15 and 16 months old

Having fun with Minnie Mouse ears at 15 months

A combo post for Ellie at 15 and 16 months.  That covers October 26th to December 25th, 2014. The big themes for this period are teething ruining sleep, dress up is fun, and becoming a big sister!

Sleep:
With a third baby coming, we had decided to move Ellie and Claire in together.  My original goal was to do that in October.  But Ellie's sleep, which had been great, went to crap!  She'd scream herself to sleep when we put her down.  Then she would wake up screaming in the middle of the night, sometimes multiple times.  Sometimes she would calm down as we sat with her but freak out as soon as she was put down (even if she had fallen asleep sitting with one of us!).  Other times she couldn't relax even if we were holding her.  So we knew something was going on.  And we're sure her molars coming in were a big part of it.  She had a lot of Tylenol and ibuprofen to help with the pain. And all the holding and rocking of course led to bad habits.  It became hard to tell if she was truly in need of comforting or just wanted some midnight snuggles.  We had to let her cry it out multiple times.  Naps were affected as well.  And with me being very pregnant, it was very uncomfortable for me to try to hold her.  And it cut into my already very precious sleep.  So when Jeff was able he'd get up with her or at least take turns with me. Once Daniel came, I took Daniel duty while Jeff was usually on Ellie duty.

So we held off moving her into Claire's room as long as possible.  Even after we painted it boy colors, Ellie was still sleeping there.  I moved my deadline back to mid November and then was considering December 1st.  I wanted her to have time to transition but I also didn't want to screw up Claire's sleep.  Claire went home with Grandma after Thanksgiving so I decided to put Ellie in Claire's room that night.  That was one her night of transition since Daniel arrived early!  When the girls came back from grandparents houses, they went right into the room together.  It was not all sunshine and roses.  We experimented with putting them down together and separately.  We also had the pack n play set up in the guest room for those nights that went really badly.

Teeth:
Previous to those problematic molars, her 4th bottom tooth and a 3rd upper tooth came in.  Those were teeth number 6 and 7.

Language:
As of 10/27 definite words (clearly identifiable, used multiple times) were:
Ball (ba)

Dog (do)

Hi (hah)

Moo (boo)

Book (Bo/buh)

Shoes (shoo)

Other words used once or twice:

Cheese for pictures (chee)

Woof woof (wuh wuh)

Da da (da)

Duck (duh/guck)

Cluck cluck (guck guck)

That/this? (Dat/dis)
Uh oh (uh oh)

Dance (dah + booty shaking)

Jump (juh + bending knees)

Fine Motor:
Ellie's gross motor has always been advanced.  She moved early and is now climbing all over everything.  But her good fine motor skills are becoming obvious.  She became interested in utensils early and is now quite adept with a fork.  Her fork skills aren't far off from Claire's!  She also does really well holding pens, crayons, markers, etc.  Her interest and skill in making marks and "coloring" is greater than Claire's was at the same age.

Other stuff:
Ellie has discovered dress up!  With an older sister, she has plenty of costumes to choose from.  She loves shoes, hats, tutus.  I don't think she's met an accessory she doesn't like!

I can see that she has some of Claire's love of routines and knowing how things should be.  She will close baby gates that are left open instead of trying to escape through them!  She will also close doors left open.  So if you leave the garage door open to bring some stuff in it's very likely she will close it on you!

She hates when her hands get stuck in her sleeves.  So when I'm putting on her shirt or pajamas I can't move on to another part until I've made sure her little fingers have all popped out of the sleeve.  If not, she will hold her hands up and shake them and fuss out you.

Becoming a big sister:
On November 30th, Daniel arrived!  It worked out that Claire was with Grandma Schulze and Ellie had gone home with my mom.  Ellie was shuttled between grandparents for a few days.  But all with people she loves so she was fine with that.  I had no idea how she would react to a new baby.  She was too little to even try explaining things to her.  She did so much better than I expected!  She loves Daniel, although that love can be dangerous!  She likes to kiss him, which mostly involves head butting.  She also loves to poke at his eyes and nose.  There is of course frustration when I'm busy feeding Daniel.  She wants to be held as well so that's tough.

