Keira is the light of my life! She is just sooo much fun! She is so cute and sweet and smart and developing such a personality.
Keira is gaining quite the vocabulary. She is sooo good at repeating words. I'm trying to remember all of the new words she can say... up, hot, back, brrrrr, that (which she says all the time when she wants me to say what something is), appleees, touch, bath, book, bubble, baba (bottle), please (every now and then), puppy, dirt, dirty, trash, babIES, me, eeewwww, yum, yummy, flower, sock, and there are some other words that she repeats after us. It's also really cute how she says Jason, super excited, it's hard to explain. She can say a couple of two words together phrases like all gone or hi baby or hi mommy. She loves animals! When asked what does a _________ say? She roars like a lion and a bear, barks, ee, ee, eeees like a monkey, and meow meows. And tonight while reading she was trying awfully hard to sound like a donkey. Needless to say, to the untrained ear or out of context these words may not be recognizable. :o)
She often can point to her head, hair, eyes, ears, nose, teeth, tongue, hands, feet, and tummy. When eating if I ask her if what's in her mouth is gone, and it is, she'll sometimes open her mouth to show me it's gone.
It's also so amazing to see her actually understand what I tell her to do, and to learn routines. Sometimes when I tell her to put something back, she does. Before she gets out of the bathtub I ask her to put all of her toys away, and usually she does. After our bottle she knows we brush her teeth. After that I put her down and ask her to pick out a book. She goes into her room and then runs over to me in the chair for me to read her a couple of books. She loves books, but mostly looking at the pictures, especially animal pictures. Now-a-days not much reading takes place.
She's starting to like things to be clean. If her hands are dirty she looks at them and rubs them and says "dirty." Or if there's some food on her hand or a little area is dirty she'll say "dirt." If she can get a hold of some kleenex, a washcloth, or a duster she's in heaven and loves wiping everything. All of the sudden she doesn't like anything on her food tray, unless a plate or bowl has food in it. But even so she'll take a handful of the food and stuff as much as will fit into her little mouth. The second the bowl is empty she'll push it off onto the table or hand it to me. She doesn't like any crumbs on her tray either and if she's being ornery she wipes them off onto the floor and if she's good she'll hand it to me. She won't keep her sippy cup on her tray, she'll push that off onto the table. When she wants something she'll usually point at it and give a little high pitched "mm??" If she can't chew a piece of skin or something after a while she'll take it out and give it to me.
She's a little bundle of warmth. I just love to hug and squeeze her. She's starting to like hugs too. My favorite is when we run towards each other to embrace. :o) JHowever, sometimes she shifts to avoid me so I chase after her. My little stinker.
She can also be a little terror. Hopefully I already made up my six positives to one negative. Some days it's like she goes around searching for things she's not supposed to be doing. Or purposely doing mean things, like hitting Jason or myself. Or purposely disobeying, like I tell her not put her hands in her hair while she's eating, she'll stop for a second, look at me, and do it again! Or the same thing with throwing food on the ground. And sometimes she makes a little path of destruction.
When we're at home (now that she can walk great) she likes to be carried around. She stands below me reaching up and sometimes tries to climb up my leg, saying "Mommy", which of course melts my heart. When I give in and tote her around she's so happy and points at everything. However, if we're in a store, she hates to be carried and will arch her back trying to escape. She also doesn't like to spend much time in a shopping cart and tries to stand up and usually can despite the belt.
She refuses to wear bows. And as soon as she realizes it's there will pull out her cute little top of the head ponytail that she can finally pull off.
Just about every time I change her diaper or clothes, unless she has something fascinating in her hands or is drinking milk, she cries and throws down the toy I gave her to keep her happy.
If something doesn't go her way or pretty much anytime I take something away from her, she looks at me like it's the saddest thing that could ever happen, pouts her lip, and usually bursts out in tears.
Which then usually leads to falling to the ground crying.
P.S. I'm now finishing a shift at work and am wondering how parenting works. Does it really matter how strict you are and how much you encourage proper behavior? Or will kids be who they are? I'm certainly not perfect, but I feel like with my very strict upbringing, I try to guide Keira towards good manners and good behavior. And I definitely try my hardest to be a good mom and do what's best for her. But then I have patients who I feel aren't the greatest parents and their kids are soooo good. Example: Several months ago a 26 year old single, meth-addicted father of a 10 month old come to the ER for abdominal pain. The baby boy just sat in his car seat for over two hours smiling and seemed as content as can be. I felt so bad for him. Tonight a family with three kids, ages six, three, and almost two came in. The parents seemed just fine, but all three kids were so good, I barely heard a peep out of them. And then there would be Keira. She would have explored everything in the entire room and then would be bored to death and probably fussy. Maybe it's a phase?? :o) But I love my little sweetheart and wouldn't want her any other way!
