17 months...

Happy 17 months Hannah! Another month has flown by. You're growing up so much with each passing today. This is kind of a long post, so we'll just jump right in.

Things you're not fond of: Bows (your promptly pull them out of your hair and carry them around) and new places (you cling pretty tight)

Things you love: stuffed animals, elmo, the wiggles, cheese, corn puffs, bananas, milk, yogurt, the pink pillow from great aunt gigi, books (no really, it's an obsession), your paci, to dance! and girl you can break it down!, and being outside.

You love "patty cake" and always want to sing it. You come up to us and clap in rhythm while saying "pah, pah" until we start singing. Then, you start doing the hand motions with the words (pat, roll, and pointing to yourself for "me"). You also do the hand motions to "Itsy Bisty Spider" and "Twinkle Twinkle."

You are happiest when you first wake up. You love to just sit and play in your crib when you wake up in the morning and from most naps. Mommy likes it too :) You usually look at your books or play with your stuffed animals. You also "talk" a lot. It's fun turning up the monitor to hear what your sweet babble.

Brain Gymnastics: This is a new category this month. Your little brain is getting bigger and bigger each day. In addition to learning new and exciting things, you are actually developing quite the memory. For example,this month, you gave me the baby and said "baby." Then, I asked you to put the baby to bed and you correctly put the baby in its crib! I had no idea you knew that. We talk about the different people, the rooms of the house and the objects within the house. I'm happy to see it's clicking with you and you're learning!

Another example, we finished reading an Elmo book and when I asked you to bring me another Elmo book, you walked into our closet and came out with another Elmo book. This was exciting for me! You passed by your favorite book (Pow Pow), went into the closet (where there normally aren't any books), and brought back another Elmo book. You remembered seeing that book on the floor! Go Hannah!

You always play in the tupperware drawer. One day, you grabbed a large cup looking piece, walked to the fridge, held your cup to the water spout, and then pretended to drink your "water." You are quite the observer.

Finally, you still love to climb up and down stairs. Now when we need to go up stairs, I'll tell you to go up to your room. You'll walk over to the baby gate, I open it, then you climb the stairs and quickly run into your room. It's super cute. It also shows me that you're learning and remembering complex thoughts and commands. It's really neat to see the progression.

Daddy's Girl: This month, for the first time, you wanted out of my arms and immediately ran over to daddy. This is HUGE! You love your daddy, but given the choice, will come to me. You also talk to daddy on the phone. He will call while traveling and I'll put it on speaker. You've started to recognize his voice and say "Hi Dah-dee." It's so fun and you melt your daddy's heart!

Favorite Books: You have another new favorite book "Tickle Monster." You bring it over and say "tickle, tickle." You also make us read "Good Dog Carl" quite a bit. Not to worry, Pout Pout is still up there.

New words: Hannah "Hah-noh", Max "Ma," happy, Elmo "el-moh," Mimi, all done "ah don," please "Pwuees," you can say all your vowels (not by sight) and come (to Daisy).

New foods: you tried scrambled eggs this month. You weren't took crazy about them. I have no clue how to cook eggs since I'm not a fan, so aunt Kris stepped up to the plate to help me out. We thought you were going to like them, but I think one you got passed the layer of cheese you weren't loving it.

Speaking of food, you love to feed Daisy. I will scoop her food into a cup and then give it to you. You walk carefully over to her bowl and pour the food in. Most of the time, it actually makes it into the bowl. If you miss, you're quick to pick up each pebble and carefully place it in the bowl. You get so excited when it's time to feed Daisy and are so proud of yourself when the pebbles fall into the bowl.

Separation Anxiety: You had a huge break through this month. I dropped you off in the nursery before choir practice. Normally, you won't let the workers put you down. To my surprise, I came back to a SLEEPING baby! Not only were you sleeping, but you were sleeping on the animal chair by yourself. The ladies told me you warmed up quickly, played with the other children, then fell asleep watching mickey. I was so proud of you!

Milestones: I've been a little slack in recording the little milestones over the past few months. Here are a few you've achieved:

• Successfully pull a toy behind you when walking- this started in the past month
• You can carry large toys or several toys while walking- we joke that you are a "power lifter" and you constantly surprise us by what you can pick up (eg- your leapfrog activity table, no really)
• You began running sometime over the past two months
• Can stand on your tiptoes and thus can reach many more things on tables now
• You love to cover and uncover containers
• You also love to fill up and pour from containers
• You're into turning pages one by one in your big books (vs. board books)- this started this month
• You are favoring your right hand 
• You can point to objects/pictures when I ask "where's the..."
• You can follow simple instructions
• You can play make-believe (you started this when we were in Chicago with your Little People House, but I'm not sure I recorded it).
• You can identify yourself in the mirror and in pictures
• You imitate a lot of our behaviors 
• You can feed yourself with both a spoon and a fork

Illness: You came down with a mystery illness this month. At the tail end of a cold that just wouldn't go a way, you spiked a very high fever (104.1) and then broke out in a weird rash. At first we all thought it was a fever rash, but it changed over the course of a few days. You were the "mystery baby." All three peds on staff checked you out and none of them could identify the rash. It was only on your legs, raised, and didn't blanch out when pressed. The best diagnosis they could come up with was HSP, but you weren't showing all the signs. So, we just had to wait the mystery illness out and watch you closely. 

