At 18 months Elizabeth is a sweet cutie pie with a motor mouth and an adorable wiggle to her walk. She uses more than 100 words with new words every day. The sign language is really helpful because it gives us confidence that we understand what she's saying (even when her articulation leaves something to be desired). Being understood in turn gives her confidence to increase her vocabulary. She is quite good at please and thank you. Sometimes using both in quick succession - presuming the result... Her pleases are hilarious and so cute that we can hardly resist them.
We want her to be able to speak other languages too, and so we've been working on introducing her to french through songs and francophone library books. The first stage of bilingualism is apparently understanding the concept that the same object has different names in different languages. I don't know if Elizabeth has completely grasped this, but she is able to point to various body parts in both official languages now. She only has one spoken french word so far - "nez" (nose). Clearly our work here is done.
We're working on being able to sit quietly at the table until everyone is finished eating now, so when Elizabeth tells us "done" but the rest of the table hasn't finished, we have a little ritual where we ask her whether the other people around the table are done. "Is Daddy done?" we ask. "No" she says in the teensiest-tiniest voice you can imagine. "Then you have to wait." "Wait", she agrees. When Grandma and Grandpa H were visiting it happened that Elizabeth was the last to finish. "How unusual", Daddy remarked. Then the whole table cracked up as Elizabeth gamely attempted to repeat "Unusual".
She has finally hit 20 pounds (yay!) and is somewhere between 80-85 centimeters depending on the exact second. Since this is supposedly half her adult height it's fairly clear she'll be taller than Mom. Her hemangeomas are definitely lightening and some of them are starting to shrink a bit as well. She is eating pretty well but still not large quantities, unless it's pasta or chocolate or ice cream. She certainly still loves to nurse ("nur, nur, nur - please"). She sleeps well at night, waking only to visit the washroom and then going straight back to bed. During the day she typically asks for at least one and sometimes two naps ("nap please"). Mommy is suspicious that what Elizabeth really wants is the associated nursing session, but would any parent turn down such a request?
We encourage her requests to help too, whether it's helping Daddy shave, Mommy apply deoderant, taking laundry to the laundry basket, helping in the kitchen or helping in the garage by rearranging screws and nails. Sometimes the help is even useful, although we're continuously frightened when she's able to do things like screw the lid back onto a jar (implying that she could probably manage the reverse) or when she pushes a chair over to the fridge in order to get at something up high.
You may recall that we were hoping she'd be toilet trained by now, but no such luck. Actually, for a few months there she was totally back into diapers - a real disappointment given that six months ago we were down to only one diaper a day. Going to the cottage seemed to be the change that she needed - no sooner did we get there than she suddenly started to use the toilet again. Daddy especially hopes this means that the end is in sight. Her own toilet paper and getting to flush are special treats. I do not recall ever finding the toilet as fascinating as most of the small children around me now seem to.
Eighteen months also means picture with a bear day, so we collected Teddy and Elizabeth and attempted to take cute pictures. As she gets older I regret my choice of chair more and more. Let's just say that rocking in the chair is much more fun than having your picture taken. Eventually we decided we had at least one picture that would do. And then Elizabeth rocked and rocked and rocked and rocked.
Stephanie said:
Also - I'm impressed that you're teaching her French. Do you and/or your husband speak it?
Stephanie said:
Grandpa H said:
Great aunt Judy said:
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