Natalie - 23 months

Natalie is 23 months - ok, technically almost 23.5 now that it is already the 20th, but oh well!

This girlie makes us laugh every day with the things she says and her mannerisms.  One Saturday this month, we had the following conversation from our beds (she was in her room, we in ours):
N: Mama?!....Mama?!...
M: Yes?
N: Daddy!?..Daddy?!
D: Yes, Natalie?
N: Milk?
M: Natalie, come in here.
N: Ok, Mama. I'm coooming.

It's funny (but good), we always close her door at night, but sometimes we don't latch it.  But, she always stays in her room until we come to get her.  She can even open the door on her own, but she stays put.  It's great, because we don't find her wandering the house, but it's funny that she thinks she has to stay there.

She's starting to put more and more words together for some little mini sentences. She says:
I'll get it
I got it
I'll get her (Rhys)
I'll do it
I did it

We took our first road trip this past weekend.  Natalie was pretty cranky and tired when we started our trip, but we thought she would fall asleep and it would be easy. Boy were we wrong.  She whined and cried the majority of the trip.  Luckily Rhys tuned her out and slept most of the time, but as soon as Natalie would stop screaming, Rhys started!  Natalie looked over at her and said "Rhys, ENOUGH!" haha, guess she heard that from us a few times (directed at Natalie, not Rhys).  Yesterday, she said "Rhys, STOP" when she was fussing.  Funny how she can tell Rhys that, but she doesn't obey when we ask her to stop crying!

Lately Natalie has really been into coloring.  For a while, we've just been giving her one crayon at a time, and we make her sit at the counter so we can supervise the crayon use (she did manage to color on the chair a few times, but luckily it cleaned off pretty easy).  This weekend, she and Ryan spent a good, long while coloring together.  I'd guess an hour at a time? And they did this more than once.  They made sure to cover every bit of white space on their papers.  We let Natalie have the whole box of crayons last night, and I'm pretty sure she used them all. 

We were asking her to name the colors.  Our conversation went something like this:
M (holding red): What color is this?
N: GREEN! (this is usually her first guess)
M: No, it's red.
N: Ok
M (holding blue): Natalie, how about this one?
N: Red!
M: No, it's blue
M (holding yellow): Natalie, what color is this?
N: Blue!
haha, she just usually repeats the prior color.  But, she does get orange right a lot of the time, and she does know purple, yellow and blue, but she doesn't always say them at the right time.

Shoes! This girl loves to wear my shoes around the house.

 

And look at that crazy hair..it's getting out of control.  I need to practice doing fun things with it now that it is long enough for pony tails and probably braids if I can get her to sit still long enough.  When it is wet, it is down to the middle of her back, but it springs up with curls when it dries.

She is quite the little dancer.  We will be playing in the living room and she'll hear the music on a commercial and get up and start dancing.  She pumps her arms up and out in front of her. And she pushes her hip out to the side.  I'll have to try and video because it is just hard to explain, but it's so cute.  She also likes to dance in the car, or she'll push the button on one of her toys and then jump up and try to dance before the song ends. She repeats this quite often and because most toys have short songs, the song is almost over by the time she stands up.

Jumping is also one of her favorites!  She gets some good air too! She jumps or runs Everywhere.  Last weekend I showed her how to jump like a frog..it's pretty funny, she'll crouch down and do one good frog jump, but then after that she stays on her knees and sort of lunges forward.  All while saying "ribbit" of course.

She is one picky eater..at least at home!  Apparently she eats everything at daycare and for grandma & grandpa, but at home, we struggle.  Fruits and veggies usually go over well, but pasta and ANY kind of meat is usually a no-go.  David smoked ribs one night, and Natalie wanted a bite, so when she went for bite #2, I had to take a picture.  And for the record - there was no bite #3.

Height: 35-36 inches? need to check again.
Weight: around 26lbs
Diapers: size 4 (thinking about starting potty training soon..)
Clothes: size 2T
Shoes: size 6

Can't believe I'm already planning her 2nd birthday party!  Time needs to slow down a little..seems like the past year has just disappeared.