twenty-one months

Last week was L's monthday (time is flying by. . . ).

At 21 months old, L is enthusiastic about life. When she wakes up in the morning she's usually happy, saying, "Mama! Mama!" I love it every time she wants me to see her enjoying what she's doing; she either makes eye contact with me and smiles, or does a little laugh until I look. Sometimes she sounds very excited, like when she points to something in a book -- or on anything that has words -- and names it (or the sound that it makes). In the past month she started to point to a letter O and say "O!" I thought nobody had taught her to do this, that maybe she picked it up from a video or something, but just now I asked Shboogoo about it. I asked, "Did you teach her that?" and she said she did. Haha. I have taught L two others. If we're sitting with a book and I ask her to find the letter S or the letter T she looks and most of the time gets it right. She points to the letter and says it (but with S pronounced "eh").

Some of her favorite activities: 

• Playing and laughing with Daddy. He thinks of fun things they can do.
• Books -- usually I'm the one to read to her; she also loves it when her sister "reads" her a book by telling her the basic story.
• The song Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree (that's how I get her to hold still during a diaper change).
• Looking at pictures of herself or her family.
• Saying "no" -- one of her newest words -- while shaking her head.
• Saying "yeah!"
• Watching movies. Her favorites are probably Blue's Big Musical Movie and Signing Time but she'll watch, at least for a while, whatever we put on. She likes showing me cartoony movie cases, too. She was fine with sitting on a lap during Tangled in the theater.
• Signing and saying "bear."
• Holding a baby, putting it on the floor and spreading out a blanket or baby washcloth on it (like her sister does). 
• Scribbling.
• Saying "two" and "wee" -- mostly when I say "one" and she knows I'm about to swing her in circles.
• Watching others set up the Marble Works, and then putting a marble in it.

If L is able to do something without help, she likes to. She's gotten a lot better at feeding herself using a spoon or fork instead of her hands. Besides getting really upset (we call her "Freak Out") when her sister takes something out of her hands, L doesn't like it when her sister makes her go somewhere or holds onto her for too long. As you'll see in a video in a future post, L can be loud regardless of her mood. I don't remember Shboogoo being as noisy or restless during church as L is.

L is observant and helpful. She says "uh oh!" when she spills on her shirt or when anybody accidentally drops something. She has repeated "uh oh!" until someone understands and takes care of the problem. She watches me load the dishwasher. Her job is to close it after I put the detergent in, and she sometimes helps take the things out of the bottom of the dishwasher. She follows instructions about putting things like measuring cups in the correct drawer, and throwing away trash.

You can see the post about Shboogoo at this age here.