Feedar, Gheetor and Mekis

At almost 28 months, Truman is emerging as an incredibly imaginative child. He's still focused on how things work, but he goes about the world seeing every object for its possibilities.

This weekend he took a vacuum attachment and used it as a shoot to slide a butter knife through. Then he found a water bottle top and placed it on the end of the attachment so the butter knife couldn't fall through.

This, then, became a tub of butter. He stuck the knife in the attachment, then took the cap off and made the cap into toast. After buttering his toast he offered it to me.

"Buttered toast!"

He like simple language and words that describe more than one thing. All mechanical things that fly are airplanes, even though he knows the word for helicopter. All birds are birds. After seeing a duck at the Stearns County Fair last weekend he called it a "duck bird."

He is also making up his own language. Feedar is a word of excitement and empathy. If you look sad he will come over and say Feedar. If something wonderful happens — Feedar! Gheetor is basically the opposite, or at least it leads to the opposite. Gheetor is his word for all kinds of violence. It can be a noun or a verb or an adjective.

If he starts getting crazy we tell him "no gheetor."

Mekis is his word for music. It took us a long time to understand what mekis meant, though he said it all the time. I have no idea why he says mekis instead of music, but it is a relic of his toddlerhood I will miss once it is gone.

He is starting to sleep on his own so much better than he used to. We started giving him a bed time. He's always reluctant to head to bed, but happy to fall asleep and now Joe and I are able to leave him for a while until we're ready for bed.

He also naps by himself.

He is brave and kind and starting to be just a little more cautious about the world, especially bridges on the playground that bounce when you run over them.

For the first time Khai would climb through something Truman would not.

They are emerging as even better friends now that they are on more even footing.