Clementinese

For all of her toddlerhood, and quite a bit of her preschool-hood (so far), Clem has spoken what can only be described as Clementinese. She has had a bit of a speech delay and struggles with consonant blends, but with the help of a local SLP and her preschool teacher, she's just about 100% understandible these days! YIPPEE!

She's also FAR more willing to talk and try new sentence structures knowing folks can understand her now. I had to capture some of my favorite Clementinisms of late:

*"No, Jose!" she says (too often), forgetting the "way" in the middle.

*Everyday she talks about her "Sneaky peep." This is the kind of pee she didn't know she had but all of a sudden it hits her. Mostly this happens at night or while we're running errands.

*"Take a minute to come look at this mama," she says to me. A direct quote from teacher! Same as "Wait a minute! I have an idea!" with finger tapping her chin.

If you are on Facebook, you already saw this one last week. Lately Clem loves to tell each of us how much she adores us. Last weekend, she snuggled up in bed right next to me very cuddly like and said "I love you mama... But I REALLY love my daddy. A whole bunch." (She is daddy's girl.)

Every Saturday she does swimming lessons and as she gets dressed, she runs around the locker room singing "Single Ladies" by Beyonce. Only she doesn't so much sing it as she hollers it. I love this fearless performer.

After dinner each night as Cam and I start to unwind, Clem is just getting geared up. She bares her teeth, squints her eyes and points right at Cam then says "Let's wrestle!" And then they do--which mostly consists of Cam tickling her mercilessly, which she loves.

Clementine has discovered the power of telling tall tales. Stories she tells are a bit exaggerated lately. On Friday, she told her class at lunch that I was no longer pregnant with one baby boy but there are actually two baby girls in there (shenanigans). When I went to pick her up from preschool that day, other preschool moms kept coming up to congratulate me on the recent surprise. They had totally bought it! Clem was so embarassed as I cleared up the misunderstanding, clarifying that it really is only one baby boy.