I am so lucky to be your Mama. You are a sweet, funny, silly little girl, who is completely fearless and fiercely stubborn. We spend our days watching Baby Signing Time or Sesame Street, cooking in your play kitchen or my real kitchen, coloring, making crafts, spinning around, singing songs, playing tea party, reading books, going to the park when it's nice outside, going to library story time, climbing on EVERYTHING, and eating, eating, eating. We do LOTS of eating!
You're a fantastic eater so far. There are things you're not too fond of, like meat, especially chicken, and pieces of cheese (you'll eat it cooked in things just fine.) For the most part though, you're wiling to try most things and like much more than I expected you too. You love fruit, many vegetables, noodles, lots of grains, eggs in all forms, milk, water, lemonade, and iced tea (decaf only!)
Lately you like to push a dining room chair into the kitchen so you can climb up to help me cook or to steal some fruit. Climbing & eating-two of your favorites together!
For such a good, adventurous eater, you sure are a tiny thing. We think you're around 24 pounds but we'll find out for sure next week at your 2 year checkup with the doctor. You wear mostly 18 month clothes but there are still a few 12 month items in regular rotation in your wardrobe. When I recently took out your 24 months and 2T clothes, it seemed like they were huge, but you'll be in them soon enough.
This year you've grown and learned SO much. You started walking at 14 months, 14 days old and you've barely stopped moving since! You also started talking! You are a great talker, and most of the time we can figure out what you're saying. But when we can't, we can usually figure it out in other ways. You know a lot of ASL from watching Singing Time and Baby Signing Time, and that has been tremendously helpful with communication. There are some words you only say, like "okay!" and others you use both the word and the sign, like "please," "apple" and "doggie." Mama and Daddy have been learning ASL right along with you and feel like it's a good second language, so we intend to keep up with it. I sure hope we do. Your newest development with talking is that you are forming short sentences, like, "open door please" (sounds like "appen dar peez").
You love the water. We took a swim class in December and you really enjoyed it, except when it was too chilly. You also love bath time, washing your hands and just playing with water in the sink.
You LOVE to see yourself on a screen. If I take out my phone or camera to take a photo or video, and you notice, which you always do, you yell out "Baby!" and come running to watch yourself. We have a lot of pictures and videos of you running toward the camera. It's getting tough to get decent photos! We even have a playlist of just videos of you for you to watch to keep you occupied in the high chair while I get something done around the house.
You know all the colors, all of the alphabet by sight and by sign and you can attempt to sing your ABCs but you don't get every letter quite yet. You also know your numbers by sight too.
Speaking of singing, you LOVE music and having us sing you songs. At night before bed, I sing Soft Kitty, and you always request "Twinkle Star" and ABCs over and over and over. In the car, you'd prefer to listen to Signing Time music non-stop (Part of Life, which you call "Hurt" is your favorite) but you'll also accept Adele. Your favorite there is called Take It All, but you just call it "Take It." You have no problem listening to the same song over and over but that gets old for me so we're working on expanding your horizons. Sometimes you get mad when we listen to other things, but that's ok. Another area we are working on where you get frustrated is brushing teeth. You want to do it yourself but we want you to have clean teeth, so we need to help. You're getting good at having your teeth brushed, but once in awhile you won't let an adult do it and when that happens, you don't get a sticker at bedtime and that makes you upset. I'm trying to figure out what the best motivator is for you when it comes to things like this. I'm hoping we'll find out in the coming year.
Other highlights over the last year were our summer vacation to Maine, going to Minneapolis, MN again, our road trip to Maine with Grandma Gail, Sesame Place for New Years Eve, so many more teeth, your first real illness (influenza type B) and your first ER trip and stitches from cutting open your lip. You started out your 1 year old year by being sick for your 1st birthday party and here we are one year later, and you are sick again, on your last day as a one year old. Let's hope that doesn't follow us around to your next birthday!
It's been a fast, action packed year, my girl. You are always on the move, always in a hurry and always keeping me on my toes. I am excited for you to embark on a new year, with all it's wonder and possibility. You are growing and learning and changing so fast. It will be interesting to see how we navigate the age of two. You're your own person now, with opinions and ideas all your own and I think we'll be spending the next year figuring out how to mesh your opinions with ours! Daddy and I are so blessed to have you as our sassy, smart, silly, beautiful girl. Thank you for being exactly you.
I love you, baby.
Mama
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