The girls turned three this month and we just posted the thirty-six month photos.
The favorite word of the month is definitely “baboon”. The kids have an I Spy book with pictures of all sorts of toys, and when they found that one picture was a baboon, they decided it was their favorite picture. Eleanor always turns to that page and points it out and shows it to Miranda.
Miranda’s been experimenting with spelling recently. She’ll recite a series of letters and then ask me what it spells. More often than not, it doesn’t spell anything, but I’ll pronounce it anyway. She also tends to draw things and then step back to take a look at what she produces. She then declares what it is she’s drawn. We’ve been trying to teach the kids about rhyming, but I don’t think it has sunk in yet. One recent example that Miranda came up with was “octopus rhymes with rocks”.
Eleanor has been getting better about eating different things. This month, she was willing to eat penne with tomato sauce (previously, the only pasta she would eat was spaghetti). She has also been fairly open to fruit, and seems to like granny smith apples.
In the last week or two, Eleanor has suddenly decided she wants to include Miranda’s duck stuffed animal in their play. They were playing with some jigsaw puzzles and Eleanor and Miranda each had a puzzle in front of them. The duck was also sitting on the floor and had a puzzle in front of it as well. I’m not sure who was going to do the puzzle for the duck.
The kids had a trial session at their new school this month. We’re planning on moving and the new school wanted to make sure to give Eleanor and Miranda a trial run. They seemed to do okay. I think they were probably quiet and well-behaved because of the new surroundings.
Miranda has been preoccupied with favorite colors recently. She keeps on asking us which our favorite is, when there are different colored options. Agnes has decided to consistently answer “green”. I initially chose “blue”, but that was also Eleanor’s choice. I’ve switched to purple. Miranda always likes red things. I wonder sometimes if it has anything to do with the red car she drove at Autopia at Disneyland.
I did a bit of a quiz with the girls this month to see how many letters or numbers they can recite back to me. They can repeat a sequence of three letters without problems, but the instant I increase it to four, they lose track of them. For a short time, Eleanor was repeating four letters, but then she got distracted again.
This month, we stopped carrying around the Baby Bjorn toilet seat with us when we go out. The kids are fine propping themselves up with their hands when they use a regular toilet, and Agnes and I are always there to make sure they don’t slip and fall in. It’s nice to have one fewer thing to bring with us.
So, the kids are three now. They no longer qualify for free admission to Disneyland. I’m considering stopping how we track how many months old the kids are after this point. It may make sense to switch to “August 2008″ for the next update. We’ll see.