Noa had a great weekend and there was something about her entire demeanor that seemed different this weekend - more engaged, more focused, though of course still super silly.

We were quite struck when, at horsey on Saturday, her trainer Margaret asked, "How many ears does horsey have?" When Noa didn't answer, she added, "Does horsey have 1 ear or 3 ears?" Immediately Noa responded, "Two!" We are so used to giving Noa options that include the correct answer, that we never considered what would happen if all the options we gave her were wrong! In any case, this turned out to be a fun game, and Noa seemed to like knowing the right answer that was different from the ones suggested to her.

Noa also seemed to really enjoy a rhythm (or maybe a short poem?) she came up with during her bath. It went like this: "hot water on hair and chair." She repeated it a number of times and later shared it with Daddy during breakfast. 

In other news, Noa did a great job of reading her journal with Mommy and spelled out the few words that she didn't understand (usually because they were names.)  She was also very happy that Mommy had followed her requested from last week and did shopping for shirts with shapes on them. 

Noa had a great weekend at home. She clearly enjoyed all the Halloween festivities at school. She wore her big, funny glasses and bandana all the home and all through a long ride on the blue stroller. She finally took the glasses off once she was in the house, but she kept the bandana on until bedtime and then wanted to put the bandana on her walker overnight and made sure I understood that she wanted to wear it again on Saturday. She also wanted to wear the same shirt in the morning (a purple shirt with two bird embroidered on it.) She also wanted to spell bandana several times. She was thrilled Saturday morning to find that her bandana was still on her walker, and wore it around her neck all day.

Noa was also very attached to a pair of purple and blue socks that she wore to horsey on Saturday, so much so that she didn't want to take them off when we got home even though they were cold and wet. Ultimately, I convinced her that we should put them in the dryer and then she could wear them later. She even came with me to put them in the dryer and press the start button. 

Saturday night, she told me she wanted the bandana on the walker again, and wanted to wear the blue and purple socks again as well. Unfortunately, I'd neglected to wash her purple shirt Saturday night (though I should have guessed she'd want it again) but she was agreeable - and settled for another shirt - when I told her I'd wash the purple one so she could wear it back to school.

In other news - 

• Noa asked me how to spell "lips" but when I got to the letter "p" she told me she was finished with "p" (she's done this before, she seems to want me to spell it differently) - we went around on this a few times with her continuing to tell me she was finished with "p."  Usually she eventually just gives up, but this time she started suggesting other letters I could use. She suggested "n." I told her that spelled "lins" - somehow (I don't even remember how) we got to a place where she suggested L-I-S-Y. I told her that spelled "lisy" and she liked that. I said okay, we can say lisy for fun, but I can't change the way we spell lips.
• Noa also really enjoyed reading her journal for me and especially enjoyed telling me that her favorite class on Thursday was "vegetable." She seemed to get that was funny.​