The first two years of his life, I pretty much took photos of him every single day. You’d laugh if you saw our living room, hallway and fridge. A whole lotta Jayden, as he once described the overload of photos.

Until one day he got so sick and tired of it, he simply refused to look up when he saw a camera. Let me rephrase that; when he saw me with a camera, he didn’t mind posing for his dad. Can’t say I blamed him. From there on I only took photos when he asked me to.

Turns out he’s really a poster child for self-love because he even made me get my camera while he was at the playground. Then he’ll ask me if I’m going to post the photos and nods, frantically, when I ask him if he wants me to.


It had been a while since we last took his photo, so I asked him if I could take a shot or two today. “Sure“, he said. “If I get two cookies and can bring my dinosaurs with me“. Being the hard-nosed mom that I am, we closed the deal on one cookie and one dinosaur. You gotta show them who’s boss, right?

Oh, those dinosaurs drive me stir crazy. He’s been dragging them with him ever since he was 18 months old. He knows the name of each and every dinosaur. In English and Dutch. He knows by heart what they ate, when they lived, where they lived, how tall and heavy they were. Everything. It’s scary.

Now fess up: which one of you took my baby and replaced it with this mini adult?

I used to keep his hair short, but now that he’s turning into quite a mini person, he decided he wanted his hair a bit longer. It looks like I just don’t have a say in the matter anymore *gulp*

Make him stop growing, please. Just for a little while.