twenty months

Oh, Miss Renee, she never runs out of things for me to say about her. She's always coming up with something over-the-top to make me laugh or to make me bite my tongue to stop myself from yelling at her. She’s a special girl.

She is very particular about everything. Everything in our house has its assigned place, and moving something as small as a toy from one side of the living room to the other has her pointing and directing and demanding that we move it back. It clearly disturbs her. If her bedtime routine is altered in ANY way, down to what order her dad takes off his glasses and turns off the light, she loses her shit. She gets angry at me if I do something that her dad usually does and demands 'Daddy DO' even if he is gone and won’t be home for several hours. I would love to say that I have no idea where she gets this behavior from but I can’t. She didn’t stand a chance. BOTH of her parents are creatures of habit and love routine. By day four of a seven day vacation we are both generally ready to go home, to the familiar, to the comfortable and she feels the same way. HOMEBODIES, the lot of us. Maybe Cameron stands a chance of being adventurous and free-spirited but I'm not holding my breath.

I made the mistake of giving her a 'special treat' after her shots at eighteen months. The treat came in the form of a product called YoBits which is really fruit-flavored corn syrup coated with some sort of fake yogurt-like product that I had purchased during a somewhat vulnerable moment while walking through Target in a sleep-deprived stupor shortly after Cameron was born. You would think I was giving her molten chocolate cake with fresh whipped crème and caramel ice cream because she walks around the house demanding 'TWEATS!' all of the time now.

I think Becky must be giving her a bit of juice at daycare because she says 'Apple deece' the minute we open the fridge. Rather than fight her on it I would put about an ounce of juice in with five ounces of water and give it to her and she would be all proud walking around with her 'deece.' Then, last week I realized that if I give her straight water in the cup that she thinks juice comes in she doesn’t seem to notice. I am smarter than you, Renee, always remember that.

She’s obsessed with comparing things and gets especially excited when there is two of something. When she sees her toy guitar she runs over and points at her dad’s guitar and says 'two ditars or 'two whammy.' I love that she knows what a whammy bar is.

She loves to get the mail and starts talking about it the instant I pick her up from daycare. She got a new toy house thingy for Christmas that we just put together last weekend and it has a mailbox and fake mail and you would not believe how many hours of peace and quiet we have gotten out of it. That toy is worth its weight in gold. She’ll sit there all day and put the mail in and take it out and ring the doorbell and play the radio. It cracks me up every single time she goes to the door and says 'Knot, knot'…whether it is on the bathroom door when one of us is in there or on her toy house door.

She's mimicking everything we say and absolutely loves music of any kind. She loves to put her rain boots on and dance around to Laurie Berkner. Even the annoying, electronic music on Cameron's exesaucer can get her shaking her little booty. She wants to read books that aren't in the correct holiday. Her favorite books right now are her Christmas and Halloween books.

She learned her colors this month and is sure to tell us what color EVERYTHING is. I love how green is gween and blue is boo. She loves to have tea parties and is very particular about what color cup everyone gets. Ski’s is always red, mine is always pink and Yadi’s is always green. I love how she sets 'Yadi’s pup' right next to her when she’s napping like the cat is going to wake up, grow thumbs and suddenly learn how to drink from a cup. The other day I found the green cup in the cat’s food dish. I love how she runs, not walks, from the living room to her play kitchen to fill the cups up before delivering them to their rightful owner. I love how proud she is of herself and how she says 'Yeah Nae!' when she’s done something she knows we’ll get excited about.

She woke up one day this month and decided that she wanted to sleep with a pillow and a stuffed animal in addition to her beloved green blankies so now in addition to a blanket corner in each hand she lays on a pillow with her doggie under her arm when she sleeps. It cracks me up every night when I go in to check on her on my way to bed, all snuggled in with her lovies.

When she’s not sick or teething she’s an awesome eater actually asking me the other day for 'mo bok-li' (more broccoli) and 'mo skash (more squash).' I think she probably put on at least a couple of pounds in the last couple of weeks, devouring everything we put on her plate like she was catching up from fasting for two months while she was sick and getting molars. She loves carrots and peas and chicken and pork and demands that she has some sort of dipping sauce for her meat. I love how she says 'mo sauce, pees (more sauce, please).' I have taken to giving her mashed up avocado or pureed squash as a "sauce” and she is totally cool with that. She has never taken a bite of any sort of beef product that she hasn’t spit out, whether it is a cheeseburger or a taco or in some form of casserole. She is a fruit and cheese kind of girl (a girl after my own heart) and often leaves most of her starch on her plate, be it rice or noodles or bread. The insane amounts of fruit are good for her but it makes the thought of ever potty training a daunting thought. She still poops 2-3 times a day at odd times and it is mushy. I’m sorry but cleaning mushy poop out of one of those little potties (or GOD FORBID out of her underwear) pushes my gag reflexes to the limit. I think I’ll have kids in diapers for the next five or six years, thank-you-very-much.

She still absolutely LOVES milk and whines when she finishes what's in her glass and says 'Mo milt.' I love how milk has a T instead of a K at the end. I love how she puts it off to the side of her mouth and literally chugs every last drop the instant you give it to her.
 
All of the pictures I have of her recently have her missing some article of clothing because she HATES pants and socks and boots and hats and well, shirts. She’d prefer to be in just her diaper at all times. She has her boots, socks and hat off within seconds of being strapped in to her car seat and requests 'pants OFF' when we are changing her diaper. She’s going to be one of those adults that hangs out at nudist colonies, I swear it. It drives both Ski and I absolutely insane, it is not like we are dressing her in lacey, itchy clothes; I am talking sweats and a cotton shirt here, people. I just don’t understand the problem.

She gives the sweetest hugs and kisses and has started running over and giving me a huge squeeze and a nice, wet kiss on the lips when I’m leaving to go somewhere. I think she is trying to say “I love you” with something that sounds like “I ahhoo” and it MELTS the very heart out of my chest. Because the love I have for that kid, it could move mountains. There are days when I look at her and I feel the emotion rising up out of my chest in an almost painful way and I realize that because of her I know what it is truly like to love someone so much it hurts.

 

Comments

[Melissa]

Oh, she's just adorable! I can't believe how much our little girls are growing up already! It seems like just yesterday we were telling each other that we were pregnant! Where does the time go! Love the post and pics!

[The Mommy]

Amazing! 20 months old! And too cute for words! That whole naked thing cracks me up every time you mention it. Our Baby Girl has pretty much given up pants. And she now knows how to get one arm out of her shirt. Wait until Renee learns how to take off her diaper...that'll make you consider potty-training in a BIG hurry!

[Gretchen Olson]

I love, love, love the little curls in her hair. So cute!

[Jill]

Elliott and I really loved these pictures of "our Renee" (as he called her) - nice work :)

[anne]

I'm not sure we can arrange the marriage anymore. Ryan could care less about putting anything back in it's place. Could mean a lot of marital discord.