Mama's Little Chatterbox

I'm taking a break from the month-by-month updates to try to record some of Evan's words. He is quite the chatty one, full of words and very happy to express himself loudly whenever the mood strikes. Restaurants and church are prime places to let the joy out, apparently.

Okay, milestones:

First words right around 12 months old

First sentence: 12/20/09 - 18 months old

Evan's first words were Mama, Dada, and No! I like to think Dave or I won out, but in actuality I'm pretty sure his very first word was "no". Pretty quickly it progressed to "No no no no no!"

Over the next few months Evan started saying:

Wow!, puppy, car (kah), vroom (nyoom), kitty cat (ki-ka), ball (ba), hi, bigcar (for trucks and busses - thanks to Daddy who taught him that one), choo-choo, night-night (ni-ni), bye bye, up, uh-oh, please (mi-mi - not sure where that one came from), down (dow), shoe (choo), woof (wow wow), baby, banana (mana), wherego?, and juice (ju). That's all I have recorded in his baby book.

His first sentence was "Hi kitty!" . Some of his earlier pronunciations have progressed nicely: ki-ka is now kitty, kah is now car (with an honest to goodness /r/ at the end), please is still 'mi' or now 'pees', shoe is shoe, juice is juice.

At 22 months it seems like Evan has a million words, though often he just loves repeating what we say. He has quite a few words in his vocab though which he spontaneously says.

Transportation is a big hit - in addition to car he can now say truck, bus, t(r)acto(r), whee(l), tire, he(li)co(pter), train, and would love to say airplane but he never can seem to remember the word in the heat of the moment when an airplane flies overhead. He says 'wee-ooh wee-ooh wee-ooh' and 'beep beep beep' for all things with sirens or horns, and makes one heck of a 'vrooom' noise for anything going fast.

Food is another favorite of course - Fruit: banana (mana), strawberry (strawbar), grape (gape), pear, apple (appoh), applesauce (appoh-so), avocado (cado), raisins (raisy). Veggies: carrot (ca-ot), and 'soupy' or 'dippy dippy' (thanks to his veggie boycott we often turn his veggies into a soup or a dip.) Drinks: milk (used to be miku, now is mok), juice (juicy), water. Favorite foods: egg, toast (toe), ce(r)eal, chicken nuggets (nuggy), pizza and pasta (pata for both), soup, rice (ricey), cracker (cah-ker, which goes for all manner of snacks), snacks (nahku or nahky), hummus, san(d)wich.

Activities/Favorite items: go!, wa(l)k, jum(p), co(l)or, ba(th), poo-poo, potty, pee pee, phone (hone), blow (bow), bubbles (bubo), sleep (seepies), pacifier (ni-ni), wash wash, bib (bibby), naked (nakey), c(l)ose, push (pus), doo(r), kno(ck) knock, book, read (weed), eat, hung(r)y, chair, ou(t)si(de), tickle, f(l)owe(r), cam(er)a, pi(c)ture, cheese! (when taking pictures)

Animals: puppy, kitty, piggy (on a good day), gorilla (goa), shee(p), goat, horse (ho-sey), co(w), duck, monkey, bear, woof (whoa whoa), meow, rooooooaaaarrrr

Shapes: circle, sta(r), heart (hot), moon

Colors/Numbers: yellow (yeyow), purple (popo), two

Sports: ba(ll), foo(t)ba(ll), ba(sket)ba(ll)

Clothing: shir(t), diaper (di-di), socks (hock), sho(r)ts, pants, pocket

Body parts: eye, ea(r), no(se), mou(th), tummy, toe(s), knee, tee(th), hand, hair

People: mommy, daddy, Evan (ah-ni), baby, grandma (gaga, gama, ganny), man, Aunt Amy (an-Amy - though to be fair to poor Uncle Steve who got shafted on this deal, he also says an-Amy in a bunch of different contexts, the meaning for which we have yet to figure out)

Miscellany: hi!, bye bye (which he says anytime someone comes and goes quickly, like a waiter at a restaurant, or anytime he hears us hanging up the phone), oh!, ooh!, yay!, uh-oh, sorry, thank you (sanky), more, I love you (used to be 'wah-wu', then progressed to "I gaga" after a trip to England and saying I love you to Granny all the time), night night (ni-ni), he(l)p, up up, all done (ah go), kiss (kissy), hug, home (homo), ouch/ouchie, (s)neeze, achoo, try, this, (a)nothe(r), stuck, and his very latest: coool! (as in, when given the choice of his circle bib or a bib with cars on it, Evan chose 'coooool bibby')

He's combining his words into all sorts of sentences, mostly surrounding what Mommy and Daddy do - Daddy car, Mommy car, Where Daddy? Where Mommy? Where Daddy go? Hi Mommy, Hi Daddy, Where kitty? Where go?, More strawbar, More car, etc. Every once in a while he comes up with a three word sentence, a 'la 'Where the car?', but those are very inconsistent still. He's starting to make some demands, like "Mommy chair?", which means Mommy sit in this chair please. It seems like everyday he comes up with something new that I didn't know he could say, which does make sense, and is a joy to hear.

