{monthdate} 19 months

Christmas is just a few short days away and here we are with a 19 month old!!!

This time in Ellie's life is for sure my favorite to date!!  So many changes are happening on the daily and her character and personality is shining, growing and showing more and more. 

Lu is quite the adventurous eater but she certainly has her favorites. Topping the list are: green beans, broccoli, cornflakes, Cheerios, gold fish, cheese, mac'n'cheese, rice, potatoes (mainly French fries), and apples. Things Ellie does not seem to like: chocolate, meat, oranges, and pretzels.  We have been working on table manners and she is a champ at praying for our meals and actually does a pretty good job at sitting the whole time. She does better at sitting in a chair than her high chair. 

Miss E is developing physically very well. She is an expert climber. She has finally figured out how to climb up on the couch and our chairs and she enjoys being a "big girl". Though she needs to be reminded often that we do NOT stand on furniture.  I got tired of telling her that she cannot climb on the coffee table (among other things - because that is not polite) so Christmas came a little early and we got Ellie a slide. (Killer Black Friday deal). She is running around everywhere and stairs are her favorite, she goes right back up after falling down them. And when the goats purposefully knock her down she gets right back up and pushes them! - this girl really has no fear!

Ellie's vocabulary is growing every day and she amazes me with the words she is picking up!! Standards: mama, dada, nana, papa, baa, neigh, meh (goat), ssss (snake), hoho (Santa) caw caw (crow) caaaaa (car) upah (up). New Words: buh (bowl, bus, or ball) choo choo, pease (please) taka (thank you) moh (more or milk), bye, apah (apple), heppa (help please) and a few words I'm still trying to decipher. She is also starting to repeat words when asked. She is proficient in waving hello/goodbye and blowing kiss for thank you. 

Sleep is really hit or miss, which is kind of frustrating but we relish the nights that are good. We are still working on eliminating the middle of the night milk, which we can mostly do with a cuddle. We think it's pretty good if she makes it to 4:30 or 5 before needing her sippy. Most nights she does end up in our bed, but I will take that over some of the behaviors I've seen other little kids display out in public!! 

Speaking of behaviors, Ellie does have her fair share of tantrums. Luckily they have only lasted less than a minute or so.  Most of her tantrums are because she wants me to pick her up or because I can't understand if she wants to eat or drink!  Also thankfully she has reserved most of these outbursts for our house!!! PTL. 

Some character traits and behaviors we are working on are: staying calm, helping to clean up toys (actually she is really good at this - she loves to put things in bags/boxes!), using utensils at the table, staying seated while in her high chair, saying thank you when we leave places, as well as waving hello or goodbye.  Ellie also has a chore at our house and she LOVES it! She gets to help feed the puppies their breakfast and dinner. We started out slow with giving her the kibble cup right next to their bowls, but now she can walk down the hallway and dump in the bowls all by herself!!!! 

Keeping her hands off the Christmas tree had been much easier than anticipated but she sure does like to try and get something when she thinks we aren't looking. 

This truly is my most favorite age yet! Just the other morning Thomas got up before me (like he does every morning) and was making coffee. Ellie was in our bed and woke up. I told her to say Daddy and she proceeded to roll all over the bed. So I put her down on the floor and told her to go open to door and find daddy. She walked really get over to the door, opened it and ran down the hallway to see him. This is one of my top memories of watching and hearing her find him to date!!

♥ Ashley