It's pretty much official that this little doll is not a baby anymore! Our life has been so busy with selling our home and moving to a new city... and I feel like I blinked and suddenly she is so grown up, intelligent, and spunky as ever.
Her stats are:
- Weight: 24.0 lbs.
- Height: 31 inches
- Diaper Size: Still wearing the Size 3's.
- Clothing Size: Fits best in 12 Months outfits but wears 18 Months also.
- Likes: Singing and dancing to music, talking, exploring, doing anything with her big brother/best friend.
- Dislikes: Being tired, when she can't do what she wants.
She is adorable and so much fun every day. She and A have truly become friends and are able to interact like two little humans. Her personality is strong and still continuing to develop, particularly how she loves to make everyone laugh, but is also so dramatic and stubborn when she doesn't get her way. Her tantrums are an entire level above anything we ever experienced with A and make me laugh out loud as she flails on the floor with a tantrum worthy of a theater stage.
She also has her daddy completely wrapped around her little finger. The other day, he came home and she started crying so he would cuddle and adore her. I was cracking up and pointing out that she was completely faking it but he didn't believe me and felt so sorry for her sad little cry... until she tried it again a little bit later and he could see how well she was switching the sadness on and off like a switch! I'm nervous how well she'll be able to play these games on him when she's 16! But the way they adore each other is so cute.
She is very creative and it's fun to watch her play. She loves to draw and color and create. We have toy blocks that she and A play really well together. They love to dump out the entire bucket and play building towers and patterns for a long time. She is very curious and determined, which makes her surprisingly good at building and figuring out how things work.
She also loves to play with stuffed animals and dolls. She is so nurturing and loves to hold and snuggle the toys like a baby... but drives us crazy when she holds her baby dolls because they "cry" {which means she screeches "wah wah wah!" at the top of her lungs until we stroke the baby's head and say "it's okay baby, don't cry!" which makes her giggle every single time!}
Last week, she found one of her old binks—which she hasn't used since she was only a couple months old—and pretended it was a bottle to feed her toys. She was holding it to their mouths and saying "mmmm!" She has such a big heart and loves to take care of everyone.
Her big brother loves to be the recipient of her kind heart by inventing games such as suddenly falling down and telling her that she needs to come save him, so she drops what she's doing and runs over to help him back up. And he does it over and over; and she helps him up again and again. I love seeing their friendship developing and how much they adore each other. Don't get me wrong, they still fight like crazy and I spend {what feels like} the majority of my day refereeing their battles! But they both constantly refer to each other as their "best friend" and would do anything to help or protect one another. I'm so grateful they have each other and recognize what a great opportunity it is to have a best friend/sibling friendship!
She is beginning to show more interest in talking, but usually only says "dad," "mom," and "ayn-en" plus a variety of animal noises such as "moo," "baa," and "meow" {plus when we ask her what dogs say, she makes a panting noise instead of barking!}
Her level of comprehension is really advancing too. She understands things we ask her to do, even if they are somewhat complicated and involve a couple separate steps of instruction.
Similar to her brother at this age, she really likes music! But while he liked pretending to play instruments and conduct, she loves to sing and dance. They both love the show "Little Einsteins" but she is much more active and excitedly follows all the directions {such as singing along or clapping or jumping to the music} and it's really fun to watch her interact with the characters in the show!
She loves bathtime and if anyone so much as mentions the word "bath," she instantly tries to remove all of her clothes and run to the bathroom immediately.
She loves books! When we moved to the new house, we put our old bookshelf in their room to stack toys on and filled the bottom shelves with the kid's books. Now she loves to run to her room, grab a book, run to the front room where she plops down and reads the book, then jumps up and gets a new one. Over and over again.
Playing outside is so much fun for her now that she's very stable on her feet. She loves slides and climbing on everything at the park; she gets bored in the swings and never likes to do it for more than a minute or two unless A is the one pushing her.
She is a good sleeper and has adjusted to sharing a room with A better than I anticipated. She knows when she is tired and likes to sing herself to sleep, especially at nap time.
She loves discovering her body parts and points to everyone's nose, eyes, mouth, ears, head, hair, tummy, fingers, hands, toes, feet, legs, and arms. She especially likes to do this when she wakes up too early in the morning and I'm trying to rock her back to sleep... but instead she wants to poke my face and tell me all about things like my "eeeeyyyyeee" and "nooooose!"
If anyone has food or something she wants, she says "pitttty peeeessseee" {pretty please!} over and over again until we share. And it's so cute that it's hard to ever tell her no!
She loves to help in the kitchen and seems to constantly be underfoot when I'm trying to make meals. She knows which cupboards have her favorite things to play with and she loves to help get things out of the fridge any time it opens! She loves milk but has been really easy to transition away from a bottle to a sippy cup. She also has never really cared for a bink or anything like that; she does sleep with her blankey every night and wants to carry it around with her—but I think it's to copy A {who is extremely attached to his blanket!} more than an actual need to have it with her.
She is great at eating anything we serve for meals and is not picky at all. I can't even think of a single food she doesn't like. She is very aware of her appetite—she pulls out her chair at the table when she wants to eat! And as soon as she's had enough food, she very adamantly refuses any more bites!
This girl has been such a blessing to our family. I feel like she really completes us. Her dad is smitten with her, her big brother adores her, and I absolutely love to be around her. She is happy, silly, and so much fun to be with!