Evan never really got into baby signs, but he does sign fairly consistently for please, thank you, sorry, and he blows kisses like a champ. He does love to sing, and often dances and spins to accompany his vocal styling. His latest interest is imitating facial expressions. It's really cute to see your own expression mirrored in a toddler's face, complete with quizzical look and raised eyebrows. Evan also does an exact impression of the "Evan's in trouble" face - brows furrowed, pouty lips - but then ruins the effect by breaking into a big toothy grin - designed, I'm sure, to make Mommy forget why Evan's in trouble in the first place. Ah, toddlers. What a joy.

20 months,and the Telling Game

February was BUSY. Busy busy busy. We started out with a visit from my friend Beth, who not surprisingly was ready to escape the Chicago winter for awhile, and therefore decided that the desert sounded like an excellent place to go. We were excited to have her, especially since she was the first friend we got to tell about Baby H2. The thing about telling people you're expecting is that with every person told the pregnancy becomes more real. Heady stuff. Oh, and earlier that day we had our first ultrasound to "meet" baby. Too soon to tell (I was just 12 weeks) girl or boy, though to my eyes Baby H2 looked exactly like Evan did in his ultrasounds. Go figure. And for those of you making predictions based on heart rate, Baby's heart beat at 161 bpm during my February doctor's appointment.

We took advantage of the tourist opportunities and trekked up to Sedona for the day; en route we saw Montezuma Castle and Montezuma Well. For those of you not in the know (like I was prior to my visit), there was no actual Montezuma anybody in Arizona; rather the Sinagua people, who lived there 600 years ago, built houses literally in the cliff-side, and then one day mysteriously disappeared. So Montezuma Castle is literally a ghost town, Arizona-style. But someone back in the early 1900's who first came across it decided it looked Aztecan, hence the name. The well is a natural phenomenon, a collapsed limestone cavern that has a spring running through it and is apparently incredibly unique and biodiverse. Enough of the history lesson; here are some pictures.

Then we went to Sedona, which happily had some snowy peaks, and Beth got to be enlightened by a new-age tourist information guide who was excessively into the vortexes of Sedona. Apparently many of the red rock formations have a vortex, or "spiraling spirtual energy", which is said to be able to facilitate prayer and meditation and healing, and an "energy flow that exists on multiple dimensions." The lady said one you get drawn into the energy, rumor has it you never leave Sedona..."I got married on vortex 8 years ago and I'm still here." Happily there were no nuptials in our little party that day, so we made it out of Sedona safe and sound. The red rocks are indeed impressive though.

We also took Beth to our favorite Phoenix tourist spot - Dobbins Lookout on South Mountain to watch the sunset and see night fall over Phoenix. Sadly there was no real sunset that day, but the stellar views never disappoint.

(This one is for Kristen, whenever you read this. The big yellow building in the middle of the picture is the PCH expansion. They're making lots of room for you to come back and work there someday):

Here's Evan looking at all the planes coming out of Sky Harbor Airport:

The day Beth left was Superbowl Sunday (sadly, no Cardinals to root for this year). Like much of the U.S., we rang in the occasion going to a Superbowl party, though unlike the rest of the U.S. we also decided to announce Baby H2 to my brother and Dad (why not make an already great day better?). Dave'd told his sister a few days earlier. I was about 12 weeks and feeling confident that all was going well, though it would be another week or so before we told the general population of family and friends. Needless to say the family was all very happy. We also announced Baby H2 to our friend Jackie and Brad, gracious hosts of the Superbowl party, and proud parents of baby Molly, whom Evan knows well because Dave and Brad get together fairly regularly to do stay-at-home-Daddy outings with the kids. But I digress.

Shortly after Beth's trip, my friend Brianne and her daughter Corinne came to town. Naturally, we met up for a playdate. Evan and Corinne were happy to see each other again and to play with someone exactly their own size (they're 3 weeks apart in age). Brianne was the third friend I announced my preggers to, which was funny because she also announced to me that she was preggers herself. This time I'm about a month ahead of her. I guess great minds think alike.

Then, Dave's friend Brent came into town briefly, so they could hop up to Flagstaff and go snowboarding for the weekend at Snowbowl, taking full advantage of the extreme amounts of snow Flagstaff got this winter. I know Dave wishes he could go snowboarding more than once a year, but nevertheless he was happy with what he got. In any case Dave was happy that finally he had a friend to tell our good news to.

That weekend was also Valentine's Day, and I chose that day to announce "to the world" the news of Baby H2. Ah, technology in the form of Facebook. Why would a lazy person like me go to the effort of typing a whole long email to family and friends, when I can type a simple one-sentence post and let the news disseminate from there? Facebook, you are my friend. (Though in hindsight I suppose it was a little rude not to at least call my closest friends and tell them specially...). This is how I announced Baby H2: "Apropos for Valentine's Day...My heart is going to grow soon...excited to add a new member to our family." At almost 14 weeks along, the news was finally out, and the congrats rolled in. Ah, how loved we felt. To give Dave his due, he also announced Baby H2 to the wider public on FB, with the post: "Ever so thankful - for a wife with whom I am still falling in love, for a son who brings me new joys daily, and for the miracle of a new life." Well just push me over with a feather...thoughtful and grammatically correct? Who couldn't love a man like that?

In the middle of it all were the Olympics, during which our little family became sports-obsessed and sleep-deprived, and even Evan started training for the snowboarding events...at least the gear anyway. Add to that a trip to the Phoenix Public Market downtown, the annual American Heart Association Heart Walk in Tempe, some more outside playtime with the favorite toys of all time..."CARS!", and that just about rounded out our month.

See what I mean when I said busy??