Kids change so much at this age. From one day to the next, they can add a whole new skill set, a ton of new words, a new favorite thing, or a new phobia. How are my kids these days? Well, ...
Amalia, currently about nine-and-a-half months old, is quite the character. At the dining table, she is very discerning about her food; if she doesn't want to eat something, no amount of pleading, airplane-ing, or cajoling will get her to unpurse her lips. She smells her food before she eats it, particularly if she knows I might be trying to sneak in something she doesn't like. So, to get her to eat things she isn't overly thrilled about, I scoop some of that up (usually her cereal), then I dip it in something she will actually be eager to eat (fruit, veggies, meats, etc.). She smells the non-cereal food and opens her mouth. And sometimes, if she's really unsure, she'll sneak her tongue out from her pursed lips and sneak a quick taste to see what's being offered. She is, most certainly, a funny, very particular, little lady.
A while back, maybe a month or two ago, Mollie was having trouble sleeping through the night. In spite of my diligence putting her to bed awake every night thus ensuring she was able to get herself to sleep, she would wake in the middle of the night and not sleep for up to three hours at a time. At her last appointment I begged our pediatrician, Dr. Mike, for some advice. After asking me a few questions, he said he wasn't quite sure what was going on, that it sounded like she knew how to go to sleep. So he recommended three things: rearrange all her furniture (maybe a shadow was scaring her), get her a night light (maybe she was afraid of waking up in the dark), and try a sound machine. For whatever reason, we tried the sound machine first and it has worked. Like seriously worked. She's only had a few rough nights since we started with the sound machine, and most of them were because of something clear-cut (pooped in her sleep, zipper pull sticking her in the chin, etc.). I'm seriously considering getting one for Baylor for his room because I feel like noises from outside might be keeping him from napping well and sleeping long enough into the morning. We'll see.
Mollie has fallen in love. My girl loves, unequivocally LOVES, climbing stairs. She sneaks over to them and starts climbing. All the live long day, she snorts and breaths heavy and makes cute noises while she's slapping her hands on the floor as she crawls around the house, but when she takes to the stairs she goes into stealth mode. It's amazing ... and, as her mother, it is scary.
Much to my delight, Mollie is finally starting to get into books. Before she wouldn't sit still long enough to be read to, but now she seems to like them ... especially Sandra Boynton books and anything with giant peekaboo flaps and babies.
Oh, and another cute thing ... she does the wonky oar-and-rudder crawl when she's on tile or another equally slippery surface, but when she hits the carpet it's straight crawling all the way. And boy is she fast!
On to the little man, now 2 years and 4 months old ...
Baylor is talking a lot these days! He always has something to say, and I can understand pretty much everything he says (though I know I have a distinct advantage being around him so much and all). While he is pretty good at expressing himself, he often has trouble getting things out. For example, when he wants something, he often starts off his sentence with, "I need-ta, have-ta, want-ta ..." And then sometimes he just pauses to collect his thoughts.
He is always telling us he loves us, and one way he expresses his love is to say that he wants to go and get us a Christmas tree. I love that about him; he thinks love is a Christmas tree.
Baylor loves his sister; he loves it when she gets into stuff and will often exclaim, "Mollie, what are you doing?!" They have fun together chasing around the house, her usually following him They shriek, they giggle, they have all sorts of fun getting into trouble together (I found them headed up the stairs together the other day ... sigh). She often wants to do exactly what he's doing, and he's not great at sharing just yet so sometimes it is more of a "can I get away from this little girl?" kinda deal. And sometimes he just wants to have whatever she has because she has it, so he'll snatch it from her little hands and walk away. Mollie, good girl that she is, will just follow him and the toy she lost and reclaim it once he's done. I have confidence, though, that Baylor will get the hang of sharing soon enough; it's just going to take a little time.
His favorite food right now is peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with honey on it. And he thinks everyone and every thing wants one of his favorite sandwiches, dogs, cats, characters in books ... everyone. Because who wouldn't want a peanut butter and jelly sandwich with honey on it?
Illuminated by his new found verbal skills is his amazing imagination. The little dude is always pretending this or that, from washing his hands under a faucet coming out of the wall next to the glider in his room, to changing the color of the lights, to using his closet as the elevator at the Gardens so he can go visit the turtles and fishies. It's amazing what his mind comes up with and what he deems important enough to be reenacted.
And sometimes when he's talking about these thoughts of his, he'll talk in a type of third-person narration. Just now after his nap he was talking about getting some stickers out of his closet and he said, "And the stickers are in here, he said." I love that the stories we've read to him are starting to come through in his speech.
As a result of one of his Christmas gifts (thank you again, GiGi and Great-Grandpa!), we have started a new morning routine with the little man; every morning we get up and put a new sticker on his very own truck calendar! He gets very excited about it all, plotting out what color sticker he'll put on the next day and checking out the days of the week, the months, etc. It's a great way for him to learn about our calendar system, and he has really started looking forward to getting out of bed in the morning instead of wanting to laze around his crib for as long as I'd let him.
So that's what's new with the kids. What's new with you?
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