Learing to Communicate

Sterling is growing up so quickly.  I can't believe he will be one in a few weeks!

In the last few weeks it seems that he has grown so much.  I feel like he is comprehending so much more these days. 

He is growing so much in the fine motor skills dept, too. (or gross motor skills whichever has to do with hand motions).  He has been waving "bye-bye" now for a while but in true Sterling style never liked doing it when anyone else was watching.  But recently he loves waving to anyone he sees a stranger in the grocery store, his nursery friends at church, the trees as we are driving, and he does it when we ask him to and when we don't.

Last week he started clapping.  I thought they were supposed to do that much sooner, but whether they are or not, he is now a clapping machine.  He claps and claps all day long.  And after about a million games of pat-a-cake he can now play by himself!  Today, Alex said Sterling heard someone clapping on TV and stopped crawling to sit up and clap.  Then when Alex was telling me the story he started clapping again.  We hear him in his bed when he wakes up from his nap singing and clapping to himself (which is better than chewing on his crib).  He is so silly!!

Last week Sterling also started signing.  We haven't been nutso about it, but when I think about it I try to show him the signs I know, for words he would want to communicate.  He has gotten really whiny lately out of frustration.  I can tell he wants me to know something but just can't tell me.  So I started to step it up a little to see if he can learn some signs, since he is now waving and clapping I know he is capable.  Last week he started "saying" "more."  I was a proud mama! I have also been trying to teach him "eat," "milk," and "sleep."

Well, tonight I said, "Are you ready to eat?" as I signed eat.  He did it back several times so I took that as a yes!  Then, as he was eating he kept signing more so I gave him more corn.  Apparently that is not what he wanted.  He kept saying more and looking at his cup sitting on the table.  So I gave him a few sips and gave him some more corn.  After doing this a time or two. He started signing more and milk.  It was water not milk, but I knew what he was saying, more milk!!  He did it over and over.  I'm not sure if it was because he was thirsty or because he could tell I was pleased.  I was very excited and come to think of it the whining has decreased dramatically this week!