Kids Update

I haven't done one of these in a while.  I know that a few of these things are in posts I've written out by hand, yet haven't typed up yet.  And, its the first time for William!

Natalie:

• Singing most of the ABC's.  She skips over like D - G, but she has all the harder stuff at the end.  
• Singing tons of other songs including Row Your Boat, Ba Ba Black Sheep, Happy Birthday, and many songs from TV.  Our favorite is the part of Nice and Clean by Chromeo.  
• Getting very close to counting.  She sings most of 1, 2, Buckle My Shoe.  I've heard her counting stairs.  Tonight, she was counting blocks as she stacked them.  
• Speaking of blocks, she can stack 7 of them.  Learned this because of the home visitor because usually she isn't interested in blocks.  
• When the home visitor asked her to make a train out of the blocks, she immediately lined them up perfectly and started singing the train song from Kai-lan.  
• Though this is a little negative, today was the first time that she told both of us (at different times) to put William down and pick her up.  She even tried to move William.  
• She has sat on the potty twice with no diaper, but with no deposit.  If I wasn't so busy nursing William, we would be giving starting serious potty training some real thought.  
• When we went to a birthday party, she asked to drink from a paper cup and she did a great job!  
• At play group she took out a toy drum and beat on it saying she was practicing playing the drum.  She learned this from YGG.  She got a music set for her birthday from her Uncle Ricky, and she uses the maracas to beat on the tambourine. 
• After watching her Auntie Jen, she makes her new Pooh Bear beat the maraca on the tambourine.  I've seen her make toys do things like this a few other times, such as making a doll hold a crayon.  
• Not sure when it started, but she now says "no thanks" very consistently when she doesn't want something.  
• She is getting very good at filling in words in books we've read before.  Most notably is when we read Humpty Dumpty.  She fills in the last word of each line.  
• She understands how the phone works in that she asks to talk to certain people who we talk to a lot, and she knows to listen and talk. 

William:

• If we've calculated correctly, he is now 21.5 inches tall, which is a 1.25 growth in a month.  
• Our best guess is that he weighs over 10 lbs, but we'll hopefully get him weighed on Monday at Natalie's 2 year appointment.  He looks bigger, as everyone we see regular agrees.  
• He seems to lift his head way up, especially when you hold him up on your shoulder.  
• He is working on learning to suck his thumb!  I swear it was way later when Natalie figure that out.  He's actually accomplished it a few times.
• He doesn't seem to like it when toys touch him, like if I try to see if he wants to hold one or lay it on his stomach for him to find.  But, he is looking at toys and pausing to listen to them if I shake them.  
• He seems to actively be batting the toy to his side in his toy gym.  
• He loves to look out the living room windows.  
• He's discovered the light in the kitchen.  Natalie loved the similar light in her bed room.