Lydia Elise: 13-14 Months

Summer with a 14 month old is SO fun. She's big enough to go out and play in the grass, or at the pool, or even at the park but young enough that she still naps through the majority of the hot part of the day. I know I say it every time, but it's amazing how much she is learning. You can see the intelligence and adventure sparkling in her eyes.

Stats: Lydia is solidly in 12 month clothes now. I have several 18 month outfits that I occasionally put her in - but they are obviously too big. It's hard that clothes jump from 12 months to 18 months because that is a big difference! It's hard to balance that. She is still wearing size 2-3 shoes, but they are starting to get a little tight on her toes. She is in size 3 diapers (we took a break from cloth diapering this month). When we put her on the scale at Jeff and Kaylee's house the other day she weighed just over 20 lbs. She still only has her two bottom teeth, with no more in sight and she has very very little hair (although it is starting to come in a little bit!)

People still comment all the time that she is so little to be walking. And she really does look so little, especially compared to the other babies at church who have just started walking. I always reply something like "Yeah, she is just a little girl - but she has enough energy to make up for it!" While inside I am thinking - "Little? She's been walking for almost six months now. You should have seen her at 10 1/2 months. That was little." But in all honesty, she is little. And cute. Really cute.

Some things that I want to remember from this month:
--She loves to read books. She isn't as patient as she used to be. But she still loves to flip through books as you read them to her. The other day, David was reading his book and Lydia - all by herself - came up to him with her book and wanted to read next to him. She climbed up in her chair, reached for her book and they read their books together. Melt your heart! I hope that she learns to love reading as much as we do.

-- She still loves to play with balloons. I don't know why but she. loves. them. Don't worry, we don't let her put them close to her mouth and we always watch carefully when she is playing with a balloon. But it is too cute. (The outfit below was not matched to the balloon on purpose. In fact, I didn't realize it until I loaded the pictures on the computer - but lets be honest - it's so cute, right?)

--When we went to the pool on our little "Stay-cation", Lydia loved taking the laffy taffys and putting them in the waterbottle. So this month, we picked up some pompoms at the store and made her a little toy. She has spent hours and hours picking up the pompoms (we call them poufs or sometimes puffs) and putting them through the opening of an empty Powerade bottle. I'm constantly amazed at her small motor skills. We didn't even have to teach her what to do. She innately knew that she wanted the poufs in the bottle and she knew how to do it. She can pick up three of the smaller ones in her fist and manipulate them so that they all go into the bottle at the same time. She knows how to balance the big ones on the top and them push it in with her little fingers. She also demonstrates her quirk about wanting to carry things all in one hand - at one point she had seven of the larger pompoms in one hand. The other hand wasn't even really helping get them in. She would just push her fingers against the floor until she was able to get them all contained.

--Lydia has loved shoes for several months now. But lately she's gotten even more excited about trying on our shoes. She plays with them all the time. She will come and bring me my shoes (or David his shoes) and wait for me to put them on. Then she will go get her shoes and bring them to have us put them on her. Then she will go stand by the door like "Okay, we are ready... lets go!" Or sometimes she just wants to carry them around. But most of all, she likes to put her feet in them.

--Lydia started baby signing this month. I've been trying to teach her for months, but she just wasn't interested in it. While at the grocery store she saw a carton of strawberries and immediately started signing "more". It was amazing. Of course, I bought the strawberries and then practically overnight she started signing to communicate. She signs: more, please, milk, and all-done. Our neighbors let us borrow their signing time videos and we have been working on learning more signs. (Lydia won't really watch the videos (she doesn't watch TV ever really). But I watch them while she walks around me so that I can learn the signs to teach them to her. Right now we are working on: drink, water, dad, thank you, and dog.. among many others. I love it because she doens't have to whine and cry to tell me what she wants. It's already reduced her whining by 100%. Now she really only whines if I'm not fast enough to get her her food - or if I'm not watching as she is signing.

-- Did I mention that Lydia loves balloons? We've been to a couple of fairs/boutiques with the Lehi Roundup, Orem Summerfest, and Fourth of July. Every time she sees a balloon (or anything that looks like a balloon) she points and starts "ooh ooh ooh"ing. This balloon had lost about half of it's helium and so it would float, but only about halfway to the ceiling. It was probably the most fun balloon we've had at our house because it was low enough that Lydia could bat at it, then it would float away, then it would sink back down very slowly. She loved it. 

--Lydia loves her dad so much. You can see how much she adores him. She is a lucky girl to have a dad as wonderful as David is. He loves to play with her and she loves to show him all of her toys. These two have a special connection, and it's neat to watch them play together. In fact, she pretty much wants to do whatever he is doing. All the time. 

-- I don't know where she got it from, but she loves to "lounge". She will lean herself back on the couch, or the chaise, or in her little chairs and look so comfortable. It's just like "What, I'm just relaxin here." My favorite is that she will climb up on our brown chaise and turn around to lean against the back. She will throw her little legs out in front of her and just have this look of complete relaxation. It makes me laugh every time. 

 

-- Everywhere we go, people comment about how pretty her eyes are. They are big and blue just like Davids. Also, Lydia loves riding in her stroller. It doesn't matter if we are walking around the block or if we are strolling along the fairgrounds - she just loves to look around and see new things. 

--She loves to play with her pink ball (from Grandma Walker). She will pick it up and throw it, or kick it around. She really loves to play with ANY ball that she can find. She found this one at the Coopers House and wouldn't put it down to play with any other toys. 

-- I take hundreds and hundreds of pictures of Lydia each month (not a lie). But this girl is a mover she loves to GO GO GO. So, most of the pictures that I take end up looking like this: 

Her as she is walking away from me. Its a miracle if I can get a good picture of her. 

Some of the things that I want to remember from this month that I don't have pictures for: 

--She eats a TON. She just burns so much energy that when we sit down to eat, you'd think that I hadn't fed her for days. I'm in need of some good baby/toddler friendly meal ideas because cottage cheese and graham crackers just aren't cutting it. She easily eats as much as I do. For the most part she will eat almost anything - but she is starting to get a little more selective about the things she likes. 

- She has started blowing on her food when I put it on the tray. It's so cute to watch her mimic me as I blow on her food to cool it off. It's the cutest little blow (pfuu, pfuu, pfuu) and I wish that she would never stop doing it. 

--When she is tired and she sees her fuzzy bunny or teddy bear, she will grab them and bury her face in the fur. The sweetest thing is when I lay her down in her crib at night and she reaches out for her stuffed animal and pulls it in close to her chest as she falls asleep. I love it so much. It reminds me of the many many years that I slept with my stuffed bunny cuddled up to my chest just like that. 

Moral of the story - we love this girl. I'm sure there are a million more things that I could write about... but I'm just doing my best to do what I can do. Every day I pray that I can be a better mom than I was the day before. It's slow going, but we really are working on it. I love this girl more than I can even imagine and I am so grateful that I get to call her mine.