Leaps and bounds, 2/13/11

These kids are changing so fast, I hardly have a chance to write it down. Deep breath...

Boy 1 has had a major explosion in pre-reading skills lately. The light bulb has come on! Without any encouragement, he is suddenly sounding out words and telling us "Spaghetti starts with s" or "Kitten haves a k." (Ah, leave it. We'll work on that grammar later.) When we read a book together, it's not uncommon for him to point out words he recognizes and find words he knows on the page before the reading has begun.

Boy 1 is getting much better at following complex directions. He got several board games for Christmas and his birthday. I was skeptical about a couple of the games, but sure enough, once he'd played a time or two, he had it all figured out. Including how to cheat--gotta watch this kid!

Boy 1 is developing better coordination. He's always had exceptional fine-motor control, but larger movements like jumping, throwing, climbing, etc. have escaped him. That seems to be changing now, and he's having fun with his new abilities, especially dancing. The picture above shows him mimicking Wags the Dog (from The Wiggles) ending his dance with a split.

Boy 1 "flew up" out of the nursery at church after his 4th birthday. Since his history of accepting changes is not good, we were pretty anxious about the move to a new room. But so far, he has done well. He's not so good at sitting in church for the few minutes before his dismissal to the 4-year-old room, but--one step at a time.

Boy 2 also has made a leap in language/pre-reading the past few weeks. He has such good pronunciation and an advanced grasp of grammar. He likes to play with words, speaking in made-up rhymes instead of the words you expect. The other day he laughed while telling me "I bont wy yilk bease, Bomba" instead of "I want my milk please, Mama." He enjoys reading books that rhyme. Actually, he enjoys lots of different kinds of books now, partly because he's more able to sit still and concentrate on the story. He's getting interested in picking out letters and numbers, too.

Boy 2 likes putting things together and taking them apart, but now he's doing it with purpose. He's less apt to jam two puzzles pieces together and force them to fit; now he'll try turning them this way and that to get them in the right way. And when he does, Happy Boy will jump up, throw both arms up in the air, and shout "I did it!" We hear a lot of "I did it!" from Boy 2 lately, from lots of things besides puzzles.

Boy 2 has a wicked sense of humor. He knows how high-strung Boy 1 is, and it delights Boy 2 to say or do some little thing that is sure to set off his brother's temper. But he can be a good sport too, and the boys are still buddies more often than they're fighting. This is especially true when they're running around outside together, chasing and climbing and just being rowdy little boys. And he loves, loves his little sister. Nothing calms Boy 2 down quicker than telling him that if he sits still, he may hold Girlie.

Finally, Boy 2 has graduated from the high chair (which BIG boy really didn't fit too well in anyway) to the dinner table. Once we tried it, he never looked back. He's also making progress on using a real cup instead of a sippy cup.

Girlie is happy and good-natured like Boy 2, observant and thoughtful like Boy 1. But make no mistake, she does things her own way, in her own time.

We'd been waiting and waiting for Girlie to roll over. She did roll off her belly to her back twice, but those times were months ago and many weeks apart, and she seemed completely unaware she'd done it. There was no curiosity to try again. When Girlie passed five months old and still hadn't repeated the roll, I worried this would (once again) set off alarm bells or some over-cautious tsk-tsking at the next doctor's appointment.

Turns out Girlie just had her own timetable. About two weeks ago, she started creeping. Then two days ago she made her first couple little crawls forward. She's not steady, and she realizes it's faster and easier to squirm or creep to get where she wants to go--but it's definitely a crawl, belly lifted, knees under the hips, pulling with her arms, progressing forward. Then yesterday? Suddenly Girlie's rolling front-to-back every time we put her down. Still no back-to-front, but when you can crawl, well, who cares!

Girlie is also doing food her own way. A week ago, she tried rice cereal and did not like the taste at all. Her look of disgust was absolutely comic. But, like her brother Boy 2, she also had bad nights all three days she ate rice. Given the tummy aches, we moved on to sweet potatoes instead. She loves them, and they don't bother her. She also enjoyed her first taste of butternut squash. So much for the rules about starting with "mild, inoffensive" cereal. They do not apply to Girlie.

We've had some pretty rough days--no, weeks--lately, but all this progress and all the laughs along the way make it worthwhile.