Matt had an exciting day with Jon today while I was at work. They went to an open house at a fire station, and Matt got to check out some vehicles. He also got a hat, balloon, stickers, and a coloring book, so it was a successful outing.
Matt is talking up a storm these days. He now says two, three, and even four words together, more and more unprompted. He is getting close to complete sentences, although he doesn't always include the subjects and/or verb, and it'll be a while before he consistently uses prepositions and conjunctions. He is also adding a second syllable back into words, which is helpful. Matt tells longer stories now, too. The other day we had to go vroom vroom in the car to the store to get more milk to drink in a cup before going to sleep (Matt, that is). But his favorite story is about our trip to the zoo last month, specifically our rides. He still talks about how we had to wait for the choo choo to come back so we could ride it, how we went on the yellow car, and how one of his friends went to sleep. Then he talks about how we went up [and] down and round [and] round on the carousel, where he rode the hum[ming]bird and one of his buddies rode the ze[bra].
Within the past couple of days Matt has shown some interest in learning the alphabet. Specifically, he's starting to learn his ABCs - or, as he says it, his CD! He knows some of the letters in roughly the right order or at least in the right half of the alphabet, including Z at the end. Jon had written a few letters for him today, and Matt drew a couple Os somewhat on his own initiative. (His Cs and Ds had quite a few extra flourishes.) We haven't even been really working on the alphabet, just reading some alphabet books now and then, doing a few alphabet puzzles, and singing the ABC song from time to time. But no rush - Matt still has a few years before he'll be in school!
Matt hasn't added any new interests this month. He's still into the same old same old, particularly trains. His puzzle mania has subsided a little, but he will spend a good deal of time on them when the mood strikes him. These days he's more interested in hooking things, specifically trains, together. (I've even heard him mutter, "Hook," while rolling over during a nap.) We continue to read a lot and are very well known at the library. One thing Matt started to do last month that I forgot to mention then was naming each book after one or two reads, but now that he's saying several words in a row it's even clearer. Sometimes it's amusing what he picks up from the title or story itself to use as his title. Before bed he currently likes to read stories like Cur[ious] Geor[ge and the] Fire[fighters], Gid[eon], Sheep [in a] Jeep, or Dig Dig [Mike Mulligan and His Steam Shovel]. (Who knows what he'll want to read next week!)
I just switched out Matt's shirts, sweaters, coats, and pajamas to size 3T. The 2T tops were getting to be just a little too short, and the 2T pants are still loose around the waist, so he was flashing more and more of his tummy. He'll definitely want that covered in the cold months to come!
I forgot to mention last month that Matt had finished getting all of his baby teeth. No more teething! We are all very happy about that. Matt in general is much happier now that he doesn't have odd things going on in his mouth.
