14 months old!

Marissa will be 14 months old on Friday!
She always wakes up around 7:30-8am. Then we cuddle and she nurses for about a half hour. After breakfast around 9:30-10, she plays with her baby and we read her books over and over and over again. She consistently takes a 2+ hour nap every day around 11:30, then we eat lunch when she gets up, around 1:30-2. If it's nice, we walk outside, go to the playground, or go swimming. Sometimes she takes a short nap around 5ish, but it makes her cranky, and she still goes to sleep at the same time, so it doesn't seem to do any good. She stays up waaaay too late. I really can't figure out why. I know I should start to establish a strict bedtime, but she still nurses to sleep, and I don't think she's quite ready for the whole CIO method of toddlers-going-to-sleep. Sometime this summer I will start that though, because I know she needs a better routine, and I'd like for her to go to sleep earlier than 10:30 or 11!

She regularly says these words:

• Uh-oh
• No
• Hi (only at home, never out in public of course - lol)
• Bye
• Tickle-tickle (sounds more like tik tik tik - but it's cute, and she knows exactly what it means)

And loosely imitates:

• Cup
• Ball
• Teddy bear
• Shoes
• Where did ____ (person, cup, ball, baby) go? (with arms outstretched appropriately - lol), then proceeds to look for that object all over the place!

She signs:

• More
• Please
• All done

She knows what the doggy says, and what the cow says, and we're working on duck, birdy, etc.
She does the fish face every time we come to the fish page in her "First Words" book, which happens to be her favorite (while I'm trying to type this, we're on the 4th time of this book, and she gets mad at me every time I stop!)
She loves Peek-a-boo, but if we're not paying enough attention and say it right away, she says it for us, only it sounds more like "tod-ul-da" - it's pretty cute!

Yeah, I know she's supposed to have more words by now, but she seems to be soooo close to lots of words, and she completely understands everything we say to her. So I'm not worried. Yet

The other day, Dan, Rach, and I were all sitting in different spots in the living room, and Marissa was playing on the floor. We took turns asking her to "Give Daddy a kiss" "Give Aunt RaRa a kiss" and "Give Mommy a kiss", with random people saying it each time, and EVERY TIME she went directly to the correct person to give them a kiss. It was too funny.

All this to say, we are completely and utterly enjoying every new thing she throws at us! She is hilarious to watch and interact with, and such a joy (I accidentally just typed "job" instead of "joy" - she is a handful too!). I love my girl!

Whew...lots to catch up on:

L's house
Last weekend (before our 2nd anniversary) Marissa and I visited L, who is 23 weeks pregnant. She is a nanny for four kids in her house, so I tried to help out a bit, and Marissa played with the kids. We had a really fun time, and it was good for Marissa to be around kids her own age and have a change of scenery with the toys! It made me realize how much I miss the triplets and Seth though, and I came to the conclusion that I love multiples. A bunch of kids the same age is just so much fun! Heehee...

Our 2nd anniversary
Rach took Marissa for the evening, and Dan and I went to Brio (like Bravo, our V-day tradition) for dinner and dessert. It was wonderful, and so nice to spend some quality time just the two of us.

Swimming!
We finally went swimming in our apartment complex's pool. The water was a little cold, but we had fun re-introducing Marissa to the water. I don't think she cared either way last summer, but so far this summer she is loving it!

Our house!
They are moving so quickly on our house! We went to see it last night, and half of the siding is up, all the brick is up, and all the drywall is up inside! It's so cool to finally be able to picture it better, since we had never seen an actual model of our floorplan. It should be ready for us to move in around the middle of July!

Marissa
Marissa is changing into a toddler more and more every second! The other day she put her baby in her highchair, and just this afternoon at work (while everyone else was sleeping) she was pretending to feed a baby pretend food out of a bowl, using a spoon! I thought the whole "pretending" thing didn't happen til much later! She is also beginning to throw little tantrums more often. While I still have a hard time not laughing, I absolutely refuse to give in now. Hmm, I just looked at this milestone chart (link) for 13-18 month olds. I know all kids vary so much in the timing they acheive different milestones, but it's still very interesting to me. Marissa is doing a lot of things that are "advanced skills" like saying 'shhhh' (15 mo), pushing/pulling toys while walking (14 mo), taking clothes off by herself (16 mo), dancing (17 mo), kicking a ball (17 mo), and especially being finicky about food (16 mo - wait, that's a milestone??? Lol); "feeds doll" is an emerging skill for 17 months, and "discovering the joy of climbing" is around 16 months; but she doesn't do some of the "mastered skills" like using more words skillfully. Well, I guess she sorta says "hi" "bye-bye" and "yeah." But I kinda just guess that's what she's saying.
Oooops, I almost forgot to mention that she has picked up the word "NO" - she doesn't say it often, but usually repeats it after I just said it to her! She also said it to the 8 month old at work today when he tried to take the toy in her hand. It's funny to see her asserting herself like that.
She gets her shoes and brings them to me if she wants to go outside. She also gets her shoes and her cup if I ask her to, which I think is very cool, especially if I'm being lazy. Lol, just kidding She is still nodding 'yes' to almost every question we ask her, but every once in a while she'll shake her head 'no.'
Her next top front teeth are very close to coming in. She has at least one finger in her mouth at all times, which creates a nice little waterfall of spit dripping down to her elbow. Haha.
She is consistently taking one nap a day, and it lasts anywhere from 1.5 to 2.5 hours! Finally, I get some time to myself! When she used to only sleep 45 minutes at a time, it was so hard to get anything done. I love naptime!

For some reason, she loves to lift up her shirt/dress to rub her belly...and I caught her picking her nose (and eating it) while we were walking around our house - lol.