17 months old

I know I say this all the time, but I just cant believe how big she is getting and how fast. But I have never meant it more than I do right now. Everyday she is changing and accomplishes something. I suppose it is time to face that my "baby" is no longer a baby in any means. She is a very independent smart toddler.....she makes this whole raising her gig so easy, almost too easy, and I give a lot of credit to signing with her.

I am going to write out her current vocab *if I can even remember it all, its coming so quick now, its hard to keep up, so I need to document this* The ones with * next to it are ones she can sign as well. Some are sign only.

hi
bye
bye bye (which means when we leave)
Go
Lets go
Car*
night night
sleep*
potty*
ewwww (when something is gross, something in her mouth she doesn't like, dirty diapers, things she finds off the floor)
book*
Cat*(also kitty, kitty cat)
cold*
bear*
dog*
banana*
Bella (our dog's name)
up*
all gone and all done*
please*
Madison
daddy*
mommy*
baby*
girl*
hat*
duck*
pig*
block
watch
time
eat*
drink*
apple*
water*
baba *(signs milk)
ut oh
oh no
woah
dang (yes...dang...thanks to hubby, she also groups woah with it..so she says, "woah dang!"
outside
more*
whats that
whats this
thank you (sign only)
clothes*
down
bath*
brush teeth(sign only, but she mumbles something similar)
frog (sign only)
fish(sign only)
wash hands(sign only)
soap(sign only)
stop*
no
yes (yup, yah)
Yeah (followed with clapping)
poo poo, pee pee
powder
cheese*
ball*
cracker*
bird*
shoes(sign only)


There are more, she actually talks with me all day but when I want to recall them its hard. They are simple words but she communicates in context. She will tell me "lets go" then signs shoes and runs to her shoes and tries to put them on her feet. Once her shoes are on she'll walk to the door and say "outside" then "car". She tells me if she is cold. She tells me she is hungry and wants to eat but telling me, signing and going to her high chair. She can tell me when she wants water or milk. She tells me she wants a banana or a cracker or whatever it is she wants. She will tell us that she wants to take a bath or that she is tired and wants to go to sleep (which is good for me). If I ask her if she wants to go to bed, she will run for the stairs and walk up them. She is really good at doing it upright. She will go straight to her bed. Before bed she tells us to brush teeth and she will also do it on her own. She takes the comb and brushes her hair and even puts her own powder on during diaper changes.

She is getting to where she can repeat something only hearing it 1 or 2 times. Today hubby was showing her his watch and she said it back several times when prompted. He told her it tells time. She said it back several times.

She always calls for us...if he walks out of the room she says, "daddy go?" and calls for him. Same for me. She will come up to us and pat up on the leg or arm and be like, mama? daddy and then tell us what she wants. She lets us know when she is full. She just says all done and we know she is done (if we listen to her, she doesn't throw food, if we ignore her request, that's when she gets bored and slings food, so its very helpful). She now tells me when she has to go potty, so we are starting to potty train her.

I am not trying to sound like I am bragging...I am just amazed at what she is doing (I think she is right on time for most of it), I am just saying I cant believe she is growing up so fast. Before long she will be miss independent and will be able to talk fluently and come and go as she pleases. Kinda scary.

Today we were singing Old MacDonald and I would stop between the animals and she knows what sounds they make and she signs the animals with the song. I would stop after one verse and she would sign and say, "More eieiei-o?" so I would sing another verse and she would dance and sing and sign with me...then she would say, "more?" which comes out, Moe? She can say most of the words where others understand her, there are only a couple she says them half, like more. But most are complete words.

She knows to hold on to our hands and she listens surprisingly well for as young as she is. if we tell/ask her to do something, she does it. She understands so much, I think more than we even give her credit for.

Her hair is getting outrageous. :) I call her trumpy *donald trump hair* Its shaggy out of control and its making her look so much older, but she still has those adorable chubby cheeks!

She loves the park. She can swing on a big kid swing all by herself *with us pushing of course* and can climb up the stairs like a big girl and even go down the slide all by herself yelling WEEEEE all the way down. She likes to run with the big kids and do as they do.

She can go forward on her ride on toys and I think she might be ready for a pedal bike already...she is certainly tall enough and she understands motion like that really well. Cause and effect she is good at. If I show her arm motions for songs, she can do it right back to me, little copy cat this one.

I am so blessed to have a beautiful healthy little girl and I just love her so very much and so very proud of her. I cant wait until my family gets to meet her, I cant wait for her to meet them.

