17 Months Old

Okay, this is super late, but I figured it would be better late than never.

My little Sarah has grown so much in the past month. She has seven teeth now and is more or less holding her own when it comes to eating. Depending on how much she likes the food, she often eats faster than Noah. She's also starting to use a spoon to feed herself. She actually prefers to feed herself and will often refuse what I'm trying to feed her…then eat the same food happily when scooping it up on her own. It's great that she's so into feeding herself, but sometimes I just want to feed her because the food is so messy (like soup)…but she is so stubborn. Screams and cries and fights with me to do it herself. I'd like to say that in the end I usually win, but I think it's really 50/50. But in general, I'm glad Sarah's starting to eat on her own.

She's also gotten much better at walking, and even is starting to "run" - particularly when I'm trying to change her diaper or take her upstairs for bath time. If she sees me holding a diaper or if I say it's time for a diaper change, she'll look at me with a rascally smile and then turn and run away. Sarah was really  late in moving around, even when it came to rolling and crawling, so it's a bit strange to see her just walking off on her own now and interacting with other kids. With Noah, I remember I was always looking forward to the next milestone, but with Sarah, I've been more content to hold on to her baby-ness as long as possible. But now she's running away! Like Noah, she loves pushing things around. Anything that can move and has a place for her to hold on to, she'll push around. Also because she's becoming more active, she's playing with Noah more and it's been fun to see them interact in that way, even though it often ends with Noah knocking her over. She may be physically weaker than him, but when he gets her upset, she shouts at him and hits him. I know that the responsible thing to do is to curb this kind of behavior, but I just find it to be so entertaining!

Sarah isn't saying much, beyond "mama" and "dada" like before, but she seems to use "mama" for lots of different things. Depending on the tone, and how many times she repeats the "ma", she can mean "mommy", "milk", "more", "food", etc. Haha. She also knows what sound a sheep makes. Haha. Whenever we ask her what sound a sheep makes, she goes, "BAAAA!!!" with a great deal of emphasis on the B. Even though she isn't speaking much, it's clear that she understands a lot. When I suggest that we go down to the basement, she walks right to the door and starts trying to open it. When I say it's time to wash hands and eat, she walks right to the bathroom and up onto the step stool with her hands in the sink. When I say it's time to eat, she goes over to her highchair and tries to climb in. Even when I take out the hand sanitizer, she sticks out her hands and starts rubbing them together in anticipation. Now that she's starting to understand things, she's very good at following instructions…I'm just wondering how long this will last before she decides to join Noah and mutiny. She may be cute and compliant now, but she's already showing signs of mischief.