Talking more like a people, all the time.

[I wrote the first part of this post in, like, October, and found it in my drafts folder. I'm posting it now because HER WORDS ARE SO AMUSING]

One time, we were on a plane and Eleanor was eating a snack pack and there was a picture of a heart and she pointed at it and said 'heart!' and then pointed at her OWN heart, and I didn't know she knew that word and I almost died of the shock.

These days are like that basically all the time. Because she's like, What's DAT and you're like, That is a sailboat, or an orangutan, or a biscuit, and then she sort of knows that word (if it's a word like 'biscuit,' then she REALLY knows it, even if she calls it a 'fiskit.' You only have to tell her the name of delicious foodstuffs once). But you know she knows it, because you told her. Or you assume that someone else did.

But also, she is just sort of hanging around and listening all the time, and then later she's reading to herself and she's all, Ooop! I miss a page! Or she's beetling around the house, asking herself Where are you going? or What are you doing? or What did you find?

Or she's building a dinosaur out of blocks (it's the only thing she can build besides a tower, and it's a 'dinosaur' in the loosest sense) and he snaps in half and she's like, Oh, bad news!

Ok and NOW [this is the part I'm writing in February, not October] she just goes around, not just repeating things she's heart, but talking like a human all the time, (albeit one with terrible grammar and a weird, hilarious brain). I just never want to forget all the wacky things that come out of her mouth. Like in November when we were at my parents' house, and she's playing by herself on the couch and then looks over at us, hands to either side of her face with fingers spread, thumbs to her chin, and goes, I got a diamond face!

Or the day we got back, and she's rooting around in her soup with her spoon and then, Behold! A chickpea! And Joel and I are just like, What.

And THEN this last time we were home, we were walking the trails with my dad and Eleanor comes to give me a leg hug and then just puts her tongue on my jeans. And I'm like, Hey, cut it out! And she holds up her index finger and goes, Just ONNNNE taste. And I'm like, What? No. No tastes. And then twenty minutes later she comes at me again, tongue out and finger up, all, Just ONNNNNNE more taste. And I was so glad my dad was there because you need someone else to look at like Ha ha ha what even, child.

Never change, Eleanor.