A bit about my 3-year-old

Has Marley been 3 for a quarter of a year already?  Yikes!   A few Marley tidbits, for the record:

Skills
*counts to twenty (still often skips some numbers and sometimes includes eleventeen)
*can spell his name orally, and can recognize it in print
*can write an M
*knows all 26 capital letters and most letter sounds
*is beginning to recognize lower case letters
*can do a 12 piece puzzle by himself
*uses a tripod pencil grip
*prefers his left hand for eating, writing, and throwing.  (This takes some real concentration on my part as I'm helping him do things like pour liquid and twist caps - both feel really odd for a righty such as myself.)
*can dress and undress himself (needs help with snaps, zippers, and buttons)
*can wash himself in the bath or shower
*goes potty and *usually* washes hands without prompting (still needs help wiping)
*no longer wears diapers at night (hasn't had an accident, day or night, since turning 3 - I just jinxed us, didn't I?)
*still has a little trouble with 's-consonant' words (spider, small, slippery), but is correcting himself lately.  (For the longest time, spider was "fider", then "fa-pider")
*has a pretty incredible sense of direction (always knows when we're near Tiny Tribe or Alki Co-op)

Sleep
*still loves his "car" bed
*no longer takes naps (since turning 3)
*sleeps roughly 12 hours, from 8:30 - 8:30 (ish)
*prefers one of us to lay down with him each night until he falls asleep (this happens relatively quickly)
*wakes 1-2 times a week with nightmares (see below), but falls quickly back to sleep when "a grown up" lays down with him.

Likes
*when asked, his list of favorites includes: "Spiderman, scary things, baseball, and pink"
*still really loves pink
*likes things to 'match' (dinosaur socks with dinosaur shirt, Dora bowl with Dora spoon)
*prefers to 'be' something when getting dressed in jammies or clothes (Batman, Spiderman, Elmo, Thomas, Cookie Monster, a guitar, a dog, or a dinosaur)
*the Disney movie, Cars
*reading books (prefers to be read to, but will sometimes 'read' the pictures by himself)
*'reading' environmental print  (he loves to read a magnet on our fridge that says "Dawn's Kitchen")
*circle time/story times at school (is usually pretty focused in preschool settings) 
*most every food we put in front of him, or is at least willing to try (see below)
*playing with Thomas trains, dress up clothes, Cars/Lightning McQueen, puzzles, Legos (Duplos)
*going to the beach
*'helping' me do just about anything around the house (laundry, dishes, cooking, etc)

Dislikes
*loud noises (covers his ears for flushing toilets, vacuums, loud cars, etc)
*spicy food, bell peppers, pickles, avocados
*being left alone (his recurring nightmare is that we've gone somewhere without him - he sometimes wakes in the night yelling, "Wait for me!  You forgot me!")
*getting dressed in the morning
*brushing his teeth (though this is getting a little better)
*when Amelia tries to "play" with his carefully set up toy scenes ("She's going to eat Lightning McQueen!")

edit: I just wanted to clarify that when I put 'grown up' in quotes above, it wasn't because Jeff and I aren't really adults (though some may disagree).  Rather, it's what Marley often calls out when he wakes up in the night: "I need a grown up to come in here!"