22 Months

Our daughter is already 22 months old. I took a bunch of pictures of her at the park (I tried to take even more but her smiling-and-not-moving lasts for only a half-second, too quick for the camera to capture before she gets curious again). We had so much fun in spite of the heat. I let her roam where she wanted to most of the time. She got pretty dirty when she splashed in a puddle and played in an old greenhouse. In the bottom middle picture she was saying "Hep [help] me!" because it was hard for her to get her hand into the small pocket.

We saw this guy after his dog jumped into the water, losing their frisbee. He was not happy with the dog for doing whatever it was doing in there. When we came back their direction the man was in the water up to his knees and feeling around with a stick for the frisbee. Then he was so mad that he threw the stick into the water. Poor guy.



Shboogoo decided to gather some pinecones and carry them around everywhere. She lined them up on this picnic table and counted them a few times. She can't say four so if I remember right it was "one, two, wee, two." Then after counting she
would say "yay!" and put her arms out to the side and then up to where you see them in the next picture. She is such a happy girl.
















This is a nice gazebo. And I love the word gazebo, don't you?
This squinty look on her face became a regular cute smile less than a second after I took the picture. I guess that's the way she smiles.

At 22 months:

• She loves to pick up rocks, sticks, leaves, and pinecones.
• During this past month she started speaking in longer sentences, like "Thank you, Katy" instead of just "thank you." I told her to say "love you" to my brother, but she actually said "love you, Mart" and he was happy about that. She still can't make the k sound. She'll try to say just about anything we ask her to say. Of course we as her parents understand her language better than other people do. However, her nursery leader says she can understand her little voice and thinks she is more mature than the other toddlers.
  
• She likes to take her shoes off, usually in the car. She only occasionally puts them on.
  
• She's still a great sleeper! She sleeps 11 to 12 hours at night and has about a two-hour nap. In the last week or two she started (although she doesn't do it every time) telling me "my bed" or "crib" when we're on the reading chair, so I know she wants to be put in there.
• New words or phrases: see ya [pronounced HEEya], chocolate milk, couch, stirring, pumpkin [pronounced like tumpin]
  
• When she gets a sticker she typically puts it on her hand.
• I'm teaching her colors; I point and ask her, "what color?" She can say most of them pretty well. Sometimes, regardless of what color the object is, she says it's red.