Emmy is 2!

First off – how is my precious little girl two???  I still remember her being born like it was yesterday (ahem, and probably always will). I have loved all of her little stages (ha – well mostly!) and I know I say this every time, but this is such a fun, fun age! My sweet girl has soooo much personality and each day I am amazed at how much she knows!

  

Her schedule is up around 7 (if we are lucky…she usually starts stirring around 6:30 on average). She will play in her bed for about an hour, though, before she starts calling me to come get her.  She still sleeps in her crib and in a sleep sack because crazy girl is a climber!  She takes a nap around 1-3:30 and goes down for the night at about 8. 

She loves:

Music – Her favorite song in the world is Old McDonald. I downloaded a bunch of songs to my phone and that is one way I motivate (bribe) her to get in the car some days! When it is over she will tell me “nother song!”

Baby dolls – She loves to play with her babies and get out the diaper thing that I keep all of her supplies in and pretend to change their diapers. She even uses the nose Frida!!! I crack up! Her favorite dolls are named Tiny Baby (which are the cheap circo babies from Target that are, well, tiny).  She likes to sleep with them even. All of her other dolls are named Baby Abby after her cousin.

Shopping cart – Baby girl LOVES to go shopping with her “cedit cards,” which are Tommy’s hotel room keys.  She pushes that shopping cart all around with her purse on her shoulder and her baby dolls in the cart. She will usually stop by my closet to put on a pair of my shoes too. She has a great little imagination! She will put the credit cards between slots in the furniture to run them. Ha!

 

She is also very into puzzles and books. Her favorite phrase for a while was “Emmy do it.” So she would have to read the books to us. Now she will cuddle back up and let me read to her again. Her favorite books are Llama Llama wakey wake, Snuggle Puppy, Ladybug Girl, The Belly Button Book, Bubble Guppies lift the flap and really, any book you put in front of her. 

She also spends a lot of time in her play kitchen! (So this is also basically a toy round-up).

Oh, the girl looooves the show Bubble Guppies. I haven’t introduced any other shows because this one is the one which her heart desires! She will get so excited to watch it.  (I sometimes also use this as an opportunity to dress her if I haven’t already.) I limit it to one show a day and the days we work, she usually won’t catch one unless I need something to entertain her while I make dinner, but usually she wants to get the step stool and help me. She loves to crack the eggs on the counter and stir.  It makes cooking a little longer, but she is so proud of herself and I am thinking if I play my cards right maybe by age  9 she will be cooking for us.

Another favorite is pajamas. Girl loves herself some pajamas. Probably because this is where most of the character clothes are in her life.  She is harder and harder to get dressed in the morning because she has an opinion on clothes.  A strong opinion.  I have taken to dressing her as soon as she wakes up in her crib because she won’t (can’t) run away. Another funny thing about her pajamas is that she will get super upset if they don’t hit the floor. She does not like a capri pant.

She is showing interest in potty training but doesn’t have the concept fully yet. As soon as she is done going to the bathroom in her diaper, she will tell us she needs to go potty, but the business will already have been done.  We got her a potty chair and some pull-ups, but I those are more because she knows the other kids at Miss Julie’s have them and she is so proud.  I am definitely going to take her cues on this one, so I am not rushing it. 

One milestone is that we finally got rid of the bottle at bedtime sometime in July or August.  She didn’t have it for two nights and we decided to just stop.  I will say going to bed is a wayyyy bigger challenge now. I used to wave the bottle and she would rush to her room. Now it is a series of toddler negotiations and sometimes just picking her up and taking her to her room while she goes completely limp (or as Tommy and Julie call it – boneless), which is met with tears and lots of dramatics.  Our nighttime routine is a bath (most nights), milk, brushing her teeth, reading and then I rock her and sing her some songs.  She will be well-versed in Christmas tunes by December.

Emmy has a great vocabulary and talks all the time.  She is now up to five-word sentences that mainly go “I want a____, mommy.” The other day in her crib she was saying, “I want mommy, mommy!” Ha! She can identify most colors and shapes (well, the basic ones…). One really cute thing she does when she sees the cross shape in a Tupperware shape sorter we have is that she calls it Jesus.  As far as other milestones, she can count to about 8.  She does know about to the number three in German, since my mother-in-law works with her in German when she can. Emmy has been known to tell her “no” when she speaks to her in German. Ha!! Little stinker.

Her current favorite phrase is “What’s that, mommy?” I love her inquisitive spirit and hear this question no less than 200 times a day.  I do indulge her, but sometimes ask her to tell me what she sees since I know she knows the answer.

Emmy does have her fair share of toddler behavior – running away, not listening, telling me no, fit-throwing and taking a swing at mommy. We have instituted a “calming area” and it works about 25% of the time.  She is able to sit in the calming area and read a book until she calms down. I definitely need to read up more on this area of discipline because almost every time I have her calm down, she wants me to hold her.  Not sure how effective that is.  She responds decently well to the two options technique of parenting.  Granted, one option totally sucks and is undesirable, and she knows that. (For example, her options during her bath are to wash her hair under the faucet (which she prefers when it comes down to it) or me use a bucket on her head to get the soap out.)

We love our little girl and I cannot believe how much she has grown and matured over the past three months since I last posted about her! She has become so much more independent and is just so much fun to be around. I love having a special day each week to spend with her to do something fun just the two of us and she is just the light of my life (obviously)!