Where did my baby go?! (20-21 months)

Well, my little baby is no longer a baby - she's a little girl.  She's developing and growing like crazy these days.  She's got a personality all of her own and is learning words by the minute it seems.  This month, instead of just talking randomly about milestones, I'm going to tell you some funny Abby stories.

Abby really started to string together words these months.  You could actually see the sentences forming on her face before she vocalized them.  Her first sentences were... surprise, surprise... food related.  "More... thinking, thinking... milk"  It was very cute to watch her.  We eventually got her to add the please at the end.  Some days she wasn't content with the speed at which I was answering her, and she'd emphasize her requests with sign.  "More milk.  More milk.  MORE milk (with frantic signing of more)."

Abby's saying "Heaby" - she says "b's" instead of "v's"

For Dustin's birthday in October, we went to the zoo.  We had a great time and Abby actually "saw" the animals.  As the weather was cool and the crowds were low, the animals were active.  We stopped to watch the gorillas for a while, as a couple of young gorillas were playing around and wrestling.  I was loving watching the interaction, but Abby was not.  She was so concerned every time the gorillas would start hitting and wrestling with each other.  We had to leave for fear that Abby would break out in tears.  She's turning into quite the empathetic child.

Abby has surprised us more than once with the words she knows.  She listens and then will just say a word she learned just yesterday.  We've learned the hard way she hears everything.  Abby was walking around the house (doing laps with her stroller), when Dustin accidentally let the knife slip.  First instinct was to let a swear out, and wouldn't you know, two seconds later, in the sweetest voice possible, her comes our parrot, swearing through the kitchen!  It was hard not to laugh.  Luckily, her swear sounds a lot like how she said "sit" so - "Yes, we tell Molly to sit!"

Sometimes, we encourage Abby to finish her dinner by making silly noises (airplane or otherwise) with her fork.  One night, we were just finishing dinner when Abby loads up her fork ("big, big" she said as she scoops a big pile of potatoes on her fork).  She looks at Dustin and starts making airplane noises while "flying" her fork in his direction.  It is so cute to see Abby pick up on things we are teaching her and use them independently.

Abby is miss bossy pants and miss independence these days.  She will frequently request "Mommy, get de book", "Daddy dog" (meaning she wants Daddy to bark like a dog).  She also is not afraid to venture on her own.  On one walk, I hung back just to see how far up the street she would go.  It was me who got uncomfortable with how far she was before she did.  She has no problem telling me "Bye Mommy!" before venturing off.  I'm going to have to keep an eye on this one!

One of Abby's favourite activities is to dance to "Shake it Off" by Taylor Swift.  She will request the song over and over and over and over.... it's a good thing it's a pretty awesome song - or else D and I would have gone crazy by now.  She loves to shake that booty.  As soon as the song is coming to a close, she's already yelling "More Shake off, more Taylor!"  We get a kick out of how she knows 90% of the lyrics and frequently sings along as she's dancing.

Abby's really starting to play pretend.  She doesn't know that the sink faucet in her play kitchen is for water.  She thinks it's a steam wand and will hold her toy coffee cup under the faucet while making steaming milk sounds.  After which, she'll present D or I with a coffee.  It's quite hilarious.  She also loves to feed/share food with her Teddy and Baby.  One night as we are just winding down for the night, Abby is playing with Baby.  She stops what she is doing and looks at Dustin saying something that sounds like "Baby dressed, baby dressed."  She then marches up stairs (while D follows her), and runs to her room.  She pulls open the top drawer, looks in, doesn't see what she needs and slams the drawer.  She pulls open another drawer and finds a pair of pants, grabs them, slams the drawer, runs back downstairs and proceeds to "Dress Baby."  She was so satisfied that she could find clothes and dress baby; meanwhile, Dustin and I are laughing ourselves to tears.

Bonus: First snow photos!

Our smart child is causing us some problems.  She's learned how to undo snaps... which doesn't seem like a big deal, until you realize many of her pj's are snap closures.  There have been a couple mornings where I have walked into get Abby in the morning and she is almost completely naked.  She's out of her sleeping bag and her pj's - or her pj's are just held on by the arms and feet and the rest is completely open.  She'll just look at you and smile and say "Abby nunie (nudie/naked)."  She loves been "nunie".  Many times as soon as the diaper is off in the morning, she's running around the house buck-naked.  Too funny.

Sometimes, Abby is just too smart.  She woke up from a nap saying "Daddy home.  Listen" while pointing to her ear.  She could hear the garage opening.  She will also say "Mommy running" every time I take my running shoes out or grab my watch.  Abby loves to colour and will tell you that crayons are for "paper only", but will wait until you turn your back and colour the walls (while telling you "paper only").

We built a snow teddy - and as I'm putting in the blueberry eyes, Abby looks at me and says "No blueberry eyes! No blueberry eyes! Eat blueberries."  She was not thrilled that the snow teddy got blueberries and she didn't (even though she had a full bowl for breakfast!)