Felicia has upped her crawling game this month. She is more likely to be crawling on all fours instead of the army crawling she was doing at the start of the month. She loves all the food and is pretty good at getting it into her mouth.
She has got such a fun personality and loves to be around people she loves. Sometimes she is in the arms of one parent and gets so excited about seeing the other that she tries to leap into the other parent's arms.
Felicia's favorite things to find on the floor and eat include: paper, cords, shoes, and actual food. It is hard to keep the floor adequately safe for her. She also loves baths and showers. She does well in her car seat still and was better behaved than her older sister for our road trip to Montana for Easter weekend. Speaking of this weekend, she was a big hit with her older cousins, especially Diana, who frequently stated that she wished she had a baby sister. (Four younger brothers, apparently, is not the same as a baby sister.)
I was terrible about taking pictures of Trixie this month, but here are a few:
She is always this happy in the tub:
This month we went to dinner at Grandma Great's and watched Coco, which I love so much. Felicia, (whose real-life first and middle names are actually the same as Grandma's older sister's) was really sweet with her great-grandma.
I was certain that my abnormally fussy, feverish baby had an ear infection. With the next two older siblings both getting tubes, I might be a little paranoid about ear infections because, no, she did not have an ear infection. She was just getting two teeth. It was a rough day.
Grabbing food from other people's hands and cramming it in her mouth
Putting her hands in the air indicating that she'd like you to pick her up
More babbling
Finding the binkie on the binkie clip and putting it in her mouth
Rarely nursing (so much earlier than my others!)
She adores Ike and frequently laughs at him. She thinks Felix is pretty cool too, but he's not big enough to pick her up. She tolerates Trixie, who is still madly in love with her.
I think this may be my favorite age. My little two-year-old is sometimes tyrannical, but mostly she is sweet.
Her speech is still really delayed, which can be exhausting sometimes, but I usually can figure out what she wants using a combination of careful listening, context clues, and a little baby sign language. It's been about a year since she stopped having chronic ear infections. (Even after getting her tubes in December, she still had ear infections for a few months.) I know eventually she will catch up on her speech, and it will happen really fast. We are starting speech therapy (she finally qualified after the third assessment!), and I'm excited about where that will go.
She loves to repeat everyone (but usually what she says is still totally incomprehensible.) Recently at dinner Ike pointed to a part of his neck and said, "My throat hurts a lot right here, and I keep coughing." Trixie (also sick with a cold) then pointed to her throat and said, "Oh. Ah," which I'm pretty sure was, "Throat, cough." Once when Eric tried to distract the boys so he could sneak a cookie, he shouted, "What in the world can that be?" Trixie spent the next few minutes pointing and shouting, "aah eeee?" (Vowel sounds are her strong point. Consonant sounds rarely happen.)
Trixie loves cuddles. There is a guest bed in her bedroom, and before naps and bedtime we like to cuddle with her in that bed singing songs. It is probably her favorite part of the day, honestly. Most of the time when I tell her it's time for bed, she is happy to comply. (We also only let her have a binkie at bedtime, so I know that's a good incentive for her to go to bed.)
There are usually no fewer than three stuffed animals in her bed. Her favorite three are a giraffe, an elephant, and a bunny that she got her first Christmas. Other animals that also make it to her bed: another giraffe, her giraffe costume (see below), her big yellow duck, her pony, a bear she got for Christmas this year, and a bear that actually belongs to her brother which she has claimed as her own.
Trixie doesn't really care about babies, except for our baby. She has a couple of baby dolls, and they rarely get touched.
She spends a good deal of time putting her bears to bed, in the baby swing, and in her doll stroller, and in her sister's car seat. I was the same way. I always preferred my stuffed animals to my few dolls.
She also loves real-life animals, and it has been fun taking her to the aquarium since we renewed our pass this year. And of course, the farm is still a big hit. She loves to choose a pony to ride, and she's always sad when it's time to go.
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Whenever I go get Trixie from her crib, I often pretend that I can't find her. I say, "Where is Trixie? Is she under the bed? Is she in the drawer?" etc. I love listening to her laugh hysterically and tell me, "nooooooo" until I finally ask if she is in her bed, and she shouts, "YEAH!"
We do a similar game with animal sounds. She makes the animal sound, and I play dumb trying to guess what it is. She knows: cow, horse, snake, owl, cat, dog, pig, baby (wah), mama (sh), Trixie (hello!), cougar (Ra, ra, Gooooooo 'ers!), rabbit (scrunches up her nose), and giraffe (hangs her tongue out of her mouth).
Trixie also loves to sing and listen to people sing to her. We go to the library for a music and movement class for toddlers and she just loves it. She usually indicates to me with hand motions what song she wants me to sing to her.
As a rule, Trixie is the quickest of my children to reply to a request like, "Go wash your hands" or "Get your shoes on." But then she is the slowest to actually complete said task.
She loves to be included, and she is very aware of people's feelings. When she notices that a member of the family is sad, she will offer cuddles and speak gibberish to them in soothing, empathetic tones.
Trixie is incredibly affectionate. She loves to give hugs, even to people she barely knows. She has a great uncle, in particular, whom she adores. I love to see the two of them together. He gave her this adorable Minnie Mouse for Christmas, and we snapped a photo of them together.
Later he presented us with this painting of Trixie and her Minnie Mouse, which was just so thoughtful of him:
Other things that Trixie loves right now:
Baths
Showers
Lotion
Putting on makeup (I just pretend to put it on her, and she thinks that is awesome.)
