Alphabet

Sophie can identify most of the letters of the alphabet on flash cards now, but she does get a few pairs of letters confused.

D is frequently called B

J is often identified as L

K is usually seen as X

the other interesting thing is that these mistakes don't go the other way. X is not seen as K, and B is not seen as D.

Watching her learn to read letters has been making me realize just how confusing our roman alphabet can be, and how similar some letters are to others. It's not something I have thought much about until recently, but consider how many features are common in these sets:

LEFTIJ

UCGOQ

DBPRKX

HMVY

to say nothing of lower case: pbdq; and adding numbers make things even worse: 1l

It's a wonder people learn to read at all.

ANOTHER LANGUAGE UPDATE:

Sophie just said her first spoonerism today, too: She went to get me a diaper and a wipe so I could change Jacob, and, as she gave them to me, she said "Wiper and a diap!"

an insightful exchange

I was having a wee dram this evening in honour of the 250th anniversary of the birthday of Robbie Burns, and the following exchange transpired:

Sophie: "That's yours"
Daddy: "Yes, that's daddy's drink"
Sophie: "I have some. a little taste"
Daddy: "No, this is a Daddy drink. Mommy doesn't even like it that much"
Sophie: "Mommy likes water. You like beers"

Out of the mouths of babes...

brief language update

Sophia's getting to the point with her language that she is starting to generalize rules from what she has heard. As is common, she tends to overgeneralize, building unique constructions for new situations out of phrases she knows, and not quite remembering some phrase structure in other circumstances. It's really interesting to see what she comes up with and when. For example:

"I not can do it" = I'm having trouble, please help me do this

"I Doed it!" (sounds like I dood it) = Look at me! I did it!

"I flush it away" = I wiped/am wiping/will wipe it away (eg on a whiteboard or magnadoodle) or even when sweeping the floor.

"all up" = to completion. for example "I watch it all up" (a movie or show. either a request, as in "can I watch the whole thing" or a statement of fact.) or "I do it all up" when she finished a puzzle.

Since we regularly alternate between "Sophie" and "Sophia", she has generalized this, and has taken to extending "mommy" to "mommia" and "daddy" has become "daddia." just today, she was pretending to talk to "poppia" (poppa) on the phone. her pretend phone in this case was a vegetable brush...

Also, I was drawing triangles today and she said "You dood it! you do sandwiches cheese grilled!" I had to figure out what cheese-grilled meant, since it sounded very strange. Eventually I got that she had transposed "grilled-cheese sandwich. I wonder how one would cheese-grill a sandwich? It might be very tasty!

Tobogganing with the Grandparents

Visiting grandparents are an excellent opportunity to go to the hill and head down on sleds. Even Haley got into the act, chasing us up hill and the chasing us back down.
 
 
 
  
 
 
 

Off the Bottle

As of two days ago, Sophia is bottle free. I just decided that she was big enough now to have all of her drinks in cups. Besides I was tired of washing milky sheets after the bottle leaked at nap time. She was down to just one, so it was relatively easy to get rid of. We started warning her a couple of weeks ago that it would be going, and then the other day I just didn't give her the option. She still asks, but usually goes down for her nap easily enough with out it.

This means more cupboard space...for now. It's just a matter of time till they reappear for Jacob.

But for now we celebrate.

The next big challenge.....the soothers.