"What a Big Brain You Have!"

It really feels like one day I had a baby, who only observed and sat by as things happened around her or to her, and then the next day I had a little girl who interacts and develops more every day.

I keep meaning to write, but life just gets in the way. I need to stop apologizing for it, after all, I'm not making money on this blog--it's just for me. I keep documenting our lives in photos, so that's an important thing.

Avonlea just gets more and more interesting. It always surprises me whenever she exhibits some new skill, or shows me new things that she has learned.

I mean, she is pointing at things when we read!  I know it's something little, but it's just seeing those brain connections that didn't exist prior, and are now getting stronger and stronger.  I read a lot of books with her. She used to have no attention span whatsoever, and now she goes to the book box and picks a book out and brings it back to me to read. She'll sit on my lap, turn all the pages, and point to pictures as I ask her questions. She can identify "ball", "balloons", "zebra", "fish", "eyes", "mouth", "elephant", "Elmo", "Cookie", and "monkey". I love asking her, "Where is the monkey?" and waiting while she scans the page and then makes a quick point at the monkey on the page. Today, she gave me an additional highlight: when I asked her where the monkey was, before pointing to it, she said, "ooh ooh ooh!"

The other day, Nick was blowing bubbles inside, and just for fun I said, "Bubbles, bubbles, everywhere!" a line from one of Avonlea's favorite stories. She toddled away from the bubbles, over to the book box, and grabbed the bubble book and brought it back to me to read.

She's not saying too many identifiable phrases, but she talks all the time and uses lots of inflection when she speaks. You can tell she is asking for certain things. She loves to drink out of my water bottle, and loves to munch on whatever I am eating--she'll point at my bottle or my plate and say, "oissssh?" She's also good at saying goodbye when people are leaving. It's really funny to look up in the window and see the top of her little head and her eyes peeking over the ledge, with her little arm pumping up and down in a wave. :) She also loves to wave at Waldo in the window.

As she gets more independent, we're also dealing with more temperament and strong-willed issues. Tonight we had a particularly cranky fight about leaving her bib on while she eats. She's been trying to pull them off each meal (velcro--urgh), and I haven't been letting her. Well, tonight that really made her mad. She threw a fit, and kept fighting me on it, but I tried to be calm and collected but continue to stand my ground.  Nick observed and said I did a good job riding the storm, which was nice of him to notice.

Avonlea also loves to go places and do things by herself. She doesn't like to hold my hand--she likes to walk around by herself and explore things on her own. Today that meant finding her several steps into the kitchen in the Asian restaurant we were in. Thankfully the staff thought it was funny instead of annoying, but I have to keep a closer eye on her now.

She also likes to eat by herself. If I put any food in her mouth, even if it's something she likes, she will spit it into her hand and then put it into her mouth herself. She also takes spoons away from me to put things into her mouth herself. Basically I have to make sure that whatever is in the spoon won't fall out--I really only do avocado--otherwise I spear things with forks for her or mash them into a pouch or let her pick them up with her hands.

She's becoming crazy-obsessed with her stuffed Boo. She already loved Boo--but now, she wants to carry Boo wherever we go, and she is always asking for him. I think I'm going to have to put the kabosh on that--Boo is already a little worse for wear, and he hasn't left her bedroom (except when we traveled to Ohio).

She's also better at playing with her friends. I noticed her sharing with her friend Ava today, and while I know that won't always be the case, it was nice to see her interacting with kids around her own age, since she's been mostly ignoring them up until now.

She is starting to recognize humor. She laughs at videos of herself doing funny things, and at puppets doing silly dances. She also does things to make us laugh. She blows these amazing raspberries that always make us giggle.

I also love watching her figure things out. We have a shape sorter, and she'll try the shapes out in the different openings, trying to see which one it will go in. She'll manipulate the piece in multiple angles now, instead of just trying to force it in a certain hole without moving it around.

Easter was a great example of her burgeoning cognitive abilities. She totally "got" the Easter egg hunt idea!

I love watching her grow. It's to the point now where pictures don't do her justice. My memory card on my phone is filling up much quicker now, because I'm taking videos all the time!