December 1

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving. We had a lovely visit with Carl and Sonia's parents and grandfather. Amy got to use her newly learned phrase, "How you doin'?" and Sarah said the family word "kapshida" that means "let's go" in Korean.

One of our goals for the past several months has been to encourage Sarah to sing in tandem with us. This usually only works if I prompt her to start and then I follow as immediately as I can, always waiting for her to initiate each new word or letter. Now it seems that perhaps some sibling dynamics are going to help further that goal, but not in the way I expected. Amy loves to sing but feels strongly about doing solos. Lately when Amy starts to sing or recite a part of a book, then Sarah jumps in with some words too. Amy gets mad and says she wants to do it by herself. It seems like Sarah is partly voicing her contributions to get a rise out of Amy! I know this is typical sibling behavior, but somehow it still surprises me a bit.

Every few months Sarah has a party in the middle of the night where she is awake for a couple of hours. Last night was party night. Yawn. Luckily, Amy slept through it. I couldn't because Sarah was so awake that she was attempting all sorts of things she isn't supposed to do in addition to being loud. She was playing with the shades, attempting to relocate the blue footstool from the bathroom, opening and closing the door, reciting books, and pretending to be the teacher from school.

Overall Sarah continues to get more capable in ways that are exciting and annoying, reaching new heights and getting into more things we thought were child-proof. She is also taking over with some aspects of Becky's program, where she gets out the needed materials herself or starts singing the songs by herself. And I am realizing that some puzzles and shape sorters are easy for her now. I am hoping with continued practice with things that are easy she will get better at understanding the tiny manipulations that have to happen with more complex puzzles.

Amy's imagination, puzzle skills, language skills, and overall play are just delicious. I think Sarah will learn some phrases better from Amy than from us because they maybe have more meaning or different emphasis, or they annoy Amy when Sarah says them, such as "No, no, that is mine!" 

One of Amy's favorite activities is to set up a tea party with our cardboard set. She expands the food options by taking pieces from other games. A couple days ago she put Purple Cat (a stuffed animal) on the living room sofa under a small blanket. On Purple Cat's lap was a cardboard plate with 3 pieces of plastic cheese. So sweet and adorable! Then last night Amy went to get a coaster from the coffee table to put under her water bottle on the dining room table. It isn't necessary but it is very observant!

Sarah's sunny "hi" and "hello" have expanded to "hello. hello there." She recently expanded further to "good morning. good morning, there."

Despite my not being thrilled about the timing of the party last night, I did have some awareness that it was totally awesome that she was keeping me up with her verbosity, play, and mischief. 

My love to all of you. Goodbye. Goodbye, there.