constantly amazed

I don’t keep a baby book for Emma. I have one, but I just don’t think to write in it. I think the last thing I recorded was the first time she crawled. Over a year ago.

Yikes.

So I’ll just record some of her latest things here when I think about it. And I understand that if you’re not her parent or grandparent, you really won’t give a hoot — so I’ll stick some pictures at the end.

* She apologizes for EVERYTHING. If she stumbles and falls, she says, “Oops, sorry, mommy.” ??

* When the dogs are sleeping, she comes up and whispers, “Shhh, Macey’s/Jessie’s seeping. Shhhh.”

* She now knows what she wants for breakfast/snacks/lunch/etc. – and she is none too happy when I don’t have or make what she wants. And if it were up to her, she’d have yogurt and strawberries for every meal and snack. Period.

* Last night, we were putting her to bed, and she said, “Rocker, daddy” and pointed to the glider. Once he sat down with her, she hugged up to him and sang, “Rock bye, baby.” Oh my goodness, I’ve never laughed so hard.

* He said that the other night, he sat down with her in the glider and she cuddled up to him, and said, “Mmm, snuggles.”

* She has a few embroidered diapers, and she wants to wear either the fish diaper or the pig diaper with every.single. diaper change — I can’t wash them fast enough!

* Tonight, we had pizza for supper since Ken was teaching – he gave her a few bites before he left and took his slices with him. As always, we followed him out to the car, and she said, “Bye daddy. Wub you. Have more pizza?”

* She’s already asking one question CONSTANTLY – she says, “Is it, mommy?” whenever she sees something that she doesn’t know. So she’ll ask and I’ll tell her and then she’ll repeat it. That’s about all it takes for her to get it — which is why we’re well over 150 words, now.

* New phrase alert – she just picked up my camera and said, “Take a picture?” Hmm, you think I take too many pictures?!?

List of animals she knows:
bear*
elephant
giraffe
bird (including live ones flying over)*
monkey*
fish*
cow*
pig*
sheep*
chicken*
dog*
cat*
duck*
fox
mouse
horse
starfish
octopus
whale
dolphin
snake*
frog*
turtle
bunny
owl*
(* – she also knows the animal sounds)

shapes:
stars
hearts
blocks
circles
moon
sun
rainbow
clouds
flower

body parts (names and locations):
eyes
nose
mouth
ears
tongue
teeth
belly button
heiney
feet
toes
hands
fingers
elbows
knees

I’m really quite amazed at her vocabulary – I had NO idea kids knew this many words at 20 months!

She can also name everything she wears (shirt, pants, diaper, socks, shoes, dress, pajamas) and most of the different vehicles (car, truck, bus, plane, boat).

I’m just typing these as I think of them, so it’s all discombobulated.

Even now, she’s watching her Dora before bed, and she’s answering all of the questions and repeating the Spanish words that Dora says.

We’re working on counting — for some reason, she starts at 6 and counts to 14 on her own, but she skips over 1 through 5. She also recognizes what are numbers. For instance, she’ll go up to the blender and point at the numbers and start counting – but she doesn’t do that with the letter magnets on the fridge. So she knows that they are actually numbers.

She also knows 1 through 7 in Spanish.

If we’ve learned anything with Emma, it’s that she’ll count from 1 when she’s ready and not until then.

I guess the cutest thing is that when she doesn’t want to do something, she’ll just say “no _____” — so if I say, “I’m going to fix your hair, Emma,” she’ll say, “No fix hair.” Or if I say, “Eat your carrots,” she’ll say, “No eat carrots.” Even though she’s saying no, I still think it’s too adorable.

And on days that she drives me completely insane, she always comes up to me and says, “Have hug? Have kiss?” and it’s all better.

Well, it’s her bedtime, so I better go read some stories, give some hugs and kisses and get some snuggles.

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