Growing Up

I haven't taken the time to post in awhile. Emma is now nearly 18 months old. Her vocabulary is huge and she's learning lots of wonderful new things. She knows almost all of her body parts by name. She even knows where chin, cheeks, wrists, elbows and knees are. Emma also knows the sun, moon and stars. She knows when it's raining or when it's snowing and gets very excited about any kind of precipitation. She also knows the names of all of the pieces in a place-setting. I've introduced the sippy cup and it took her a while to get the hang of it. She will drink out of the cup, but she resents it and often insists on using a drinking glass. I can't blame her for that. If she doesn't need training wheels, why make her use them? I hope to occasionally use the sippy cup in the car since that is safer for her.

Emma still nurses, but weaning is just around the corner. I probably feed her 2-3 times daily. I don't think she needs the milk anymore. She just likes the habit. Sometimes she forgets to ask for milk now.

Emma has become slightly picky about her food. She eats absolutely everything and enjoys almost everything she eats. The problem we're having is that if she doesn't like the appearance or texture of the food, she won't eat it. We have to put the food in her mouth before letting her get a look at it. If she can eat the first bite without seeing the food, she'll eat every bite thereafter. Some of her current favorite foods are: raisins, minneolas, black olives, pasta, anchovies, cottage cheese, bread, asparagus tips, popcorn, shrimp, and chicken. She's also a huge fan of sea scallops and capers and she does not like bacon or steak.

Emma is a neat freak when it comes to her high chair and hands. She absolutely will NOT let food get on her high-chair tray. It drives me nuts, but if I don't watch her carefully, she'll throw anything on the tray (even the tiniest crumb) onto the floor. She also hates it when food gets on her fingers. She'll wipe her hands on a napkin if one is close by. If a napkin is not easily to hand, she'll use her clothing or mine to wipe her hands on.

She is currently wearing clothing in the 9-12 month range. 9 months usually fits perfectly except that the pants tend to be too short. 12-month clothing is perfect in length, but too big everywhere else. If my scale is correct, she weighs about 19-20 pounds.

Emma is starting to learn her alphabet. Yesterday, she was drawing on some paper and singing quietly to herself. She sang "A, B, C, D, H, I" over and over. I impressed, but I can see that we have to focus a bit more on E, F and G!

Emma has begun to memorize many of her books. She likes her Noah and Jonah books as well as "Brown Bear, Brown Bear". She pronounces Noah as "Ona!" and it always makes me laugh.

Emma loves it when I give her a pen and paper. Drawing is something she really enjoys. She hates using crayons and I suspect it's because she never sees Mommy and Daddy use them. Emma loves her purses and always grabs one to take bye-bye with her. She also LOVES to dress herself. She's not very good at it. She knows the names of all the clothing pieces and she knows where they go, but she lacks coordination. I probably need to buy her a baby doll of some sort. It would have to be one that is easy to dress and undress. If anyone has any recommendations, let me know.