So, the Other Day

So the other day we were at home taking a nap and Holly woke up in a cranky mood asking over and over for CoCo (Chloe) I called Katherine to see if we could come and plan, since we weren't planning on seeing them, but we hadn't for a few days. She say yes, so we headed out to there house. Earlier that day, after school we had picked up daddy and went out to lunch. While I was driving I hit a back up on San Pablo and decided that instead of heading straight to Ashby and then get on the Highway, I would cut through the neighborhood where Joel works. As soon as I make the turn Holly starts to get upset and she yells at me, "No no Dada, Go go CoCo!" I tell her we aren't going to get Daddy from work we are going to Chloe's, but she just keeps saying Go go Co Co, for the next few minutes until we leave the neighborhood and get on the highway.Once we are on the on ramp she sighs and calms right down. Not only is she certainly making sentences and telling me what she wants, but she sure has a good sense of direction and spacial awareness too.So the other day we were at music class, and the entire drive over she was asking for Coco (There is a theme here) and I tell her we will see Chloe at Music Class, but she isn't there when we arrive. Class starts and after the welcome song Kim pulls out the guitar.Kim (the Teacher) has started a habit of giving her son William a snack whenever she plays guitar to keep him from climbing on her so she can well, play. I think there is a bit of a Pavlov's effect here, because most of the kids usually then also start asking for snacks when it is guitar time.So like the others Holly gets out her Puff container. Just about then Chloe comes in, you can tell she was napping in the car, she is sleepy and shy and wants to stay in her mommies lap.Holly looks at her Puffs, she realizes Chloe doesn't like them, goes into the Diaper bag grabs a second container (which she checks the contents of first) of Veggie Straws and runs across the room and hands the snack to Chloe, then she sits down on Katherine's other knee so they can have there snack together.So the other day Holly is asking for a bath. On this particular day I wasn't planning on giving her one, i think we had went swimming earlier in the day and she showered at the pool. She was persistent though and wiggled out of her top. She can now take off tank tops or long sleeved shirts.She then runs around topless asking for Bath, bath Bath and manages with very little help to get out of her pants. I figure she needs a new diaper anyway, and developmentally it is good practice, so off the wet diaper comes.Daddy was in the office working on something and it was his turn to change her (I had a long day - from the pool) A lot of the other kids are talking about potty training and I figure it would be a good experiment to see what happens if I let her run around naked.So I keep a close eye on her and she starts to cross her legs. I ask her if she has to go potty, she says no, but then crosses her legs again. So I bring her to the potty and let her sit on it and tell her she can go pee pee. She says no and wants down. So then she runs into the living room and grabs a flower watering container and squats on it and pees. At least it was on the hard wood floors. She was fascinated by the puddle she had made. Daddy comes to clean the mess up and I figure, well she already pee'd so she might as well run around and have some more naked baby time. She loved looking in the mirror.A few minutes later, back in the office goes daddy and she is on the fence calling his name. he comes to say hi, and then goes back to work. Suddenly she is hysterical crying in almost the same stop she was in when she pee'd. It seems that she pooped, had no idea what it was or what had happened and then stepped on it.She totally freaked out. I guess the lesson here is that if you poop on the floor, Mommy will give you a bath. But in all seriousness, it only took daddy a few minutes to clean it all up and I think it was a successful experiment.She learned what pooping is, and she didn't like it. I learned that she won't tell me that she needs to go potty yet. So we won't start training in the next few months, but I think she is getting closer to being ready.So the other day we went to Pharmica to pick up some Melatonin. outside they have some stairs and a ramp. Holly was very energetic and wanted to go up and down each over and over again. At first I was hovering, but then she got the hang of it and she was fine going up and down the ramp.I think though she ended up getting a little ahead of herself and while running down tripped and fell. Luckily there was no head thump and she simply landed on her hands and knees. She cried of course but it was really just a skid mark and she was ok. She had a Yogurt Juice and we went home.I washed her all up and she was fine. When Daddy got home she showed him her Boo Boo and he told her that you had to kiss it to make it better. She loved this. The next day one elbow was gone and the other was scabbed over, the opposite knee was also clear but the other had a scratch.So she came up to Mommy in the morning and showed me her knee and pointed at it and then went "Mmua" (Insert Kiss Sound Here) So I kissed it and she said better. it has now been a few weeks and it is faded, if all but gone, but she is still kissing her knee several times a day and saying "better" Now when she bumps herself or gets hurt, I can ask her where it hurts so I can kiss it and make it better and she points. 9 times out of 10 she will stop crying after the kiss.So the other day we went to school and were playing. When we first arrive there is always a few minutes of free play to allow the kids to transition into the space. On this day there was a "Boat" See-Saw type toy. Holly is a huge fan of all of the gross motor activities. So she runs over to the boat and climbs in and her teacher asks if she wants to Rock. She shakes her head no, and points at Citlali and then pats the seat next to her. Citlali had been curiously cautious about the boat, but now that Holly was there was happy to give it a try.Once Citlali was all situated Holly told her teacher to go. They later remarked to me that it is a goal of many of the kids to show that type of social interaction and empathy and it was amazing that Holly is so thoughtful to her friends.So the other day we were watching an episode of Kai-Lan. It is one that we don;t put on often when the characters all go for a boat ride. Rintoo is super excited about driving the boat, but everyone is suppose to take turns. Tolee keeps asking for a turn but Rinto won't give him one, so he gets upset and stomps off.Holly was watching this with such deep conviction and then when Rinto wasn't giving Tolee a turn she was saying "Ney Ney" (Another way she says No) and then she started to cry because Tolee was upset.I had to give her a hug and tell her that Rinto didn't mean to hurt Tolee's feelings and that he would give him a turn soon. She watched and waited upset for Tolee, until he got her turn. She did something similar the next night when Rinto ripped Tolee's picture and he got upset.Rinto said sorry but Tolee wouldn't forgive him (it was like the third thing Rinto had done to upset him that day) This time she was upset that Rinto was sad, because Tolee wouldn't accept the apologies.It's amazing that she is starting to actually follow along on the stories now and watch. In other shows sometimes she says the name of the character, right before it comes on the screen, she knows what's going to happen next.So the other night we decided to give reading a bed time story a try again. Before she wouldn't really listen and simply flip the pages as fast as she could barely glancing at the pictures. Then we moved onto "Where is" books where she points at things, but still she wasn't following the story.
Now that she started following the story on her tv shows, it has translated to books and we have noticed she is paying a lot more attention. The first book we read was "Good Night to Tad" Which is about a very imaginative and busy bunny. The art is beautiful and as we read on each page she narrates something she sees.One page is a Pig, another a Money, another a Car, one a turtle. She listens to the story, then describes the pictures with either the words or the signs or sometimes both then turns the page. The other book we read is called, "Are you my Mommy" and is about a duckling looking for it's mommy and asking various animals.After we read it, it was sitting on the bed and she opened it and started to read it to us. She would point at the Horse and shake her head and say No, and sign horse, and then turn the page, then the same for the Pig, Squirrel, and Dog. Finally on the last page she would point at the mother Duck and do the sign for Mama, and say Mommy and point at me. It was the cutest thing every. So now every night, I ask on each page, are you my Mommy and she says "No" and we read the book together.