Having fun

The other day Ilianna and Jan were having some fun on the couch and I took a couple of really great pictures!

They were really having a great time! Fooling around - that's one thing that Ilianna really knows how to do and loves doing!

This week Ilianna has learned a new word, "nee", which means "no". Actually, she knew the word already, but was not applying it to everyday life. When we would ask her something, for example if she wanted a particular item, she would say "eehhh", instead of no, so since last week I've really been working with her to get her to say no, instead of making that annoying sound. Yesterday it proved to work, because when she wanted something, and I had to guess what she wanted, she said no to an item that she didn't want, and yes to the one she did want! That's another hurdle she's jumped over! And this afternoon when I was putting on my scarf, Ilianna named it, saying "sjaal", and I asked her who's "sjaal" it was. She didn't understand that question, so I said "is it Ilianna's sjaal?". She answered by saying "Mama sjaal". That was really exciting, because she's associating things with people, and that is really super! All of these little things probably are really trivial to most parents, but for us, they are really big steps she is taking.

One last picture, and it's of Ilianna with her doll. If you squeeze the feet, it will cry. Last week Ilianna surprised us by saying "Oh, baby", when the doll cried, it was so very cute!

On saturday we are going to see Sinterklaas (Saint Nicholas), who is arriving here in Kollumerzwaag. I have been practicing the special Sinterklaas songs with Ilianna (and learning them myself) and hopefully that will be something she will recognize on saturday if her surroundings are too busy for her. We are really curious how she will react to everything. If I get any pictures, I will post them next week.

"I wanna do what Mommy does!"

Well, I have a few pictures to show, all of Ilianna doing things that I also do. The first one was taken about a week ago, showing Ilianna sitting on the potty. Ok, you may ask yourself, What? You still sit on the potty? No, I don't, but the point of the picture is the phone. Alot of the times that I am on the phone, Ilianna gets her little phone and copies my conversation. It's very cute.

I took the next picture a couple of days ago. I was in the kitchen getting dinner ready and after I while I realized that Ilianna was really quiet. Now if Ilianna was like any other 3 year old, I would have been really concerned, but because she isn't, I was just curious and when I had a look, she was sitting like this:

Every morning Ilianna sits on this stool while I brush her hair and put ponytails in. Here she was brushing the "My Little Pony"'s hair. The next picture is really funny, too, because she is using her sippy cup to make the pony's hair wet, just like I do with her, but then using a water bottle.

And this last picture was taken this morning, on my crosstrainer. I guess that Ilianna is trying to get in shape!!

But it's not just me she copies. Last week one of the girls I babysit was walking around with a pail over her head, and yup, you guessed it, Ilianna saw it, and later on this is a picture we took:

As you can see, Ilianna is doing really well. Her speech is getting clearer in some cases, and we are working on getting her to finish off her words, for example saying boat, instead of bow. She has that with alot of words. She was saying po, instead of pop, which is fries for doll, and ske, instead of skep, fries for shovel, but those words are getting better now as well. She even adds a t to the end of words that don't need it, which is pretty funny. This week wednesday we have another appointment with the speech therapist, and I'm curious how that will go.

One more picture, just cause it's so cute! Until the next time...