The Hoverman Honeys....: Anna at 19 months

Here are Anna's most recent 6-7 months (this was written over a two month period because despite being on bed rest it took me THAT long to get this done.)

From here to there... Anna at 12 months

Anna at 19 months

A day in the life of Anna at 19 months

Anna has recently started to sleep to the late hour of 6:45, a vast improvement on the previous wake up time of any point between 5:30 and 6:30 (on a very good day.) When she wakes up she calls into us. She is very smart and always calls for mom even though mom is stuck in bed and it is ALWAYS dad that delivers the bottle but somehow she knows that mom is the one who wakes dad up. Very tricky. After drinking her morning bottle in her crib (4oz, heated up and don’t even think of putting one of the big kid nipples on the bottle, no thank you!) she calls again and Daddy comes and gets her. She gets to play in Mommy and Daddy’s room for a bit with Sarah Jane (who has moved there to sleep on the floor at some point in the night.) She usually finds some books and climbs into bed on mom’s side to have them read to her. She is very good at climbing up our ridiculously tall bed. She is also very good at using mom’s enormous belly as a kicking off pad.

After book time Anna usually climbs into the shower with whoever gets there first. She LOVES showering. She stands there very quietly and relaxes in the hot water. Very grown up of her! After the shower she usually asks to go potty, sometimes successfully, sometimes not, If not dressed right away, she will then grace our carpet with whatever should have gone in the potty. Thank you Anna. After dressing (if by daddy, jeans, a tee shirt and a sweatshirt, if by mommy, soft pants and a tea dress), she heads downstairs to breakfast. Anna is not our breakfast girl. Unless we are having eggs. Then she eats those all up. She is getting better at oatmeal too but more often than not she is not interested in breakfast food having just recently had her bottle. She sits there and humors us though.

Elizabeth arrives at 8am and gets a big hug from Anna who LOVES Elizabeth. Sometime after 8, Daddy, who has (all in a very coffee deprived state) managed to get two kids dressed, himself dressed, breakfast made, vitamins distributed, and a load of household chores done, departs for work. Both Anna and Sarah Jane enjoy “pushing him out the door.” At 8:45 Elizabeth, Sarah Jane and Anna head up to Berkeley Hills to drop SJ off at school. Then they head back down the hill to wait for Owen who arrives at our house at 9:30 during which time Anna has her second 4oz bottle. After that, Elizabeth, who has very efficiently packed a lunch, takes them off on their day’s adventure. When it’s raining (as it has done lots this winter, it has been a VERY wet winter), they head to either Studio Grow or Habitot, both of which we have memberships to, when it’s nice, they go to the park. They eat lunch and play and play at the various locations. Zeke or Grandma drop Sarah Jane off at 1:30 and they play some more. At around 3pm they head home and Anna goes down for her nap sometime around 3:30 after having her third bottle of the day (which she has in bed to help her fall asleep, something we still do for naps but not for night time.) The length of her nap varies, she could sleep for 45 minutes, she could sleep for two hours. There is no pattern as far as I can tell. On the weekends we put her down earlier and she sleeps for about 2 hours.

After nap there is occasionally another outing, sometime to go for a walk, sometimes to the Red Store (Target) which apparently is very entertaining. Then it’s dinner time. Mom emerges from her room where she is stuck on bed rest (or in the old days, came home from work) and the three of us sit down to eat. Dad usually gets home too late to have dinner with us but occasionally we get him which is always very nice. At 7:15 we have dessert (yogurt, honey and fruit) and at 7:30 it is BathTime!!!! Anna LOVES bathtime, she loves saying it, she loves running upstairs, but then she strangely doesn’t love actually getting in the bath. Once she is in she is happy though. At about 7:50 Anna climbs into my bed with as many books as she can manage and her last bottle of the day. We read the books and then at 8 begin the nightly ritual of “Parental Manipulation by Anna.”

Parental Manipulation includes yelling “Dada Dada Dada” and “Mama Mama Mama” repeatedly, throwing her blanket out of the crib and announcing “Uhoh” (repeatedly), declaring that she has a poopoo in her diaper, declaring that she would like to go to the potty AND taking her PJs off. This can last anywhere from 45 seconds to 90 minutes. Eventually she will decide that she is ready to go to sleep and she will promptly fall asleep but it needs to be an Anna driven decision.

