Talking more and more

It's probably hard to beleive, but I haven't taken any new pictures in more than a week! So here are some more from the fall festival you might like. (I ate some blue cotton candy - I love the stuff! Thomas took off on a kid's dirt bike)

But I posted to talk some about Petra.

Petra is talking more and more. We have started to have little conversations. Yesterday, I think Thomas was surprised to hear her answering my questions. Basically she is answering simple yes and no questions. For instance, Petra do you want this toy? Petra do you want your juice? It is obvious when she is frustrated and nothing will please her .. no, no, no, is her response to everything. But then tonight, I asked her if she was ready to get out of the tub? Her reply was yes and she stood up.

She is also getting better at repeating more words. She often tries to repeat what we say to her. I have no idea how many words she has in her vocabulary ... this is some of what she said this weekend - yellow, table, bath, bow, hi, bye-bye, yes, no, bottle, turtle, night night, mama, dada, dog, moo, roar, meow, eyes, nose, blue, uh oh, row, stop - I'm sure I must be forgetting some. But not everyone would understand them. For instance, every word that starts with a "b" she says as a "d." so its dottle, dye-dye, dow, and dath. Even if I just shake my head at her, she will say no because she knows what means. If I say stop, she will say no ... not in a challenging way but in an accepting way that I mean no, stop. She even said Hi, bye-bye, and roared for Aunt Lynn over the phone this weekend.

And every time I leave the room she starts crying or looking for me. I usually put her down in the living room with her toys and with Tom and wander off to the kitchen to do something. Within 10 seconds I hear "mama" and she is crawling or walking into the kitchen wailing for me.

And interestingly she has a few favorite songs. She does not like Twinkle, twinkle little star. For months she has disliked this song, she starts getting cranky, hitting the air, and thrashing about when I try to sing it. When I put her to bed I used to try to sing it. She would rather me lay her down and leave her, than sing her that song. She prefers Row, Row, row your boat. And also "If you are happy and you know it." Whenever I start singing the latter song, she immediately starts clapping and smiling.

And like most children her age, she likes to throw her food, toys, and cups. In the truck we will pile toys on top of her for her to play with during the ride or put them at her feet so she can reach them, she slings them across the truck if she doesn't want them. If she doesn't want it at that very moment, she doesn't think it should be in front of her. Same goes for her bottle at meal time, if she is busy eating, she doesn't want in on her tray. I'll try to sit the bottle in the cup holder, she will say no and slap it onto the floor. I'm sure this will all change in just a few short months.