Avery has a new friend. And not just any friend, he’s an imaginary friend. And not just any imaginary friend, he’s a dragon. Dragon appeared one day when we came home from somewhere and closed the door to our apartment. I can’t remember if we had to let dragon come in too, or if we had to close the door really fast so that dragon couldn’t come in and get us, but somehow dragon became friendly and now makes appearances now and again.
The other day I wanted Avery to go do something and she asked if her dragon could come. I said “sure” and that started a whole story about dragon.
“Dragon come with me?”
“Sure.”
“My dragon fine. He’s not roarin’.”
“That’s good.”
“My dragon in my hand.” (Shows me her hand)
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yeah.”
By the end I had forgotten what I wanted her to do, which was probably her intent all along. Clever little stinker.
We went to Vienna last weekend to meet a friend from Utah. On Thursday I told Avery we were going to Vienna. A couple minutes later she asked “Go to Vennia’s house?” She loved Vienna and asks every other day or so when we’re going to go again to “Vennia’s house.” And we haven’t even taken her to the Butterfly Garden there yet.
In everyday news, Avery loves to sing. We go to a group that some international moms do every week called rhyme time and we sing little rhymes like “The Grand Old Duke of York” and “Row, Row, Row Your Boat.” It’s really fun and Avery loves it. We do some that I did when I was little and some I’m learning new, but Avery sings them all week long. Her current favorites are “Wind the Bobbin” and “Sleeping Bunnies,” although “Roly Poly” and “Five Little Cookies” aren’t far behind. We sing outside, we sing (quietly) on public transportation, we sing at home… anywhere is a place to sing.
We also started learning sign language a little bit this month. That’s been really fun. A friend told me about Baby Signing Time at signingtime.com and I checked it out a couple weeks ago. There’s a set of sample videos you can watch on the website and Avery loved them. So we looked on youtube and found some more. We’ve learned lots of signs: cook, Happy Birthday, more, Happy Halloween, girl, boy, and probably 20 or 30 others. I’d really like to buy the DVDs, but we’d never get them here and they’re $23 each (there are almost 20 of them I think). There’s a combination pack for $700! Maybe when we’re old and rich. But we’ve had a really good time and maybe I’ll find some more resources somewhere else.
Avery’s a cuddly little thing, which is really nice. She comes and lies in bed with us every morning for at least a few minutes and sometimes we all fall back to sleep for an hour or so. She comes and asks for kisses when she’s hurt or sad and sometimes even when she’s being punished. Sometimes she can be quite forceful about it, demanding a kiss when she’s had her cheek flicked for misbehaving. She loves to sit on my lap and I think she’s figured out that Evelyn gets to sit on my lap when she cries because sometimes when Evelyn is crying Avery will start crying hoping to get lap time instead of Evelyn. Sometimes they have to share my lap, which doesn’t seem to bother either of them much, as long as they can keep their hands to themselves. Avery likes to touch Evelyn and Evelyn has gotten good enough with her hands that she can grab things and loves to pull Avery’s hair.
So, she grows and grows,
When she’ll stop nobody knows,
She has tantrums and fits and her toddlerhood shows,
But we like her, so we’ll keep her I suppose.
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