Piper grows up- 18 months

Piper-girl,

I know I say this every time, but I cannot believe that you are 18-months old. When your sister was this age, we were getting ready to welcome you into the world but you are still very much my baby.

The past couple months with you have been both tons of fun and lots of hard work. Which I suppose can sum up parenting in general. Your vocabulary is exploding. You can climb up anything at the playground and go down the biggest slides with a smile on your face the whole way. You have learned to say please and thank you and it's seriously the cutest thing ever. You love to play outside and brush your teeth (no help allowed, thank you very much). You reach out for Jade's hand to pray the second we put you in your high chair and blow me a kiss every night after I say "amen". You bring us books constantly and rarely let us finish one. You still love to nurse and now that  you've learned that "mmm" means that something is good you frequently take a couple sips, lean back and say "mmmm" and then latch back on again. Melts my heart every time.

Not so fun things that you are doing: hitting, biting, pushing, kicking, and in general just being the most opinionated, independent, tantrum throwing kid ever. Nothing that I have done discipline wise is proving to do any good, so I'm just focusing on being consistent and praying that you grow out of this soon because I really don't want you getting kicked out of Mother's Day Out in the fall!

With that said, they have never mentioned you doing this at church- they always say that you are really good and so much fun, so I suppose it's something you reserve for your closest friends and family.

You still love big sister and try to do everything that she does- you insist on carrying your backpack (which is almost as big as you) in and out of church. You are also starting to walk from the car to wherever we're going more than being carried/worn.

Your sleep has been all over the place. You're teething and going through a growth spurt, so some days you don't nap at all and other days you nap and sleep 13-hours at night. I rarely know what to expect.

You're going through the 18-month separation anxiety phase, which has made leaving you with friends a bit more difficult. At church, you're fine as soon as I leave, but with friends you generally want to be held the whole time.

We have lots of fun things coming up for you- in a couple weeks you start gymnastics, since you have been trying to break into the gym for the last 4 months while watching sister. We're going to the beach at the end of June and I have no doubt I will not get to sit down for a minute in order to try to save you from drowning yourself! We have lots of friends coming to visit this summer, so I know we won't be bored for a minute and then in the fall you're gonna be a big girl and go to MDO with Jade :)

I love you so much baby girl. You bring many smiles to my face every day. Your fun spirit will serve you very well in the future and I consider it pure joy to watch you grow up.

Lots of hugs and kisses,
Mama

18-month stats:
Weight: 22 lbs 2 oz, 19%
Height: 30", 10%
Head: 18" 29%

For the record, Jade was the same height at 18-months, but weighed 3 pounds less.