There is a sweet little voice in there trying to come out. We are hearing it more and more. My heart literally bursts every time I hear it!

Courtney is finally starting to imitate. Imitation is such an important skill in development. It’s how babies learn everything at the beginning. Courtney couldn’t or maybe you can even say she wouldn’t. It starts with imitating things like clapping hands or touching body parts. She has finally taken it to the next level and will imitate waving/saying “hi” and “bye”.  I say it’s imitating because you have to do it for her to do it. You have to get right up to her, get her attention and wave and say “hi” for her to do it back. Such a huge skill. It always made me sad that people will go up to Courtney and say hi and she had no response. Now, there is a slight chance you may get a response!

Courtney has also shown us in the past several months that she knows most of her letters and all her colors. It is still very hard to get her to label any of the above upon request but if you listen carefully while you watch her play with her alphabet puzzles or her color sorting crayons you will hear the sweet little voice labeling. I wish I could take credit for her learning things. I don’t know how much school or therapy can even take credit for it. I credit youtube. I see all the research out there on how bad screen time is for kids. As much as I agree, I also disagree. I will be the first one to admit Courtney spends way too much time on her iPad. But…she has learned so much from her iPad. She watches youtube videos where people are singing songs about colors and letters. She watches them over and over and over again. That is what taught Courtney her letters and colors! There is one YouTube video she likes to watch where someone is playing with the same color sorting crayons that she has. They label the colors and the objects that they are sorting. When she watches that video, she now grabs her color sorting crayons and does the same thing. Thanks to YouTube, Curious George and Daniel Tiger apps, my little girl has learned her colors and letters and can now show us she knows them.

We are hearing more words but she still doesn’t use words to communicate. She Courtney still needs her talker for that. She also won’t always use the words upon request. But those words are in there. It’s part of the fascination of autism. So much is in that brain of Courtney’s. Now if we can only get it out of her.

There continues to be inch stones but inch stones we embrace and celebrate. We are so proud of our little girl.