If anyone can give me an idea or has had similar experiences your children as little ones, that would be interesting. Here's the lowdown on my DD2.5.

She has never been advanced with gross motor skills, crawling and walking at the average time.
She started speaking about 25 words at 17 months and then just went in fast forward with her speech.
Before 2, she could:
speak in 5-word sentences
recognize the entire alphabet, upper and lower case (22 months)
knew all the sounds each letter makes
could count to 20
recited books we read to her only once or twice
memorized various nursery rhyme songs after hearing them a few times
could sight-read about 25 words in both upper and lower case or mixed (dog, cat, elmo, mommy, go, stop, etc)
could spell her name out loud (20 months)
knew all her shapes and colors (20 months)

Now at 2.5:
solves puzzles of 24 pieces (I haven't gotten anything bigger than that yet)
operates the computer mouse perfectly, opens certain programs and navigates through websites (right now she's drawing on the computer with free software, Tux Paint)
completes a 12-card memory game on the computer
comprehends a large vocabulary from us - we talk to her like she's 4 or 5 because she responds better to it (our family probably thinks we're nuts)
She can type her name out on the computer
Started teaching herself to sign the alphabet by herself


She does not read yet, but I think she's close. Lately she's been naming all the letters in a word and then "reading" it (for instance she took my lotion bottle, read all the letters in the word "continuous" and then said, "Mommy's lotion!" as if that's what she was spelling out).
DD has always LOVED being read to. When she was 18mo or so, she became obsessed with this Pooh ABC book so that I had to read to her at least 25 times a day, no exaggerating. We realized later she was trying to memorize all of the letters. Today at lunch, she said, "I'll stay with mommy while daddy mows the grass." She stuttered a little, but I thought that was a long sentence for 2.5.

Dottie, we are doing our best to enjoy DD while we can (although some days get a little frustrating, as life with any toddler can be). I try to write down as much as I can about her -- they say the funniest things!


I think I asked my original question on this thread because sometimes my DH and I feel like we're reading too much into what DD does. Our family has not been the most supportive, often discarding her behavior as nothing out of the ordinary. Sometimes we really second-guess ourselves even though we know in our hearts our DD is not "normal."
Any thoughts or speculations about my DD are welcome.