Elle at 18 and 19 months

These are supposed to be her 18-month stats but the ped's office

scheduled her appointment at 19 months, four days:

Weight: 27 pounds, 7 ounces (88 percentile)

Height: 33.25 inches (88 percentile)

Head: 49.5 cm (90 percentile)

Elle is at such an amazingly fun age right now.

The conversations we have with her are definitely more "real" now. I went to change her diaper, and I asked her if she had pooped. She said "Nooooo." Then I said "You did it, didn't you?" She looked somber and said "I did it." She waved at a little girl at dinner the other night, turned to Tim and I and said "I said hi." She was scared of a toy train that we bought at a consignment sale, and she didn't want to turn it on. She dove in to my chest, saying "No! I'm scared." She'll hold out her hand to me and say "Come on!" so we can walk somewhere together. She took the remote from my Mac - when I asked her to give it back because it was Mommy's, she ran and hid behind Tim, yelling "Share!" at me. I die a little inside every time she calls me "Mom" instead of Mommy.

Speaking of Mommy, Elle started singing this song a week or so ago and I. Love. It.

She's an amazing parrot. She went to Pirate City earlier in the month to watch some early spring training workouts with Tim, and she came back able to say "Pittsburgh Pirates." She's sweet and compassionate, often trying to "tuck in" her bath toys under her washcloth, saying "Night night." She's extremely smart - she sings her ABCs extremely well now and can count to 15 (she could probably count higher but always stops to clap at 15, haha).

Who would have known that toddler sleep would be as screwy as infant sleep? Apparently there is an 18-month sleep regression, and after three weeks of awful sleep for all three of us, I think we've conquered it. After a nasty bout with teething, we seem to have headed right in to a period where waking up 2+ hours early than usual and napping for sporadic periods of time is the temporary norm. It. Was. Maddening. Almost every night, I felt the anxiety in the pit of my stomach - the kind of anxiety where I can't sleep well because I have no idea when Elle will wake up for the day. One day it was 5:45. Another day it was 6:15. We'd only gone so late as about 7:30 once in a span of two weeks, and she *had* been sleeping until 8 or 8:30 before that. Her naps went from a solid 1.5-2 hours to a sketchy 1-1.5 hours, and they were sometimes broken depending on the day's wake up time and the childcare arrangement for the day. I finally hit a point where I decided, with nothing else to lose, that I would just try to get her to go back down instead of giving in to the "I'm a toddler and I'm wide awake" vibes she was giving off, and within two days (and two or three re-wakeups both days), she was back to sleeping past 7:30 consistently.

In the week before the time change, I moved her bedtime up 10 minutes a night, and through the week and after the change, things were virtually seamless. So thankful that she transitioned well, especially since her naps have been suffering a bit since her childcare changed to outside the home.

Ah, yes - childcare arrangements. Many of you who know us IRL know how rocky our childcare experiences were for the nine months or so of needing care.We had three sitters who all watched Elle for a few months and left on bad terms, and at the time, we needed care for some pretty crappy times - nights and weekends, wheeeee. When I got the new job and went to days, our situation changed, and seemingly, so did our luck with babysitters. We only needed four hours of care, 3-4 days a week, and I guess I hadn't blogged about it because things were going well and I didn't want to rock the boat. Buuuutttttt ... I knew it was going too well. Situations changed, and I was once again thrown in to the pit-in-my-stomach stress ball that only childcare issues can create. I honestly think finding care for Elle - from caring, flexible, dependable and affordable sitters - has been the most stressful part of motherhood, outside of what you'd expect to be stressful. (Like unexplainable sleep regressions.) And our arrangement - with various sitters who are in class (high school and college) and/or working other jobs - was understood to be precarious. I can't expect people to stop their worlds because I need them to watch my daughter for four hours in the middle of the day on any given weekday afternoon. But we didn't really need, nor can we afford, care from a daycare center or most in-home providers, because they (understandably) charge based on part- or full-time care needs that we just don't have, with our opposite-shifts-Tim-has-some-weekdays-off schedules.

We're three weeks in to the latest childcare change, which has been good for Elle. I knew that it could be good for her, in that she's outside the home for a few hours four days a week with other children, but knew that it could be bad for her, in that she'll be outside the home for a few hours four days a week with other children. She had been watched at our house two days a week, which means that she was well taken care of, entertained and stimulated, with one-on-one from other adults. But she didn't really have to worry about sharing or the whims of other toddlers in those situations. I've watched with great interest as she's been exposed to more kids her age on a regular basis - from church to the other two days a week when she's watched by a friend who has a daughter Elle's age. And even in these last three weeks I've seen Elle's social side really emerging - she's excited to be around other kids, and she's excited to show me all of the things she does and plays with while I'm away. We're lucky that we found a good fit and that Elle has been comfortable from the beginning.

