Lexi and her new toys

Lexi's grandparents brought her a variety of things from her relatives out West. Probably the current biggest hit (and this can quickly change!) is a doll from her great aunt and 2nd cousin. It has clothes which Lexi can ask the adults to take on and off (she can't quite figure out the velcro). She enjoys pushing the doll around in the stroller that her Baba and Lolo got for Lexi to ride in. She was doing this on the streets of NYC which garnered her lots of comments. Today she wanted to go out for a walk - which consisted of her pushing the stroller with the doll in it. Then when she got tired of that, she walked and carried the doll and Mom had to push the empty stroller.

She also had a babysitter this morning and got to show off all of her stuff to her. The books, the bunny, the stickers, the ball - Lexi sends her thanks, West Coast family!

Various and sundry

Some days Lexi plays so nicely by herself and other days, she doesn't. Yesterday was one of those days where she did pretty good. Her latest amusement is to take her potty from the bathroom and put Baby (her bear) and monkey in it and push them around. Back and forth they go, sometimes falling out, sometimes one of them sitting out a turn. Then they all lie down on the floor or sit by the door to the back porch. Lexi will sing and have them dance or just move them around.

On the weekend, we went to a picnic out on a farm in rural Maryland. Lexi made 'friends' with an older lady and led this woman around for at least 15 minutes. Later, Lexi initiated climbing into her lap which kind of surprised me. She's not always that willing to go to others. Lexi also like looking at the other kids and seemed to want to get involved in their activities, but they were a bit older than she and so that was a bit tough.

Lexi is letting me read to her again though sometimes, she grabs the book out of my hands before we have made it to the end of the story. She will read to herself making noise and flipping pages though she ends up skipping quite a few pages.

She is liking swimming more and more though she doesn't rush right into the water when we get there. We also took her on the bike for the first time. She was very excited about going biking and once she was on Dad's bike, she did cry a little, she soon calmed down and seemed happy to have gone. Mom finds that she is out of shape - DC has more hills than one would expect!

I can use my articles too!

For the past week or so, Lexi has been speaking in complete sentences. Certainly she has been saying things that we have been able to understand for a while, but her words have been mostly in broken, incomplete sentences and just a few words strung together - baby talk, in other words. But within the last week, she has said these sentences, word for word:

• At lunch one day: "I want the [peanut] butter."
• Looking at the stamp on a letter we got in the mail: "Is that the flag?" (She has loved the American flag since we attended the Memorial Day parade a few weeks ago and she was given a small flag to wave.)
• For the first time yesterday, she answered this question directly when I asked her "What's your name?" She responded, "It's Lexi." But sometimes her Es tend to sound like As, so it sounds like she's saying "Lahxi."
  

Look! I can read now!

OK, maybe my reading skills still involve quite a bit of singing too.

Boy or Girl?

I know that Lexi has short hair and she is usually dressed in colors that could be called 'boy colors' but even dressed in pink, she still gets called a boy. This wouldn't be unusual in other places, but would Americans really put pink shoes on a boy?? I don't think so. I don't care so much but it is interesting to tell people that she is a girl and see what they say next. 'Sorry' is a frequent response though personally, I don't see what there is to be sorry about. I am not planning on growing her hair long either. It seems to be rather thin and when it gets longer, it gets scraggly looking. So she's not going to be wearing pigtails any time soon.

That Funny Girl

Lexi asked to take her nap today. So I put her in her bed sans her pants because it was getting warm. 20 minutes later she is still not sleep but just talking to herself. That's no problem - but when I look at her, I see that she is no longer wearing her diaper. That IS a problem. I replace her diaper and she does eventually go to sleep. I am not quite convinced that this is any sign that she is ready for toilet training. There is still no desire or interest or understanding that she needs to sit on her potty. Instead she wants to take the little yellow bowl out and put water in it or pretend to drink from it or take that part to a different part of the house. None of which that little yellow bowl is intended for.

I was looking online at a site that talked about a bike ride that takes place in the nude to protest gasoline use, etc. Lexi clearly knows what naked is and pointed to the appropriate pictures. Smart cookie, hmm? Don't worry, we are not participating in that bike ride though I did just order a bike seat online for Lexi. She sounds interested in riding on the bike. Hopefully, she will be when the seat comes.

This morning we went to play group. She actually shared something with one of the other kids - I was pretty surprised. She normally wants to say that things are hers (MINE!).

We were sitting outside on the porch late this afternoon. I suggested that we go la-la (sleep) in our chairs. Even though her head is all sweaty because of the heat, she insisted that I get her blanket for her.

A demanding child

Scene this morning:

I woke up and got out of bed. Lexi saw and heard that I was awake. She called for me: "Up." I lifted her up out of her bed. Sarah was trying to catch up on some sleep and was slower in getting out of bed. But once Lexi was out of her bed and standing next to Sarah in her bed, she commanded, nicely at first, "Come out." When it appeared, only a second later, that Sarah wasn't going to move, there was a second "Come out!" in a shrieking voice. What choice did Sarah have but to get out of bed?

Lexi and the babysitter

Lexi stayed with a babysitter for three hours while I went to talk to a recruiter. I was a bit worried about how she would react since she still doesn't like to be away from me. I think she did ok though. The babysitter said she did have a melt down about 1 hour after I left - wondering if Mom was really coming back. She definitely seemed to happy to see me, but now I feel better about leaving her in the future - for hopefully, real job interviews!

The picture attached is of her in a new coat for the fall with a sock monkey from Stephen's parents. She actually understood that I wanted her to pose for the picture. A first!