I have a lot I could write about today. About my spontaneous trip to the city to have my body put back in place. My short but much needed phone call with my sister. The guy who offered me a chair at KFC while I waited for my food to be ready. Paint shopping. I had a good, full, successful day. But I would MUCH rather talk about my kids!
They’re growing up. In a BIG way. Laela has been uttering little beginnings of words recently, or babbling in different tones to suggest language. Its been fun to watch it start! We encourage words, and try to remember to tell her everything, which gets tiring but is how we worked with Dekker on his speech. As lots of you know, he was considered “speech delayed,” which I wrote off to be his shy demeanour, which I still think holds a lot of water. But there was also the issue of his vision, and I think its hard to get everything in working order when one sense isn’t quite operating as it should. I didn’t want Dekker to have to see a speech therapist because I knew it would come. I didn’t want to “put him through that.” For some reason, that carried a stigma for me. But in some research, I learned that a speech therapist would likely start out with more so teaching me how to speak to Dekker in a clearer, simpler way. Thats what we did, and of course one eye surgery and a new sister later, the kid is more than verbal. So that whole rant aside, this is how we’ve been speaking to Laela. Clearly, with simple words, and consistency.
Today, Laela handed me Dekker toy camera and waited for me to turn it on. Its something she always asks for. I said “Say please!” and she did her cute little nod and “ya.” I was about to turn it on, and decided to take a different route. “Say on” I said, and she said “nun.” I praised her up really good and clapped and kissed her and made a big deal of it. She loved that. She toddled off with her camera, until she forgot about it and it shut itself off. She brought it back to me, and waited. I said “Say on” and she said “un.” It was so awesome!!! After that, she would try for the word that I requested of her. No, she didn’t get any bang on, but mimicking is the first step, and I’m so thrilled to see it growing in her!
So far, words that I’ve heard come from her fairly confidently are ya, mom, dad, cup, wow, baby, and on. She tried really hard to say “paper” today, but it either turned into cake or pecker. But she tried! Hopefully we’ll establish things like milk, please, more, etc. soon. She is very accurate with nodding and shaking her head yes and no. She knows when she’s hungry, or wants a diaper change, or sleepy. She’s waaay too smart.
My tidbit about Dekkers development today is about when I got home from the city. I had been gone since they went down for their nap, and I arrived about 15 minutes before bed. He was full of hugs for me, and kept telling me “I just missed you, mommy.” Unfortunately, I came home at the worst time. Just in time for cleaning up toys and going to bed. But I’m their mom, and thats just part of the day! So I mentioned to him that it was time to tidy and, as per usual, if he asked nicely, Brady and I would be happy to help. He very politely asked for help, and then specified “just mommy.” Seriously, kid?! I have a contraction every time I bend down to the floor! But I realized that he was actually just wanting some one on one time with me, so I took him up on it.
Behold the longest and best toy tidy time in our home. We held hands pretty well the entire time, so we each had one hand to bring toys to their respective place. It took seemingly forever, but it was wonderful. As soon as toys were tidied, he put on a bit of a whiny voice and said he didn’t want to go to bed. I suggested we hold hands again and walk upstairs together, but he really wanted me to carry him. I’m sort of at the point where he’s really hard to carry, especially up the stairs, so I came down to his level and gave him a really nice long hug. When we separated, he took my hand and we walked up the stairs together without any complaint. He went to his room without any crying, had his sip of water, and said his bedtime prayer all on his own. He was sooo grown up!!! Blew me away. I could have cried, but Laela was doing enough of that for all of us. Deks kept it together and was totally cooperative.
I love my kids. LOVE my kids. I can’t wait to bring another unreasonably adorable little one into the world! God is sooo good!