New haircut, new words

Alex after his first haircut at home.

Alex playing outside on the blanket again.

"I get a picture too!" says little brother.

Alex finally got a much-needed haircut the other day. I went into the local chain discount hair salon with three boys and our Russian-speaking babysitter and announced that I needed someone who could work fast. Well, they delivered! I had Alex watch the other two boys get their hair cut (little brother somewhat reluctantly), and then had our teenaged translator explain encouragingly, which he seemed okay with. Then I sat down in the chair with Alex sitting on my knees, facing me. Aside from some squirming around, he did just fine. The haircut...eh, we liked his hair longer, but it needed cutting, and we were more focused on getting through the event than outcomes. Next time we'll have them keep it longer.

Meanwhile, Alex has suddenly started acquiring English words at a very rapid pace -- more new words every day than we can keep track of. His biggest new word of the past few days has been "music." He loves listening to music on CDs and asks for it constantly from morning until he goes to bed at night. When he acquires a new word, especially one that is important to him, he uses it over and over and over and over and over and really I'd have to fill a book to give a true sense of how much he repeats the new word. Last night in bed, as he was listening to some twinkly nature music on a portable CD player, he kept saying "Music!" Or "Musica!" Or "Oosik!" Then: "Yes?" Over and over for an hour.

He has also been saying done (for "all done"), take, shoes, shirt, eat, milk, car, outside, TV, go, bag, stop, cookie, cake, and a handful of other words I can't quite remember at the moment, in addition to some words we've already mentioned -- yes, no, Ben, etc. He still uses "da" for yes, but will say "yes" when prompted. Everyone here knows that "da" means yes, and Susan and the kids will even say it to him, so that may be a difficult one to shake. However, he now uses "no" exclusively -- no more "nyet," at least not regularly.

We are off on a short three day, two night family vacation this weekend, so we won't be posting until the middle of next week. As a matter of fact, I intend to begin posting more of our "regular" Alex news on our family blog, which has been completely neglected for the past few months. We'll integrate him into the rest of the family news there. We will keep this blog up for major news on Alex -- surgeries, major breakthroughs, milestones, etc., so those who want to track his progress over the coming years can do so without filtering through our home recipes and vacation pictures. You can subscribe to this blog on Facebook or by e-mail to be notified of new posts.

Before we transition, though, I hope to write a special "thank you" post to the many people who have helped us out in so many ways. Look for that in the coming week or two.