She acts bashful sometimes, but I secretly like it because she hugs me so tight and rests her beautiful face on my chest or on my shoulder. She likes to "pet" me too, like rub my arm or back...just like I do her. She is a very loving girl. She will give kisses when asked then tell us thank you. She asks please when she wants something...most times. Sometimes if you ask her to say please she looks at you like you are crazy! Same for thank you, but she is doing a great job.

She is very well behaved...she has her moments and her tantrums, but they are usually short lived and we discuss why its not ok and she usually goes back to her happy self shortly after. I got lucky with her personality. She is a lot like her daddy in the calm factor. I have a feeling my next one will be very opposite of her. Very hyper and not so calm. There is no way I can get this lucky twice. A good sleeper, listener, calm, easy go with the flow baby/child.

I hope Sass will like it in VA and we provide a great environment for her there. I think a lot of the reason Sass is so good too is because of hubby and my attitude around her. We don't fight almost ever and if we have a tiff, its not in front of her. We aren't stressed, never really have been and she always sees us happy and laughing. I think she is really thriving from that. We are blessed that we don't have tons on our plate to where we are stressed and unhappy and fighting..children pick up on it so easily. I know I did in my household. So far she has been in a pretty light atmosphere and I hope that continues when we move. Lots will be changing and I hope we can manage it like we do here. He will be working a more stressful job and maybe longer hours...a crazy commute so he may not be around as much. I will be going to school so she may have to be put in care for a while...that changes things too. But I guess I cant protect her forever from outside influences.

See I always liked that too...she was always in my care for the most part so other people's negative ways haven't really touched on her...my mom's house is stressful and can be negative and angry at times and she hasn't had to experience it because of the distance. But I also hate the fact Sass doesn't know her family outside of me and hubby either. We are going home for a while when we move to VA, I think the tension wont be great there anymore since there wont be sibling fights going on. I don't mean to say my family is negative, but lots of stress and tension can loom and create a uneasy vibe if you know what I mean.

Well I think I have rambled enough...if I just keep this current I wont have to write a novel every time I post....but that's how I roll I guess. So until next time.

yuck

Uh....I don't feel well today....I woke up with not being able to swallow. The feeling where you have to really think about it and TRY to swallow because your throat seems to have forgotten its primary function...and now its sore. Every time I woke up I had to use more throat spray just so I could try and get some more sleep. I hate sore throats with a passion. I think I would rather have a stomach bug and puking that a sore throat!

I even lost my voice, its cracking like I'm going through puberty again...I hope I don't get Sass sick.

Yesterday I got my second B-day present from hubby! A NEW LAPTOP! Yay! It is suuuper sweet and I am on it now. It has a 250 GB hard drive, blu ray player, 4 gigs of ram and of course a duo core processor so it does a lot of things at once. Its fast and nice. I love it!I went to the gym yesterday to start working out again and it was SO hot in there. It was raining outside so the humidity was crazy. I was sweating so bad, and I don't sweat much so if that's any indication of how it was. I barely got through my workout. I only did 35 minutes of cardio because of how much I was sweating, I thought I was going to pass out. And since I just started up again, might as well take it slow anyway. Just sucks because I am so sick today, means I cant go so.....hopefully tomorrow I will be better.

Sass amazes me with her smarts everyday!

We were looking at a magazine and she saw a lady with a cowboy hat on and she pointed and told me, "HAT!" while signing it. She then told me she was a girl, but saying it and signing it. Today she was playing with her toy pig and looked at me and said, "PIG!" and signed it for the first time! **I was JUST informed by hubby that she did this 2 days ago...:( He thought she has been doing it and didn't realize it was a new sign.***
She loves to spin in circles and she is just so funny. Her hair is so puffy and in a very awkward stage right now. She is so full of life and she is so fun to be around. I just cant believe how smart she is! I cant believe she is 16 months already. Time sure is flying.

I decided to TRY and give myself a french manicure yesterday. Operative word it TRY.It doesnt look too bad in the pic, but you can tell its a home job! haha

Well hubby is home so I can go lie down now.....and of course finish up Breaking Dawn. :)

mint chocolate chip ice cream...

...is what I am eating right now at 12:45am. I don't think Oprah and her, "don't eat after 5" speech sunk in. If you don't know, I have no self control when it comes to food. It amazes me to this day that I dropped all 75lbs of baby weight. Sure it took me 16 months, give or take, to lose it, but I did. But it sure wont stay off if I keep this up.

Of course yesterday was Memorial Day, and who can live through that day and not have a BBQ or at least go to one? ME that's who. I take every opportunity to have BBQ food, and I always stuff myself like its Thanksgiving. Of course I will jump on the scale the next day, sigh because I inevitably gained weight, and then feed off the leftovers. Kinda like yesterday and today. I finally get back down to 125 and I am ruining it in 2 days. FML.

