As CJ approaches the age of 5 (hard to believe it is only 5 months away!) he becomes more and more independent. Sometimes this makes me feel a little nostalgic and even sad.
But not when he picks up his own toys, takes his own clothes to the laundry, puts his own dishes in the sink, or generally, cleans up after himself. That just makes me smile.
It is good to be 4. For the mommy, at least. 
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I came back home last night after being away all week dealing with my father’s death, attending the funeral, helping my mom get all the affairs in order, etc, and I was greeted by a really bright spot of information about CJ.
CJ had gotten his quarterly progress report from school while I was gone. He has 4 goals for this year as far as communication, and three of them he got “Satisfactory Progress”. Which is excellent. But even more excellent is that the remaining goal is now labelled “Mastered”.
Mastered: CJ will produce 3-5 word utterances including articles, pronouns, aux. verbs, and descriptors.
Report: CJ’s utterances are age-appropriate including appropriate word order, vocabulary, and grammatical forms.
A very sunny spot in a very dreary week for me.
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My father passed away in his sleep last night. He was 58. Heart attack is the likely reason.
My kids called him Poppa. Well, CJ did. Alexa wasn’t really saying much, even last Christmas. I always spelled it Papa, and he always spelled it Poppa. And really now, it doesn’t make much of a difference at all.
Honestly, I’m heartbroken. And too shocked to completely feel it.
the one thing I will always, forever remember about my dad is how proud he was of me. I was his little girl, who in her own mind didn’t always amount to much, but to him, I am a superstar. He always supported me and thought I could do anything, even when I didn’t.
He loved his son-in-law, and his grandkids, and sharing his spirit with them and me. He was always the life of the party and fun to be around. He was the guy everyone knew and everyone remembered. But mostly, he was my dad.
Goodbye, Poppa. We will all miss you.
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Alexa’s been in speech therapy, an hour once a week, for a few months now. And honestly, so far the progress she’s made isn’t really speech exactly. She’s making a lot more eye contact. She’s actually looking at you when you speak to her consistently instead of just when she feels like it.
But the biggest noticeable difference, to me, is that all animals no longer Baa by default. When we started this, they all did. Every animal baaaed like a sheep. No matter what they were.
But now, we have a huge variety of appropriate animal sounds. From cats to cows to horses to lions, and everything in between.
My favorite, and Alexa’s favorite at the moment, is the elephant. “Rooooooooouuuuuu” is the best I can describe it.
It is good to be two.
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One of the things the allergist told us at Alexa’s appointment is that letting a child eat the same food all the time leads to food allergies (regarding the food they are overloading on). That sounds odd. But accept that as true - I am in So. Much. Trouble.
Both of my children (especially CJ, but Alexa to a big degree too) like to eat one food all the time. Then after a few days, they want to eat another (different) food, all the time. They are bingers. they request the exact same snack (or meal) for days on end.
I blame Matt. He is like this too, but he can be reasoned with.
Alexa is tiny. She doesn’t eat enough in the first place. Deny her her current favorite, she just goes on a hunger strike. Right now, current favorite is South Beach High Protein Bars. She stole one from Daddy a few days ago. Deny her that as a snack, she just drinks water and pouts (or screeches, whichever).
CJ’s even worse. Give him something he’s unsure of, he’ll just gag himself. Sigh. Sadly though, he can somewhat be reasoned with (as long as the thing you are trying to replace it with is something he accepts as edible).
Ah, it is a FUN time around here regarding food, let me tell you.
And hey - the allergist made a tape recording of fully 40 minutes of specialized instructions for what to do for the house, regarding the cats, food, etc etc etc…. yikes. The idea just makes me cry. Literally.
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