that most boys aren't talking on the same level as girls the same age. I see it at church and I see it at the playground and I see it with my friends and family. This boy was no exception. He might has well not have been talking at all when compared with our Mayzie who easily throws together sentences of 7 to 15 words, can easily answer questions, perform complex tasks when asked and tell us what she wants or ask us questions. But she's a girl and girls I've noticed are much more developed in that skill than boys the same age. She recently even started saying, "Yes, sir" or "No, sir" which of course me being the parent thinks is really cute, even though I'm sure nobody else but Aunt Jackie does.

He, on the other hand, says one word at a time and they are difficult to understand. Another attribute of boys you often hear but until you experience it is hard to imagine in a daughter only family is the rough nature of boys. He threw everything. He would push something over just to push it over. He would run as fast as he could everywhere he went which of course was the opposite direction of you. He would run smack into something, an event that would bring Mayzie to tears and ask for kisses, and all he would do is roll over look at you with an "Ouch" expression but get up and start running again. All of my friends boys are just like that.

Now, he and Mayzie are just 4 months apart so it was non-stop the entire time and I found myself counting the minutes or sometimes the seconds until his mom came back. Not that he was a bad kid but really it was full-time the entire time. Mayzie will sit and play independently without destroying stuff for long periods of time. You had to keep your eye on him the entire time. Mayzie has never fallen down the stairs. In fact we don't use our baby gates and really only used them for the dogs, but he fell down the first time he went up. It wasn't a fall down gracefully either it was a, "hey this could be serious if I wasn't right here" type of fall. BTW it didn't faze him at all he wanted to keep going, but up came the baby gates.

My wife and I have talked about having a second kid here and there and we tentatively set the official "try" date as sometime in June. If it happened it happened but June was the "try" date whatever that meant. Anyway, yesterday changed that. I had been thinking that since Mayzie was going to be 2 meaning she was going to be almost 3 when the new baby came we would be able to easily transition to a 4 person family.

This shook that thought process to the core, especially if I was considering the 50/50 chance of getting a boy the second time around. Mayzie can tell us what she wants, she understands what we say. She for the past several weeks has been going peepee in the potty and tells us before hand that she needs to go which leads me to think that for sure in the next 12 months (before the baby) we'll have her diaper free. She is easy to get to bed, feed, and she'll tell us about her day and read us books. It is easy, we're on autopilot. I figured it was time for another one because it takes 9 months before you get the second one. My wife and I were non-stop the entire time, until they went to bed. Afterward I was tired, realized if they were both time, I would have had to do it all over again tomorrow and questioning my readiness to embark on having another kid.