Happy St. Patrick's day!
Lilly is 16 months old today, and I can't believe how much I love this girl right now. I feel like this month was a real turning point in terms of speech development, and, as a result, her personality has bloomed. She is fun, and sassy, and smart, and whiny, but mostly still adorable. I love how emphatically she nods her head and says "yeah" with a little attitude thrown in, and the way she furrows her brow and says "no" like she's offended that you even asked the question. Sometimes she gets on a roll and will say yes to (mostly) everything you ask.
Do you want to go to the park? Yeah. Do you want to ride a rocket ship to the moon? Yeah. Do you want to become rich and take care of us when we're old? Yeah. Do you want to go to bed? Yea . . . No.
But she's all talk, because she has been a great sleeper lately. It's awesome and amazing and we're counting our blessings. Drew says I've done a great job, but I say we're just really really lucky. And I am always right.
Lately, Lilly has started imitating more words like baby, doll, eyes, teeth, please, etc. but refuses to make animal sounds. She is not above beat-boxing, though, or at least doing a really good impression of beat-boxing.
Lilly's favorite activities lately seem to revolve around her baby dolls. She feeds them, burps them, pushes their stroller, bathes them with wipes, puts her diapers on them, puts them in their cradle at night and gives them lots of hugs. I think she may be a better mother to her babies than I am to her, except when she gets distracted or bored and throws them on the ground, I don't do that.
She's obsessed with the umbrella stroller, and loves practicing clicking the plastic buckle snaps together. Unfortunately she requires adult help to get them un-clicked again and again and again and again.
She can be whiny sometimes, especially when food is involved. She does not handle "no" well, but she does fairly well with limits. As in, "Good job. You found the chocolate chips (again!). Of course you can have some. You can have 3 and that is all. No more." Then she is happy and if she asks again she only complains a little bit for a little while instead of throwing a whole tantrum. Plus I kind of love that she inherited her father's obsession with chocolate. Now I have two people to play "hide and seek" with.
But mostly I love the moments when she learns something new or does something good and her face lights up because she's so proud, and she knows that we are proud of her. I love the way she spins in circles when she dances, and the way she points at herself when I ask where Lilly is. I love her resilience, and her little arms that are an unlikely combination of rippling muscles and fat rolls. And I love her smile.
I guess Mellencamp was right. Hold onto 16 as long as you can.
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| After several unsuccessful photos, I said "Smile, Lilly!" and this is the face she gave me. |
Some things Lilly LOVES right now:
BUBBLES, bubble baths, CHOCOLATE CHIPS, goldfish, umbrella strollers, plastic buckles, lotion, DOLLS, toes, teeth, music, dancing, throwing things, makeup, velcro shoes, running, coloring, books, picking wildflowers, climbing ladders (esp. to reach the top of the tall spiral slide at our park), tunnels, bridges, steering wheels
More pictures from the park today:
I trimmed her side burn last week.
Her very sad face because she was scared to be put down after she got charged by a giant, but friendly, German Shepherd.
She cheered up quickly. . .
She wouldn't stay still, so I got a lot of action shots:
Lately she likes to lay on the ground and clean her tummy and toes with the wipes we keep in a drawer downstairs.
It is very strange.
It is very strange.
She also enjoys sitting in the backyard:
And a cute picture from her first Friday at daycare:
We have an awesome new Play for All Abilities Park about 15 minutes away, and we went to check it out this week. It is really cool, and is just another reason I am so glad we live where we do.
And just one more, of our lovely little lady:
Ally can you please write my blog for me? I love the way you tell the story of Lilly. It is going to be so neat for her to have this when she is 16 yrs and not 16 months! Whenever I talk with my friends who have babies Archie's age about developmental things (like what we can expect) they get to hear about my amazing niece who as they put it "does everything crazy early"! But it is just right for Lilly and her parents. She is such a fantastic little girl! (Is that weird that she is getting more like a little girl than a baby??)
ReplyDeleteThanks Erika! I probably spend too much time writing my posts, but, like you said, it will be nice to have when she's older. I'm sure Lilly is slow in some ways that we just ignore, but I also think we're given what we can handle, and God knows that I am only capable of small amounts of patience. :)
DeleteI honestly don't know what to call her anymore. I usually say "my baby", but then people picture a newborn, "my toddler" just sounds weird and "my child" sounds too old. I usually just clarify by stating her actual age.
Where is that park? I want to come play there!
ReplyDelete