14 Months!

By this time, Lilleigh is really 14-1/2 months, but oh well!

Lilleigh at 14 months...

• Says A LOT of words. Right around 13 months she had a vocab spurt. I kept expecting a spurt and then plateau, but that really hasn't happened. It seems that everyday she says more and more. Her words include: Dada, more, milk, Mom, Mama, Mammy (Sammy), ball (which she says in the grocery store around oranges and lemons etc. SO funny!), dog, woof woof (both for a dog's sound and her favorite lovey), meow, moo, down, up, no (oh, that's a fun one!), peas (please), da-du (thank you), bow (she says after she's dressed because naturally it's time to pick our a hair bow. that's my girl!), yeesh (for shoe... she has the "sh" at least), nana (banana), and I'm sure lots of others I can't think of. She also has a word for wagon but I can't remember how she says it. I so love learning her language! And it makes me happy that we can communicate! We are still doing baby sign language some, but I've kinda stopped it since we can communicate most things now.
• Walks! Yea! This is a super helpful skill. She's working on her balance though, so although helpful, we walk very slowly in public. :)
• Likes to put her shoes on and take them off. And she loves putting on Mom and Dad's shoes also!
• Has 8 teeth + her 2 bottom molars + 1 or 2 teeth breaking through on bottom (her fangs)
• Loves bananas and eat them like they are going out of style. Today she had 1-1/2, and that was me limiting her. I cut her off.
• Takes one 1-1/2 hour nap a day. She's wearing Momma out!!! The other day I got lucky and she took a 4 hour nap!!!!! It was amazing. Unfortunately, that was a total fluke. If we could find a good middle ground, that'd be awesome. But meanwhile, I'm learning to survive on an hour and a half. And Lilleigh is learning that sometimes Mom has to get some chores done while she's awake, so she needs to entertain herself. That doesn't always go over well, but that's okay. She'll get there!
• Loves going up and down steps. As her Grammy put it, Lilleigh is "focused." I do think that's an accurate depiction of her personality. Whether it's steps or getting the shape in the slot of her toy, she gets very focused on the task at hand and is not easily redirected. She's done this a lot recently with steps and has wanted to go up and down, up and down. Fortunately when we were in Houston, Grammy showed her how to slide down the stairs on her bottom. Then this past weekend we were at a friends house, whose living room dips down by a step. Lilleigh kept wandering over to the step to go up and down. At first I held her hand because I was afraid she'd fall, but after a bit I watched from afar. And what a proud momma I was to see that when I wasn't there, she sat on her bottom and slid down that step! Thanks, Grammy, for that lesson!

We are working on discipline. Sometimes this means a rebuke or spanking. But other times, it means I just need to correct, warn, or redirect her. And I am learning that this also means encouraging and teaching her. Discipline isn't all negative! In fact, I've heard many varsity moms say recently that 90% of discipline is not about punishment but about guiding, encouraging, and teaching. I find I am great at encouraging her (Encouraging is a strong suit), but teaching is harder. Not sure if it's the age or just that I'm not in the habit of doing it. But I am working on it! I've been reading Shepherding a Child's Heart, which has been a helpful read for this arena.

I think I told y'all we got this awesome kitchen set for Lilleigh for $15! What a deal! And this past weekend, I got a side rail for when Lilleigh moves to her big girl bed (which won't be for awhile!) for only $2!! I love garage sales!

Lilleigh and Aunt Anabelle

Driving back to Dallas from Houston