Pretending to put contacts in her eyes
Dressing herself
Playing tag and other chase games with her brothers
Slides
All the food
Brushing her teeth
Jackets and coats
Video chatting (usually with Eric, but sometimes with my mom)
Ice
Pony rides
Books
Talking on the phone (It's super fun to be interrupted while trying to talk to a non-family member and ask them if my toddler can say hello to them really fast.)
Drawing and coloring
Helping
Having her picture taken, taking pictures, and insisting on being in pictures that were not originally intended for her
One of the things that was most terrifying to me about having a girl was having to do girl hair. I'm growing out Trixie's bangs now (or, rather, she's growing out her bangs, my role is simply to stop trimming them), and I've even tried to do a little braid. The first time was okay, the second time was better, the third time was a total bust and I ended up just doing pigtails, and since then I've managed to do it a few more times with moderate success. Usually if I put on a YouTube video for her to watch, she'll be sit contentedly while I do her hair. (And then beg me the rest of the day to watch the videos, so it's not necessarily a win-win.)
I seriously love this little girl. She is the best cuddler and the most good-natured little girl. I'm really lucky to have her.
I stopped swaddling her in the last month, and voila! She started sleeping better. She is so much more adept with her hands that she can find her pacifier and stick it back in her mouth. Sometimes she still has a rough time falling asleep, but by and large we are getting through naps and nighttime so much better. I can't believe it's taken us this long.
Felicia loves her family and is less certain about strangers. The other day, I had just gotten Felicia up from a nap and fed her when Ike came home from school. She was so excited to see him and kept giggling at him as she tried to get closer to him. It made him so happy to see how much his baby sister loves him.
Felix, too, loves our baby. He frequently tells me she is the cutest baby in the entire world, and he loves to try to entertain her by dancing in front of her when she is getting fussy. One time this month he was singing a rock-and-roll version of a song about how cute she is. It was insanely obnoxious, but the sentiment was so sweet that we didn't ask him to stop.
She loves to sit up, especially when we are sitting up to the table to eat dinner. She previously didn't like potatoes, but we tried them again, and she liked them. So now I think applesauce is the only thing she doesn't really care for.
Maybe she'll start crawling in the next month. We'll see.
We love to pass her around at church and let other people hold her. It's a little hazardous during flu and cold season, but during sacrament meeting we don't have much choice because the toddler requires my full attention. And often in second and third hours I'm subbing in Primary, so Eric will happily pass her off to some other mama in Sunday School. Apparently the guys in Elders Quorum don't ask to hold her, though.
I don't have very many PJs in her current size, and I didn't want to buy more, so I just got the boys' out. Ditto for Trixie, who actually far prefers her "new" dino and train pajamas to any others.
We started sharing our food with her at meal times, and she thinks that is awesome. Now that she knows what is going on at the kitchen table, she is very eager to join in.
She holds on tight when you hold her. I call her my little koala.
Felicia still cannot roll off her belly, and she gets angry about that.
Everyone comments on her big eyes. They either say she looks surprised or observant. (I have noticed that people who tend to be more negative will say she looks concerned or worried. Generally positive people will describe her in more positive ways, such as the aforementioned adjectives.)
Because of her wide open eyes, I call her my little bush baby.
We bought her nothing for Christmas. She thought that was just fine.
I love wearing her in the Ergo.
She is getting to be such a fun age, with the ability to interact, really use her hands, and start to move around a little bit. I know these next few months will bring so many more changes, but I just want time to stand still so I can still cuddle Felicia to sleep every day.
It's my annual wrap-up. In the past I've felt like a lot of what I write in my yearly review was covered already in posts, but since I've post so infrequently this year, it's like it's all new!
2017 Highlights:
Baby Felicia was born. We just love her. (And she looks more like me than my others, which also makes me so happy.) (I also got a new nephew this year.)
Ike has made great strides on the piano. He doesn't always love it, but he's getting to a point where he can practice something until he gets it right, so he understands the concept that hard-fought things are often worthwhile.
I am going to be on an episode of "Who Do You Think You Are?" in the spring. (I filmed it in early October.)
Work changes are always happening, and I'm really happy with my current setup.
I feel like I'm finally in a groove with ward choir (I'm choir conductor) where I sort of know what I'm doing. We actually did multiple musical numbers on Christmas Eve instead of just one, like last year.
Jackson Hole for the eclipse, and then again a few weeks later for my nephew's mission farewell.
I went to Los Angeles for the above-mentioned filming. My hotel was in Hollywood, which is pretty cool.
Birthdays:
We kept up with Cold Stone, except for my birthday, where we just plum forgot! I was so upset when I realized it, but I was recovering from strep throat on my birthday and life just really got away from me that week.
The other birthdays in our family were pretty low-key (even the actual birth-giving day was pretty mellow).
Eric and I celebrated our anniversary as a "family birthday," which was a lot of fun.
2017 Goals:
I'm not finished with Personal Progress, but I am still working on it. Definitely should finish in 2018.
I wanted to focus on getting steps in, and I did really well until about April. I started having a lot of contractions when I treadmilled, so then I took it easy for a few months. And then I had a baby.
I did submit some writing for a genealogy publication! They sent it back and told me some corrections I need to make, and I still need to make those and re-submit.
2018 Goals:
Finish Personal Progress.
Finish making those corrections on my genealogy piece and re-submit.