Anna's Likes/Dislikes

LOVES – Elizabeth

LOVES – Maribel and Sandra showing up on Thursdays

LOVES – Sarah Jane

Likes – fish and chicken for dinner

LOVES – dipping anything in ketchup (or anything else for dipping)

LOVES – putting on her jacket and Sarah Jane’s boots (likes her own boots too but SJs boots are better)

Anna in SJ's boots (SJ in mommy's boots)

LOVES – broccoli, may be the only child in the history of the world that could seriously OD on broccoli

Likes – hugs

Likes – Running around the house with Sarah Jane pushing one of the baby strollers

Loves – showering in the morning, the only time she seems relaxed and stands still

Loves – playing with Sarah Jane in mommy and daddy’s room in the morning

Loves – having certain books read over and over and over (Moo Baa Lalala, Pop out Pets, Biscuit, Bobo, book about animals with doors that slide open)

Dislikes – being criticized or said no to

Dislikes – having things taken away (often bites in frustration, often directed at Sarah Jane who is often doing the taking)

Dislikes – going to sleep

Dislikes – mom not being able to pick her up though adjusted to this after about 3 weeks

Latest feats of intelligence and advancement

Doing the farm puzzle that makes noise – she knows where all the parts go but she has a hard time adjusting them to fit right but often times can make it work. Anna can also put the shapes in the right place on the wooden peg toy.

Putting together phrases with words, e.g., sentence heard early one morning “Dada and Mama, ALL DONE” I swear I heard the “and” She also said recently, “Sarah Jane is laughing” at the end of a long Sarah Jane temper-tantrum

Going peepee on the potty 1-2xs per day (does Anna get this shot out or does it belong to Elizabeth?) Also an occasional poop. With no drama. We are very impressed.

She is 85% for height and weight as of her last checkin (in March)

Clearing her place at the table – she brings her utensils to whoever is doing the dishes very carefully and cheerfully

Putting things back - this miight be her favorite part of any activity (how I know she is related to her father.) In a related category, yesterday Anna spilled some water on the floor. Carefully gave the cup to Elizabeth, unprompted got a towel, wiped up the water and hung the towel back up.

Eating with a fork and spoon – Anna loves her fork and would prefer to eat everything that way, with no help from anyone, including her morning English muffin which she prefers ripped into fork size pieces. She often picks up a piece of food, carefully places it on her fork and then puts it in her mouth.

Eating just about anything that is put in front of her – with the notable exception of potatoes, sweet or normal, roasted, mashed or what have you, she won’t have them. She accompanies her eating with lion noises, telling that food who is boss (definitely Anna.)

Anna eating with gusto

Vocabulary

Baba – Bottle

Bobo – Monkey stuffed animal from Uncle Matt & Aunt Laurie

Lalala – what pigs say (from the book)

GRAHHHH – what lions, tigers, giraffes, zebras and all other wild animals say

Baaaaaah – what sheep say (with lots of head shaking)

Da – Dog

Rufruf – what Das say

Ca! – Cats

Ickin – Chicken

Bababa – what chickens say

No – Yes

No – No

Tanku! – Said often and without prompting

ERRRR – Please

All Done – said very determinedly accompanied by a thorough clearing of the table in front of her including her place mat which gets thrown either to the person sitting next to her (who better be ready to catch it) or on to the floor

Ha – Hot, accompanied by blowing on her food or by putting her hand on whatever object we have said is too hot to touch. She likes to discover for herself.

Sarah Jane – though very hard to recognize

Elizabeth – Also very hard to recognize, sounds sort of like BeBet

Owen – When pointing out a boy or waiting for Owen by the window, she LOVES Owen

Byebye – said with drawn out southern accent

Pwuueeeee – said with triumphant smile because we had to work on this for a long time and she knows it will get a BIG response. She also always puts her hands on either side of her face and tilts her head flirtatiously

Potty & PooPoo – usually said when she wants us to get her out of bed. She’s very tricky, our little Anna.

Dacket & Boo – Jacket and boots – Anna’s favorite outfit.

Note that this section was very hard to write as it is a moving target, Anna is learning several words every day. These seem to be the ones that come up most often.

Big events in last 6 months (Maybe I should write these more often?)

Trip to Hanover for Mom and Dad's 5th Tuck reunion