You can’t put anything past my daughter.
You really can’t.
Just when you think she’s in some Sesame Street-induced haze where nothing else matters to her besides her crayons, her accessories, and her alphabet, she’ll do something surprising just to prove that she sees it all. My favorite example from this month is when she grabbed my Coach wristlet (which she considers a Kate-sized handbag), flung it up onto her shoulder, marched toward me asking for “kisses!,” kissed me on the cheek, found G and gave him a kiss, and then headed for the doorway, cheerfully saying, “Bye-bye!”
Give that kid a pair of high heels and she would have perfectly mimicked how I leave for work in the mornings.
Nothing gets past her! She has an incredible attention to detail that rivals that of most adults. One morning at daycare we were removing her coat to put on her hook and she started pointing to other children’s coats and telling me who they belonged to. Each hook is labeled, and sure enough, she was right every time–and most of the kids weren’t even in her class!
Kate knows many shapes now, including triangles, diamonds, squares, circles, stars, and hearts. She can identify them when playing with her shape puzzles or her shape toys, but she also notices them in everyday objects. One night as I was reading her a book before bedtime, she jolted up from my lap and shouted, “Diamond! Diamond!” She was pointing at this geometric panel hanging on the wall by her rocking chair. She was so excited about her discovery that she scooted out of my lap, climbed up onto the storage cube below the panel, and traced out the diamonds she had spotted in the pattern with her fingers.
Nothing gets past her!
I mentioned that Kate loves her accessories, and I think Abby Cadabby from Sesame Street is to blame for that, because she certainly doesn’t get it from me! I’m not much of a jewelry person, but Kate is absolutely nuts about bracelets and necklaces. In her mind there is no such thing as too many bracelets. She will pile every single bracelet she can find onto her arm, along with anything else circle-shaped that she comes across. Here’s a picture of her arm adorned in bracelets, a circle baby rattle, a yellow link, and she’s clutching a teething ring (because it kept falling off her arm) and a clip-on cow toy that she tried to wear as a bracelet but the circle clip was too small:
Kate: 22 Months |
Other loves of Kate’s life this month include jumping (she loves jumping!), stickers (whoamigawd, she loves stickers!), trying to put diapers on her stuffed animals, and dancing. When a song comes on that she likes she’ll say, “I like this song! Dance?” Of course I always say yes, and we happily dance around the living room–but don’t you dare try to sing along with the song! Oh no. That’s no allowed. Kate has decided that she doesn’t like our singing and she will not hesitate to stop her dancing to say, “No singing, Mommy. No singing.”
Kate has become really interested in what’s on her clothing this month. I feel like she’s way too young to have this kind of awareness about what she’s wearing, but I suppose it goes hand-in-hand with her love of accessories and her desire to express herself. She’s beginning to have an opinion about what she wants to wear and sometimes she’ll declare her shirt of choice as soon as she wakes up:
“Polka pot shirt?” she’ll ask.
(That’s how she says “polka dot.” We think it’s cute so we don’t have the heart to correct her.)
Her favorites right now are her Elmo shirt, and her butterfly pajamas. She also has a giraffe shirt that says, “Grandma Loves Me” that she asks to wear every morning on the days that Grandma Pam watches her. (“Giraffe shirt? Polka pot pants?”) I think it’s sweet how she remembers that’s Grandma Pam’s favorite outfit.
We did have one really rough patch this month when Kate got super sick right after Thanksgiving. She came down with a nasty stomach bug that had us up all night cleaning her up and changing crib bedding. Her vomiting finally passed after a couple of days, but then she came down with an awful week-long fever that hovered around 104 degrees, and even hit 106 degrees at one point. It’s the first time I ever called the pediatrician’s office and the receptionist dropped the phone and immediately got a nurse. It was some really scary stuff. And absolutely heartbreaking. Every night she was so miserable she couldn’t sleep and we were up all night trying to give her any kind of relief that we could. At one point as we rocked and I tried to help her get comfortable, she whimpered and cried out, “Help me.”
I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve cried out of fear, frustration, or desperation for my child.
That was one of them.
It was a horrible, awful, time that brought me right back to the horrible awful time following Kate’s cleft palate repair. We were so grateful when it was finally over and she was back to covering her arms in bracelets, diapering Froggy, and telling us we’d never make it on The Voice.
