16 Months Old

Dear Hailey,

You are 16 months old!  You are as sweet and silly as ever, and your daddy and I just can't get enough of you.  You are growing like crazy and getting smarter by the day.  Here are the fun things you did this month!

New words you say are:

• Mama :)
• Cheese ("Cheesh") - You like to find my camera (or my phone or daddys phone) and hold it up like you're taking a picture and say "CHEEESH!" 
• You love to lift up your shirt and say "Booh!?"  We assume this means belly/belly button.
• Shoes ("Shoosh") - I love when you bring my shoes to me and try to put them on my feet.
• Hot ("Hah") - Every morning you carefully place your hand on my coffee cup and say "Hah!"
• Many new things about this world must amaze you these days because you frequently say "Wow!!!"
• Instead of the ever-popular response to all my questions with "no" a couple months ago, now you respond to every question with "yeah!"  It goes a little something like this:

• You love to walk around doing the sign for "all done" while saying "No Mah" (no more)
• You also started saying "Up" and "Down" this month

Other fun facts about our little blondie at 16 months:

• You LOVE the book "The Wheels on the Bus".  Your favorite part is when the parents on the bus go "Shh! Shh! Shh!"

• You can find your head, hair, belly, belly button, ears, teeth, hands, and nose.  On a good day you can find your eyes and your toes, too!  Here you are showing mommy where her teeth are:
• You are starting to point out things in books when mommy or daddy asks you to find them.  You are the best at pointing out the birdies, cats, dogs, cows, pigs, and ducks.  Sometimes you find the trees and flowers, too. 
• You can make the animal sounds for a cow, sheep, horse, and cat
• You are {usually} very well behaved in restaurants and out in stores.
• You are so curious about the world around you and can't wait to touch every single thing you see.  You are bold and independant, that is for sure!  Last month you may have walked past Bucky's food dish, looking down at it like "hmmmm I probably shouldn't touch that".... but now you just crouch on down without hestitation and put handfuls of his food straight into his water dish.  Mommy does not like this very much, young lady! 
• Speaking of doing what you want, your strong will has certainly emerged this month.  You just love to throw tantrums when mommy takes away things you shouldn't be playing with or when its time to get out of the bath.  So dramatic!
• You LOVE to play on the couch! 
• When you decide you are finished with a meal, you rip off your bib and say "No Mah!"
• You love to imitate everything you see mommy and daddy do.  You are also a very good listener and {most of the time..} respond promptly and correctly to the things we ask you to do.  This would be an excellent trait for you to carry on into the coming months!

New Foods.  Oy.

• Little Missey, you make mommy and daddy's life so difficult at meal time!  You absolutely hate trying new foods!  Here I was thinking you were getting bored of the same 'ol same 'ol, but when I try to offer new and different things, you won't even touch them!  It is frustraing to say the least.  I even tried putting cheese on some broccoli and cauliflower and you still wouldn't touch it.  The only new food you have taken to is fresh mango.  And that was after a 20 minute-long battle of sippy-cup-throwing-bib-tossing-raspberry-blowing refusal to do anything with it but squish the pieces onto your tray.  Finally I put it in some yogurt and you scarfed it down.  Guess we'll continue sticking to your favorites:  oatmeal, bread, fruit, yogurt, cheese, applesauce, PBJ, peas, pasta, black beans.  Bor-ing!  However I did get a little clever and made you some carrot/zucchini muffins that you just love.  HaHA!  Mommy wins.

You have gone lots of fun places and done lots of fun things this past month.  We have had some beautiful fall weather! 

• A day at the Augusta wineries with mom & dad.  You were such a good girl, as usual, just eating your snacks and taking in the sights!

 
• Took your first trip to Laurie's Shoes to get your first pair of big girl tennis shoes

 
• You helped Grandma Peggy celebrate her 59th birthday.  You drew her such a pretty picture!

 
• You and I took a trip to Jefferson City to visit your Aunt Melissa and cousins Keaton and Collin

 
• Fingerpainted with your BFF Kenzie



MESS.

• You helped your Grandma Marge celebrate her 65th Birthday!

 
• You helped mommy and daddy celebrate their 3rd wedding anniversary with another trip to the wineries.  This time we went to Hermann, MO.  We also went to a fall gathering at your daddy's Uncle Cliff's house that day.  You rode your first horse!

 




 

 
• You helped mommy do lots of cooking and baking.  You love to look and see what's cookin'!

• On a random warm day last week, you and Kenzie played at Suson Park.  You love to show people your belly!




