It's hard to believe that Ellen is almost 21 months old. Jeff and I are totally in love with her and are enjoying her so much. I still find it so interesting how different Ellen is from Lucas. She still seems to be a textbook baby, which is interesting in itself because I've said that from day 1 about how she entered this world with such a predictable labor and delivery. Whereas Lucas never really took to books or songs, Ellen's favorite thing to do now is to read her little board books. We'll find her in her crib, after her nap, quietly looking at her books. She can describe a lot of the pictures in the books - 'ba ba ree" for blueberry, "naaaah" for horse, "maawwww" for kitty - and can identify most when we ask her to find it. As for music, when she hears it she will do her Ray Charles dance where she moves her head from left to right. When she sits on the potty she requests songs like Itsy Bitsy Spider and Five Little Monkeys to entertain her (she's never actually done any business on the potty, but we practice a lot). Recently she has started to make up her own songs. They go like this, "Da da da da. Ma ma ma ma. Du tus Du tus. Grrr Grrr." She loves her family : ) Grr is the sound she makes for Tyson - not sure why.
One way that she IS like Lucas is that she is a super duper climber. If she wants a snack, she'll drag her chair to the counter, climb up on it (the counter is even with her chin, so this takes great upper body strength) and open the cabinet to see what we have to offer her. She is also really fast and has great balance. Friends used to comment on how fast Lucas was (he's normal now) when he was a toddler, and we get the same comments about Ellen. She runs from room to room. Jeff and I joke about how funny it would look if we ran around the house like she does. She has great coordination and balance. She can go up and down the stairs while holding something in both hands. There is a walkway that has cross ties on each side at our pool. She, trying to keep up with Lucas, can walk on top of the cross tie thing as if she's on a balance beam. This all looks even more impressive since she's still a little shrimp that looks younger than she actually is.
Our favorite thing about Ellen right now is how she LOVES attention. She seems to thrive on it. When we are out in public, she waves to strangers and engages them with her eyes until they talk to her. When we get home from our outings Jeff always asks how many friends Ellen made. It's rare that I say none. At home she will initiate games of making faces because she knows it cracks us up. At dinner we always ask her to show us her mad face. She'll poke out her lips and cross her right hand over her left wrist, and then call us each by name until we do the same... then she claps and smiles because we all participated in her game. Her next move is to roll her eyes up, or look up. It is such a FUNNY face and we laugh so hard at her, which makes her do it more.
I love her personality right now. She is smart, carefree, confident, strong, silly, happy, loving, and sweet. I hope that we can provide an environment for her so that she keeps these traits as she grows into a little lady.
Ellen - we love you so much! Thank you for being just the way you are!
1 comment:
I just had this picture pop up in my head of Jeff running through the house - made me laugh. :)
Mary does this too. Last night she even ran so fast that she couldn't stop and hit her head on the night stand.
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