Chatterbox

It seems that Lily has inherited from me a great appreciation for the sound of her own voice and a zest for knowing what stuff is called. Over the past few weeks, her vocabulary has just exploded and I'm constantly picking my jaw off the floor when she identifies things on her own. I'm gonna do my I-swear-I'm-not-bragging-but-am-recording-this-for-posterity-thing again, so bear with me!

Animals
Doggie (and it says "mmm, mmmm")
Kitty (says "mow, mow"),
Duckie (which she LOVES and and will say it says "Kha-kha" (like quack, quack) in a very middle eastern back of the throat way)
Horsey (some days it sounds like "Ho")
Monkey (Mah-kee)
Birdie (Bah-dee)
Turtle (Tur-tah)

Objects
Clock (ka-ka)
keys (she tries to put them in the doorknob)
juice (sounds like deuce!),
Socks and shoes (tries to put them on -- doesn't quite work out)
Milk (which she hates unless I throw the word "chocolate" in front of it!)
Phone (which she loves to "talk" on)

Phrases
All Done (means you better come or I'm gonna start throwin' stuff)
Bye Bye
Hello (when she "talks" on her Elmo "phone")
Hi
No-No (and she wags her finger while she does it)
Uh-Oh (even if she "drops" her cup over the side of the high chair intentionally)

Body Parts
Eye (poke)
Ear (pull)
Nose (insert finger)
Mouth (poke)
Teeth (pry open lips and poke)
foot
toes
Belly Button (she calls it her "buh-buh")

People
Mommy
Daddy
Melissa (she's been calling her na-na, but actually said "Me-Lee" the other day at lunch!)
Derek (deh)
GG (what she calls my Mom)

I swear I didn't intentionally add the "eee" sounds on the end of everything, it just sorta happened!

She is also getting better about following instructions. The other night, I told her to give Daddy a Night-night kiss and, without hesitation, she walked right up to him, kissed him, pulled back and said "Nye Nye." I thought this was maybe a fluke, but I started noticing that the more I asked her to do things, I could see her giving the appropriate response. Our favorite game is "Give the XYZ to Dada." If he makes me mad later, I will give her a dirty diaper to deliver to him :)

I also noticed that she has figured out which words go with which situations. I dropped her off at my mom's last night and I said "see ya!" and she looked at me, waved, and said "Bye!" I can also tell her where we're going and she can anticipate it. She knows to stand by the door when I say we're going outside. This all may seem very mundane, but I get so surprised how much her little brain is able to connect words with actual objects and situations.

My little girl is growing up. With the birth of Leah Catherine, I can clearly see that Lily is indeed a toddler now. Holding that new baby almost made me ache to have another one of my own...but then I realized what I really felt was a sadness that my current baby has just grown up too darn fast. Those first few months went by so fast and I was a blur of new hormones and lack of sleep. As hard as I tried to savor those moments then, I couldn't hold onto them long enough because here we are, a year later and I'm still lamenting their loss. Don't get me wrong, I love the age Lily's at now, but wish that I could hold her as a newborn again, even if just for a few minutes.

Pictures of Lily

As her first birthday approaches, Lily is learning more and more things. She recently figured out she could give me "stuff" do do. She started handing me this book and demanding that I read it OVER and OVER again. If I don't get 'on task' fast enough -- she starts pouting!

Devin's Dad left a "Mr-Hanky,-The-Christmas-Poo" doll at our house and its one of the few things that makes noise that Lily can't figure out how to work. So, she drops it in my lap 50 times a day so that I can make it "sing" for her. It's disgusting, but she loves that thing!

She also likes to "brush" her hair -- or she'll hand the brush to me and make me do it :)


And she's running now -- still with the frankenstein gait, but MUCH faster. I will post a video when I have more time.

I took some cute pics and wanted to share:

Also, I'm just noting this for my own future reference, Lily can say the following words without being prompted (as in, she makes the connections on her own when she sees pictures or the actual object): Kitty ("ki-ee"), Doggie ("dah-ee"), Daddy, Mama, Baba (this is what we call her pacifier), Bottle (most days, she just points and calls it a "Bee"), shoe (soo), sock (saaak), Hank (my mom's dog, usually she calls him "kah"), Book ("buh"), Hi (she waves when she says it -- so funny!), Bye-Bye, Train ("tay" -- this one is not bc she's seen a train, but we have one that comes very close to my house and we talk about it when it blows its whistle), and All Done "Ah-Dah" and she makes the 'question' hands, as I call them. I think I ask her if she's all done and then she thinks it's a question. She definately says it and then spits her food back out. Anyway, that's all I can recall right now. My brain is functioning at an exceptionally slower pace than normal, it seems.

Sorry I made you all read that. I just feel like I've done a bad job at really recording her milestones. This talking thing is happening so fast and I really want to document at least part of it. I used to get really mad at my Mom for not remembering important details of my life and I"m 26 -- now, I realize how Mommy brain really makes everything one big ol' blur. I can't even remember when Lily hit some of her big milestones. It's only been a year, I think I'm losing my mind :)

New Pictures

This is baby Melina Christine! She is the new daughter of my cousin Kristina and her husband Cory. They live in Germany, so it'll be a while before we meet her in person, but we love her already. Isn't she beautiful?!

And here are some more pictures of my little one. Since her hair is finally growing in, she gets "bedhead" -- its so sweet!

Also, her top 4 teeth are finally through, bringing her grand total of chompers to 6!

I have to record Lily's new stuff, it seems like she learns new things every day. She now can point out nose, ears, mouth, and teeth. She sticks her tiny finger deep in my ear and says "Eee?" then she pulls my hair so my head turns to the other side and sticks her finger in my other ear and asks "Eee?" All very cute.

She has also started to say "Hi!" and wave to EVERY person we meet. I took her to the Dr the other day for a diaper rash gone bad and she spent the entire time in the waiting room saying Hi to everyone that walked by. The little charmer. (note: she weighed only 19 lbs 12 oz -- when will she fatten up?!).

Also, she is awesome at recognizing Dada. A cop on a motorcyle drove by the house yesterday and the looked at me and said "Dada?" It was really sweet. I explained that Dada couldn't afford a white Harley, so no, that's not him.

She is still walking like a bat out of hell. She rarely crawls anymore and when she falls, she can actually hoist herself back up into a standing position by sticking her butt straight up in the air and then lifting her torso to follow. Super core strength, that one.

She says "Thank You" but it sounds more like "Dad-En." Its actually become her favorite game. She gives something to you and you say Thank You and then you give it back and she says it. This game can go on longer than you'd imagine :)

Per Leslie's request, her is a video of Lily dancing. Check our her new moves!

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