A few more new words:

challah
cheek
necklace
earring
eyelash
elbow
pepper

Found that list!
Here are the words we noted as new (since we posted the last list), but as I said before, there are many I'm forgetting. I think it's neat to have some noted though, because it is telling to see what words she speaks first. You can learn a lot about her diet, her likes/dislikes, her personality, and what her life is like.

Dutton (can tell you now that her name is "Hapah Dutton")
song
dance
tortilla
everywhere (it's the last word in "Goodnight Moon")
home
beef
none (the latter three from the "little piggies" rhyme... she can fill in the blank when you say it with her toes)
some
more (the later two often said together, "some more!", but also said separately depending on context)
There it is!
heart
circle
star
square (these are the words she can say, but she can identify triangle, square, rectangle, circle, oval, heart, and star)
horse (usually said to cue me to sing, "Ride a little horsey down to town, ride a little horsey and down fall down!" while bouncing her)
on
off
top
bottom
in
out
boy
girl
chair
highchair
wash
dry off
towel
done
purple
blue
orange (can often, but not always, identify colors correctly. Today she told me, "blue shirt" and in fact, I am wearing one.)
pants
panties
shirt
dress
button
hands
arm
fingers
thumb
knee
back
toes
mouth
nose
eye
eyebrow
Elmo (sounds like "Alpo")
Grover
Big Bird
purse
Ahab (the captain of her boat in the bath tub)
egg
flap (the latter two from her "Little Duck" book)
Na Na (for "grannie")
Pa Pa (for "grandpa")
MaMa (a variation of Mama, for "grandma" and "grammer")
boo!
socks
shoes
you
stripes
dots
cup
house
mouse
car
bear
apple
nanas (for bananas)
easy (singing along with, "summertime, and the livin' is easy...")
cheese
berries
this
plum
sun
sky
half
bus (when playing with her wooden one, when prompting me to sing "Wheels on the bus")
bye bye
one
two (understands the concept of both one and two-- will answer correctly when asked "How many?" or will just tell you correctly unprompted sometimes too)
four
five (knows they're numbers, but doesn't understand them yet, really)
water
sit (says to the dog, mimics my palm toward dog-- by the way, Parker sits for her, too!)
puffs
those
do- dos
there
brocolli
beans
cute (usually referring to her hair clips)
[Harper also correctly uses plurals and possessives. She'll tell you when there are many "books" and when she is bringing you just one "book", or when she lifts the flap on a page and there are "hops" (bunnies) behind it or when she is holding her stuffed bunny, "hop". She will also ask for bites of "Mama's" food during dinner or ask for "Dada's" cup to clank against hers and say "cheers". If I ask her who's cup she's drinking from, she'll say, "Hapah's".]

Exciting Week
Last Wednesday Harper went to StoryTime at the library, where they read a few books about Autumn. She was very excited to be surrounded by "books!" and sat quietly on my lap while the stories were read, paying more attention to the many other children than to the stories. Next time we go we're going to check out some books.

Then Saturday (while Ethan was playing tennis with Ed) Erin, Miles, Harper and I went to the COS farm here in town. Harper got to see real, live cows, pigs, sheep, horses, and even a llama! She has been talking about it since! She'll list those animals' sounds to me, as if recalling the visit!

After the farm trip, we went over to ImagineU Children's Museum on Main St. We played there a while more. (That's where she learned "orange", from the orange padded play gym piece.) Harper always has fun with Miles. She loves to give him kisses. When returning from the kitchen, Erin and I found the two of them kissing in the living room! They give each other sweet pecks on the lips!

This Wednesday (today) we went to a nearby park and Harper enjoyed the baby swings. I told her she was flying in the sky like a bird so she kept saying "sky" and "tweet tweet!" and kicking her legs. Harper also walked all around that park and enjoyed picking up wood chips.

I was making a list of newish words that Harper now speaks, but it got lost somewhere. It was very long. I don't feel like recreating the list because it is very tough to keep track of all of them. Let me just say that she is able to communicate very clearly and even attempts many multi-syllabic words (tortilla, everywhere, brocolli, eyebrow to name a few). She always tries to say a word if we cue her with "Can you say _______?" and she understands when we're teaching her the label for an object. She also has a very good memory so she'll reuse the terms we've given her in other contexts as appropriate. All of this contributes to her extraordinarily large vocabulary.

The walking is tremendous. She's on her feet all the time now, getting faster but never out of Mama's sight. She's a cautious little thing. She wants to be right by my side all the time, which is convenient for keeping her safe and unharmed, but sometimes a bit tough because when it's not nap time, I'm expected to be performing and teaching and entertaining. With walking comes separation anxiety (typically) and Harper's no exception to this. She understands the concept of "bye bye" now, and she says it (verbally, and very clearly) to Dada daily. When he's not around, she asks for him, "Dada, bye bye?" with a questioning tone and her hands up. I have to explain to her that he's at "work" (another word she's recently learned) but that he's coming back. Sometimes (the separation anxiety, I guess) she'll get sad-looking and ask me, "Mama, bye bye?" and I have to reassure her that I'm not going anywhere. I feel very lucky that my girl is able to tell me when she's feeling insecure rather than just cry in the isolation that comes from not-being-understood.

We've begun to wean Harper, and I am sure this adds to the separation issues. We cut out the middle-of-the-day feeding and she had a conversation with me about it yesterday. Went like this: "Mama... ninnies... bye bye?" (For those outside my family, ninnies are boobs.) I said, "yes, bye bye ninnies. We'll have some ninnies later." I know she misses it because she talks a lot more about "ninnies" than she used to. I'm still nursing her right before bed, in the middle of the night, and first thing in the morning. The next feeding to remove will be the middle of the night, followed by the first thing in the morning, and then the before bed feeding. At least that's the plan.

Gotta run... more later! So much to catch up about-- I hear Harper waking from her nap!

With Elmo-- thanks Susan!

Carie's Caroline and our Harper