Ins and outs of HE

Today Iona seemed to suddenly grasp the concept and the word "in". She'd been playing with her Noah's ark and small animals, and I thought I'd heard her say "in" when putting an animal in it. Later, she got her teddy and tried to cram it into a (smaller) tin, while saying "in". We then spent some time together testing out which toy animals would fit into which containers, with Mummy saying "in" when we put them in, and "out" when we took them out. It's amazing how quickly she's growing!

I''ve also been astounded over the last week or so that when Iona points to her tummy (while saying "tu") she often then signs "food" and says "f". Likewise, just after breakfast today she said and signed food, then pointed to her tummy and said "tu". The really strange part of it is, I don't remember either David or myself ever telling her that food goes into her tummy! I guess we must have done at some point, and that for some reason it's stuck in her brain.

Happy Talking, Talking

Iona seems to be making huge leaps in her verbal ability at the moment. She's mad about colouring at the moment, and is forever asking for "colour" when she sees a pen. However, this afternoon I had to ask my husband if he'd been using the word "pen" to her, as she suddenly started pointing to his writing pen and saying, clear as a bell, "pen". I think we've both probably been using the word to her, actually, but she suddenly realised what it meant.

Then, just before she went to bed, she started saying "see" very pointedly. I couldn't relate that to any of the words she's been trying to say, so I asked her several times to repeat it and eventually said I didn't understand. She then pointed upwards towards the ceiling, and it dawned on me that several times lately she'd been asking, amongst a score of other things, what the ceiling was called. She obviously had finally remembered our answer. It's amazing to think how even the smallest words, that almost seem throwaway to us, are becoming really important to Iona's quest to understand every aspect of her world!

Potty talk

Yesterday I decided that Iona was old enough to begin seriously teaching her what a potty was for. I had previously bought her a potty training book second hand from the library, and we've looked at it several times. I'd also bought her a potty many months ago, but she'd screamed whenever I put her on it, so I'd given up at that time. Anyway, I brought the potty back downstairs, got the book out to read with Iona, and began teaching her "poo" and "wee". Teddy was also sat on his potty a couple of times. Iona wasn't too bothered to begin with, although by the end of the day she wasn't keen to sit on the potty.

I tried the same procedure again today, and then in the early evening Iona suddenly said "poo". To begin with I wondered what she was referring to, then, thankfully, I realised and whipped her nappy off. She barely sat on the potty, struggling and crying, but when she got away from it I found a "small deposit" left on the side. OK, she did the rest in her nappy shortly afterwards, but I praised her to high heaven anyway for telling me before she did it. It'll probably take a good few months yet, but at least the journey has begun!

Postscript - later in the evening Iona sat sideways on her potty, still wearing both her nappy and a great big cheeky smile directed at me, as much as to say "See, I can do it when I want to!".