An 18 month update

Sadie's 18-month checkup went just fine. Nothing extraordinary to report - she's in the 25% in weight and 10% in height (no surprise there).

But developments there are aplenty. Her words are now accumulating far too fast to list here anymore (half a dozen a day, often) and she's expanded into two-word phrases (mama duck, baby duck, blue hat, big O, etc.) though her descriptives are still somewhat limited in scope. Her new favorite word is probably "seat" which means either "sit" or "seat," often both. "Mama seat" is usually accompanied by a tug and a point to exactly where I need to plant myself.

She knows basic colors but only says blue and red. She says one, two and three (thhhhhhh) but I don't think she quite grasps quantity yet, at least not in conjunction with the words that represent them. She loves finding similarities in things - picking out a piece of a puzzle that is red and holding it up to another red object and saying "red," or putting a cheerio on top of the letter "o" on her place mat. It's great fun to watch what connections she'll make next.

She's still doing lots of pretend play. In fact just this evening she spent at least half an hour putting her Mr. Pig and Monkey to bed, first on one pillow (and covering with a blankie, of course) and then moving them to another pillow, and then back again. Toy ducks get their teeth brushed along with Sadie and nearly all of her toy dolls and animals have had a drink of water or a bite to eat at one point or another.

Today after doing a #2, Sadie walked into her room, called me and made the sign for diaper change.

She's feeding herself handily with both fork and spoon (even cereal!) which has made mealtimes more pleasurable for everyone (we can all spend the time eating our own meals). Chicken parm with pasta is probably her favorite meal in the world (she's her father's daughter, after all) but she also loves her broccoli.

The girl loves singing and songs. She's got the ABC tune down pat and you can hear her singing it to herself. The Wheels on the Bus continues to be a favorite and I'm pretty sure we have at least one verse for every word and person she knows. She really got into Glee (hooray!) which we all watched together this week.

She remembers and chimes in with words and motions more and more both in song (we go semi-weekly to the library singalong) and with books. I was reading a book aloud to her while she was busying herself putting Mr Pig to bed and I thought she wasn't really listening, but she chimed in regularly with favorite words and sounds from the book as she played.

Favorite toys this week include puzzles, nesting boxes and pulling pull-toys around the house.

And last, but not least, she now knows how to (and will) climb out of bed and come find us if she decides she doesn't want to sleep.