Emma Kathryn @ Two Years Old

I have been meaning to write this post since June 27th, my Emma Kathryn's second Birthday, but obviously, I am a little behind. :)

With how hectic and crazy life is right now, I am afraid that I am going to forget all of the little things about my babies unless I write them down. So, I thought I would give you a little introduction into both the big and little things about my baby girl.

Age: Two Years Old ::: sobs ::::

Weight: Emma has finally made it to 23 lbs, which just bumped her from the 5th percentile, up to the whopping 10th percentile.Height = 33 inches (25th percentile)

Height: 33 inches, which puts her in the 25th percentile which is another jump from her last appointment.

Size: It always depends on what brand you are talking about when it comes to what size Emma is wearing now. For the most part, she is in 18 month outfits. Most of her 2T stuff is still WAY too big, in both around the waist and in the length. She often, is sporting a 12 month outfit as well, mainly in shorts. But at least we are getting our wear out of her clothes since she is still wearing summer stuff she had last year!

Movement: Rarely.Stops. Moving. It took Emma a while to get going when she was little, but I don't think she has stopped since. She LOVES running and although our perfectly square house sometimes annoys me, it provides the perfect race track for Emma. She is constantly running in circles around our downstairs, either chasing Shamus, or Shamus is chasing her, or just running because she can. She isn't the most coordinated person in the world (God love her), mostly because she doesn't pay attention. I'm surprised she doesn't run into more walls. During gymnastics class, she does great with coordination, unless she hears the kids behind her, in which case she pays attention to them, and then immediately proceeds to fall off the balance beam. She loves jumping too. On Mommy's bed, the couch, the ottoman, the trampoline at gymnastics, you name it, and she has most likely jumped on it.

Teeth: Emma has sixteen teeth now, and just finished cutting the first set of her two year molars a few weeks ago. Whoa. Those babies were tough. She got all four at the same time but was a trooper. So I think four more to go. Crikey.

Sleeping: We are still extremely lucky in this category, continuing from when she was an infant. Emma goes to bed every night at 8:00PM without a peep. There are the rare occasions on weekends where she will stay up a little later, but for the most part she sticks with 8:00PM. She gets up about 6:30AM in the morning and takes one nap, one LONG nap, usually from about 12:30 to 4:00PM, and we are the ones that wake her up at 4:00PM. She is still in her crib, since we didn't want to transition her to a big girl bed at the same time Jackson was entering our lives, but that's probably right around the corner. The past couple of weeks, she has been taking a book with her to sleep at night. It always has to be her Shapes book though. She says goodnight and "reads" her book for probably 20 - 30 minutes before finally falling asleep. If you walk by her room after putting her to bed, you will most likely hear something to the effect of this..

"Pink. Orange. Blue. Heart. Square. Circle. Red. Diamond. Oh! I like that one! I like that one. I like that one. I LOVE that one!!!"

Eating: Emma's eating habits seem to vary by the day. She still has her staples though that she will eat any day of the week. Those are mostly fruits (although she is NOT a fan of cantaloupe). Emma is just like her daddy in this category where she loves anything that has to do with carbs. She could eat plain white rice for days. She probably eats just as much white rice as Wes does in a sitting. Veggies continue to be a struggle. For a few days, she will one asparagus, then not touch it for another month. This month, she has been all about "big corn" (aka corn on the cob). She still loves her milk, and would drink it all day long if we let her (but since its an appetite suppressant we limit her intake). She has a big class right when she wakes up, then another big glass before going to bed. But she also loves water (with ice of course), so that's what she drinks most often.

Milestones: I guess this one is hard to describe, because it seems like Emma learns to do something different every day. Every time she goes "pee pee da potty" we consider that a milestone, although we haven't truly started to potty train her. She has pretty much eaten all of the "restricted" foods now, other than shell fish. I'm still a bit scared to get that going, although her pediatrician said he has no reason to believe she would have an allergic reaction. For some reason, that just freaks me out.

Favorite Toys: This one is easy. Anything outside and books. Emma is definitely an outdoor girl. She LOVES to play with her water table outside, her baby pool, "helping" Daddy cut the grass, or water the flowers, going on the boat, playing in the yard with her big cousins, going for walks in her Radio Flyer wagon. If its outside, she loves it. Her other big love is books. There are times where we will sit down and read books for two hours. She loves her Curious George book, so that one gets read about 1,000 times a week. She loves her Spot books, and her Goodnight Moon book that her big cousins recorded for her. She also has this little set of books that we got at the dollar store, and they are all about the baby Disney characters. You don't just read one of those books. You read them ALL. She also LOVES movies. There is a new Winnie the Pooh movie coming out in theaters soon, and we are thinking about taking her to her first real movie.

Dislikes: Hmmm....well, vegetables are on the list for sure. I'd also probably put sharing down as a dislike as well. :)

Words: Emma still has an incredible vocabulary, and I know I say that a lot, but she amazes me every day with words she has learned and uses in the correct context. She speaks mostly in 4 word sentences but will break out with the 5 or 6 word sentences once and a while too. This morning in response to me asking her if she would like some yogurt for breakfast she said "Oh! Yes I would like some!". Granted, most of the time its a "yeah". :) She knows a lot of letters, their sounds, and words that start with that letter too. Although I think Wes and I are in trouble because when you ask her what words start with the letter "G", her response every.single.time is "Guys!!". Uh oh. She now knows A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, J, K, L, P, R, S, T, X, Y. She started learning random letters, but once we saw how she seemed to be catching on, we started picking one letter a week, starting with "A", and moving on down the line. That's why A-H are in the right order, then it gets a little crazy. We are on letter "H" this week. :)

Personality: Emma's personality is contagious. She is very laid back in a lot of ways, just like her Daddy. Then she gets all worked up about some things, just like her Mommy. She really is a happy child. She laughs all the time, but no one can get her to laugh like her Daddy. She loves playing with other kids, mostly bigger ones (like all her big cousins) but she is still shy at first, and it takes her a few minutes to get going. When meeting new friends, she is very shy, but ends up bossing them around in no time flat. She is very bossy! I guess she is practicing for being married one day already. :) If she wants you to play with her, she tells you exactly where to sit. She is becoming more and more independent every day, which Mommy is fighting tooth and nail. I'm not ready to have a big girl yet. Emma also is very meticulous. Here is the perfect example. For her Birthday, Emma got this huge array of pretend food to use in her play kitchen. When she "cooks", she puts the food in the exact pots and pans that they came in when she got them out of the box. So the chicken always goes in the same pan. The pan that it was in when she opened her present. The pasta goes in the same pot, every.time. You can only flip the eggs with the red spatula because the blue one was next to the cookies in the box. Not the eggs. She is a little love bug. She still loves to snuggle.

When I get home from work, no matter what kind of day that I have had, she makes it all better. Unless its on the days where she is all cranky, in which case Mommy wants to head right back to work. I mean, she is a toddler. :) She runs over to me when I get home from work, jumps into my arms screaming "Mommy's home!!!! I missed you Mommy!", and then demands to go upstairs with me while I change. On the way, she insists on going up the stairs all by herself (meaning that Mommy just can't walk behind her while she climbs, but Mommy has to stand all the way at the bottom until she gets the top). What a stinker.

So that's my baby girl in a nutshell. I am sure there are things that I am missing, but that's a good start.

PS: What should I do about that hair! That's actually pretty tame compared to what it normally looks like. It's getting pretty long, but only in some spots, and it hangs in her eyes. I don't know whether I should go get it trimmed, or just hold out until it grows? What do you think?