A picture is worth a thousand words. . .

Love that static.
Her early morning "Spring Bunny" bubbles.
Want some?
Brrr, that's cold.
Double fisting the suckers. . .

Sometimes it's nice to have the words too. . .

My Whitney is definitely turning out like my Molly . . ."Miss Independent".

She's potty training herself, she doesn't need much help with anything--she won't ask for help even if she really does need it, and she wants everything her way.

She also seems to want to have her language come "her way."

She's always babbled just a few words and I never thought much of it. . .then I really started to pay attention when she was almost 2 (this past March) and realized that she really didn't say much of anything. Not even Mom and Dad. I brought it up with my Dr and he didn't seem too concerned but recommended that I wait 6 months, then I can see where she's at and get her tested with LPS (Lincoln Public Schools) to see if there's any language development issues, OR I could just go ahead and get her tested.

I opted to go ahead and get her tested. I know several people who have had the services of LPS, in which therapists of all kinds come to their home and work with their little ones, and all have had great outcomes.

SO, in early April I got her tested. Whitney is a smarty pants, she can understand anything you say to her, and did lots (and still does a little bit) of sign language to help her communicate. From very early on she could follow any command you gave her, no matter how many steps.

We had her hearing tested first. I always wondered since she had the milk/soy allergy if it was affecting her hearing (some studies show that "allergy" babies develop fluid in their ears that affects how they hear and how they hear themselves speak, and usually end up getting tubes). Her hearing ended up fine, although she screamed through most of it. On to the speech pathologist. She just played with Whitney and tried to get her to mimic and babble along with her. Whitney didn't do much, but did say a few words. So, at the end of all the testing we/they determined that her comprehension was well beyond her age, but her speech was delayed.

Her speech therapist Deenie had her first appointment while I was out in Utah for my girls weekend. The therapist is good for Whitney but also good for us. . .she has tons of tips for working with Whitney and tools for her language development. In essence, we were letting her get away with way to much and we needed to make her work harder.

Matt called me after the first appointment and put Whitney on the phone. I heard her say

"Bubbbbbble!!"

I almost cried. She went on and on. . ."Bubble, bubble, bubble, bubble." Needless to say Deenie had brought her big container of bubbles to the appointment and they didn't get much further than bubble, but that was fine by me. To this day, when I say Deenie is coming, she starts saying "Bubble, bubble!"

A week after I got home from Utah, I was at the dance studio with the older girls getting their pictures done with their classes. Whitney was across the room and I heard her actually call after me "MA!", with her little cupped hands around her sweet mouth. That was the first time she had ever used a word to get attention from Matt or I, besides just fussing.

4 months later, I think language is finally clicking with Whitney. She's still delayed but she's come a long way. I think the hardest part is to not compare her to where my other girls were at her age, or how the boy down the street talks in complete, complicated sentances and he's younger than she is. But here's some other milestones:

***While out in Utah this summer, my sister Heidi got Whitney to say her first 2 word combo. Actually it was 3 words!
"Ice, ice, baby."
Whitney could say the SSSSS, and kept wanting ice, so Heidi worked on that one with her, and as soon as she got it, one of the kids started saying "ice, ice, baby" and she was off. It's really cute.

***A few weeks ago I heard her in the other room babbling, and I finally caught on that she was singing the ABC's!!! (or at least I could understand about every 5th letter). I will say that her "Bubbleboo" (W) was definitely the cutest.

***With the help of her speech pathologist we got Whitney into a free program with another speech pathologist. She usually works with severe cases, but likes to have some lighter cases in her workload too. SO, she'll be able to meet with her 3x/week starting this fall and it's FREE!!!

***When I say to Whitney "They tried to make me go to rehab". . .she chimes right in with "No, no, NO!" Click here if you're not sure what that means.

Ok, so I'm not so sure how her speech therapist is going to feel about that one. . .