Now you know I can’t end this post on a sad note, so I have to share my favorite picture of Kate from this month. It’s a photo of her “washing her hands” (really she’s just playing with the water–another one of her favorite things to do) in the powder room. I love so many things about this picture..her unbuttoned onesie covering her bare tush (she had just finished sitting on the potty), how she’s up on her tip-toes trying hard to reach the water, her beloved “monkey socks” on her feet…
If that doesn’t make you smile, nothing will!
Kate: 22 Months |
Edited to add: Now that YouTube is cooperating with me, I have to add my favorite video of Kate from this month. It’s a clip of her watching her favorite butterfly colors song. She gets so excited to see all the colorful butterflies! Now if this doesn’t make you smile, nothing will–and I mean it this time!
And here I was feeling traumatized because my 7 year old kiddo has a slight temperature this morning. Kate’s days-long illness sounds terrifying. You poor things!
She’s as sweet as can be at 22 months.
jbhat
So adorable! I love the arms loaded with bracelets.
I am really interested to read about the palate surgery when you have a chance to blog about it. My 3 month old has a cleft palate and I would love to know about your experiences with Kate’s repair.
Wow that video is SO incredibly cute! Orange and purple are REALLY tough for kids to say usually but she says them so well! I am not going to lie, my childless-for-several-more-years self is wondering how often you guys clean your TV screen? lol!
Thank you jbhat–I hope your little one is feeling better! G and I heading to Seattle at the end of April. We’re so excited! I’d love to try and meet you for a coffee or a cocktail. My email address is under my “Contact Me” tab in my header–email me if you’re interested!
@Megan–I’m going to try to blog about Kate’s cleft palate repair soon, but one of the (many) reasons I haven’t yet is because I don’t want to scare parents of children with cleft issues who haven’t gone through the surgery yet. Our experience was significantly different from the norm for reasons we never could have anticipated. I apologize for sounding vague, but I’m not ready to get into it further than that at this point. My biggest fear is that when I do post about our experience it will give other parents unnecessary worry and anxiety. The thought of that crumbles me. You have to know when I finally do find the right words to put it all down and get the courage to hit “publish” that what we went through IS NOT what you and your precious child will go through. The best advice I can give you is to not worry about the repair at all right now. You’ve still got plenty of time before going through it and worry gets you nowhere. When it is your time, please try to stay as positive as possible. I truly believe in the power of positivity! Please let me know when your child’s surgery is coming up. I’ll be sure to send out lots of prayers for peace and positivity for your family and a speedy recovery for your little one.
Thank you so much Paige! That’s so interesting to hear that about the words; I didn’t know that. We certainly don’t clean our TV as much as we should, but truth be told she never touched the TV until the butterfly song came along, lol!
Ask Kate where she got that fabulous magenta bracelet, her Auntie Allison needs one!
And I love how enamored she is with the orange butterfly! Just like her mama! Smart and loves orange!
She is such a precious beautiful little thing!!! I love reading your posts about her because I can tell motherhood is as fun to you as it is to me. I can’t get over what a treat it is to have a kid of my own.
Kate sounds and looks like so much fun at this age! And you’re right — watching the butterfly video DID put a smile on my face. Too cute!
I appreciate your response and your honesty. It’s so easy to look at our sweet little girl and forget she has these issues and has to go through this brutal surgery. You’re probably right that it’s better not to even worry about it prematurely. I am SO glad for you that your daughter is doing well now. I will definitely let you know when our daughter’s surgery is and thanks for your kind words and thoughts!
@Allison–I can’t remember where we got the magenta ones, but the smart money is on Charming Charlie. And yes, orange appears to be her current favorite color. It was yellow for the longest time, but now she’s all about the orange. I think I’ve rubbed off on her a bit, haha.
Thank you so much Britt! What a wonderful compliment; that’s so sweet of you to say!
So happy to hear it, Carla! 😀
Big hugs to you, Megan! Please keep me posted when the time comes. I’ll be thinking of you!
Stumbled across your blog – your right the video of your daughter is adorable. I have a 12 month old who talks a lot, he just doesn’t say anything understandable. I love everything about his current stage, but your video excites me about his future stages. Thanks for sharing.
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