16 months

Elle's now 16 months old. This is one of my favorite ages- tons of fun and learning so much everyday! Not a whole lot more to update since my last post (just 2 weeks ago). I mainly just wanted to get back on track with one post, on the 17th of each month, highlighting Elle's monthly accomplishments.

My favorite things about Elle's 15th month was her explosive vocabulary. New words (since my last post 2 weeks ago):

Jesus

moon

eyes

hat

please ("eese")

baby

She also now folds her arms for prayers and says a loud, "AMEN" after (love this)!

She's finally using signs to communicate- not many, just a few (milk, thank you, and please), but at least she's using them. For some reason Elle thinks signing is such a silly thing, so I really have to make her use them. I let her whine and whine, refusing to give her what she wants until I get a please.

Elle's finally becoming a better milk drinker. She still loves fruit (any and all). Her favorite veggis are peas and broccoli (which she doesn't eat much of, but at least she'll eat em). Her favorite meals are the same as Madi's- chicken, broccoli casserole and Hawaiian Haystacks. Elle's better at attempting new foods, but she's still got a picky side. She loves her snacks though (which I have to monitor so she'll eat meals) and regularly helps herself to the snack cupboard. It's only the raisins she's able to pull out and open, so I'm usually ok with it.

Elle's super friendly to strangers from afar, but when people want to get up close- to hold, hug, take out of Mommy's arms, etc, Elle makes sure to put up a fuss. Luckily she doesn't have separation anxiety like Madi did at this age. Elle's fine with being left with a baby-sitter and doesn't care a bit about being left behind with her Daddy.

We had some serious teething this month (first year molars)- which for Elle, always seems to bring on major crankiness, high fevers, and lack of sleep. Then right after recovering from her new molars, we had daylight savings- which only threw things off for another week and a half. Luckily things seem to be pretty much back to normal. She hasn't slept past 6:30am since the time change, but hopefully in the next week or so. . .

Elle's got a major obsession with her binky and pink giraffe. After what we went through with Madi, I was hoping to break the binky habit right at 12 months, but with all our traveling this past summer, I thought it would be best to wait. But now I think we're stuck with it. Elle sure is a great sharer though. She always wants to shares her binky with any toddler she sees in a magazine and all book characters that have their mouth opened in the picture. And I love how she makes a sucking noise- as if the person is really sucking on her binky. It's hilarious!

Elle really is a sweetheart- always trying to make everything better. Anytime Madi's screaming or crying, Elle will try to find some way to help the situation- like bringing Madi a baby, giving Madi a kiss, a hug, etc. She hates to see people sad and is really good at the sympathy cry.