19 Months

At the beginning of the month Josie stood for 45 seconds on own! She has been able to stand while holding onto something since her birthday but has never let go to stand on her own. We were so excited when she started doing this but it was never for more than a few seconds. When she finally stood for 45 seconds on her own we were ecstatic. She is getting stronger and braver and I know that walking will be in her near future. Josie has been standing so much more on her own. She still isn't going from sitting to standing but she is getting there. She will often do the downward facing dog pose, which always makes us laugh. She's so close to standing up that way though. She is fine was standing if we can help her first. She will also pull up on furniture and then let go. She's even getting brave now and drinking milk while standing.

Besides being brave and standing on her own, Josie is finally starting to walk! She would take one and a half steps before falling into the couch or ottoman or our legs. On August 3rd, while watching a video of herself on Joe's phone, she decided to get brave and take three steps! A week later she was taking about five steps. Last week I was able to catch her on video taking about eight steps. She still crawls the majority of the time, but she's getting braver and braver in terms of walking. She's even starting to take steps without us trying to prompt or convince her to. When she's holding on to something like the ottoman she can even take a step and turn. I can't even describe how proud I am of Josie. She has been working hard!

Josie's lower left canine has been working its way through her gums and her upper left canine is getting close to the surface. She has been so cranky because of them. Hopefully next month they will all be completely in and we won't have to worry about teeth for a little while.

Speaking of teeth Josie is letting us brush them a little bit. I've tried multiple times in the past and she did not like it one bit. She wouldn't even let me put the toothbrush in her mouth. Now she will let me brush them and will then take it from me and suck on it to get the extra water out. It is a start at least. 

Josie has been adding more words to her vocabulary. She has about 19 words now that she has said multiple times. The issue is that while she does have these words, she doesn't always use them in the correct context. Some of them are just words that she likes to jabber. For example, she will say guppy. I'm sure it's because Sophie sometimes watches Bubble Guppies and it sounds like a fun word. It isn't in reference to anything though. Josie will say some words as she supposed to, such as more and ball. Nothing is very consistent though. I think she is realizing that we are not understanding her and it is making her angry. She often will start yelling and screeching when she doesn't get her way. It can be extremely frustrating for all of us. 

I never really realized it before but Josie doesn't really nod or shake her head.  I've seen her do that before but just a few times. She is been doing them a little more this month and I have to say it's a little awkward looking. When she nods her head it is a really big movement; she has to include her whole body with it. It's really quick and jerky as well. Shaking her head she more throws her head to either shoulder instead of just a quick nod.  This is something we will have to ask her PT about. 

I had to go back to work this month. I think this transition has been hard on Josie. She's been a little more fussy than normal, though that could be due to her new teeth. She has gone from taking multiple naps a day which total about four hours to taking only one or two naps. I like that she is limiting the number of naps she is getting, but I do want her to be well rested. Hopefully she'll just back into a schedule and this will get better for her. Until then we are trying to get used to our laid back girl being a cranky one.

Josie has made such great strides this month. I can't help but wonder if she will be walking and talking more if only we had started First Steps earlier, like when the doctor suggested it. (If only she would have explained her concerns to me instead of just offhandedly suggesting we call First Steps.) Regardless, I'm so proud of the hard work that she is doing. I just love that girl so much!

Here are some pictures from this month:

Josie loves being outdoors! I can't wait until she can run around and chase after her sister!

Josie is still Sophie's shadow (and Sophie loves it!)

Water play is still Josie's favorite. She really enjoys splashing around and running her hands through water. When she sees that we are filling up the tub or baby pool she speeds over to our sides. 

Classy family photo

I had no idea how much Josie likes apples!

Cranky

When Josie is tired she will pop a paci in her mouth and grab her blanket from her crib. 

She still doesn't know how to come down the stairs. We've worked with her on it, but she gets distracted and wants to jump into our arms or crawl back up the stairs. Oh well. 

A Frozen Birthday Party

For months Sophie has been saying that she wanted a Frozen birthday party. I kept giving her other ideas but she wouldn't change her mind. The nice thing is that everybody seems to be doing a Frozen party so it was easy to find ideas of what to do. However a quick search on the Internet left me overwhelmed. There were so many possibilities! I could have easily gone overboard but decided to keep it simple.

The Decorations, Favors, and Games

Like I mentioned, I didn't want to go overboard with the party decorations. Since Josie had a Winter 'ONE'derland theme for her birthday, I was able to reuse some of those decorations. I also picked up a couple of snowflakes that I spray-painted silver, which we will reuse for Christmas. I also found some paper banners in blue-and-white that I hung up around the house. I cut out letters to spell 'Happy Birthday Sophie' and hung them on our wall. I also printed out a few quotes from the movie Frozen that I put in picture frames and put on tables. I bought some centerpieces that had Frozen characters on them, though I wish I wouldn't have wasted money on that.

Sophie helped me create the party favors. We made blue glitter Gak.. The only issue with the Gak is that the glitter would settle to the bottom of the container and it would come off easily on your hands. We did make a second batch for boys that didn't have glitter in it and that was much better in general. I looked all over for containers to put these in but they were either too big or too small. I ended up just using old (but clean) baby food containers. They still had the names of what food was originally in there but who cares.

We had the trampoline and the bounce house for the kids to play on. They really enjoyed that and spent a big chunk of time outside. We also played Pin the Nose on Olaf. (My students from last year traced a picture of Olaf on a poster board for me. They even traced out carrots for the game. I am so thankful to them for their help!) We tied a scarf around the kids' eyes and let them try to put the nose in the correct spot. We ended up with two winners who each received an extra large sized chocolate bar.

Food

Of course we had to have sandwiches for lunch. I printed out the quote from the movie that was obviously the inspiration for the meal choice. We also had picnic type sides such as coleslaw, broccoli salad, and deviled eggs. 

Instead of a big cake this year we had cupcakes. My mom's friend makes amazing cupcakes so she helped us out. They were delicious! Everyone enjoyed them, especially Josie.

Gifts

It was so much fun watching Sophie open her presents. I loved hearing her exclaim over everything before she tore through all the presents. We are so thankful for all of our generous family and friends.

I am glad that so many people came out to celebrate our girl turning 4. We are blessed to have such wonderful family and friends in our lives.

Four

Josie took 4 steps today!