Aurora - Twenty One Months

Aurora is starting to talk in sentences. I was upstairs the other days and I heard Aurora wandering around saying "Mama!  Mama, wher'are you?" And to get someone's attention she says "hey, hey, hey!" It's pretty funny.

This little girl is developing quite an opinion. All of the sudden she cares what she wears. Some days is she fine and other days she throws a fit about what I put on her. Actually she often just throws a fit if she can't wear "pink" her current favorite dress.  



She also likes to try to direct the other kids at playgroup. If they are doing something she doesn't like its "no no no" and waggles her finger at them. Hah. 

For the first time since she was swaddled Aurora is now playing happily in her crib. She comes and asks us to put her in her crib with her stuffed animals and will often play in there for 10-15 minutes before asking to come out.

She has been waking up in the morning relatively happy this month too. Instead of crying hysterically when she wakes she has been calling, "Mama, whereareyou? Whereareyou Mama?"

She has been really interested in lions lately so we got her a book and a stuffed animal which she quickly named "Baby Lion." She wants to take him everywhere.

Favorite books this month are Toot & Puddle, Peter Rabbit
Favorite song right now is Bingo, but sung with all her favorite people/animals/books inserted i.e. There was a girl she had a dog, Wyatt was his name-o...

We had a great time with Mimi, Papa and Uncle Matt when they were here for Thanksgiving. Aurora kept following Uncle Matt around saying "Uh-Matt! Uh-Matt! Hey, Hey, iPad!" She loves the iPad because she only really gets to use it when we have family over that want to use it with her.

Aurora - Twenty Months

Height :: 33 1/2"

Weight :: 25 lbs

This little girl's personality is really starting to come out. Matt and I leaned a big mirror up against the wall which she is loving  It is just too funny to watch her stand in front of it and sing to herself. She gets so into it!

Her new favorite thing to say is "hows your day?" which cracks everyone up.

She is a total tornado! I really hope we have reached the peak of the pulling books off the shelf phase. Although once she is done clearing the bookshelves she will sit and "read" to herself for ages which is awesome.

She has finally figured out how to rotate a puzzle piece to fit into the appropriate hole on the puzzle. She used to get so mad when they didn't all go in easily.

It is truly amazing how much babies absorb even before you think they are capable of it. Matt was putting Aurora to bed one night and he yelled down to me that he she was wandering around upstairs calling "mina" and he couldn't figure out what she was looking for  It took me a while but I finally figure out that she was looking for the ballerina book that I had read to her a few times as a little tiny. I can't believe she remembered it!  

Rora is in real undies! I definitely wouldn't consider her "potty trained" but I'd say she is down to 1-2 pee accidents a day and sometimes not having one at all for a few days at a time. Yay!

She is finally starting to wake without crying. It is so much more pleasant to wake up to "Mama mama mama" than a frantically crying baby. Her sleep now is a little after 7pm to almost 7am and then a one hour nap.

Aurora - Nineteen Months

Height :: 33 1/4" (75%)

Weight :: 24.7 lbs (50%)

Head Circumference :: 19.2" (90%)

This girl is really starting to be able to communicate her thoughts.  We still get a lot of grunting, but if asked she usually can tell us what is going on.  And thankfully if we don't quite understand her she is very patient about leading us and showing us what she needs.



She is great about asking Please, and saying Thank you Mama or Thank you Dadda.  If you are in her way and she wants you to move she will say "beep beep, dadda (or mama or chile etc)

Everything is "no" these days.  It really doesn't matter what you ask, sometimes she will even reply no to something we ask her and then realize that she really wanted it and promptly change her mind.  She usually loves to play and wrestle with Dadda, but sometimes she just isn't in the mood and will tell him "no, no Dadda, no." It's pretty funny.



Football season is upon us again and Matt is teaching Aurora all about the Broncos, or Brown Shoes as she calls them ;) I was watching the two of them watch football the other day and it cracked me up because Aurora gets to excited mimicking Matt wave his hand at the screen and yell "go go go" to some player or another.



Aurora love to sing!  She has always loved music and dancing, but she is really enjoying singing along with us to some of her favorite songs.  Some of her favorites these days are ABC's, Bingo, Mary had a Little Lamb, Twinkle Twinkle, Puff, and the Itsy Bitsy Spider.



Unfortunately this increased interest in communicating is not only limited to words and talking.  She has recently started screaming... a lot... and usually in public.  Luckily it is almost never upset screaming, only excited screaming, but that usually doesn't endear us to other people at stores or restaurants...



She is also really beginning to take in what she is seeing.  Until now I think when she did watch any TV she was just mesmerized by the flashing lights.  A week or so ago, Dad got Rora up from a nap and decided to finish out the TV episode he was watching and apparently the alien on screen scared her so badly that she is still walking around saying "TV? TV? No, no TV"



Aurora went through a growth spurt this month.  Our refrigerator doors used to clear her head when she was hanging around...don't ask me how I know that they don't anymore...



