Playmate wanted – St. Louis, MO area. Approximately 2 years of age. Preferably female, but will consider males. Serious inquires only. :-)
Ok. So a toddler personal ad is ridiculous, but I really do need to find Ava a playmate. Ava’s starting to show an interest in playing with others. When a friend comes over to play with Michael she follows the two of them around. We were at the park recently and she was fascinated with a three year old little girl who was playing nearby, but unfortunately that little girl didn’t want to play with a “baby” and Ava didn’t even have the language to try to engage her. The signs are there that this would be the perfect time to find a friend (preferably female) for her to play with regularly. But I don’t know anyone with a little girl. Our neighborhood is full of rough and tumble boys. Seriously. I can think of 7 boys under the age of five on our street. But no girls.
Ava does go to daycare two mornings a week and her class is full of children her age, but I never really run in to any other parents. Is it ok to ask the teacher if Ava has one or two children that she gets along with the most and put a note in the box of the children asking the parents if they’d be interested in a playdate? It seems… weird. And a little desperate. I hate to come off as weird and desperate.
Does anyone have an opinion on that idea? Or have any other ideas? I’m completely open to suggestions.
A Speech Pathologist Mother and Her Daughter Diagnosed with Childhood Apraxia of Speech
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
The sun's gift.
Last night we were heading out to the mall just as the sun was setting. There was a beautiful sunset. I explained what a sunset was and asked Michael what he thought of the sunset. He said, "I like the orange clouds the sun made for me." His favorite color is orange and the sunset was primarily orange. I just thought it was cute that he figured that the sunset was special ordered just for him.
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Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Overshadowing
I haven't talked much about Michael here. He's an amazing kid. At 3 years, 3 months I'm starting to think of him as a little kid and not as my baby or toddler any more. He's so smart and helpful. He loves to figure out how things work and always wants to help fix things. He's had the opportunity to help both his father and grandfather with plumbing and car projects and loves it. He loves to be read to and we spend at least 45 minutes a day reading. He knows all his letters, both uppercase and lowercase, and he knows a lot of the letter sounds. Just this week he's started to help me read books. We were reading a Little Bear book and he could read the words "cat", "duck", "hen", "bear", and "owl" each time they came up.
He plays with Ava now and I adore watching them play together. The sound of the two of them giggling over playing tug of war or watching them roll around wrestling just fills me with happiness and pride.
He also talks all the time. Seriously. All the time. Constantly. Even when he's alone in his room I'll hear him talking through the monitor. He's talking in full sentences and is pretty much intelligible to his family and to strangers at least 90% of the time, so my speech concerns for him have disappeared. All the talking is wonderful, except for one drawback.
He spent this past weekend with my parents. Friday night through Sunday evening we were without him and it gave us a lot of one-on-one time with Ava. It was amazing. She was a lot more active and assertive and talkative when he was gone. She was the one getting to direct the play. She was the one being listened to. She was the one getting all the attention. It made me realize exactly how much attention goes to Michael when he's around. It's so natural and easy to interact with the child that is talking to you and so easy to overlook the one who is silent.
I guess I need to find a way to let Ava take center stage more often even when her brother is home. She's a delight. She's funny and sweet and interested in everything going on around her. When she gets our attention she just blossoms. Now how to make it happen without making her brother feel left out?
He plays with Ava now and I adore watching them play together. The sound of the two of them giggling over playing tug of war or watching them roll around wrestling just fills me with happiness and pride.
He also talks all the time. Seriously. All the time. Constantly. Even when he's alone in his room I'll hear him talking through the monitor. He's talking in full sentences and is pretty much intelligible to his family and to strangers at least 90% of the time, so my speech concerns for him have disappeared. All the talking is wonderful, except for one drawback.
He spent this past weekend with my parents. Friday night through Sunday evening we were without him and it gave us a lot of one-on-one time with Ava. It was amazing. She was a lot more active and assertive and talkative when he was gone. She was the one getting to direct the play. She was the one being listened to. She was the one getting all the attention. It made me realize exactly how much attention goes to Michael when he's around. It's so natural and easy to interact with the child that is talking to you and so easy to overlook the one who is silent.
I guess I need to find a way to let Ava take center stage more often even when her brother is home. She's a delight. She's funny and sweet and interested in everything going on around her. When she gets our attention she just blossoms. Now how to make it happen without making her brother feel left out?
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