One thing I've noticed since she started the new childcare arrangement is that she grunts a lot more - instead of "using her words," she grunts and points. Her verbal skills are more advanced than the other kids at her daycare (there is a 21 month old and a 2.5 year old), and I think she's picking up from the way they communicate.

Cute things that Elle has been up to in the last few weeks:

* She loves to color, and points out, matter-of-factly, every wooden puzzle piece or book page that she has colored on. Her father gives her a lot more artistic license than I do (read: I often find crayon on toys, books, furniture and walls), but she really does like artsy stuff like coloring and playing with stickers. 
* She watched Teletubbies for the first time last week - the show brings back a lot of memories for me of when my youngest brother, Doug, was obsessed with the show. Elle initially called it "Telebabies." She loves the "sunshine baby," too, and is still in love with Sesame Street characters.
* Elle still loves books. One night it was getting late, so when I read to her before bed, I said "One book." Elle immediately responded with "Two books?" 
* We were driving home from having dinner with some friends two weeks ago (before the time change), and Elle kept saying "It's dark." It was really sweet to hear her discover and experience that, and since then, she whispers it any time we walk in to a dark room or if it is close to sunset outside.
* Elle has been telling Tim "Good girl, Daddy."
* She loves being outside. Elle and Tim will go for walks around the lake in our complex and do "Bubbleducks," which basically means blowing bubbles and looking for ducks.
* If you mention to Elle that we're leaving to go somewhere, you have approximately 2.7 seconds to actually get out the door before she freaks out, standing at the door, yelling "Go! We go!" until you actually let her outside. 
* Because of the lunch meat we buy at the grocery store, she may be one of the only toddlers in the United States to be able to recognize and name a boar when she sees one.
* Shoes are no longer safe around Elle. She likes to put her own shoes on, Mommy shoes, Daddy shoes - it really doesn't matter unless they are on her feet.
 

* Possibly due to a small incident involving the preparation of dinner by her father, Elle also can recognize smoke. She points to the "steam" from her cool mist humidifier and says "It's smoke."
* Her utensil-using skills are fantastic. At times, she needs me to help her load her fork up with food, and she graciously says "Good job, Mommy." If she does it by herself, she cheers "Yourself!" (albeit with food in her mouth).
* Elle likes to talk on her fake phones, always starting the "conversation" with a very solemn, low "Hedo." I think she might be imitating Tim's opening "Hello," but I'm not sure.
* She points out colors all the time now, saying "Dat's blue!" or "Dat's purple." She'll ask me, too: "What's dat?" and "Dat is?"
* Her interest in going to the bathroom on the potty has definitely plummeted. We're not pushing it. I have to admit it's funny and cute to hear her say "Bye bye, pee pees" whenever she hears a toilet flush.
* She thinks all candles mean that it is someone's birthday. I lit a candle from Yankee Candle and had it on the kitchen counter. Elle was OBSESSED with it, saying "Birthday? Birthday candle? Happy birthday to you?" She's smart, but boy can she fixate :)
* She chases me around with a "I'm gonna getchou!" followed by a squeal. (Which is pretty much exactly what I say and do to her, haha.)
* She has a rubber ducky that is dressed like a pirate. Elle always talks to "Pirate Duck" during her bath, and calls her bath toy octopus a name that sounds like "applesauce." 
* I called her Booger Brain last weekend, and she repeated it. Several times. Hi-lar-ious.
* I think I've blogged before about how she would shake her bottle of teething tablet pills and sing "Shake shake shake, shake your booty." In the last week or so, I've given her a bottle of pain reliever, and she sings "Shake your bottle." Then I taught her "Shake your bottle, yeah." It's quite amusing, but I realized she had taken it to a higher, cognitive level when she changed her tune while holding a toy truck - she paused for a minute and then sang "Shake your car, yeah." 
* She was looking at herself after her bath the other night and said "See you later, Baby."
* She used to call my mom (aka "Grams") "Me." Not sure why, but then almost overnight, she started saying "Gams".
* Something cute that she has always mispronounced is "ninonaur" for "dinosaur."
* She's big on the temperature of everything. She always assumes her food is hot, but will eventually believe that it is just warm. The oven is always hot to Elle. And she'll point out that your water is cold until she's nearly blue in the face.
* She's aware of textures and other sensory factors in regard to things like her blankie, which she will tell you is soft and warm. 
* She loves, loves, loves to sing. "Wheels on the bus," "Itsy bitsy spider," "Row, row, row your boat," the birthday song from the Sunny Side Up show on Sprout ... there is very little she won't pick up on.
* She tries to say her first and last names now - you'll often find her repeating "Elle Belle Lastname" with a cute little smile.