She has really taken an interest in coloring in the past few weeks.  Before now she didn't really know what to do with markers or crayons (besides try to eat them) and would give up quickly.  Now you can't get her to stop coloring.



We were dealing with early early mornings at the beginning of this month, back on track now with a bedtime around 7/7:15 and waking up around 6:15/6:30.

Aurora - Eighteen Months

Aurora has always loved it when we sang to her, but now she is starting to sing along.  The words are still pretty much nonsense, but she is getting notes and intonation.  It is so much more fun to sing when she is singing with us :)  She has also started to sing something that is clearly recognizable as the "ABC's" all by herself.

She loves hats!  Mimi started wearing hats with her while they Skyped together, and now she can't get enough of them.  I think it is probably because it is the one article of clothing that she can put on all by herself.  It's pretty cute though to see her walking around in her hats.

She is becoming more and more gentle all the time.  She is still very interested in eyes, but she is finally responding when we tell her to be gentle or to not touch the eyes.  Wyatt and Chile are really liking this new development and aren't running from her the way they used to.

Everything has become a phone.  Last week I was cleaning up upstairs and I started hearing Aurora from the other room saying "Hi Dadda" over and over again.  At first I didn't think anything of it, but after 5 minutes of this I figured I should go make sure she hadn't really gotten ahold of the phone and called someone.  She was sitting up in one of the office chairs talking to Dadda via a calculator.  Too funny.

This girl is into kissing everything.  It used to be just Mama and Dadda when we asked, but now she walks around the room handing them out to all her stuffed animals... the chair... the table...

I love it that she is now saying "Love You."  I don't know that she has any concept what it means, but if you say "Love You" to her she will say it back :)

Aurora has also starting taking an interest in directing the dogs.  She has always loved to tell Wyatt no when he barks, but now she wants them to lay down where she wants them to lay down, or get off the couch just because.  They don't listen of course, but she tries.

Sleep has been pretty consistent lately.  She goes to bed pretty easily a little after 7pm and wakes up sometime around 6:15 or 6:30am.  She also takes a one-ish hour nap around noon. 

Aurora - Seventeen Months

Height :: 32" (75%)

Weight :: 23 lbs (45%)

Head Circumference :: 19" (90%)



Aurora has added "Thank You" to her vocabulary



All of the sudden she has become interested in helping Mama clean up messes.  It is amazing how much their little minds absorb -- the other day she spilled a glass of water on the coffee table and without me saying anything to her she promptly ran into the kitchen, brought back a towel and laid it down on the spilled water.





She has started dancing with her dolly -- too cute!



Aurora is off and running... and running... and running.  This girl never slows down!



The Olympics have been on the last few weeks.  We usually don't let Aurora watch television, but we have made an exception for this.  She thinks it is especially fun to cheer with Dadda for America, 'Mer-ta!



She has started requesting her favorite song, Baa Baa Black Shep, by name -- Baa Baa Baa?

Aurora - Sixteen Months

Aurora 's language skills have exploded this month.  We bought her some flashcards for the plane to Anguilla and she can identify almost all of them.  She also knows the sounds for most of the animals we can think of and is naming objects in her surroundings as well. 

While we were in Anguilla, Dadda taught Aurora how to say adventure, which comes out more like "Abee-da" for stroller rides.  Now it is one of her absolute favorite words.

While on vacation we also gave everyone in Matt's family a name, and she loves to play the "do you remember" game where we ask her if she remembers each member of the family and she excitedly repeats the name back to us.



She still loves being sung to, and now claps and says "yayyyy" at the end of every song.  It's pretty funny.



She also loves dancing, and her dancing is evolving from just bopping her head to the beat into dancing around in little circles.  Is it sad that Matt and I could watch her do that for hours?

She is developing more and more of an opinion.  She is starting to want to take off and explore while we are out and then gets super cranky when we tell her she has to stay and hold our hand.  





Now that she is getting more steady on her feet she is exploring speed.  She thinks it is really fun to get two hands to hold, lean into them and move her feet as fast as possible in a sort of supported run.

Sleep is going downhill again.  Early in the month she was having a hard time falling asleep at night, sometimes not until 7:30pm or so.  I don't think she isn't tired, I guess maybe she just needs a little alone time to unwind?  In Anguilla she was going to bed around 7:30pm without too much difficulty (except the stress of a new room which is to be expected) but did develop the wonderful habit of waking up around 5:20/5:30am...

Naps were getting a little longer for a few days but are now back to averaging about an hour.  Very recently we have been having some success, however, with going to her when she first starts to stir and rocking her back to sleep for another 20-30 minutes.