Speech Spurt

It's been about five months since I've given any kind of speech development update on Diego (Now 2 yrs, 10 months).  You may have read a few posts here and there in between this time to catch new words that he's picked up, and Man has he had a "speech spurt" in the last few months!  He has more than doubled his entire vocabulary!  Though still fairly behind as an "almost" 3 year old, I'm really proud of his progress.

His major attitude change was his sudden willingness to immitate more.  Now he will try to copy what you've just said even if he has no idea what it means.  I believe that this behavior change was really brought on due to his speech therapy.  He has repeated the entire alphabet which takes focus, tolerance, and patience.  And you know - he even lasted through an entire session of me reading a book!  You may recall, he would have nothing to do with book-reading in the past.  (I think little brother, Tater may have inspired him because Tater is tolerant of books).  And which book was the first?  The Old Lady Who Swallowed A Fly.

Diego is also trying to count but really hasn't gotten past Three.  He also picked up the idea of "plurals" when he first started saying, "Two Airplane" and then it developed into "Two Airplanes" (with an "s" at the end), and now I'm amazed that he will say two and hold up two fingers.  He's getting it, Guys!  He also knows basic colors (thanks to M&Ms during Halloween) but his favorite and only color he will say so far is "Blue".  Such a boy!

Here is a comparison of the words he picked up since 5 months ago:

2 years, 10 months

2 years, 5 Months

Some of his favorite multi-word sayings:

• Brother Cry!
• Mama Car!
• No Milk
• More Milk
• My Car
• Big School Bus
• Blue School Bus (when he sees the blue shuttles by our house)
• Mama Hug! (when he wants to be carried)
• Eat Cake
• Not this
• Mama Cook Egg
• Move Brother
• Shark and Whale!
• Two Airplanes

I'm ecstatic about this progress and can't wait to see what his 3-year update will look like!

-Shirley

What If...

I think you know me by now to be a very free-spirited, easy-going type of mother.  I don't stress myself out by setting unrealistic expectations on my children or myself as a mother.  I just focus on precious moments with my family.  Otherwise, I would have never made it out alive as a pregnant mother of a toddler living through a total house remodel that left our daily lives without any kind of structure or normalcy. 

I encourage Diego to learn and explore at his own pace.  I don't place too many nit-picky restrictions on him, but he does often hear "no" from me.  Like "No, you can't have candy for breakfast" or  "No, don't kick the dog!" or "No, you are not allowed to play on your tablet until after your noon nap."  And he understands and obeys for the most part. (Except for the candy - those no's automatically lead to temper tantrums.)

Diego is allowed an occasional soda or more-than-occasional piece of candy, he sometimes falls asleep after us watching Youtube videos on my husband's iPad, and we don't prohibit him from running or riding his tricycle in the house. We let him be.  He is a child, after all.  And he's had some amazing progress all on his own.  His two recently-learned words are "Candy" and "Apple", but he isn't stringing two words together yet like "Candy Apple" which he should be by now.  (OK maybe not exactly "candy apple" but you know what I mean)

And lately I find myself thinking "What if..." and I never wanted to think that.  What if.....  What if I had tried a little harder to push through his maniacal need to be the only one holding and using a book, and tried read him books more often?  What if I spent a little more time with him writing and drawing instead of watching Mickey Mouse Playhouse?  What if I tried a little harder at carrying out a longer monologue when "speaking" to him so that he would have had more exposure to words and sounds.  There are so many things that I could have done.  But that is the past, and "What Ifs" are my present, and my future (Friday) includes me sitting in a waiting room as Diego starts his speech therapy at two years of age. 

"What if"  you click below?

Then you automatically cast a vote!  And Shirley gives Diego a candy apple...