Great News!

Jack & Cullen have made so much progress in their speech over the past 3-4 weeks that they no longer qualify for speech therapy! When we arrived at their appointment yesterday I told the therapists they had been doing much better at speaking or at least trying to speak and wasn't sure they still needed therapy and I was so happy when they confirmed it! The 3 therapists spent an hour interacting with the boys and assessing their cognitive abilities, gross/fine motor skills, emotional/social skills, and receptive and expressive language. At the end they told me they were right where they should be for their age!

Their speech, or "expressive language" as they called it, was still a tad behind the age-appropriate level but not delayed enough to qualify for therapy. Jack now has about 20 words or "word approximations" (they count signing as a word approximation) and Cullen has about 15. This is a huge increase from the 4-5 words they had last month! They said the boys were talking at an 18-19 month level but that in order to qualify they would have to be at or below a 16 month level. They recommended that we continue to encourage them to speak at home but said that it seemed to have finally 'clicked' in their minds and it was obvious they were trying to speak and making lots of progress in it.

In all the other areas they were right on track with their age level and socially/emotionally and in receptive language (understanding) they were even at a 24 month level! I got a kick out of the fact that they can actually assess a toddler's social skills- does anybody else think that's funny?

Anyways, I'm very glad that the boys have begun to communicate more. I've noticed a huge decrease lately in whining and in their frustration level (and mine!) and an increase in obedience and contentment. They still have temper tantrums a few times a day just like any other almost-2-year-old (mostly stemming from disputes over toys and not wanting to share with their brother) but they don't get so frustrated over every little thing anymore.

And they're learning and repeating more words every day. Their new favorite word is "buh" for bus and they shout it out every time they see one (or see any truck, big van, tractor, etc). Over the past couple days, I must have heard that word at least a hundred times! But I don't mind one bit ;-)