DEVELOPMENT
I'd say the name of the game for the past few months has been communication. No longer is everything guesswork and hypotheses AND IT IS AWESOME. We can ask her questions AND SHE ANSWERS THEM.
"Lillian, would you like some crackers?" No. "Did you poop in your diaper?" Yes. "Would you like to color?" Yes. "Will you give Mommy a kiss?" NOOOOO. Occasionally I get lucky on the last one and get a big ole open-mouthed barracuda kiss.
I mean, responding to simple sentences is not the theory of relativity or anything, but it makes daily life much easier. Plus it is so stinking much fun to see how much she understands and how her understanding grows from day to day. We are actually having to watch what we say sometimes and spell things out. She can also understand some simple sequential things ("if you eat this bite of green beans, then you can have some spaghetti") with some amount of reasoning.
She can say 50+ words (including a handful of signs) and is willing to try just about any word. Now, some words sound the same, but if she uses them contextually then I count them. For example, "spoon," "food," and "poop" sound pretty much the same, but she uses them at the correct moments--and now you're imagining what those moments are! Kiddo loves to talk obviously. Perhaps 18 months of talking non-stop to her like a crazy person during the day is paying off. ha.
As far as gross motor skills go, L loves to run and is an avid climber (it's like a personal ad for toddlers). We think she's going to spend her whole life pretending that she isn't short. She also loves to dance and generally likes to have music or noise in the background. She "watches" one Sesame Street episode every morning mostly for the music and MELMO.
Biggest changes in fine motor development are a newfound love of coloring (if only it was limited to coloring books...) and the ability to eat most things with a fork or spoon. Mealtimes are always messy, but she loves the independence of driving the fork or spoon so we go with it.
DAILY LIFE
Kiddo is a decent eater, not great, but we've seen a lot of improvement since some of those big chomper teeth in the back came in. So, we all lost a month of sleep while she grew molars, but at least she is eating better! She loves steel cut oats, all kinds of beans, all kinds of spicy stuff (maybe b/c I ate Mexican a lot when I was pregnant?), spaghetti and mac n' cheese, and anything with ketchup or dipping sauce.
She is a decent sleeper as long as we don't compare her to our friends' children who are all champion sleepers (Gretchen and Allie Grace, I'm looking at you). We are happy with 11-12 hours at night and hope for a 2-3 hour nap in the afternoon. She has just recently started sleeping through the night again on a consistent basis after about 2 months of pure nocturnal craziness AND EVERYBODY SAID HALLELUJAH.
She is a ton of fun and her little personality is really starting to come through. She is definitely shy and loves to suck her thumb in new situations while she takes everything in. She isn't great at playing with other kids yet--some combination of not interested and not good at sharing except on her terms--but we try to give her opportunities each week to work on this. Community group on Sunday nights has been awesome at helping her learn to interact with older kids and adults outside of the family.
She loves to be out with people and her favorite outings include the aquarium, the library, the park, the grocery store if a race car cart is involved, Barnes and Noble, and my parents' house. My parents got us an aquarium membership for Christmas and it has been awesome. She starts talking about fish as soon as we pull into a parking place and pretty much owns the place now. Local friends, let me know if you want to go sometime!
Lillian loves to play outside and I foresee a lot of outside hours this summer as I sweat and pack on the pounds. She also loves Sullivan and the feeling is occasionally mutual. He seems to get tired of her screaming "EYE" and then poking his eye. Can't imagine why! She makes up for it at meal times though. L spends many hours at her little table coloring and playing with stickers. Or, more accurately, putting stickers on her face, then on my face, then on her shirt, then on my shirt, then crying when they don't stick anymore. Heaven help you if you try and put a sticker on a piece of paper and it won't come off again.
She loves to help with little tasks around the house like unloading the dishwasher, sorting socks, bringing Daddy his shoes in the morning, "cleaning" windows, and sweeping. All of these tasks take about 3x as long when she is helping, but I don't want to squelch the spirit of her intentions.
Main sources of tears: many, many split lips from falling off of various surfaces; when something doesn't fit into her little OCD world; sometimes when we speak sharply to her; often around bedtime or naptime, etc. She is a pretty happy kid on the whole, but she definitely has her opinions and her ideas about the way the world should work.
TAKE AWAY MESSAGE:
We have been blessed with a wonderful kiddo, who is not without her quirks and sinful tendencies, but who teaches us every day to be grateful for the little things in life and to rely more on grace because this parenting business is hard and we need the hope of Christ to make it each and every day.
Phew! You made it to the end of the post. And here is your reward:
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| Post first haircut this morning! |