 
• Here is a cute video from later that day.  You have totally mastered climbing up and sliding down all by yourself!

 

•  The Cardinals made it to the NLDS!  You love wearing your Cardinals hat!

• 

 

 
• I know this sounds silly, but Mondays are one of my very favorite days to spend with you.  We run all our errands, do our weekly grocery shopping, and sometimes even go out to lunch.  You love to ride in the shopping cart and hold things for me.  I love when you reach out to give me big hugs while we walk around.

 

 
 
• Your daddy has a wonderful job that allows him to work from home sometimes.  So we are lucky to be able to enjoy some beautiful weekday afternoons in our backyard playing as a family.













 
• And last, but not least, on the day you turned 16 months, your Great Grandma Helen turned 94 years old!  She was so excited to see you at the nursing home and loved the pretty picture you drew!  You loved sitting on her lap pulling all the tissues out of her tissue box :) 
• 

Until next month!

 

Love you always,

Mommy

 

 

 

 

 

15 Months Old: Books, Bows, & Baby Dolls

Hailey Rian continues to impress and amaze us every single day.  She understands so much and has her own special ways of communicating with us.  When she is thirsty she stands in front of the fridge pulling on the handles saying "wawa!!".  And when she is hungry she stands at her high chair and whines for us to put her in it.  And when she is tired and runs up to me and grabs my legs and gives me this pitiful face:

More fun facts about H at 15 months:

• BOOKS - She has fully discovered her love of books this month.  Our floors are always covered in books!  She flips through them all and knows exactly where the touch-and-feel parts are on each page.  I love it when she brings me or Rian books to read to her.  She crawls onto our lap and just waits patiently for us to start reading.  She is perfectly content looking at the same book over and over and over again!  I guess she doesn't get tired of the repetition, but I do!  So we've gone to the library a few times to spice up our at-home library.



• BOWS - Her hair is really getting longer and I can finally put bows in my baby's hair!  I've been patiently waiting 15 long months for this!  She even had her first-ever pigtails this month :)

 

 



• BABY DOLLS - Hailey has really taken a liking to her baby dolls this month.  It's so sweet to watch her carry them around and take care of them.  She wraps them up in blankets, feeds them little bottles, and gives them baths with washcloths.  It's really neat to just sit back and watch her play; it shows how much she observes about what we do on a daily basis and then tries to imitate it with her dollies.



• WORDS - Hailey has added a few words to her vocabulary this month:
• Yo (for yogurt)
• Bye and Bye Bye (most of the time it sounds like "Bah Bah")
• No more ("Nomo")
• Duck ("Guck")
• Stores ("Stoh-iz") - Story: Every Monday Hailey and I run our errands, do the grocery shopping, etc. We have been doing that pretty consistently for months now, and before we leave I always say, "Hailey, are you ready to go to some stores with mama?" And a couple weeks ago she started responding with "Stoh-iz" and walking over to the back door ready to leave! She just too smart!
• Whenever my phone rings or a car pulls up she gets so excited and says "Who zat?" or "Wha zat?"
• The most frequently used words in her vocabulary these days are Wawa, Dada, Dog, Hi, and No.
• Note: In Hailey's world, Wawa means both water and milk.  Choose wisely because if you give her the wrong one, a mini-meltdown will ensue!
• When she sees a picture of a cow or you ask her what sound a cow makes, she says "mooooooooooo" or "mmmmmmm"
• And in case you're keeping track, that's still a big negative on the "mama" front...
• FOOD/DRINK - Her appetite isn't what it used to be.  Her current favorite foods are fruit, oatmeal, cheese, yogurt, black beans, pickles, and PBJ.  She eats really well at breakfast, so-so at lunchtime, and just forget about it at dinner time.  Three bites of dinner and she's squirming to get down.  She would rather be playing or reading or chasing the dog rather than eating.  But she is still gaining weight so no worries over here!
• SLEEPING - Just like clockwork, she naps each day at 9am and again at 2 or 2:30pm. She goes to bed at 7pm and wakes up around 6 or 6:15!  We have it down to such a routine at night and she hardly ever puts up a fight when its time to go to bed.  Rian is in charge of bed time and is just amazing with it.  I love to hear them laughing together while he is putting on her PJs, and I love hearing him singing her sweet lullabyes :)
• TOOFERS - Hailey has finally gotten some new teeth! Two more on top (on either side of the big middle ones) plus both of her first molars on the bottom.  The top first molars are cutting through as we speak.  But surprisingly, she's doing pretty well with the pain!
• MISCELLANEOUS CUTENESS -
• Hailey has found a few "hideouts" around the house and loves to play there.  I love it!



