At her 18 month check-up Emory weighed 23.9 lbs, and was 32 1/4 inches long. That's the 60th percentile for weight at 75th percentile for height.
Clothing Size
She is still wearing mostly 18 month pants and shorts, but everything else is 24 months now.
Sleep
Sleep is still going well. She has started waking up between 5:30 and 6:00am. Its a miracle if she sleeps past 6:00 these days. Naps are still the same. She is taking one nap a day that lasts about an hour and a half. A few days a week she will take a 2 hour nap at daycare. I guess daycare wears her out!
The big accomplishment recently is that she is totally off of the bottle!!! It took us about a month to wean her, but it worked. We started out decreasing the amount of milk in her bottle every week or so. We started with 8oz, then went to 6, then 5, and so on all the way down to 2oz. She was a little confused at first. She would drink the little milk we gave her, then look at us and make the sign for more. Finally when we had her down to 2oz we just stopped giving it to her. The first night we stopped she kept looking for the bottle. We sat down to read her a book, and she took her pacifier out and handed it to us, expecting a bottle. When we didn't give her the bottle she pointed to the spot where the bottle normally was, with a very confused look on her face. Luckily she never cried, and it never messed up her bed time routine.
Lately she as been a dream to put to sleep! She plays in the bath, we get her dressed, and we read her favorite book Llama llama, nighty-night. As soon as the book is over she points to her crib and wants to go to sleep. Earlier in the month she would let us rock her for about 5 minutes, and then point to the crib...not anymore! After that book she is ready to sleep.
Eating
She still enjoys going out to eat, but lately it has been difficult to take her. She does not want to sit in her highchair. All she wants to do is run around! We went to Logan's Roadhouse for dinner, and it was not enjoyable. She kicked and screamed when we wouldn't let her down, so we may not be going to eat for a while.
She is still eating well. She really enjoys pasta, yogurt, popsicles cheese, and doughnuts! When she sees the doughnut package at the grocery store she points to it and yells...she has a sweet tooth for sure. She knows which drawer we keep the cheese in, and she will point to it and say "cheese". She has such a cute way of saying cheese. She also has a plastic plate that has the Disney princesses on it. I guess we tend to put a lot of cheese on that plate, because when she sees that plate she grabs it, sits down of the floor, points to it and says "cheese". So cute!
She has learned a few more pieces of sign language. Recently she has learned "eat". When she is hungry she makes the sign for "eat" and points to her highchair. She has also learned to sign "thank you".
Favorite Activities/Milestones
More cute stories and happenings these past two months...
1. We tried to teach her to "hop like a bunny". She would watch us hop, smile really big, and then run in place. She still doesn't understand how to hop, but she likes to try.
2. She learned how to turn around in a circle these past few months. She's a pro at it now. She stands up and spins and spins.
3. She has learned some adorable new words lately. She still says all of her typical words but now she also say cheese, juice, baby, choo choo, hat, and she tries to say outside but it comes out more like at-ide. By far the cutest new word that she says is daddy. She use to say dada, but for some reason she started saying daddy, and it sounds like "da-de". It is seriously the sweetest thing I have heard in my life. Over the past week she has learned to not just shake her head no, but to actually say no. It's cute right now, but I think it may get old fast.
4. She has started giving lots of hugs. She loves to run up and hugs our legs. She will also give us hugs when we ask for them now.
5. She moved up to the toddler 2 class at daycare. The first 2 days were pretty rough. I dropped her off and she screamed and cried. She also pointed next door to her old toddler 1 room, because she wanted me to take her there. It was SO hard to leave her when she was like that. Luckily this only lasted a few days, and now she loves her new teachers, Mrs. Crystal and Mrs. Millie.
6. She still loves to dance! She even loves to make other people dance. We had our friends Kevin and Biz over for dinner one night. Emory has a book that plays "If you're happy and you know it" when she pushes a button. She pushed the button and Kevin started dancing. Well Emory thought that was pretty great, because she kept aiming the button at Kevin, pushing it, and waiting for him to dance. She kept doing it over and over. Kevin finally hid in the bathroom for a few minutes, hoping Emory would forget about him. Well he was wrong. As soon as he stepped out of the bathroom Emory ran over to him and pushed the button again.
7. We learned that Emory is scared of bugs...and loud noises. Over Easter weekend when we were in Clinton, she became so scared of caterpillars. I have no idea why! Every time she would see one she would start to cry and run away. She started doing this when she saw other bugs too. We took her to the Science Center, and there is a machine there that shoots a fake rocket into the air. We were showing her how it worked, but we didn't realize the loud noise would scare her so bad. When she heard that rocket shoot up, she looked SO scared! She tucked her hands in close to her face and almost started shaking. I felt so bad for her!
8. She learned how to raise her eyebrows up and down this month. She looks at us and raises them up and down, up and down. She has this devious little look on her face when she does it...and it makes me laugh every time.
9. She still makes her animal noise, but she has learned some new ones lately. Martin makes a loud elephant noise, and Emory loves it. She tries to do it, but ends up just making a motorboat type sound with her lips. She also started making a noise like Sage does when she yawns. When Sage yawns she makes a very very loud yawning noise. Now Emory makes that noise too. We ask her "what does Sage say when she yawns?" and she makes the loud yawning noise.
10. She loves to give everyone kisses! It melts my heart. She also loves to give Sage kisses. She will go kiss Sage on the nose and make a loud "mu-ah" noise. She is such a sweet girl.
11. She has really started liking her baby doll. Our friend Jon sent her a baby doll for a late birthday present. She loves that doll! She will kiss it and hug it. She also tries to put it to bed. She will turn it on its stomach, cover it with a blanket, pat it on the butt, and say night-night. She is going to be a great big sister.
12. I know I have said this before, but she LOVES Sage! Recently she has really liked to feed Sage. She will go grab a piece of food out of Sage's bowl and bring it over to her. Now she likes to take Sage's entire bowl of food over to her and hand her piece after piece of food. Sage is so gentle with her when she takes the food out of her hand.
13. Emory still says "no-no" and shakes her finger at Sage if she tries to mess with her while she is eating. Well apparently she likes to do this to other dogs too. Both of our neighbors have dogs, and both of them like to jump on Emory. Emory doesn't like this, so she says "no-no" and shakes her finger at them.
14. We bought Emory a water table and a plastic pool, and she LOVES playing outside in the water.
15. I painted Emory's toenails for the first time. She was very excited. Surprisingly, she sat very still while I painted them. Now she likes to point to her toes and say 'mama'.
16. She really enjoys coloring and playing with stickers.
Months 17-18
Well I can't believe 2 more months have flown by! So many new milestones and events. I took a trip to Chicago for work, and Martin and Emory had a great time while I was gone. My parents came to visit, and my dad ran the half marathon. We also took a trip to Atlanta to celebrate Parker's 1st birthday. Emory and Parker had a great time playing together. The older they get, the more they enjoy playing with each other. Emory loved playing with all of Parker's toys. Here's to a great summer with lots of exciting times coming soon!
