telegraphic speech

So Lydia said her first "paragraph" the other day. Whenever she says "Go?" that means "Where did it go?" so that will help you translate this. I had her on the changing table, and she had her diaper cover, then tossed it on the floor. I said "Uh oh, did you drop it?" and she replied, "Drop it! Go? All gone." It was the cutest thing, and she's done little paragraphs here and there a few other times since then.

She had an Early Intervention therapy session today, and I mentioned it to her therapist, who told me that's called "telegraphic speech." She also said that most children in therapy services will just skip that phase, so it was really neat to be able to see it.

As for other talking stuff, Lydia will tell herself "Bless you" after she sneezes. During her therapy today, she belched, and told herself "Bless you" after that belch. The therapist and I were cracking up. She'll also say "Thank you" and "You're welcome" appropriately (although "you're welcome" comes out more like "come-come" lol). She "counts" sometimes, like this: 4, 5, 6, 4, 2. She recognizes that letters exist, and will sometimes point out the letter A, but usually just calls anything w/ words on it "A."

In other news, the hubs and I are going out this afternoon to vote when he gets home from work. I'm so ready for all the drama to be over.

grinding some grain, flax seeds to be exact

I "inherited" a Magic Mill from my grandmother (she's still alive but we've been "claiming" some of her things that she doesn't use anymore w/ her knowledge and permission). I remember her milling flour when I was a child and so I asked mom if grandma still had the mill b/c I wanted it. (Grandma and Grandpa have a wheat farm.) They did and I got to take it home. :) It still works and Mom was even able to find the instruction manual. It was missing a part but I was able to order it online. (The instruction manual is copyright 1980 to give you an idea how old this thing is.)

Anyway. I finally used it today for the first time, but not for flour. I wanted to make some "grainy" banana nut pancakes (like w/ some oatmeal and cornmeal and flax and whatnot in there) and usually, I would grind some flax seeds in the coffee grinder. But the coffee grinder has been used for coffee since the last time I ground a grain in it, and some of the coffee "sticks" in there b/c of the oil content and I didn't want coffee-flavored pancakes. So I decided to try out the mill for my flax.

It turned it into flour. It was very noisy, like a very loud vacuum cleaner. A little bit of "smoke" came out while it was operating, and I thought it was the motor smoking, but it when I sniffed the smoke, I decided it was a little bit of flax dust. Then when I turned it off, I heard it "whine" as the grinding mechanism slowly came to a stop. It took about 10 seconds for the noise to completely stop after I cut the power.

But it was fun and I can't wait to grind another grain sometime. I have a whole bucket of wheat that Grandpa sent me home w/ too.

growing up but staying small

Lydia has more words now that she says spontaneously.

off - when she wants me to take her shirt/dress/shoes/etc. off
dress - shirt, dress, get dressed, or I'm dressed
juice
milk
weenwee - sandwich, although this word is soon to be replaced by sanwee since she's already started saying the latter here and there
down - put me down, I want to get down
c'mere (accompanied by her reaching out and grabbing w/ her upturned hands) - come here and pick me up and hold me
body there - is anybody there (when talking on the phone, lol)

She also is starting to put two words together on her own, finally:

nana bowl - can I have a banana in a bowl?
juice please

She goes to sleep like a dream most nights. She knows the routine and when I put her in her crib, she lays down and waits for me to cover her up and doesn't make a peep until after her nap or until the next morning. I'm still nursing her an average of once a day. When she's done eating, she will take her plate into the kitchen and put it on the counter by the sink (and it's so cute b/c she has to stand on her tiptoes and can barely reach it).

She is getting taller, but she's still in 12 month play clothes. I have a bag of 18 month winter clothes, so I'm hoping that the change in weather will coincide with her fitting into the next size. It's still too warm in the afternoons to switch her over to those clothes full time yet. She is a whopping 22.4 pounds, and about 31 inches tall. She's going to take after her mama in the size department, definitely.

Both of hubby's jobs are still going fine. My jobs are going fine. It's about to be peak season for transcription again. I was nervous for a little while because the operations were suspended while they worked on renegotiating their major contract, but they were successful so I will start back to that work late next week. I'm also working hard to get caught up on my play food orders, and I still have ideas for a bunch of new foods that aren't even on my "menu" yet. I'm hoping that my small work at home ventures will help us here and there w/ paying down debt and putting into savings and saving up for particular goals and dreams, including a house eventually, for one, but we are accepting that for now we will be in an apartment for the foreseeable future.

feels like fall

The days are getting cooler. It's nice to be able to open a window in the morning now and not be blown over by the heat and humidity. The afternoons are still pretty toasty, though.

Lydia is getting too tall for her 18-month dresses b/c at church, her little bottom peeks out from beneath the dress when she bends over. I bought a few long-sleeve T-shirts and some coordinating woven material, and used this tutorial to make some fall dresses for her. They turned out cute, I think:


The method can be used for any size, even on up to adult. I'm so excited with how cute they are that I want to make some next fall for her, too. Hopefully she'll grow a little between now and then. :)

Lydia loves shoes, no matter if they're hers or mine or hubby's. Hers are a little too small for her to put on by herself, but she loves to step into mine and hubby's, and even walk around in them:


Hubby's jobs are still going great. He loves both of them and is able to relax at home now instead of stress out wondering what he's going to do with the rest of his life. My "three" jobs are going ok, too, but I'm waiting on an unexpected update for one of them tomorrow. I am an independent contractor for that company, and they posted something the other day about suspending operations, so I hope there will be work this quarter. But if not, I still have the other two things to continue helping w/ debt, etc. Our credit card is finally under 6K again, so we're making progress there.