elsie: ONE YEAR!

Elsie

One Year

--Elsie gets leaps and bounds smarter everyday. It seemed like suddenly one day you could ask her things like "Where is your spoon?" and she would look towards the spoon drawer, look around her high chair, earnestly looking for the spoon. Or if she were holding it, she might hold it up and smile.

--Other words she recognizes: socks, ball, doggie, Snoopy, bear, hat, Mommy, books.

--Speaking of spoons, she can use one pretty effectively these days. She dips it in the bowl (though sometimes using the opposite end), and brings it to her mouth. At first the spoon would tag team with her hand, but now it's pretty much a straight shot from the bowl to the mouth.

--She also likes feeding other people, generally with food that has been in and out of her own mouth several times. She's just sharing the deliciousness!

--Also, one day it seemed she magically learned the sign-language sign for "sleep" and "wash hands", and there is a chance she knows "brush teeth", too.

--Pretty much everything is still "Daddy" in Elsie language. We think she just learned to copy Aaron, who in attempts to teach her that he was her daddy, would frequently point to himself and say "Daddy". Now if you ask her where daddy is, she probably will point to herself and say "Daddy".

--Still no teeth and no official steps yet, but they are just under the surface and just waiting to happen!

--She is fascinated with zippers and eyelashes.

--Somehow she has learned to shake her head and say "No". How do they learn that?

--She loves her hats, though for some reason totally hated the hat her Gramma knit her that we tried to use in the photo shoot. She ripped it off immediately and shook her head "no" when we brought it near her :( We are hoping it just needs a soft lining!

--We are working on animal noises. It seems like she is trying to master "Moo" and "Grrr", both excellent choices.

--She is great at opening cabinet doors and making a mess of whatever is inside. If there is a trash can in it, she'll go for it. She loves the game cabinet, and knows exactly which buttons to push on Catch Phrase to make it start beeping.

--And along with buttons, she has totally mastered pressing Apple device home buttons. It's not super fruitful though. She will usually get a picture of herself, since all of our lock screens are her, and sometimes she might get Siri to say something to her. If she's on an opened Apple device, who knows what she might do...

--And finally, drum roll please...it looks like she has some curls forming at the base of her early-stages-of-a-child-mullet!