• She still loves to play peekabo



• She loves to "clean" around the house. Must be because she sees me cleaning all the time ;)   It's really precious how she finds towels and just scrubs away!



• H has become obsessed with belly buttons this month.  She walks around with her shirt up pointing to her belly button practically all day long!  And she loves to lift up mommy and daddy's shirts and stick her finger in our belly buttons, too :)

• The climbing.  Oh, the climbing.  Gone are the days where we can keep her little blue chair next to the couch because she will use it to hoist herself up onto the couch when mommy is not looking!  One day I made her a pillow mountain to climb on and she totally loved it. 

 

And now for the best part, my favorite pics of the month.  Enjoy!

 



 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All 3 cousins playing at their Great Grandparents house :)

She was dancing to his music!

Love.

 

 

 

 



14 Months Old & Florida Vacation

Our sweet angel is 14 months old!  I love watching her grow and learn new things each day.  She certainly keeps everyone entertained with her silly faces and laughs.  She amazes Rian and I daily with all the things she can do and her ability to communicate her needs.  Here is a quick run down of Miss H at 14 Months Old.

• She can locate her belly and her head, and sometimes her nose.  Most of the time when I say "where is your nose?" she points to mine instead, but I think that's pretty smart, too!
• She loves to give hugs and kisses, even when we don't ask for them (which is the best time to receive them!).  She is even starting to pucker up to give her kisses instead of giving the open-mouth variety :)
• She can still wear size 12m dresses, but is in 18m for everything else.  Size 3 or 4 for shoes.
• She has started to pay more attention when I read books to her.  It seems like her overall attention span is getting better.  She will sit and play with one toy for a good amount of time before moving on to the next.
• She has the most adorable laugh in the world.  Just ask my aunts and cousin who spent a week with us on vacation :) 
• She hasn't gotten any new teeth in a while.  Still just the 4 on bottom and 2 up top.
• She still takes 2 naps per day (each about 1 hr long) and sleeps 10-11 hours through the night.
• Whenever there is a pillow or blanket on the ground she will drop to the ground and lay on it for like 10 seconds then get up and continue on with what she was doing.  It is so funny!
• New words she started saying this month:
• Stop
• More
• Uh Oh
• Wawa (water)
• No
• Up
• Ball
• Hi
• Nana (banana)
• Her favorite word is still, without a doubt, "Daddy". Sometimes it's "Da-Da", sometimes its "Daddy", and sometimes it my favorite, "Da-Da-Yeeeeeeeee". She has said "Ma" probably twice. Sad Face for me, but I'm glad Rian is gettin' some love! It is so apparent how much she loves her daddy.

Rian, Hailey and I took our first family vacation last week!  Along with two of my aunts and my cousin, we all headed to Perdido Key in Pensacola, Florida.  It was such a great week!!!  We decided that the best way to get there was to drive through the night so that Hailey would be asleep for the majority of the 12+ hour drive.  It was a fun adventure for Rian and I to drive all night long - and by the time the sun came up we were pretty loopy!  Lots of caffeine and no sleep can really mess with your brain.  We were pretty slap happy by the morning but so excited to finally be in Florida! 

Hailey did so well on the beach.  Just give her a bucket and a scooper and she is good to go for hours!  She didn't try to eat the sand and it only got it in her mouth by mistake a couple times (and she did not care for it!).  She liked the ocean, too.  She would giggle each time a wave would come up and hit her back.  Such special memories created on this trip :)  Here are some of my fave pics from vacation. (For a full library of vay-cay pics, head to my fb page).

 

Now, driving home was a whole different story!  Hailey was not happy one bit.  We divided up the trip home into a two-day adventure, and so I'm sure it was boring for her to be strapped to a chair for 9+ hours on one day and 4 hours the next!  Poor girl just wanted to get up and run around.  We tried putting a movie in to capture her attention, but seeing as how she's never watched TV before, she could care less about adorable Nemo on that screen.  She didn't want to play with toys either, at least not for longer than about 3 mintues!  Books worked for maybe 5 minutes at a time, but the thing that held her attention the most was letting her go to town on a roll of paper towels.  Sounds crazy (and was a huge mess) but when you are desperate, you are desperate!  Turns out she's really good at tearing up paper towels into teeny tiny pieces.  Who knew!?  :)

I think I'm ready for fall.  Anyone else??