A little cupcake at Halloween

Getting a ride from Claire

Wings!

Wings, 2 tutus, and a lei

Shoes with footie jammies at 8am?  Why not?

Tearing apart mommy's wallet in a Princess Sofia dress

First time meeting Daniel!

Poking at Daniel to say hi

Cookie?  Don't mind if I do!

Making herself at home at Claire's school party

First candy cane!  Yummy!

Guck!  (Mislabeling a goose at the zoo)

Checking out a gorilla

A game of chase in princess dresses

Claire age 3, part 2

July-November

Personality:
Claire continues on in her march away from toddler and into a full fledged preschooler.  She is still sweet and silly but has definitely formed her own opinions that she will let you know about!  At meal times, I hear a lot of "I don't want..." and "I don't like..."  Plenty of whining and complaining happening here.

But despite her definite likes and dislikes, she also has some issues with decision making.  Her favorite color is "all of them."  If you give her a couple choices for something, she will often say "you choose" or "you tell me" because "I can't know" (i.e., I don't know).  That progressed in to "whatever you tell me" but then of course she would complain about what you chose.

She continues to conquer her fears. At the pool she no longer wants to be held and even jumps into the water!  A far cry from the little cling-on of last summer.  At Chick-fil-A, she has been afraid of climbing up into the play structure because of an airplane sound that plays that once scared her. When we were at a different Chick-fil-A and I noticed her climbing all around.  When I commented on her overcoming her fear, she told me "this one doesn't have a propeller.  I'm scared of the propeller."  Well, ok!  But she soon was able to move past that fear and play with abandon at any Chick-fil-A!

Interests and activities:
Her most favorite activity is "arts and crafts."  Pretty much anything in the category, but particularly stickers and markers.  I try to hit up Michael's clearance for their foam sticker kits.  So now most every day she asks to do "arts and crafts I've never done"

She also loves music, TV, and movies.  We've shown her how to use the CD player in the living room so now she can put on her own kid's CDs.  We got our new minivan in August and the rear entertainment system allows her to listen to her own music through head phones.  So she loves riding in the car.  She loves to sing along.  Her enthusiasm makes up for her lack of skill.  Favorite TV shows include all the Disney Junior shows (Mickey, Sofia the First, Jake and the Neverland Pirates, and Doc McStuffins).  She also likes Daniel Tiger, Curious George, and Clifford on PBS.  She saw her first movie in a theater (Planes 2) in July.

I also introduced her to scavenger hunts or treasure hunts using clue cards hidden outside this summer.  She loved it!  Getting a small prize at the end surely didn't hurt.  She wanted to do it every day.  But being pregnant and tired and also managing Ellie made it hard to do it often.

She invented her own game to play inside.  She asks us to play "Gingerbread Man."  Which means she is the gingerbread man we are trying to catch as we run around the kitchen.

She started soccer for the first time in August.  She did awesome in the beginning!  Running all over the field.  She scored 2 goals in her second game.  In subsequent games, she was a little less enthusiastic and more distracted.  For some reason, she liked to try to run with her eyes closed sometimes.  She seemed to have a good time.  Every time we drove past the fields where she played she would announce it proudly.  And she was thrilled with the trophy she received at the end of the season.  Her coach did a really good job with a difficult age group.  Trying to get 3 year olds to play an organized sport??  Very challenging.  The coaches were on the field with the kids, running with them by the hand, even picking them up and putting them in the right spot.  I think it was a great first sports experience for her.

She experienced her first trip to Disney in July.  She loves all things Disney right now.  Mickey and pals, princesses, Toy Story, Planes.  All of it.  So the trip was a grand success!  And she was very well behaved.  I was afraid of a lot of whining and complaining from waiting in line and being tired. But she was great and once she understood the concept of waiting in line she was pretty patient for a 3 year old.  And her awe of the characters was so fun to see!

