Grace turned 21....

....months old today.

She is such a big girl. Her language is really developing. I can hear her trying out new words every day. This weekend I heard "bye-bye", hat, broccoli, snow, nice, socks, and shoes in addition to all the words she already says consistently. She has also been learning to identify animals from her books. She can point to many of the animals in Brown Bear, Brown Bear What Do You See? and can make the sounds for a cow, a horse, a dog, a duck, and a sheep. I will have to try to get her on video doing those - they are hysterical. Grace also knows the signs for "more", "all done", "potty", "eat", "thank you", and her own version of "help". She continues to amaze me with what she understands. I just talk to her normally - sometimes repeating the statement - and she shows she comprehends by doing what I ask. She can even follow two step directions if it is something familiar like, "Go get that bone and put it in Daisy's basket".

I know I have said this before, but Grace loves music. We think her favorite song right now is "Kung Foo Fighting". They play this at daycare and I happened to come in last week as it was on. You should have seen her dancing! After he heard about it, Kyle made her a mixed CD with "fun" songs and she danced on Friday night for over an hour. She was able to anticipate when each song was ending and during the brief silence in between songs she signed "more", not knowing the next song would come on automatically. It was so funny to watch! We didn't know our dinner came with a show!

(Notice the speaker on the counter next to her. She was sitting there, enjoying her snack and listening to music)

I also notice her doing "big kid" things like sitting in a booster seat at restaurants instead of the high chair, holding crayons and pens and staying focused for a long time as she does her "work", saying "yes" and "no" correctly when she wants or doesn't want to do something, and remembering where things are stored and going to get them. She does this with food in the refrigerator and kitchen cabinet and clothes she wants to wear. The other night Grace remembered where a deck of cards was stored in a drawer in the basement. She just went right over to the drawer and pulled out a bunch of cards to play with. It seemed like she liked touching and looking at them but Kyle was also helping her count and sort them into groups. Grace loves to laugh and to make other people laugh. We play Hide and Seek and she always finds me. She makes funny faces and weird sounds and likes to look in the mirror to see how she looks when she is doing it. And just so you can get a dose of Grace's antics here she is showing us her delicious fruit snacks:Yes, this one was blue. And don't be fooled - they call them "fruit" but they are really candy.