22 Months

On May 29th Baby Girl turned 22 months old and I want to briefly update about her development.

It's much harder to describe the changes that she's going through at this point--it was much easier when she was walking, rolling, and sitting.

Our sitter claims Baby Girl has had a language explosion but I think The Hubby and I would say it happened closer to 21 months.  She's definitely using phrases and sentences a lot more and rarely communicates with only one word.

My favorite thing (I think) that she's doing right now is singing.  Just tonight, for instance, she sang almost all of the ABCs with me.  She didn't get all the individual letters right, but said something for each of them.  She sings Mary Had a Little Lamb and says all the repeating lines.  She also sings pieces of Itsy Bitsy Spider and Wheels on the Bus, complete with hand motions for both.  She still insists on If You're Happy and You Know It in the can, but has started playing tricks on Mommy and not actually doing the actions you're supposed to do.  The silence after I say "Shout 'Hooray!'" cracks her up and she will laugh for about 5 minutes afterwards.

Speaking of the car....we still battle the car regularly.  Baby Girl always claims that her "buckle hurts" and wants to get up.  She always wants entertainment from one of us as well--either singing, reading a good, holding a finger, playing "Hide Seek" (covering her eyes and saying "I can't find her anywhere!")...you get the idea.

The major thing that can keep her occupied in the car, though, is looking for buses or big trucks.  She loves them.  I'm actually pretty nervous about car rides now that school is out and we won't be seeing too many "big yellow bus" anymore.

Baby Girl's eating has gotten worse.  I'm not sure if she's just not as hungry or if she's getting pickier.  She just recently started refusing broccoli, which was one of her favorites for awhile.  She also seems to be starving on the way home from the sitter's so we give her her afternoon snack that she didn't finish and we're wondering if this is filling her up enough that she's not hungry for dinner.  We're hoping she isn't getting too picky--we've always been really pleased with how many different things she would eat.

We're pretty much at status quo for pottying.  She's peeing in the potty about once a day, but we typically have to ask her if she wants to try.  Sometimes she'll try and sometimes she'll refuse.  We don't push.  We've been giving stickers as a reward for trying and money (typically five pennies) as a reward for actually peeing in the potty.  The sitter will have almost half as many kids in a week, so she plans to focus on potty training at that point with her, which we really appreciate.  I hope Baby Girl is ready. 

Baby Girl is still refusing Daddy a lot.  We have to reason with her and tell her that there are two parts to bedtime--changing diaper/pjs and the everything we do upstairs--and that Mommy will do one and Daddy will do one.  We typically have a tantrum (which is fairly mild compared to what I hear from other parents of kids her age) before she gives in and lets Daddy change her diaper and pjs.  Her refusal of Daddy makes both of us incredibly sad.

Baby Girl is definitely discovering her will and opinions, for better or for worse.  A lot of the parts of this age are sweet.  She's loving, still snuggly, curious, adorable (seriously--you need to hear this kid say "okee-dokee"), and fun.  But she's also very opinionated and strong-willed and because of that we butt heads a lot.  I am typically exhausted by the end of the day, especially when she fights bedtime every.single.night.  But I love her truly and deeply and only want the best for her.  Only two more months until she's two.  Wow.

Edited to add some things I forgot:

Baby Girl is now navigating stairs entirely standing really well.  We still try to spot her sometimes, but she does a really good job.

Baby Girl is still technically wearing 18 month stuff, but we didn't buy any summer 18 month stuff, so we're having to use safety pins on some of her 24 month/2T bottoms.  The tops are fine and the dresses seem fine but the pants are long and pretty big in the waist.