Once again, I feel it is my duty to report how quickly Mandy is coming along. She’s really quick to pick up new words, and she seems to understand everything I say unless I purposely obfuscate my message. By, say for example, using the world “obfuscate.” Surprisingly, Mandy has even reportedly started using possessive pronouns, like in “my cup, your cup.” Or are those possessive adjectives? Eh, whatever. Colors we’re still working on, though, as she currently reports that everything in the world is just different shades of pink.
Sam’s doing great as well, especially if you take “great” to mean “learning to game every reward system we put in place.” I hate to keep moving the goal posts on the kid, but it seems like every time we offer her a reward for doing something (like getting herself ready for bed), she takes it to mean that she gets something EVERY TIME she does something good. Or even half-assed. Still, baby steps.
On the plus side, Sam and Mandy have really taken a liking to each other now that Mandy has developed some more social and motor skills. The other night Sam read to Mandy (and by “read” I mean “flipped the pages and made stories up,” but still) for over half an hour. Mandy would trot over to her book bin and pull a volume out, take it to Sam, sit on her lap, and sit quietly and listen to Sam tell her all about it. Very cute. And very nice for Daddy, who got to sit in the other room with his laptop.
Aw geez, do I look forward to a time when the older sibling can and will read to the younger one. This morning what I had instead was the younger one yelling at me from the crook of my arm while the older one was standing in front of me, similarly yelling. The younger one was speaking in infant, but it loosely translated as, “I cannot breathe for my nose has been invaded by unwelcome mucous-y invaders! And where is my milk for I am famished! And why is this cretin here crying, cannot he see I am in distress? Management!” The older one was speaking in I’m-having-a-fit-eze but it roughly equaled, “I want to be in your lap. No I don’t want to cuddle with Daddy. How dare you pawn me off! You shirker!” It all resolved in the end. I prodded B out of bed long enough to get me a bottle for the younger and managed to awkwardly arrange the two of them in my lap and quiet them both down. One day, I dream, I can see them tearing through their bookshelves. Figuratively, of course.
Yeah, I get the two kids in one lap treatment all the time. Usually immediately after one or the other of them crawls in.