20 months (plus two weeks and two days)

Dear Mateo,
Your 20 month letter, not surprisingly, is going to be a little short and is already quite belated. Despite our general lack of well-restedness around here, you continue to light up our lives! Here are a few things you've been up to recently, and a few photos.


We've noticed that you seem to have had another verbal leap recently. You've started to use the pronoun "I" in sentences - and you often speak in four and five word sentences now. You still sometimes use other pronouns (like in the mornings, you'll often say "carry you!" or "carry him!" if you want us to pick you up) to get your point across, but "I" comes out more and more.


You say the funniest things, only a few of which we can remember at this moment. The one I remember most was when you randomly pointed out, as we were walking home from swimming lessons, "I don't see a fan!". You love fans. And wind chimes. When your grandmas were here for two weeks after your baby sister was born, you loved to go out on adventures around the neighborhood with them and look for fans, air conditioners, and wind chimes.

So far, you seem to love your little sister. Of course, you've had your jealous moments and your capacity for whining has increased rather dramatically, but overall you're doing quite well. One cute thing is that you will tell us that baby Talia wants to go to someone else when you want their attention. For example, you might say "Baby Talia want go to Mommy!" if Mama's holding her and you want Mama to hold you instead.

Along those lines, you've become a little more...well, directive of us. We're working on learning to use "please," because you like telling us to "get it!", "read it!", "wash it!", etc.


You are also loving mama's milk more than ever these days, probably in response to how much your sister nurses. We've started having just a few sips of Mama's milk if you need a snack, which seems to be fine with you.


This month, you have fallen for cookbooks. You are very excited about the photos of all the different culinary creations and will often squeal in delight when you see the next picture.

One of our favorite Mateo-isms from this month: You've been carefully observing your baby sister as she nurses and have started announcing "Baby Talia say eh-eh-eh-eh...she nurses!"

We love you to the moon and stars!



love, Mommy and Mama