Big kid

I have so much to write about, but so little time. We’ve been busy with all the spring activities and end-of-school-year fun, which has left me with very little energy to write. So here’s a bit of a catch-up.

June is another month of many appointments for Colin. He sees the allergist and the urologist this month, has his six-month review with Early Intervention and then the twins have their two-year-old checkup the first week of July. Yes, you read that right — Colin and Veronica are almost two already. 

Colin’s walking continues to improve. Right now he’s at about a 14-month-old level for his gross motor skills — which makes sense because he’s been walking for about two months. He is just starting to run, and is getting better at that skill very quickly. But he still struggles with his balance and we cannot get him to look where he’s going, which is especially problematic as we’re working on actually walking up and down the stairs, rather than crawling. 

Colin also is adding lots of words to his vocabulary — but I’m not sure how many anyone besides our family would understand. At this stage, he should have at least 20 understandable-to-the-outside words. By my estimate, he’s at about 15 that others would be able to make out. Not too far off, but for the most part he still sounds like he has a mouth full of gravel when he’s speaking. (Of course, the fact that he typically has a mouth full of fingers doesn’t help the clarity of his speech — but that’s another story.)

Veronica is full-on into the Terrible Twos, and apparently has inherited Mommy’s temper in full measure. We had one morning last week where she ended up in time out before I was even able to get her diaper off in the morning. It was not a good day.

On the other hand, her verbal skills and cognitive development are amazing. She regularly says four or five word sentences, and initiates conversation regularly. Yesterday, when John brought her down for breakfast (where Colin and I got an early start), she walked up to me and said, “Hi Mommy, How are you?” Her speech, overall, is very clear. Of course she still has several words that sound alike to me, which causes problems when I can’t figure them out contextually. Again, that temper.

We also can see Veronica making huge leaps developmentally as she figures things out. 

Last week, she and John and Colin where playing a pretend eating game the twins enjoy outside (they “pick” food off our neighbors’ fence posts and feed it to each other). John was a few feet away from the twins, and Veronica “picked” something for him to eat. She started to walk over, then she must have decided it was too far because she “threw” the food to John and said, “Catch.”

They’re both also aware that they’re not babies any more. John has been working with them on the difference between baby and big kid or baby and boy or girl, because honestly it gets a little embarrassing to have the twins pointing to a three- or four-year-old and shouting “baby” when they go by. 

Veronica now feels she has this down. If you ask her what Colin is, she points to him and says, “boy.” Then if you ask her what she is, she responds, “Big kid.”

“Isn’t Colin a big kid too?”

Veronica (pointing to Colin): “No. Boy.” (Pointing to herself) “Big kid.”

So the world is divided into three groups in Veronica’s world: adults, boys and big kids. And no amount of arguing is going to change her mind.