18 Months

After She hit the big 1 year mark, I stopped doing monthly birthday posts. But a half birthday is pretty exciting! And so much has happened, a metamorphosis really. 6 months ago Little One took Her first tenuous step. Now She is running. Fast! Out the door and into the Forbidden Cabinet and back. So fast that if She didn't have such a terrible poker face I wouldn't even know to check Her hands for containers of shoe polish.

She can not only run but climb, and even slide without letting Her booty get ahead of Her head, flopping backwards. She can dance like a rock. Star. She can carry the potatoes from the car to the kitchen.

In fact, She's getting pretty useful! She very carefully tears the lettuce into perfectly sized pieces, and puts them, one by one, into the salad bowl. She unloads the clean silverware from the dishwasher. She cleans up little spills on the floor, and wipes the windowsills with Her little sponge. Sometimes She wipes down the whole house, below knee-level. Including knees. She "sweeps" the floors and driveway with the hand sweeper. Aw. My own little mini-indentured servant! So handy! She helps me remember to put clean clothes away, and not leave them folded into piles on a chair. Because clothes that are out go in the hamper, of course. She throws Her used diapers in the bin. She picks up leaves and pebbles from the entryway and holds them out in front of Her, wrinkling up Her nose. "Tash!" She says in disgust, as She walks it into the kitchen and throws it away.

Oh yes, She says Tash. And that's not all! There are few words that She pronounces perfectly (one of which is the unfortunate byproduct of something She heard when a dish broke recently) but She is currently working very, very hard at practicing them, on repeat. The amount of new words She has added to Her vocabulary just in the last week is amazing, and they are becoming exponentially more clear. Between signing and speaking, I am starting to have real little conversations with Her, and it is SO cool. Or as Little One would say, breathlessly, "CooOoo!"

And She understands everything we say. I mean everything. Lordy! Watch it from now on missy! Everyone else, too. She is still little, and still doesn't say too much, and so it can be easy to forget how smart She is. Until grandmother wonders aloud where she set her glass, and we all can't find it, and I keep shh-ing Little One because we are trying to find something. And then I look at Her finally, and She is standing in the corner, pointing up at the glass we are looking for. "Dat!" Why yes, Little One. That. That is the one we needed, thanks. How She remembered when 3 adults did not, and when we thought She was paying attention to stacking the tupperwear, I do not know.

But it is clear that She is quickly growing up. She can understand multi-step directions and see them through. She can understand concepts like "later", "after" and "first". First we close the bottle. Then we shake it. She can hold an idea in Her mind and understand permanence and absence. She is able to miss people when they are gone. She can understand consequences. She can remember something and want it without seeing it. "shide!" She pipes up as I walk by Her, sitting in Her stroller with Her hat on and Her shoes perched on the tips of Her toes. "Go!" (shide= the playground slide).

She's always busy busy, always in motion, needing the next thing to do, to learn from. It's like She's on a mission to figure out the world, and knows She has to take it apart to do it. She's horribly vulnerable in the face of just this much too much hunger, sleepiness, or boredom. Melting like ice cream into a puddle of whimpers with a pouty lip on top. Or winding up and up and up into a frenzied knot of uncontrollable energy, totally unable to keep out of forbidden places or from throwing something on the floor. "Little One, do you need a rest?" "BAHH HA HA HA HAAAaaaaaaAAAAaa!.......(and then in a whisper, collapsing into my shoulder) "wes."

And Peanuts She loooooves that shoulder. She is still such a snuggle-bug, and I love it. It's like She has to keep a certain level of cuddles on hand, tanking up for the night with a good five minute nuzzle under my chin after bedtime stories, and then starting the next day with a great big bear hug first thing and refueling periodically throughout the day. She has no regard for timing, striking when I'm covered in some deadly food product or carrying boiling water or 10 minutes late. But then I ask Her, trying not to be exasperated as She dangles from my pantleg, "what do you need right now, Little One?" And She holds Her little hands up. "Hug?" The girl makes an irrefutable point.

It's nice to know that in some ways She still likes to be my baby, because I spend so much time these days staring at Her and shaking my head in disbelief. I see it coming, Peanuts! It's on the horizon! Having a baby is one thing, but having a child, well. Yikes, that's another. And it's happening to me! I'm partly terrified, and partly thrilled. Little One is becoming my partner in crime and I have a feeling it's going to be a lot of fun. I'll still take as many of those snuggles as I can get though.
Happy Birthday Little One!