Milestones!

There have been so many the past 2 weeks, I hardly know where to start! First of all, Joy’s language skills have just blossomed! I am getting “Mama, can you help me please?” and attempts at complete sentences, “Mama, may I dadada again please?”

Of course, there are the phrases that she hears all the time that she repeats back to me. “Please don’t do that” is her favorite. I roll my eyes at that, but am glad that at least I’m saying please…

There are so many little turns of phrase that appear and you can tell she’s working on it. We have “piece of pizza” which is really hard to get a hold of at first. This morning, she showed me the snow in the chairs on the patio and screamed (at the top of her lungs which of course, is the only way to scream) “Mama, look! Piece of cake!”

The other night on the way home from choir rehearsal, she is in her car seat in my car. I have the passenger head rest up as far as it will go so she can see what’s going on in front of her. All of a sudden, she stops singing with the cd and asks, “Mama, red lights. Why?” She’s asking me why do the cars in front of us have red lights. So I point out that the cars have red lights on the back and white lights on the front so we can see them at night on the road. The car in front of us puts on its brake lights and she screams delightedly, and asks, “Mama, look! Why?” I said those were there so that I wouldn’t hit the car in front of us when it slowed down. She then announced that they were “please don’t hit me lights”. Of course! What else would you call them?

We had quite a conversation about the lights and the cars and the road and light signals. Then, she came out with “Mamamamama, dadada gagagaga dodo”. I hesitated, wondering what in the world she meant, and then we both burst out laughing. I said, “You just ran out of words didn’t you?” and she laughs “yes” over and over again, because it’s the only word she can find after all that exertion!

I have to admit, I’m going to miss some of her phrases! Like, “do it again please” means, can I have some more of whatever that was, as well as can we watch that again. I still smile at "what's your name?" meaning what is the word for this. (She sometimes looses Katrina's or Scarpia's name and will ask them, "What's your name?" and wait for an answer!) And of course, “bu yao/meow”!

The other milestone in the language is not just vocabulary, but the subtle things like “Sorry mama” has become “I’m sorry, Mama”. And “what is this” instead of “who are you”. She clearly understands the cause and effect of Why and Because. In fact, she is now using “because….” as an excuse. So when she is asked to sit in her car seat, she’ll say, “because…” trying to find a reason why she isn’t. Today, I started saying, “no because” when she started on it. She actually laughed and now she will sit there and repeat “because because because” and laugh! Good thing she’s laughing because I’m not always…but I'm trying!

Dance Class
We changed the basic karate class at the Little Gym to a dance class. That was a good idea (another favorite phrase of Joy's)! She is one of 8 little girls from the age of 3 to 5. At first she was just watching from the side, but after the first class, she seems to be having a great time. The first quarter of the class is tap and she's already practicing on the kitchen floor. She's actually pretty good and can shuffle step without turning her foot all the way under.

The next part of the class is ballet and she already knew first and second position! She's practicing her turns on the hardwood floor already. Then the last half is like coordinated dance/movement and tumbling. She really likes that part.

Here is her new leotard and her tutu skirt (from Courtney!). Notice those tap shoes! I changed the ribbons to pink ones and we got white socks with lace. I tell you, she's styling!


And these are her velvet tap pants!


Dress Up!
We played dress up the other day. I honestly think it was the first time she's ever gotten to do that! After I showed her kinda how it works, she got into it, but we didn't have the right shirt for the skirt. We'll have to make a trip to the thrift store for sure!

I also had to explain that the scepter was not a weapon...

I can't get rid of the 2 fingers up in the air, because that's the only way she'll smile. I'm working on it though!


Sometimes it was just more fun to decorate Katrina with the boas!