Month 17

Ruth's vocabulary, memory, ability to repeat, ability to put words together, etc. have really changed this 1st week of March...it's CRAZY what she is able to communicate!

Ruth is saying her name differently now. She says "Ruse". It's really cute. She is also saying her last name. If you ask her what her last name is she will either say "Cu-yee" or "Ruse Cu-yee". It's really cute, too!

Along with the change in her name, she is also pronouncing the "sss" sound in a more pronounced way. Words such as "bounce" receive a nice "sss" at the end.

My sister and one of her college friends came to visit at the beginning of this month! They actually picked us up from the airport on our way back from NY/PA. It was nice to see familiar faces! (Side note on our trip...we had to get up super early...I think around 4:30 NY time, so by the time we got to WI, Ruth was wiped! So much so that she fell asleep in the Ergo carrier and slept on me for about an hour in the fairly noisy airport while we waited for the girls to arrive to pick us up. She was such a trooper! On our flight out of NY, we ran into someone that I used to work with, and he gave us his 1st class seat!! We ended up having the row to ourselves! On our second flight we sat next to two older ladies who played with Ruth and were just great...thank you, Lord, for these blessings!) After we got picked up from the airport, we spent some time at a Milwaukee indoor market for lunch. This was my second time there...the food is unique and delicious! Ruth fell and busted her lip (again...this happened a few times on our trip) and was bleeding pretty bad. To help console her, I told her we'd go get a piece of chocolate...the lady ended up just giving her the piece we picked out! Very sweet (no pun intended)! The rest of their visit here...we shopped, cooked and baked (they both picked out a new recipe to make), went to a hockey game/out for ice cream (girls' night!), worked out together, went on a hike at our local nature center...in the snow, went to a nice restaurant one night, relaxed, went to the library to get some movies for them, played with Ruth, went to a cheese store (again...of course!), ate ice cream:), took them to get a doughnut at my favorite doughnut place (just a local grocery store), went to a goat farm/cafe, and just had fun chatting and catching up! We also went to Tom's farm for one of them to work on a school project. They watched Ruth one night for us, too, so that we could go out on a date!! Woohoo! We really enjoyed having them here and are so grateful they were willing to spend their last Spring Break here in WI with us!!

Ruth knows how to sing the "Itsy Bitsy Spider" and do the motions. She can't do it all herself, but she can sing along, and you can figure out what she's doing. It's too cute!

I introduced Ruth to "Ring Around the Rosy". She really likes it and will sometimes sing along. I usually have to initiate her "falling down", but she likes it and asks to do it all again after we fall:).

Ruth is still into jewelry...necklaces and bracelets.

Ruth loves going through the books on our new book shelf...
Scenario 1:  She likes pulling them off, opening them, looking at a page or two, closing them, and dropping them on the floor.
Scenario 2: She'll take them off the shelf one by one and bring them to you. When this said activity is over, you'll have a pile of books at her feet or on your lap.

Ruth is more consistently identifying colors day by day. She knows orange, yellow, pink, and black (I don't remember doing this one with her, but somehow she knows it) pretty well. And blue, green, and purple, as well, just not as well it seems.

We are continuing to work on saying "no, thank you" and "no, ma'am/sir" instead of "no".

Ruth is continuing to refer to herself in the 3rd person more and more. If she wants to do something (if I'm trying to feed her a bite of something, and she wants to feed herself), she'll say "Ruse". It's really cute.

She is also saying "go get it" and "hold it" on her own now and in context.

Ruth knows where her elbows and shoulders are now.

Ruth LOVES wearing her Nike "basketball shoes". She just enjoys putting them on to wear around the house. She LOVES going to watch Daddy play basketball (open gym night during the week) and really enjoys "playing" with him.

Ruth continues to love "Ring Around the Rosy". She asks us to do again and again. And she likes falling on Daddy. We use stuffed animals to help beef up our circle sometimes, too:).

Ruth can get down from the couch on her own without falling:).

Ruth started saying "Daddy" instead of "Dada" just this week (3/23). She is using it way more frequently now. It's not something we've been working on or anything. She just started saying it.

My mom, sister, aunt, and cousin came to visit us this month on their spring breaks! Ruth loved having them here...lots of attention and play mates!
We hung out at home, shopped, went to a hockey game, and went to a cheese store (of course:)). Tom and I got to go out on a date!

Aunt Maddy taught Ruth to count to 10 in Spanish. She can say all the numbers really well and can count by herself in Spanish up to 5 but needs help going all the way to 10. She seems to get side-tracked at "cinco".

Ruth loves orange juice and will ask Tom for when he comes home from work sometimes because they usually drink it together.

Ruth can stand on her tip toes and can say "tip toes". It's super cute!

One of our friends here gave Ruth a few musical instruments...one being a harmonica. At first, Ruth would just hold it up to her mouth and make a noise by herself like she was playing it, but now, she can suck in and out and really "play" it.

Ruth loves listening to "Old McDonald" in the van which she calls "E-I-E-I-O". She'll ask to listen to it initially and then over and over again.

I just have to emphasize how much Ruth LOVES getting all of our pantry items out! She'll do it on her own sometimes, but she REALLY enjoys having me sit in the hallway and bringing me the items one by one. She just LOVES it! We can this "cans" as I mentioned before. She knows the names of most of the items and will identify them as she brings them to me. She also will be bring items from her play kitchen, so I usually have quite the piles around me by the time we're done. She's pretty good and pitching in to pick it all up, too.