language notes

We bought a large toy at the flea market today - and Esme carried the toy into her room. I was out in the kitchen and was proud to hear her say this to her toy:

"You go in my room. See that sign? It's ESMES. My mom and dad - they do that, they make it, with the stuff. It's pretty cool. I like it."

She said a toy from the fleamarket needed a battery in it so it could make gas and go beep.

She said she was wanting to 'watching the cakes' in the bakery department. I tried to get her to say she wanted to look at the cakes instead. Later, she wanted to be watching something else - candies in vending machines - and again, 'You want to look at them, not watch them.' Esme: 'OK - I'm looking at them watching them.' *sigh*

After she got in trouble in town (not listening as we exited out into the parking lot) and was carried out to the car she is sitting in the seat with her arms crossed scowling at me. 'Daddy said I was a KID.' I told her she was a kid - a child, the same thing. She has been proud to be a 'child not a baby' lately - she decided she still didn't like the idea but cooperated getting ready to go home.

Later she was happily munching a sandwich I had made for myself. Then she peels back the bread and says Mama. Daddy not cook it, sandwich. It has white stuff in it. You take it.

She told a fish at the lake that it was going to be made into small fish sticks - we will take it home and cut it up and make fish sticks and eat them CHOMP. But it was really too small.

Things still a bit 'out there': This is from you, you can have it. And I can give it to you and it will be from you. Me: Err, you mean for me? Esme: Haha. You're right. I'll give it for you. Me: Facepalm.

She takes a bit more time now trying to sort out what she wants to say - which is a good thing and also can be annoying when what she is about to say is going to take forever and not be on topic at all. She will be starting to go out into left field 'and I will find a toy, and I will bring it, and it will be here and we will play with it, and that's a good idea Mama?' when we are talking about making lunch etc... When I try to interrupt her to redirect onto course she will squeeze her fists together and say in an agitated voice 'But I'm talking to you!' *roll eyes* Lots of arguments over that and I am glad she tells me she isn't finished just wish she didn't use that voice to do it.

She still says a lot of things are scary, or involve zombies, or bears, or 'bumping' which is her generic term for falling or crashing or colliding. Daddy helped a man who drove a van over a hill and had stuck the wheels out in the air -- and she watched him help get it off of the hill with a tractor. She said quite a bit about 'Daddy helped the man who bumped in his car, and it fixed, and it not bump!'

She tells me when she goes to sleep at night that her 'story will end when the clock beeps and I will wake up and come and find you!.' She talks a lot about how she will wake up after she sleeps and not be dead and it will be morningtime! This is a common worry among children her 'general age' on Hannah's message board. We have been talking about it and comparing the descriptions. She plays this game where she won't do something until I close my eyes - something she half wants to do but doesn't want me to know she will do it - ie: eat the rest of something on her plate. That is annoying. She has been practicing being 'good' and 'sweet' more, and as she has been able to speak her mind a little better lately we can usually get her to tell us what her current upset is about at the least... she 'misses the water' which is why she is so upset about getting out of the tub lately. Getting her to understand things we need to do for 'tomorrow' or further is still hard unless she is in a focused and ready mood.

Notes: She has started to call her 'ladies' at schools teachers, now. That pricked my ears last night as being a new thing for her. She still calls the other students 'my kids' and sometimes 'the children'. She says the other children cry sometimes, and they hit her sometimes, and the teachers help, and she helps them not to cry. She may not have needed the extra help the school is providing for her language - she may have grown out of what I was seeing - but she has improved greatly since she has been there in many things. She is getting different types of social interaction and hearing language she would not have at home.

When she gets to a 'regular' type school in a few years, this experience will have helped. And having an 'IEP' individual education plan will help as they might notice she is not just another fish in the school... they'll notice that anyway given a few hours to a day with her. She does some things like a kid three years older and some things like a kid three years younger. She is just being our Esme - doing everything on HER own schedule. Nothing too bad about that, except it drives Mom a little nuts at times ;) And those are the times I'm glad for Hannah's discussion board - the meeting place for other moms who have similar kids doing things all over their own schedules (asynchronous) and we can talk about 'what they are ready for' based on what they are already doing instead of 'what are other kids this AGE doing' which doesn't help us much.