I can't believe my baby is almost one! Sometimes it seems like I just had her yesterday and other times it seems like she's been a part of our family forever and I it's hard to remember life without her. She really is such a little light to our family. It's been so fun to watch her learn new things and continue to grow and change. Sometimes I catch myself just looking at her and thinking "how in the world do you already look so grown up?" She's gotten really good at pulling herself up and standing now, and she's a speedy little walker when someone is holding her hands. Lately Brooklynn loves standing on one side of her and holding her hand and I stand on the other side and hold her hand, and we take walks around the house. Madison walks on her tiptoes usually and it's so funny to watch her. She's also started walking with her little Lion Walker Toy. It gives her something to hold onto and gives her some stability, and she can push that thing and walk all by herself. When she does it, one of her little legs is usually turned outward a little bit and it makes me laugh every time I watch her. She just gets so excited and hustles around. She's a speed demon at crawling now. She thinks its funny when I go to pick her up, and she'll start crawling away as fast as she can.
She claps all the time now, and I'm trying to teach her how to wave. She climbs up the stairs all by herself and she'll go up there and play by herself or with Brooklynn for a while and then she just sits at the top of the stairs and grunts when she's ready for me to come get her. A while ago she fell down the stairs, and she has never attempted to go down them since. I had blocked it off at the top with the bassinet and some big pillows from the couch while I ran downstairs to switch the laundry, and she climbed through the pillows and fell down most of the stairs. It scared me to death, and I think it did her too, because she hasn't really attempted to go down them again by herself.
She has started wanting to hand things back and forth. During Sunday School this past week she just sat there and wanted to hand a toy to me, and then I'd hand it to her, and she'd hand it back. So funny! She has also started copying Brooklynn during bath time and she'll take a little toy teapot and she sits under the faucet and I'll leave a little trickle of water on and she loves to just sit there and fill it up, then she drinks some, and dumps it out and starts all over. Brooklynn used to do that every night, so I know she's learned it from watching her. She just cracks me up!
She has also started climbing! She'll climb up on Brooklynn's little pink chair all the time, and she can climb up the little slide in our backyard the wrong and right ways already! I couldn't believe it when I watched her do it over a week ago! She seems a lot smaller than Brooklynn was at this age, and I kind of love that. It makes me feel like she's still my baby. I pulled out the chalkboard I used for Brooklynn's 1st birthday that had all the things about her and about what she liked and what she could do when she was almost 1, and seeing the differences between her and Madison was so fun and crazy how different they are. Madison has 2 teeth(2 others are about to pop through) and Brooklynn had 7 teeth at this age. Madison weighs about 5 lbs less than Madison did but they are the same height. Madison has a little bit of curl to her hair, and she has so much more than Brooklynn did at this age.
She has pretty much rejected any sort of store bought baby food at this point. She's getting so much better at eating things without gagging and choking. She loves bananas, grapes, bread, yogurt, cheese, deli meats, crackers, and sadly I have to admit that I have given her a few cheetos puffs and she's obsessed. I will use our little hand masher and mash up whatever we are having for dinner and she'll usually have whatever we are eating.
Brooklynn is becoming so much better at being polite. She's finally caught on to asking for things nicely the first time. I was almost certain that having to say "How do we ask nicely?" or "What's the magic word?" was going to be a part of my lingo FOREVER!! It's so nice to finally hear her ask politely the first time. Joe started having her "redo it" every time she didn't ask the right way, and I think that helped a ton. He'd say "I'm sorry, that's not how we ask for things. Try again." " Hi Brooklynn, what can I help you with?" and she'd have to say it again. If she didn't say please that time, he'd say it all over again.
She's got a really great memory when it comes to repeating books that we read to her, or songs we sing to her. We can read a book and pause, and she'll say what word or sentence comes next. She learned "Little Miss Muffet" from reading it at Grandad and Grandma's house. She loves Llama Llama books, Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, Mary Had a Little Lamb, I Am A Child of God, Popcorn Popping, and I'm sure I'm forgetting some.
We have just a few Disney Movies, and she loves watching "A Show." She loves Frozen, Tangled, Cinderella, and Toy Story. Hopefully we'll get to add to our collection and she can experience a few others that I loved growing up, like Beauty and the Beast, The Little Mermaid, and Snow White.
She still loves doing everything "by herself." From getting her own yogurt out of the fridge in the morning, grabbing her own spoon, opening her own yogurt, stirring it, getting her own water, putting her own bib on. Everything that needs to be done, she wants to do it now. Sometimes it's really hard for me not to get frustrated. I just have to take some deep breaths and let her be independent. She has learned to buckle herself into her carseat, so that's the latest thing that she flips out about if I try and do it. She also wants to get herself fully dressed all on her own now. That's another fun one for me. ha ha!
She's the best big sister to Madison, and Madison loves her so much. She's started climbing into Madison's crib with her when she hears her crying or fussing either in the mornings or after naps. She always says "I'll go get Madison", and runs upstairs. It's so cute to watch her climb in there and play with her. She's always watching out for her. There have been several times when she's warned me of something unsafe Madison was either doing, or putting in her mouth. I'm excited to watch the bond that these two will have throughout their lives. I just hope they will always be close and be each others best friend.
Brooklynn really is a great helper and I'm really grateful she loves helping me. She helps unload dishes, clean up toys, clean the potties, switch the laundry, sweep, vacuum, water plants, refill the toilet paper basket, "fold" the laundry, put her clothes in her drawers, load the groceries in the cart, unload them when we get home, she'll grab the wipes and a diaper for me if Madison needs to be changed, and I'm sure there is so much more. Hopefully she'll always love helping and being productive.
She still loves puzzles, coloring, playing in the water, reading, playing with her kitchen, playing outside, balloons, clothes and shoes(she loves just grabbing things and trying them on by herself when we go to the store. Doesn't matter the size. ha ha) she LOVES going to Nursery still, she loves being in the kitchen with me and ALWAYS wants to help with whatever I'm doing in there. Whenever we cook or bake she wants to do everything by herself, and it seriously almost drives me bonkers sometimes. I'm looking at it as training for the future. Maybe one day she'll love cooking so much that she'll want to make dinner all the time, and I can just sit back and kick my feet up and relax. Ha ha!
Her latest thing is "Look at Me!" She's been saying it so much lately, and usually she's doing something goofy, and she lets out this big fake roar of a laugh and thinks she's so funny! She is also a rule enforcer. I wonder how she does in nursery with the other kids, but at home she's always telling Madison "we don't do that", or "Madison has to share", or a million other things I can't think of right now.
She really is such a good kid, and Joe has even commented to me that she's come such a long way with her manners, and she's such a good listener. It appears the hard work is paying off. Love my girls!
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