Soccer Dad

18 months

At 1:15 AM this morning she turned 79 weeks old.

There was one incident that I left out of last months entry. My mother traveled to Israel and my father stayed with us for Shabbos (the Sabbath.) When he got home, he called. He found a 20 dollar bill in his suitcase. Apparently she had gone into the drawer of her brother's desk, took what she found and transferred it to the suitcase!

This past month has been filled with the most growth I can remember. It's a month in which her ability to communicate has expanded greatly. While her vocabulary has expanded a bit, her comprehension has clearly improved, a lot. When I tell her things, there's a pretty good chance that she'll do those things I tell her.

Similarly, she has a much improved ability to communicate her feelings. "Do you want to go to bed?" Shakes head. "Do you want to go night night?" Shakes head more violently. I pick her up, she screams and tries to go limp.

I haven't gut the yogurt thing down. She likes raspberry or strawberry yogurts. But I have to hold her face still to get it into her mouth the first time. (Sometimes more than that.) Because usually the first time I offer it to her, she'll shake her head. But usually, once she gets the first spoonful, she starts opening her mouth much more willingly. Of course there was the time when after taking a mouthful of yogurt, she sprayed it. That doesn't usually happen though.

She's started to kiss. She'll open her mouth and press it against you.

She loves to dance. Nothing fancy, just holding someone's hand and going around in a circle. Friday nights we make a ring and sing and dance to "Shalom Aleichem."

She also seemingly has a favorite book: Eric Carle's "Polar Bear, Polar Bear." She'll pick up the book and hand it to one of us and say "Po ba." And then we have to read it. Again. Again. and Again. (She's this way with lots of books. She likes to hear them repeated several times.

And she loves babies. How many different ways? She loves real babies. She loves photographs of babies. She loves her doll babies. She loves photos of babies on cell phones. Sometimes when she says "baby" it's hard to figure out exactly which one she's referring too. If she reaches for my cell phone, it's a little easier to figure that one out.

She's become an expert "Hide and Seek" player. (If I want her to come to me, I have a better chance of getting her if I say, "Where's M?" Then she'll come downstairs or to another room in anticipation of "There she is!")

One night last week, she was hiding in the closet in our room and I'd leave the room. Then she'd pop out and pop in. This was repeated many times. She loved it. Each time I "found" her she'd go right back into the closet and the game would start all over again.

I've felt that 18 to 30 months is the most exciting time in terms of a child's discovery of the world around her.

I also thought back that this month two years ago was the time we started telling people that a baby was on the way. I recalled how we broke it to the two younger ones last year.

But looking that entry over, I see that a year ago there was also an increase in her ability to communicate. It was much cruder then.

Previous related posts: 17 months, One month, two months, three months, four months, five months, six months,seven months,eight months, 9 months, 10 months, 11 months, One year, 13 months, 14 months, 15 months, 16 months.