Claire also loves her baby brother-to-be.  She hugs and kisses my belly multiple times a day.  And she is excited for him to arrive.

She also likes to tag along with Daddy as he runs errands or works around the house.  He will take her with him to give me a break.  So she goes to Home Depot often!  Although lately she has been wanting to stay home more often and it takes some convincing to go with him. She likes to "help" him if he is puttering around outside or down in the basement.  Although she doesn't love the loud noise of power tools so sometimes she comes back upstairs.

Fine motor:
This summer Claire couldn't use scissors to save her life.  After a few weeks in school, she was a pro!  Well, not quite, but much improved.  And she loved practicing on "cutting papers."  First I gave her paper with various lines drawn on it to cut.  But we soon turned to the internet and it's many offerings.  She has begun drawing and "writing" more too as well.  In November I noticed that she's finally drawing faces and potato people on occasion.  She will attempt to write a C for her name.  It looks more like a lower case r.  Her grasp on a writing utensil isn't great.  She often uses the whole fist grasp.  And her fork and spoon use is poor in comparison to her younger sister.  Ellie is almost as good with a fork and uses it more often.  Claire still does a lot of eating with her hands.

Language:
Since she is closing in on four, her language skills are pretty darn good.  She is quite the chatterbox. Especially when seeing someone for the first time in a while (or a few hours). When we pick her up from school she usually has a lot to say.  But when a grandparent walks in the door, watch out.  The stream of enthusiastic, nonstop chatter is astounding!

She is intelligible most of the time and doesn't have too many mispronunciations or even grammar mistakes these days. So sad! So we hold on to the ones we can.

In July she told me, "I need to hold your hand so you don't lost me"

She never wants us to leave "wibout" her.

She announces to us that she needs to us the "bafroom"

Down in Dixie=Down in Hixie

zombie=bazombie
At Chick-fil-a she comes running out of the playspace and says "I don't want to be a bazombie! They said I'm a bazombie and I don't want to be.)

In September I asked her if I she wanted dip for her carrots.  She said "No. They don't taste the way. They taste juicy, not dippy." 

Funny conversations:
On the way to target: 
 Claire: mama, I really love daddy.  That's why I'm crying
 Me: You aren't crying. Are you?
 Claire: (fake crying) waah!
 Me: are you sad he had to leave us and go to work
 Claire: (sadly) Yeah.  (immediately followed by:) Hey, why you didn't put headphones on me to Target?
  She is easily distracted from her abject misery. :)

I try to supplement her dinner with chicken fingers that she didn't eat at lunch.  She says:
"Thank you for the chicken fingers but I'm good with my sausage." 

I see 3 place mats on the floor and comment on it.
Claire: "Yeah, Ellie pulled them off the shelf"
Me: "Huh. That Ellie, what are we going to do with her?"
Claire: "Put her in time out!"

Jeff and Claire are looking at pics of Ellie and talk about Ellie as a baby and when she was in my tummy.
Claire says: "I Miss her"
Jeff: "Well go see her, she's right in there."
Claire: "No, I miss her when she was in mommy's tummy!"

Some pictures:

Disney girl

Trying some skating this summer

In Maine

She loves baking.  Wonder why?

Trying on her soccer gear

Focused on cutting

Fun with leaf blowers

So proud of her soccer trophy!

Her emotions got out of control so I sent her
to her room to calm down.  This is what happened.
Someone needed a nap!

Last belly pics

Here are the last few shots of the big pregnant belly!

33 weeks (10/23)

35 weeks (11/2)

37 weeks (11/13)

38 weeks, 6 days  (11/28)

That last picture was taken 6-8 hours before Daniel arrived.  I was feeling some contractions and thought I'd better take a picture in case this was it.