It’s amazing to look at my last Leo Lately blog post. It’s only been four months, but it seems so long ago! Over that period of time, Leo’s personality has continued to blossom and his speech has improved greatly. (According to the speech therapist at USD 501 he’s gone from being understandable 14% in February of the time to 58% of the time in May- yeah!)

Here’s some of the fun things Leo’s doing and saying lately:

• “But I want to right now.” Whenever I talk about future plans that get Leo excited, he wants to do it immediately. Whether it’s baseball practice after daycare, going to visit Grandma Vickie or just playing with Tony, Leo’s ready to go.
• T-Ball time. We’ve had mixed results with Leo’s first t-ball experience. He really likes to play, but still struggles with the idea of having to participate without mom by his side. I’m sure the fact that he was only a few weeks over the minimum age limit has a lot to do with it. Hopefully next year he’ll be ready to be a bit more independent at practice.
• Let’s play outside. Leo loves being outside. In fact, we don’t really spend a lot of time inside at all unless we’re eating dinner or getting ready for bed. Leo’s usually out back drawing on the driveway with chalk, riding his tricycle or driving around in his powered car that the landlord left in the garage for him to play with. When we’re at grandma’s house, Leo loves to play in the sandbox or help water the plants.
• Goldbug. Leo loves to spend time looking for Goldbug in his Richard Scarry book. He received it from Tony’s parents as a gift, and it’s one of his favorites to look at before bed time – especially if that means mom and Tony are going to help!
• “I want to see Carson.” Leo’s found his first official buddy outside of daycare. He loves spending time with Carson, his cousin-to-be. Leo asks about Carson a lot and really enjoys being able to play with him when we go down and visit on the weekends. They have a lot of fun together. : )
• Dinosaurs & Hot Wheels. When Leo does actually play with toys, you can usually find him with a series of Hot Wheels cars or a couple of his dinosaurs. He’s at the age where he’s pretending, developing stories and using the toys to act things out. It’s pretty cute.
• Shapes and counting. Leo has a pretty good grasp on counting to 10, but he’s starting to try to count even higher. It’s pretty cute because he’s consistently skipping a lot of numbers… 9, 10, 11, 14, 18, 19, 32, 99! We’ve also been working with him on learning basic shapes.
• Growing up. While we’re still battling with the whiney stage, it feels like we’re making some progress. For the most part, bath time is becoming more peaceful and he’s been great about allowing me to put in his ear drops without a fight.
• My fruity boy. Leo loves fruit. He is always asking for strawberries, blackberries and blueberries. He loves apples and bananas. If only I could get him to give veggies a bit more consideration!