I can finally admit it. I am the mother of a toddler. She is 18 months old, and there is no denying that she is a full-fledged toddler now. I still won’t say she isn’t a baby anymore, but I will admit that she is both toddler AND baby.
So, what is the Doodle up to these days, you ask?
Well, currently her favorite song is “Head, shoulders, knees and toes”. It is the first song that she can sing all by herself. She does this often, at random times. I always wanted to live in a musical, and now I do. Aubrey Ann will burst into song at a moments notice. She also loves to to sing her ABC’s, twinkle twinkle little star, and the Veggietales theme song.
Recently we put up pictures of shapes in her playroom, and occasionally she will ask me what they are. So, I point to them and tell her the names. The ones she remembers are rather interesting. So far she has circle, oval, diamond and octagon. She calls it “awwwcagon”. My kindergarteners always remembered octagons first as well. Weird. If it weren’t for stop signs, I still wouldn’t know what an octagon really was.
She also looks at colors daily. She always gets yellow and blue right. In fact, if you ask her what color something is, she will not admit that she doesn’t know, oh no, instead she just calls it yellow. So funny. Recently she has picked up black and purple as well. For some reason, red is just not that interesting to her. Now red is something my Kindergarteners always picked up first.
One of her other favorite things to do is spin, do somersaults, and what we have labeled the “water horse”. The water horse is something she does only in the bathtub that involves a lot of neighing, and basic crazyness. During the day, she spins around for a good 30 seconds, stops and says “dizzy” while grabbing her head. So adorable.
She is huggy and kissy. She is very affectionate to anything and everything in our home. When she is in her high chair, even her milk with get “hugs” occasionally.
She is working on mastering the art of eating with utensils. She is pretty good, and loves to “stab” things with her fork. If she can’t quite get it, she will pick the piece of food up with her hand, put it on her fork and then eat it. Funny girl!
She also LOVES being outside. She likes to go to the park and she can climb the stairs and go down the slide by herself.
She is now speaking in little sentences. They are so cute, and I am often amazed at all the different things she comes up with. It is so fun to hear what she is thinking all day. Some days it seems like she knows the word for everything she comes into contact with. Rest assured, if she doesn’t know how to say something, she will simply call it an “oh my”. I never knew how often I said that phrase until Aubrey Ann started imitating me. I really need to get some new material.
Aubrey Ann is basically my shadow. She loves to imitate everything I am doing, all day. Mommy has to really watch herself lately. Everything I do, Aubrey Ann WILL end up doing as well.
As an example, I was getting something out of our pantry the other day, and I accidentally dropped a full jar of peanut butter on my toe. In an effort to not yell loudly and scare Aubrey Ann, I held it in and instead, I hit my hands on our counter. Well just a few moments later, Aubrey Ann was walking around slamming her hands on the cabinets. Yeah, I should have just yelled.
She is so much fun, and I often have people in Walmart and the grocery store tell me that they have never seen such a happy, friendly baby. She really is. I love how much she loves other people. It is a lot of fun taking her places and watching her interact with others.
Basically, life is wonderful. Brandon and I are so in love with our little one, she is truly precious and we are so amazed that God trusted us with such a special little person. Thank you to everyone who has helped in making Aubrey Ann who she is today. Both baby and toddler, I think I could live with that!