emerald city diaries

{lion: jellycat via Nordstrom // dress: Gymboree (old from summer) // thermal longsleeve sshirt: Old Navy // leggings: babyGap // moccasins: Freshly Picked // Santa hat: handmade by Aunt Kelly (same as last year’s)}

{month sixteen} Even more so than last month Eloise seems like such a toddler these days! She is super mobile & walks (& runs!) all over the place, wants to do everything herself, & shakes her head “no” a lot… Yep, toddlerhood!

Eloise is super smart. We have always known that, but it is amazing how much she knows & understands. Just this morning when we took her monthly picture, she knew exactly what was going on. She saw the camera & immediately {attempted to} put on her Santa hat, grabbed Leo, & was climbing up in her chair (though she still needs a little boost)! She gave me a few shots & then decided she was “all done” which she didn’t sign (like she normally would at the end of a meal or something) but by taking off her hat & climbing down off of her chair. And beyond just this morning, we have noticed that she takes instruction & direction pretty well. We can ask her to get something or do something & normally she will!

While Eloise is still getting one more tooth (that last canine!), I feel like we are in a lull of teething. This one isn’t bothering her too much, & she isn’t supposed to be getting her next set of molars until around 2 years. {Though I have heard from lots of mamas that those 2 year molars are the worst! I am not looking forward to that this summer!} Eloise went in for her second appointment with the dentist earlier this week & got a clean bill! She wasn’t thrilled about it, but she did lay on the chair long enough for the hygienist to brush her teeth & check her new ones, & for the dentist to do a quick examination & swab on some fluoride. My guess is that it was the time of day (during her usual AM nap) that caused the crankiness during the appointment rather than the dentist. Eloise is pretty open to us checking her mouth & teeth if we are concerned about something, & we have gotten into a good habit of brushing her teeth every night. She actually seems to enjoy it, especially since we have more than one toothbrush for her (all from the dentist) so we can give her one without toothpaste so that she can brush her own teeth!

In the past month we have been working on dropping down to one nap, & I think we are finally making the transition this week. Most days when we are at home, just Eloise & me, I can tell that she is ready to go down around 10 AM or 10:30 (she gets up around 8 AM). But sometimes we have to be out & about during that morning time, so she doesn’t get a real nap. Starting last month though we started taking Eloise to daycare one day a week (& two days a week this month!) & since she is a toddler, there is only one nap in the daily schedule. It is good & bad, but is sort of acting as a forcing function for us to drop that extra nap which is probably a good thing in the long run. So now she gets up around 8 AM and goes down for a nap between 12:30 and 1 PM. It seems like a snack around 10:30 or so seems to help with any residual fussiness, and then we eat lunch around 11:45 or noon. Fingers crossed she starts taking two to two-and-a-half hour naps now (or maybe even three?) because I think she still needs that much sleep.

So day care. I don’t know if I have said much about it, but I will do a quick re-cap: Aaron, thru work, has a back-up care benefit that allows us to take Eloise to day care (or have a nanny come to the house) in the event that the primary caretaker (that’s me!) is unavailable. It is a set amount for the year that is very (very) heavily subsidized. We didn’t even realize it was a benefit until earlier this year, & then by the time I sat down & filled out the paperwork & got Eloise on the schedule, it was November. So we are taking advantage of all this time we have & she is going twice a week this month. While I absolutely miss her terribly while she is away, it is SO nice to have 5 or 6 hours to myself, especially this time of year when I have committed to one billion craft projects & things around the house. Plus, I think it has given us all a really good introduction to child care which is great because in a few years Eloise will be in some type of pre-school. The bummer part is that there are lots of germs at daycare, hence us all being so sick over Thanksgiving which was from her first day!, & also that it is so expensive, outside of this particular benefit. It would be great to have the option to send Eloise to part-time daycare, but honestly, it is like another mortgage payment for this particular center, so I guess we’ll have to win the lottery first!

Eloise has started really talking these past few weeks. By that I mean actually saying words, rather than babbling sounds. Most of the time she will parrot what we are saying or if we say what something is & point to it. It is pretty fun to hear her speaking & I know the coming months will be full of so much speech development.

{weight} 24 pounds.

{hair} dark (reddish) brown.

{teeth} 11 teeth plus four molars & one final canine coming in on the bottom.

{eyes} dark brown.

{clothes}  12 to 18 months (fit perfectly!), 18 months, & 18 to 24 months (still long in length).

{diapers} full-time cloth {bum genius freetime, pocket, & elemental} & honest company size 4 diapers at night with a bum genius diaper cover.

{feeding} during the day, three meals & one afternoon snack. sippy cup of milk with every meal.

{likes} books, mama & papa’s cell phone, toys that squeak or rattle, singing & music, Sadie, standing, FaceTime, bathtime, her snack cup, shoes, mama’s (diaper) bag, clapping, putting things inside a bag or box.

{dislikes} having something taken away from her, diaper changes, (sometimes) her car seat, not eating when someone else is.

{nicknames} Bug{s}, Love Bug, Baby Bug, E, Wheezy, Kiddo, Love, Bugaboo, Ellie or Elle.

happy sixteen months eloise!

M

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