Baby brains = sponges

Wow! In just a day, Team Lara raised over $100! Thanks, everybody!

Well, we have quite a little talker on our hands here, so I am starting to channel it toward speaking actual words in a somewhat understandable manner. I recently posted a list of words that Lara does know, which was not exhaustive. I can understand what she says, but usually noone else can, besides Dustin. Many of her words tend to sound the same, like "pretty" and "kitty" or "tree" and "please." So I am starting to enunciate sounds more clearly for her. For instance, Lara says "all-da" (all done). Tonight, Dustin corrected her by saying, "all doNNNe." And, sure enough, Lara said back, "All done." Now, I know there are many sounds that will just take some development before she will achieve them. And I am not saying that I am concerned about her speech; on the contrary, I feel she is doing great. She is understanding words very well and really tries to communicate with them. Doctors and therapists always have to ask, "How does she communicate?" I respond, "She just tells me what she wants. If she wants juice, she says, "Please, juice." Sure, she does the pointing thing, but she does not rely on that, and she uses her words a lot more. I feel she is very open to learning how to say things. We are still working on the "ma-ma." Lara tries very hard to copy me and say it, though it comes out "na-na". SO, it's definitely time to begin really teaching her how to say things, because she will be receptive to that.

Don't get me wrong, though. My ears are still not completely trained. Lara could say "snacks" 20 times in a row before she starts throwing a tantrum and then I realize what she was saying!

Lara likes looking at her pictures. Except when she saw this one, she pointed to the toy in the background and said, "i-aaf" (giraffe). That was the first time I had heard her use that word on her own, and I thought, "wow, she DOES listen to me!"