Milk... Does a body good!

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day Sweet Hannah! Daddy and I love you more than you'll ever know. Every day with you brings new adventures and we are certainly more than blessed to be your parents.

This year, Daddy had to travel on Valentine's so we sent him this picture. He loved the red and white and we joked that today we're wearing our valentine outfits and tomorrow they will turn into "game day" outfits. Roll Tide!

You were able to celebrate Valentine's with your cousins, Max and Megan. It was so fun getting the three of you together. Y'all are interacting more with each other and had a blast giggling together. This is the picture we took right before bath time. We ought to submit it to Target for their diaper ad. We love those polka dot diapers!!

My personal favorite picture of the night....

Not only is it the cutest picture of you and Aunt Susie, but Daisy popping her head into the picture at the last minute was priceless!!!

Making Valentines

You made your own valentine's this year. It was quite the process, but you had so much fun doing it.

First, you colored. You also took a bite of several crayons, but mostly colored :)

Then, you made special pictures to include in the card. You love blowing kisses and I thought it would be the perfect addition to your cards. Nice idea.... but mommy is still not quick enough with the camera. Here are the out takes. 

You took a break for good dental hygiene. Your Great Aunt Gigi would be so proud. Look at those TEETH!

And of course, you took time to get the "sillies" out. 

Happy 16 months!

Yeah, a little late on this one too!

Another month has come and gone. This was a big month. Every month is bringing new and exciting skills and challenges. This month marked your first in our new home. You are officially a Georgia Peach. You have adjusted to your new house and room amazingly well. I'm sure being displaced for 8 weeks ahead of time helped the transition. You probably thought we were just in another house. You've come to realize that if Mommy and Daddy are around, everything is A-OK.

What's new this month. 


You love sidewalk chalk!! and your coloring is getting much better each time we bring it out. Your lines are longer and the colors are darker. YAY Hannah!

You tried two new foods this month: fish sticks (I swore I wouldn't be this mother, but eh... it expands her taste buds and they are easy) and Spaghetti noodles.

You can identify and bring us several animals from your zoo when we ask: Zebra, tiger, fish and monkey top the list.

You make several animal noises: fish (pucker and smack lips together), monkey (ooo oo oo  and move arms), cat (meow) and duck (kack). You do have one more... pig... although this one you're a little confused with. You say "la, la, la" for pigs because your book says "la, la, la" *reading gone wrong!

You are more interactive when we sing songs with hand motions. You really try to join in and mimic them. Speaking of music, we tried a new music class this month. We have you enrolled in the Spring session!!! It will be a ton of fun. The teacher and several other moms in the class commented on your knack for rhythm. You actually clap the beat (correctly!) to most music :) Maybe there is a bit of me in you!

You can stack blocks.

You have expressed an interest in putting on your own shoes and socks. You see them lying on the floor and will spend a significant amount of time trying to figure out how they go on your feet. So far, you haven't had success. However, you're really close!

Your attention span is getting longer. We can read you longer books and you sit still in our laps. Your favorite of the month- The Pout Pout Fish. We can read this to you almost all the way through twice before you're ready to move. You constantly bring us the book and say "pow pow."

You started to give real kisses this month. It's too cute. You'll still blow kisses, but there's nothing like the real thing.

You spent your second new years in a row with Hudson :)

Things you love.
You love your daddy very much this month! I love watching the two of you spend time together.

You love your Daisy girl!

You love your new helmet and refuse to take it off.

You love your new learning tower! and so does mommy. It helps tremendously when I'm cooking. Instead of constantly holding you, I can put you in the tower and you can "cook" too!

Words. New words this month include: shoe, cheese (chee), you now say "a ball" instead of just ball, you've started saying please (pwees), Daddy (dah-dee), baby, more (mo) and milk (mulk).

Signing. I've been a little slack on teaching you new signs this month. Something about a big move... LOL! BUT, you did pick up on a sign that we've been working on for some time now..."Book" YAY Hannah!

Teeth. So, I lied last month when I said we were finished with teeth. To my surprise, you got all 4 of your "eye teeth" this month. That brings your tooth count to a grand total of 16!! These 4 teeth have been complete boogers. They have caused you a lot of pain. You have been uncharacteristically fussy and have woken up from naps and night sleep. Take a look at those chompers!

Independent vs. dependent. You are a very independent child when it comes to completing tasks (e.g. brushing your teeth, feeding yourself, etc). However, you are a dependent child when it comes to playing and just being around. You always want daddy and me to hold you and interact with you. You used to be more independent during play, but I think being around family for the past few months has really broken you of that. It's not a terrible thing, just something we'll work on. You still have terrible separation anxiety. We're being consistent in taking you to church each week, so hopefully this will subside when you get to know the workers more.

Sleep. You are still an excellent sleeper, although I'm afraid you're transitioning to one nap a day. There's good and bad that come along with this for me.

Happy 16 months Hannah!

15 month stats

Yes, I'm terribly late on this. I know I'll catch up one day :)

We have a new pediatrician! I absolutely love her. She's heads and tails above the doctor in Chicago. She is very caring and takes the time to talk and explain things. She is wonderful.

You had a great check up. Your stats:
Height: 30 and a quarter inches
Weight: 26lbs

Your new doctor is also concerned that you have a partially clogged tear duct, so we are off to another pediatric opthamologist.