*takes bite*

But here I sit, happily chomping down on my ice cream. Hey, you only live once right?

I think I am going through a mid-life crisis....I am going on 28 years old. 28! 30 is rapidly approaching and I feel like I wasted my 20's away. Of course I haven't, but my mind likes to go off the deep end from time to time and its making me sad. After all, you are only as old as you feel right??

So the other day my hard drive crashed and I lost all of 2009's pics and everything I put on my computer since 7 Jan 09. Needless to say I FREAKED out when Michael told me, I actually pushed him and somehow put a huge gash on his arm. The event is pretty blurry to me as I was so shocked and taken back. I am STUPID for not backing up my files, and just like that, thousands of memories were left up to my mind to remember, never to be seen by another soul and over time forgotten. I have a horrible memory so that speeds up the process. Luckily my husband is a freaking computer genius and a few days later he was able to restore 90% of the files. Its not ALL, but enough for me to be happy. I am thankful that we got what we did, which is better than having it all gone. A lot of praying went in to it as well.

I took a break from the Internet while I was sulking and mad at myself for being so stupid and constantly putting off backing up the files because I was "too busy". I really beat myself up over this. Every though was of a group of pictures never to be seen again and it was tearing my mind apart. To distract me, I started reading the Twilight Saga...

Now I am just like every pubescent girl in the world and I am completely obsessed with the books. I read Twilight in a matter of hours, practically one sitting. New moon the next,Eclipse took me 2 sittings and now I am on Breaking Dawn. I took a break from it since it is the last book of the saga currently published and I don't want to rush it. I have a habit of doing that. I watched all seasons of One tree hill back to back, the office and Gilmore girls much the same. Now the books. I need to learn to portion things out.

So before that day, hubby asked me what I wanted for my birthday, I quickly said nothing. 2 days later I told him I wanted Twilight on Blue ray....I am obsessed.

I eat, day dream and sleep Twilight. For the last week I had vampire dreams...I look on YouTube for videos, listen to the soundtrack....look up the cast online and in magazines...I need a life is what this boils down to. I am at home with a 16 month old all day. How absurd is it that I would love to be a vampire right now...I mean...do you know how that sounds?? I am losing my sane mind...its got a first class ticket out of here and I am happily waving it good bye. FML.

Sass's new nickname is Chippy-she chipped her effing tooth the other day. GREAT. Luckily its not too noticeable....it should even out a bit after a while. Its a small chip, but I am so angry about it, my poor baby girl's mouth. She was upset too long about it, she cried harder when I put the cold rag on her broken lip. Once I stopped the bleeding and took away the rag she was all laughs and smiles like it never happened. The rag to her was worse apparently. She is a tough kid.

She loves baths...as soon as she takes her last bite of dinner, and after she tells me, "all done" she tells me she wants a bath. She randomly asks me to give her baths throughout the day as well....I have a water baby on my hands.

I am looking forward to going home to Michigan this fall and staying for as long as my heart contents. It will just be me mom and Sass in the apartment. My brother will be shipped off to the Army then and my sister will most likely be married. She already lives with him now, so....its will just be us. I am looking forward to seeing my old friends (some its been 10 yrs!) and having Sass get to know this side of her family. It may be one of the last times she sees my great grandparents which is depressing to even say. I love them so much.

In the winter I am starting school at the Art Institute in Arlington, VA for Photography. I think that will help with the, "who am I really?" blues I have been having lately. I feel like I have lost myself in the last 3-4 yrs. I need to get me back, pronto!

I went out last Saturday and it felt good. It was fun to be with the girls and hang loose. Turn drunk people down, and some in hilarious ways. Like the leprechaun joke. I will never forget the look on that poor boy's face. I had a great time dressing up and feeling girly and pretty.

Today I even dressed up to go to the grocery store. There was a time that I wouldn't even go outside to check the mail without looking glamorous....slowly that went away to where I went out often with no makeup on, my hair a disaster and in clothes that should be in the garbage. For me, I am changing that. Not saying I have to wear makeup per se, as I think I am pretty without it, but I just want to feel good before I go do stuff. I think it will help boost my esteem and my daily attitude. I am hoping to bring sexy back..;)

Well its late and even the sounds of 311 that can always keep me going is wearing off. Sass has been waking up earlier since it gets daylight sooner, looks like its time to block her windows again with dark blankets. But since she is up the same time no matter what time I go down...I need some rest. So....until next time.

~M