19 Months!

Two posts in two days -- its a miracle!

I almost forgot the date today. I only realized, half way through the crazy day, when I was leaving a tip for my massage therapist, that it was Beanie's 19 month birthday!

This past month has been challenging in terms of our health, but amazing in terms of Beanie's verbal skills. She is picking up 2-3 new words a day, can repeat back words and associate things correctly. She can even count to two and identify the letter "S", which is her first initial.


Other developments and milestones have been:

• Ability to climb on the bed by herself. It helps that I have a  platform bed so she has a built in step to hoist herself. The other day I came into my room, following her, and looked around. I could not see her anywhere. She was sitting propped against the pillows with a big proud smile! I am still not used to finding her there. 
• She is trying to jump with both feet off the ground. Its really funny to see since she is not totally there, but she tries and has the cutest grin when doing it.
• She loves imitating me when I do yoga or if I raise my hands or shake my head. Its fun to play with her and do funny things and have her copy me.
• She can twirl a flower in her tiny fingers. I was amazed since that requires some dexterity, I would think.
• She is linking words together now, such as "Mama cook egg" or "Dada gone home nigh nigh". I cannot wait to see how her speech will develop into sentences in the next few months.
• She is extremely loving and now (finally) loves leaning in for kisses. We will be playing and suddenly she will stop and lean forward. It is so sweet and melts my heart.
• We love cuddling and reading at bedtime.Her favorite book is the Three Little Pigs which we read in bed each night. Her next favorite is the Emperor's New Clothes and she loves looking for the emperors puppy on each page. My parents have bought her a ton of classic tales, but she refuses to read anything else from that collection (eg Cinderella) except there two. She does have many other books she enjoys as well.
• She loves looking at Tar.get coupon booklets. My Mom "reads" it to her pointing out things e.g. stroller, diapers etc.
• She tells me when she has done "poop" which is nice. She has not tried to use the potty, but today put Elmo on the potty. When my Mom asked what Elmo was doing she said "poop". I wish she would say potty instead of "poop" but I think that is what the kids are calling it in school. 
• She loves to sleep with her stuffed toys. Case in point, tonight, on the bed we have - Puppy, Lamb, Mouse, Baby, Elmo, Panda and musical seahorse- and Beanie!!  Little wonder poor Mommy's neck is in pain since I only get maybe 3-4 inches of the bed to sleep in!

Food wise she is getting better when it comes to iron-rich food. She is beginning to enjoy some meat (loves IKEA meatballs) and beans so that is great. She loves eggs and enjoys eating it off my plate. On weekends we like to sit on the doormat near the back deck door, and have a "floor" breakfast picnic. She loves feeding me now, and will pick up my toast and have me bite it. Its really sweet except that she is practically stuffing my face :-)

Sleep has been pretty rough this month - the dreaded 18 month sleep regression, plus the sickness did not help, Hope it evens out soon.

We have enjoyed playing outdoors every evening all summer with water and the sand box which she loved. Last week after the house was pressure washed I told her was had to say "bye bye" to the sand. She had dropped a lot of it outside the box and I did not want to have a mess again.  We had a nice goodbye ceremony where we dumped the sand on the grass around the tree in the front yard. She completely understood what was happening and did not fuss at all. In fact she helped me put her sand toys back in the box and put it away saying "all done!". I was really impressed!

Tonight as she went to bed she looks at me and says "happy?".

I replied "Yes I am very happy, darling. Are you happy?"

She smiled and said "ya".

 I love you sweet girl!