Edwin has so many words, letters, and some numbers now!  One of our favorite is that he says oatmeal, or at least tries.  It comes out sounding like "Mitmo" or "Atmo".  His word for water is slowly becoming correct.  It started as "moyle" which ... I am certain he would NOT be asking for a moyle if only he knew....  but then it became "oil" which was better.  Now it's getting closer to "wadeh".  When he's hungry or begging off you, he'll say "Bite-ey!".  He can say 'sausage' in a convincing way and he's started eating scrambled eggs.  (Good for me, so he can eat them with me!!!) It's really nice, because now I have a clue when he's hungry or thirsty!  He won't ALWAYS tell me, but it's moving in that direction!  He is starting to get the word "Car" pretty well, too. 

He gets many letters occasionally, and particularly when he's in the mood for it.  He gets Q, Y, 9, 2, for example.  He seems to know BOTH M and W, but not other letters/numbers which get flipped. He knows O apart from Q.  He realizes I may or may not have serifs, so it's not suprising that he's still having trouble figuring out why T isn't an I also!!!  Gosh, how to explain fonts to a 21 month old!???  Blah!

He also responds to sentences like, "Go get in your highchair!" and "Let's go downstairs" by taking the requested action.

This is insane, but fun!  Edwin is starting to learn letters.  The other day, Michael was showing him the ABC book I made him (by photographing all his foam letters from Carolyn and printing them out into a booklet using Shutterfly), and he was able to identify 6 letters before he started missing them.  He got I, O, A, T, V, and P I think.  He's still shaky on them, but he usually gets O and the others he kindof is getting.  A and I sound alike, and he likes to call T an I still.  B, V, P (and Z?) are so similar to say also.  What fun!

Warning: this has nothing to do with Edwin:  I was at Gimme! today and Madonna's "Material Girl" was playing.  It struck me that I love this song as well as "Captain Jack" (Billy Joel) and "Margaritaville" (Jimmy Buffet) and there are probably lots more that I'm forgetting.  When I was a teenager, I took the lyrics to these and similar songs too literally and was totally disgusted by their very existence.  I could not believe anybody would write or sing such a thing!  But, I realize that these artists are making fun of society, even as they make fun of their very fans, and I find this so completely amusing now!  I just couldn't help but note this...

So much to say!  He is learning to say letter names rather quickly and accurately now, although it's sortof hit or miss on recognition of most letters.  He usually gets O right though, confusing T and I. 

The other day, he wanted to get up to the counter where I was working in the kitchen, and he went all the way over to the table to get a chair, drag it around the 'bar' and over to the counter, and climbed up on the chair so he could reach the counter. 

He says "socks" for his mittens, which is not something we taught him!  He says "shoe" nicely.

At Sangam's today, a musician noted to us that Edwin was singing nicely in tune, copying Mommy.  ("E-I-E-I-O").  He had to say Bye-Bye to two tables of people by the time we left (a family of 5 and a couple) because he'd managed to flirt with them all over dinner.

A couple days ago, when I turned my back for 10 seconds, he started unplugging and plugging-in the electric blanket (which was off).  He was doing it totally correctly.  It was so hard to ask him to stop, because I was so proud of him doing it and doing it correctly!!!  But he nicely redirected his energy elsewhere.

He eats sliced apples now and even ate half of an uncut apple today!

So, I was visiting Lauren and her family, who are about to leave the country for awhile...  And one of Lauren's friends is a speech therapist/pathologist.  So, I asked her how you know if your child is having issues.  I asked her how you know when a word 'counts'.. and she asked if other people would be able to recognize the word.  I said, "How do you know which people count???  Do grandparents count???" and she said they did. She was encouraging of using the free assessment offered by the county, and as we were talking, Edwin picked up a magnetic capital letter I from the fridge and cutely said "I".  She replied that that was pretty impressive.  I guess he's pretty amazing...  He knows "I" and "O" now, on his foam letters.  How awesome!!!

He also says open/close for many objects, including lights and water faucets.  This is cool to me, because Irene used to do that, since the Greek language does that.  Yesterday, he picked up his mittens and said "Socks".  (He says "shoe" and "sock/s" appropriately.)

Today, at the LLL meeting, we were in the hall coming back from the bathroom, and he stops at this guy's office and looks at him and says, "HI!!!".  The guy starts asking him something and Edwin says, "Yeah."
appropriately. 

I'm starting to think he may actually be talking...

We have had this most incredible day!  It's nearly 11pm and it's still around 50F here.  The record high for Jan 7 is now broken.  It was 45-61F according to the records (64 in Syracuse), but our thermometers all read higher, with the one upstairs reading over 70 (but it's often a bit high).  I turned the heat off and opened the upstairs windows from noon to about 6:30pm and I put up the little tent and had Edwin take his nap (4pm to 6:30) in the tent.  What fun!  I raked from 4-5pm in the backyard while he slept.  The heat is 'back on' but the thermostat still hasn't triggered.  The upstairs smells fresh for a change - instead of just the kindof stale air.

We also met up with Anne today for lunch, yipppeee!!!  She is also planning an HBAC, with her baby due mid-May. 

And...  I think Edwin tried to say his name today!  I was saying "Mommy, Edwin" and pointing, and I think he said "Edin".  Sooo cute!  He's playing on his comptuer now right next to me on mine.

Well, I need to update the little guy's photo, don't I???  In any case, I should make note of some of his doings of late.

He made his first transmission on 146.58 (Ham 2m band) last night.  I don't think anybody heard us.  He was tired enough that it was okay to bring him into the geek room, and he was tired enough that if I *didn't*, he would cry rather than play.  He played with Michael's oscilliscope, although it was off.  Then, he played with a keyboard and finally turned on Lambda (an old Intel sitting around).  Then, he wandered over to the milk-crate full of HT's and managed to find the only rig with any amount of juice in it.  I didn't even know the Alinco had anything left in it!  (It's a little 300 mW.)  So, I had to go ahead and ID just in case the rats downstairs were listening.  (No, we don't think we have rats anymore, but we constantly joke as if they were still there...)

Also, yesterday, after dropping Michael off in Syracuse, Edwin and I headed out to Babies R Us to look for a new carseat for his sibbling.  A very nice gentleman (who has a 12 year old and a 1 month old at home) assisted us in trying to figure out which seat would best fit into the car.  Funny thing, though, I had been talking with him for probably close to 10 or 15 minutes and even though he'd been very helpful, he kept trying to sell me a stage 2-3 carseat and asking how old Edwin was and which way he was facing etc...  When we got to the car to test out the fit of the floor-model in the car, he handed it to me facing the wrong way, and suddenly I understood what was going on.  "You said he's 20 months old and 26 pounds, so isn't he facing forwards?"  heheheh...  Then I said, "Yes, *he* is.  But, I'm pregnant."  "Ohhhhhhhhh!!!!!   I know what you're doing now!  I know which carseat I want  you to try now, I'll be right back with it!"  And off he went to bring back the other model.  He said I didn't look pregnant at all.  Hehehehhe...  Even Jean, a Gimme! regular, has said this whenever I'm wearing one of my baggy coats.  My RPI Ambulance jacket is large and  so is the one I got in San Francisco- and people don't even know I'm pregnant in them.  But, I'm getting rather large, I think.  Not like 9 months, but hey, I'm almost 7 1/2 months now!