petit compaore

We went in January, and it was the most favorite ever for Evence! Everyone else liked it too, but it is so perfect for his age.

He always has, but, well, I think this is exceptionally cute.
This is what I came home to today after work.

On Labor Day weekend this September we went to Pacific City to visit our cousins, who came down from Seattle. We had a great time together and we definitely stayed up too late. But sometimes exhaustion is worth it!
Here are some pictures.

Evence, for about a month this summer, was calling his siblings: Isaac-c-c-c, and Swa. Actually I think Swa might have lasted a little longer. It was interesting though because he didn't really say Sonia's name at all prior to that (right around the time he turned two). Then there was a transition period between Swa and Sonia where he would call her Sonia all the time except when he was mad, then it was "No Swa!" And yesterday he said "Wait for me Sonia!" So now he only says Sonia and Isaac, correctly.

Sonia is balancing on a tricycle in different ways right now. She was doing a lot of stunts yesterday too. Maybe it's time for gymnastics again.

Isaac is continually modifying a Lego scene/structure he has made and gives me daily updates of the little improvements he has made.

Evence is kind of potty trained, when he feels like it. I almost want to give up and put him in diapers all the time until Christmas Break, but I think he does way better when he's at home with Tantie Lydie and it's just the two of them. So. Hm. Anyone else have trouble with a child potty training and have tips? For Isaac I know we had to try three times and the third time worked. For Sonia we must have only tried once and it must have been easy because I don't remember it.

I ordered my Christmas cards yesterday! Not exactly day after Thanksgiving like I was hoping to do, but early enough that I will receive them before Christmas and maybe even be able to get them all to people within the Christmas octave. Hooray!

I'm intentionally going slow with Christmas decoration this year - trying to stay in Advent as long as possible. At the same time I am wondering if we shouldn't put something up in the next week. Isaac mentioned the Nativity scene. I want to put it up but Evence tends to chuck things around when he's mad so I'm not sure how to do that without ruining the whole thing. I have an idea or two though.

He is talking a lot now, in lots of two word combos, mostly in French, but some in English. He finally started saying Isaac's name again a few months back ( a year after he first said it and then stopped) and now says a different name for each person. He's finally saying "Sonia" although he says it as "Swa", as in "Byebye Swa". For a moment, I don't know if he was confused about who certain people were. He called both Tantie Lydie and Tantie Nadege "Didi" or "Lydie". He saw a kid at Isaac's track meet who was also metisse and went over to him and started calling him "Isaac" and hanging all over him. The kid looked a little like Isaac but it's weird that he was confused about his own brother. Anyway, who knows. Each kid is a little different and I guess he does have two siblings to learn names for, whereas Isaac didn't have any to learn. Another interesting thing is that he doesn't have a consistent name for himself yet. Probably it doesn't help that we have a bajillion nicknames for him. He does call himself "bebe" or "baby" and yesterday there was an attempt at "Evence" so that was cool.

I have this idea that I'll get this blog up to date a little over the summer but in case that doesn't happen (since I am going to try to build a chicken coop and a serious garden space in the just under two months I still have), here are the nicknames I remember us using with Evence:
Lieutenant, Evancio, Aymardo, Eventius (occasionally), Aymardito, Vancito, Evantiano, Evantiao, Bebitiano.

Evence is usually just saying single words right now, but this morning we were up together before everyone else, and all of a sudden, his little brain and mouth worked together amazingly and he said “I leed a banana.” Didn’t even leave off the “ba” in banana. !!!
This past week he said “bye bye” verbally for the first time. We had a snow day and Evence and I were taking a walk around the neighborhood. We were walking away from Lydie and I said “Byebye Tantie Lydie!” Evence said “byebye!” Cute! He waved byebye at bus driver Dave this week once too. It is fun to see him communicate more and more.

He understands a lot. He can identify his tête, nez, bouche, main, pie, yeux, oreilles, cheveux, dents and sometimes langue. It depends a little on his mood and attention but usually he can :)

He is saying a lot of words now too. I am doing a continuing ed conference and they were saying kids have 100 words by 18 months. I think she misspoke because the slide said 18-24 months. I think it’s more like by 24 months. But, these are the words I remember that he can say. He imitates really well now too so he will often try a word after we say it but these are the ones I have heard spontaneously.

Gestures: shakes head no, waves byebye (intermittently), points to indicate where he wants to go, pushes things away to refuse them.

Words: Mama, Papa, Nana, Boompa, Lydie (he says this as Didi or Lydie, he also calls Nadege Lydie even though he can imitate Nadege. He doesn’t yet say Isaac or Sonia even though Isaac was his first word, unless he is calling Isaac “caca” now and we haven’t figured it out.)
têter, lire, main, car, go, mimi(me?), chaussure, chausette, coat, la lait (milk or any drink), baby, oui, caca, pipi, beepbeep, ça, c’est ça. (22 words)

He is saying “daddy” a lot lately but we’re not sure what he means since we call Henri Papa...

He probably says a few other things but that is what I remember.