"H-B-E-N"

Haven is a talker...pretty much non-stop all.day.long. I truly wouldn't have it any other way though - she is so much fun! Some things I want to remember (in completely random order)...

• For as long as probably anyone can remember, Grammy has been singing (to the tune of B-I-N-G-O), "Dutchy dog has a girl and Haven is her name-o, H-A-V-E-N." We've all picked up on it, including Haven, and so she is always spelling her name "H-B-E-N"
• We didn't realize when we named Haven that it would be such a hard name for her to say. She would not even attempt to say it until she was about 21 months old and it first came out "Hay-en" then she transitioned to "Hay-nen." Prior to Hay-en, if she referred to herself, it was as "baby." V sounds are still difficult and tend to change on a daily or word to word basis.
• Haven also would not attempt the word "love" for the longest time. You would say "I" and she would repeat it back, then you say "love" and she says "you!" She now says I love you with the "v" as an "s" sound and it is too sweet!
• F's have also proven to be difficult for Haven and they were "s" for a long time (and sometimes still are)...oss=off, coss-ee=coffee, woss-les=waffles, etc. Oddly enough (or maybe this is normal), in the case where the f is spelled with a ph, it comes out as a p...elephant=ele-pant, phone=pone.
• She calls Aunt Amy "Ah-nee" I think it is the combination of Aunt and Amy because she can say "m" very clearly (she calls Emily Emmy). She is just now starting to say Amy more clearly, and it makes me a little sad.
• She also calls Grammy "Ganny" which Benton things is hilarious and was trying to teach her to say "old granny" :)
• I didn't think I talked on the phone very much, but apparently I do more than I thought because Haven is always pretending to be on the phone. Sometimes she uses a toy, but she is perfectly content just putting her hand up to her ear. She orders cokes and hot dogs a lot and her latest thing is to say "Car-ee H-Y-T" and sometimes that is followed up with counting. Seriously, we don't order food THAT often that she should know to say my first name, spell my last name, and then give a phone number?!
• Every night I try to remember to talk to Haven about what our plans are for the next day. Particularly when she first started MDO, I always talked to her about going to school and how much fun it is because you get to see your friends, play outside, etc. Recently, one Saturday morning she said, "Daddy go work" and I said no, he's at school, and she said "Daddy go school and play friends."
• Haven has recently taken a huge interest in praying. We went through a phase where we definitely prayed at least twice each meal and sometimes lots more. She always wanted everyone to hold hands, but now she alternates from holding hands to folding hands, sometimes mid-prayer. We started with "God is great, God is good, thank you God for our food," so her standard prayer is "God is great, mommy, daddy, Dutchy, Amen." Sometimes she adds more to the list or just repeats the three of us, and every once in awhile she throws a wild card and starts with "God ah Fah-der, we 'taint' you, (mumbles through 'for our many blessings') Amen." When I was putting her to bed on October 20, she said the longest, sweetest prayer - it totally melted my heart. There were a few weeks after that where we would hear her praying on the monitor either as she was trying to go to sleep or right when she would wake up in the morning. If that is music to my heart, I can't imagine how much more God loves to hear it!
• Haven went through a VERY long phase where she was identifying everything all.the.time. Mommy's wa-wa (water), Daddy's car, Mommy's bag, Pawpa's purse (ha! it's his briefcase), etc. She has since switched to "Whas dat?" about everything.
• Haven can count to ten, but she almost always skips four and says "fibe, sick, seh-men..."
• She can kind of sing her ABC's, but she has no idea what she is doing - it's more that she is singing a song rather than individual letters.
• She said "tatoo" for thank you for a long time and says "mulk" for milk, "grink" for drink, and "up-a-stairs" for upstairs.
• If I ask her, "do you remember?" she always responds with "member." And similarly, if I ask her "what do you think?" she says "do you tink." If I ask her "what do you say?" she always says thank you, even if that's not what I'm looking for.
• Haven calls a crayon a "cown" which is cute now, but is really one of my pet peeves, so I hope she eventually makes the transition to crayon :)
• We have finally moved on from listening to Barney in the car (Hallelujah!), but I am almost always told "no mommy songs, Hay-nen's songs" which are 25 Sunday School songs that (again) she melts my heart when she sings along to them. There is nothing sweeter than her little two year old voice singing, "I've got the joy, joy, joy down in my heart..."
• Haven says "Biiiible" with the biggest southern draw you've ever heard! That draw also comes out when she says "Ben" (two syllables) for Benton. He loves that :)
• Haven perhaps gets a little too much praise because she has been known to say "Hay-nen bootiful" and "look at my pretty gress" (even if she's not wearing a dress). However, she dishes it out too; she tells me often that I am "bootiful" or look pretty - sometimes she even tells Daddy that he is pretty. Such a little brownnoser!
• I am often asked, "Mom, where-are-you?" (somehow said as all one word), even if we are in the car and she can see where I am.
• I've been trying to be really good about giving Haven choices in all situations - grapes or blueberries, waffles or eggs, walk and hold my hand or be carried, walk thru the grocery store without touching anything or ride in the cart, etc. One afternoon as I was ironing, Haven was playing in our room and very sternly telling her babies, "It's your choice," over and over again. So much so that it made me feel guilty and prompted me to remind Haven that Mommy loves you and has fun with you. She also puts her babies in timeout...am I really that mean?

I want to go on and on and will have to keep coming back and adding to this list. I just want to bottle all of these up so I can replay them in eleven years when she is a teenager and maybe not so adorable.