Elaine, 15 Months

This little girl of mine never ceases to amaze me!  Here are a few of her antics and activities lately…

Elaine loves to dress up.  She is constantly going through the laundry baskets and putting on Mommy & Daddy’s clothes.  Most times she has multiple layers on and usually trips because she can’t walk properly.  This week she started going through her own drawers for dress up.  She walked into me wearing three jumpers (which she had put on upside down), and wanted me to put on her little baby bib (which barely fits around her neck anymore).  Grams sent me a few tops and jackets this week.  Elaine hijacked the shirts before I got to them, and walked around in her “dress.”  She also likes to wear my nursing cover as a cape!

She is wearing a shirt, a sweat shirt, leggings, no diaper, and a “dress”.

I can’t believe how much she understands!  I say, “Go put your clothes in the laundry,” and she does!  Everyday, she toddles into my bedroom and deposits her dirty clothes in the basket.  (Later she takes them out to play dress up!)

Elaine wants to do whatever Mommy is doing.  She loves to “help” in the kitchen – measuring ingredients for cookies, getting into the pots and pans, or playing in the dishwater bubbles.  Daddy is the one who lets her help wash dishes.  In the end, Elaine and my floor are both drowned in water!  If I am doing laundry, she wants to help carry the clothes into the living room to be hung up to dry.  She tries to hang some things up herself.  If it is dinner time, she wants to put the forks on the table.  Yesterday she wanted to carry the bag out of the grocery store, and she became very vocal when I didn’t enlist her help in packing a diaper order.

Helping with the diaper laundry

Elaine hasn’t wanted to wear a hair bow for quite a while now.  A couple of days ago I put one in her hair and took her to the mirror, exclaiming her to be “pretty!”  Now she wants a hair bow everyday.  Today I caught her in front of the mirror, touching her bow, smiling, laughing, and talking to herself. 

Elaine also loves purses.  Or anything that functions like a purse.  She toddles around with one on her arm, or both arms.  And she gets very excited when we put shoes on to go outside.  She is definitely a girly-girl!  (But she will also play baseball, or so Daddy insists!)

Elaine’s two words at this point are “No” and “cookie”.  She loves to boss the kitty around with “No” and a pointed finger.  She likes him, but knows to keep her distance because she has been scratched before.  If he gets too close to her toys or space she gets on his case with loud no’s.  She is very opinionated with her “no” when Mommy wants her to do something, too.  “Cookie” seems to refer to a lot of things, whether an actual cookie, a Ritz cracker, or whatever object she wants at that moment.

Elaine has had a bad rash, which the doctor is determining to be an allergic reaction to some natural rash cream that I used.  The prescription included lots of diaper-free time.   That’s dangerous, I thought.  Sure enough, as soon as the diaper came off she left a puddle in the bathroom floor.  At least it wasn’t on the carpet!  I took the opportunity to introduce the potty chair.  This is how I found her:

Hmmm.  I wonder who she gets that from?

My little girl thinks she is a big girl and tries to blow her own nose.  What happens is a lot of Kleenex’s get wasted!  She also likes to borrow my napkin at mealtimes to wipe her face.  Then she insists that it is nicely spread out in my lap again.

Another favorite activity is drawing.  I am constantly finding pens and note papers all over the house.  Elaine pretends to write like Mommy & Daddy.  Her newest favorite book seems to be the Spanish-English pocket dictionary.  Not sure how that got started!  She also likes to talk on the phone (or to bring it to me when it starts to ring), and to Skype.  When we Skype she is allowed near the computer, which is taboo at all other times!

That’s it for now.  This post is as much for my personal records and memories as it is for your enjoyment!