Yakety yak

So here's something I've been quietly worrying about. 

Aerin doesn't talk much. Right now she is 16 months old and has a total of about six words. She only uses three of those reguarly: dada, bubble, and ball.  She's very vocal, but she just doesn't make many different sounds.

By contrast, Micah had at least three times the number of words at 16 months and he used them all constantly. And they were words like bellybutton, tractor, water, and spoon. Stuff well beyond dada and baba and bah.

I know that every kid develops differently.  I know that Aerin is still in the range of "normal."  I'm happy she's talking at least some.  I don't think she's delayed or having any special difficulty.  Second child, etc etc etc.

But I can't help but worry a little bit.

(Although, since Aerin's bidding fair to catch up to Micah in both weight and height, maybe being faster to talk will one day make up for the injustice of him being beaten up by his baby sister.)

Minor inconveniences

These last four weeks have been...exhausting. There's been work travel (for me for once). There've been Halloween parties and family visits. There've been milestones with the kids and lots of funny stories, but no time to tell anyone about them. There's been worry about some family and conflict with other family. I've had more projects and plans and permits and presentations to do than I can possibly squeeze into my schedule. There was a presidential election that made at least 70% of people I regularly encounter completely unbearable. The time change jacked everything up. The last month has been tragically devoid of cupcakes.

This morning I had to work to make up the three hours I missed yesterday due to voting. I should have stayed to work more, but I really needed to go grocery shopping and the idea of doing that on the way home tonight in the dark almost made me cry.  Now that I'm home, all I want to do is sit in front of the fire and drink hot chocolate with a half-gallon of Bailey's in it.  And eat cupcakes.  Of which there have been none.  I mentioned that.

But despite all the annoyances, we didn't have a superstorm wipe out half our town, so I guess I can't really complain. And we've been having fun too.

Someone can climb up on the chairs now. Nothing is safe.



We went back to Tate Farms on Halloween and practically had the whole place to ourselves.
The weather was fantastic too!

Tate Farms

Like most other families around here, we have a annual tradition of visiting Tate Farms. This was our third year going and only our second of visiting during the day. Just like last year, we had a fantastic time.

The rest of the pictures are here.

Festival

Every year, on the first Saturday of October, the city of Madison, Alabama hosts the Madison Street Festival.  I had never been, even when I lived in Madison, but this year I heard that Madison Hospital had decided to sponsor all the kid activities, and therefore all the facepainting, pony rides, bounce houses, and crafts would be free.  Also, one of my friends had a booth on Artist's Alley and I felt like we should go and show our support.

It took a little bit of convincing where Todd was concerned, but Saturday morning, despite the chilly, wet weather, we left our house at 8:30 and drove to Madison.  We didn't know what to expect, but at least we were doing something different!

First, we stopped by Jessica's booth to say hi.  Then Todd left with Aerin (and my phone and all my money) to get Jessica some coffee and ended up in the slowest coffee line ever.  So Micah and I had a good thirty-five minutes to hang out with Jessica and examine her jewelry.

While we were waiting, Micah got to see two trains go by up close. I managed to get back over to the tracks in time to see the engine on the second one, so he got to wave at (and be waved at by) the engineer.

When Todd finally showed back up (with some hot chocolate for me, which offset my anger at not being able to get in touch with him to find out when or if he was ever coming back), we decided to wander over to the Kids Pavilion. Micah was a little overwhelmed at first, but he really got into it when we started seeing his a bunch of his daycare friends running around. He got to pet a turtle, get his hair colored, and have his face painted. When he and Kaya (a super sweet little girl from his Preschool class) met up at the bounce house, he really had a blast. After that, he got to pet a pig, two goats, and some chickens.  Aerin was stuck in the stroller the whole time, but she at least was having fun watching everything going on all around.

After all that, it was time for pizza and cookies.  While we were eating, a couple of Ghostbusters walked by. We tried to explain to Micah why they were so cool, and ended up promising that one day he'd get to see the movie and then he'd understand.

When we left, Micah was so tired that he rode in the stroller while Aerin walked.

---------------------------------------------

I am so glad we went. It turned out to be a really fun event, and it was definitely better than being cooped up in the house getting increasingly irritated with each other.  It also gave us the courage to take both kids out to dinner that evening, something we haven't done since Aerin developed her 100-decibel pterodactyl screech and learned to haul full margarita mugs off the table. I like to think maybe we're finally turning that corner where we can once again go out in public and not come home exhausted and covered in splatters of baby-launched cheese sauce.

But if not, still, Saturday was a banner day.

15 Months

• When she sees a bird or a plane flying overhead, she yells, points, then covers her mouth with both hands.
• When she sees a car coming, she yells, points, and starts doing a crazy stomping dance.  Then she starts waving.  (Pretty much everyone waves back.)
• She can climb the stairs unassisted. When she gets to the landing, she stops, sits down, and claps for herself.  Then she finishes climbing the last four stairs.
• She can come down the stairs, mostly without falling to her doom.
• She refuses to wear shoes in the car.  She has trouble removing socks, though.  This requires a lot of howling until someone helps her get it off her heel.
• We moved her upstairs on Micah's birthday. I haven't finished putting everything back up on the walls, so she has a pinwheel mobile hanging over her crib temporarily. She'll try to blow at it to make the pinwheels spin.
• She can say ball, bubble (buhba), mama, dada, hi, and moon (mooh).
• She says "baba" for book and apple.
• She signs for "more" and "please."
• When she hears music, she starts dancing,  Last night she was groovin in her highchair at the Mexican restaurant.
• She loves books. Every morning as we're trying to get out the door, she follows us around with a book in her hand. When I walk into her room at the daycare, she immediately points to the books and starts signing "more please."
• She still desperately wants to squash a cat.  Any cat.
• She's becoming very attached to the pink Snoopy Jessica's mother bought for her at Easter.
• She spends the whole night wandering around her crib. I've never seen a baby scoot around so much in their sleep.
• She really likes wearing Micah's old shoes, so I haven't bought her a new pair. I like to think of them as her ass-kicking shoes.
• She can go down the slide by herself and stand up at the bottom (most of the time).
• She's a tough cookie. She isn't really bothered by things like falling face-first off the ottoman,  sliding off the picnic table she's climbing, or getting whacked in the chest by her brother's feet as he's coming down the slide.
• She hates having her diaper changed.
• She's finally cut all four eye teeth, but they seem to have stopping coming in again. She has all the rest.
• We had to buy a trash can with a lid after I caught her throwing toys in the trash. MULTIPLE TIMES. I can't help but wonder how many she chucked before I noticed.
• She has a temper.
• Oh my god, does she have a temper.
• And a little bit of a violent streak.
• But she is usually sweet and cheerful, so that kind of makes up for it.
• She's not at all what I expected, but she's actually pretty awesome.