attack of the two word sentences!

things really got exciting over the past weekend. Autumn just out of the blue started using two word sentences when she was talking to us and her aunt T when she came over for a visit.

okay no huge surprise really, because we always encourage her to try using more than one word to talk and along with reading and just talking to her plainly, we've given her the platform in which to take that developmental leap. She's very proud of herself and is excited to be able to say things which she knows we totally understand. We've also noticed that when we ask her something...typically if we're giving her a choice...she is showing us that she's really thinking about it and is more verbal with her response. For instance, if we ask her if she'd like to play with her PlayDoh or colour, she gets this look on her face like she's contemplating her choices and then with a cute "ummm..." she tells us her answer. "ummm...playdoh!" when she wants one of us to help her with something we get a very polite "help peease." That's just some of the exciting communicative development we've seen over the past few days. It's really something to see and experience as first time parents...witnessing the results of a toddler's brain putting another piece of the developmental puzzle together.

Of course the other thing that's come about from this little 'leap'...is the "my _______!" filling in the blank with whatever object she is talking about. The "mine!" syndrome is common for all toddlers we read...and obviously there are the numerous listings of advice on how to traverse the "mine"-field. It's not as easy as it seems typically though.

We've quickly learned that we can acknowledge the "mine!" but throw some rationalisation &/or decision-making ability to Autumn and head-off an impending tantrum. Autumn has (luckily) a very firm grasp of the concept of: if she listens to mum and daddy she'll typically end up coming out ahead of the game and happy. This carries over into any trip out and about. We don't bribe her with stuff (although that's happened once), but instead we've figured out how to present her with options that basically make her feel like she has some control or say in the situation even though for all intents and purposes, we're dictating the outcome we'd like. Of course we're going to have to start getting alittle more creative with things now that she's understanding and communicating things even better than before.

Another bit of great news for Autumn is that her little friend Ella Diki, who was adopted from Nepal, has recently moved up into the same class at day-care. I asked Autumn the other day if she was excited that Ella Diki was in her class now and she said "yeeeahhh cited!"

We're also trying to explain Halloween to Autumn and she already had picked out a little kittie-cat costume to wear a couple of weeks ago. I'm not sure that she understands of course what's going on with Halloween, but she seems to be excited about the idea of getting to dress up in her kittie-cat outfit and carry her 'Hello Kitty' tote bag around. I'll have pictures of that for sure!

Finally, since the theme of this post apparently centers around the word "exciting"... I've included a couple of fun and....yes exciting pictures taken recently. :)