Highlights

I'm still working on my post about our trip, but thought I'd provide some highlights of our first week home:

Vocabulary
English words used independently: ok, Mommy, car, juice, milk, toast, soup, lunch, baby, purse, book. Will repeat lots of things when prompted, or when listening from the backseat to me commenting on other drivers.

Food
Likes: eggs (a LOT), quesadillas, grilled chicken and pineapple, corn on the cob, chicken noodle soup, bananas, clementines, any kind of toasted bread, hummus, grilled cheese, broccoli, Taco Bell (don't you judge me)

Dislikes: yogurt, apples, peanut butter, strawberries, red grapes (although green grapes are acceptable).

Sleep
She HATES to go to sleep, even when she's falling asleep on the couch or at the dinner table, but once she's in bed she conks out for hours. Sleeps all through the night and hangs out in her bed in the mornings until I come get her. Waking her up from naps is a battle - it's about 10 minutes before she's fully conscious. I put my ipod in her room and can confirm that my "Classical Mix for Sleeping" is indeed musical Ambien.

Books
Sticking to a stable of classics for nap and bedtime reading - Brown Bear, Brown Bear (which she pronounces "Ber-own Bear-a"), Green Eggs and Ham (Suzanne, this book was an inspired choice - she still stops mid-fit to listen!), The Color Kittens and Goodnight Moon. Since she sometimes requests multiple readings of the same book in one sitting, I can recite almost every word of the above list by heart. Any picture in any book that includes a duck, goose, or chicken must be noted with a hand gesture and sound effects indicating a quacking beak before the page can be turned. This is not negotiable.

Play
Likes cars, blocks (for building and for using as a pretend cell phone and camera), train set, play dough, baby dolls, tea parties and picnics. She enjoys imaginative play - she likes to "cook" for picnics and has elaborate conversations on her cell phone (block) - in Amharic, so I don't know what they are about, but a number of them are with her grandparents, so perhaps they know? She has a pink purse that she carries around the house and likes to take in the car - today it contains sunglasses, a baby doll, another baby doll's hat, the cell phone block, a change purse with $1.39, a Starbucks receipt, Burt's Bees lip balm, a Staples copy card, plates from the tea set, a handkerchief and the cardboard tube from a roll of toilet paper. Clearly she's prepared for anything.