Kate @ 24 ... 25 ... 26 Months

So Kate tomorrow Kate will be 27 months old! Time is flying by, and it seems to be speeding up! The last three months, I have been jotting down things she's been saying and doing. This is for her baby book/scrapbook, so be prepared if you plan on reading further--this is going to be a long one. ;o) I have sticky notes all over the monitor as well as bits and pieces of info here and here. (Tanna will be glad this post is done so I can throw the notes away. LOL!) Anyway, I can't believe how fast she is growing and learning and changing.

• Favorite activities include throwing a ball up (just a little) and catching it, playing with plastic Easter eggs, carrying baskets or buckets or bags around and filling them with various items, painting, stamping, playing with her play kitchen and food, and playing with her dollhouse, easel and magnet letters, Little People, cars, and Play-Doh.

• Kate chewed through another paci. I had decided that when her final two pacis were no longer usable, then that was going to be the end of the paci era. But in a weak moment, I bought two more. Oh well ... she's only young once.

• Speaking of pacis, you know those pacis (like the Wubbanub or the Pacimal) that are attached to a stuffed animal? The idea is that the kid will grow attached to the animal part of the paci--then, when it's time to get rid of the paci, you just cut it loose and the kid still keeps the animal for comfort. Yeah, that doesn't work--at least not for Kate. If there is no paci attached to her froggie (Wubbanub) or piggie (Pacimal), then she wants nothing to do with them. It is a nice concept; it just didn't work on Kate.

• She grew out of size 7 shoes overnight, it seems. She is now in a size 8 and wears mostly size 2T or 90 in Hanna Andersson.
  

• Kate still loves Miss PattyCake (got to meet her!), Peanuts, and Little People. Some of her favorite DVDs are Letter Factory (by LeapFrog) and Brainy Baby's ABC's (which she calls "ABC Letters."

• Kate started watching Yo Gabba Gabba and enjoys it the most when the Gabba characters are on the screen. She learned the characters' names pretty quickly, too! I have several episodes saved in our DVR, and she usually requests to watch it when she wakes up from her nap.

• Kate has started to eat some new foods! YAY! Tanna has done a great job at encouraging this. Some of her new favorites include waffles (which she calls "waffle cookies," Tanna's way of getting her to try them), apples, peanut butter crackers, raisins, pizza (just tonight!). Oh, and ice cream and an Asian cake. She has quite a sweet tooth. Wonder where she gets it?

• She loves chopsticks and likes to try to use them from time to time. We bought her some training chopsticks, but she is still a bit too young to use them.

• She is obsessed with Sharpies. (She calls them markers.) She can spot them just about anywhere.

• In the evening before dinner, she likes to go get the mail with Mommy.

• Speaking of her sweet tooth, she LOVES lollipops! She is frequently requesting a sucker.

• She is quite fond of her hair clips and likes to look through them and carry one in each hand. She has been sleeping with two cupcake hair clips from Gymboree. She also sleeps with her "Elmo book," which she will request by name if it is not in her crib.
  

• She knows all of her capital letters and numbers 1 through 10. She knows her letter sounds, too, courtesy of LeapFrog's Letter Factory. It is very common to hear her repeating her A-B-Cs. Sometimes she leaves out D and E, though.
  

• When she isn't getting her way, she will lay down on the floor, flat on her back.

• Another thing she does when she isn't getting her way is this: She'll deliberately blow snot out of her nose. It's quite nice, as you can imagine--especially at bedtime. She started doing this when she realized I would come and clean her nose right away. I finally had to not wipe her nose for her after this had been going on for quite some time one night. She still does this, but it's not as bad as it used to be. She also will say, "Clean nose?"

• Speaking of bedtime. When we are getting ready to leave her room, we'll tell her to lay down or to go to sleep or to put her head on the pillow. She will be standing up and just lean over and put her head on the crib railing or just kind of in the air, like she is laying down. Then she'll just look up at us. Oh, and sometimes, she will put her head on the pillow when she is still kind of standing up. She just waits for us to turn off the light and walk out the door so she can pop back up. It is quite hilarious (well, most days, anyway).

• A while back, Tanna was teaching her where her organs were. So funny to hear him say, "Kate, where's your pancreas?" And then to see her she point to a vague area in her midsection.
  

• She LOVES to call out random colors and objects that she sees. For example: "Red shirt!" ... "Blue car!" ... "Orange K!" Other favorite things for her to spot: flags, smiley faces, pandas, fire trucks (any siren she hears is a fire truck).
  

• We are trying to teach her to mind her manners. Kate's been great at saying "please" since she could talk. She learned early on that when she said "please," she got whatever she wanted. She now says "thank you" and (sometimes) "you're welcome." Sometimes, she'll say "thank you" (in context) and then, to herself, "you're welcome."

• Kate now says the blessing before meals. We taught her a simple prayer: "Thank You, God, for this food. Amen!" She especially enjoys saying "AMEN!" and does so very enthusiastically. The other night, at bedtime, she was repeating a good-night prayer after us and said "Uncle Jesus." LOL!

• Sometimes, when she is at the table, she will stop what she is doing, grit her teeth in a smile, clench her fists, and shake her head. Then she laughs.

• Sometimes, out of the blue, she will randomly name whoever is in the room very quickly, "Ah-PahMommyKate!" She also will randomly bring up the names of family and friends. It's so sweet to hear who's on her mind on any given day.

• While she used to be content to play by herself, now she likes for one of us to be with her. She doesn't necessarily want us to engage in the same play, but she at least wants one of us in the room where she is. She will come get us, lead us by the hand, and say, "Help, please." Or she will lead us into her room, for example, pat the floor and say, "Sit down."
  

• She can repeat a couple of small lines from her favorite DVDs, including hand motions on some, such as: "Miss Grace!" (from Miss PattyCake) and "Sooooo big!" (from Baby Babble). One day out of the blue, she started singing a Miss PattyCake song. The song goes, "Jesus said yes; Jesus said yes. Jesus said yes to the Father. I can say yes; I can say yes. I can say yest to Him, too." It was so sweet to hear Kate trying to sing (and not just say), "I can say yes; I can say yes ..."

• She still loves to run and greet her Ah-Pah at the door when he gets home from work. I don't think I'll ever get tired of seeing that.

We love you so much, sweet girl!