"The left one"

For the past three weeks, Keeley has been very preoccupied with "the left one". She'll show you two diapers and say "is this the left one?" or when looking at hers and Kayden's plates for meals "I want the left one". The frequency with which we hear this is a little crazy. When we were in Houston for Thanksgiving, my grandparents noticed and asked about it. I said that I had no idea where it came from. My only thought was they were working on it at school. Kelly and I talk to her about left and right but we never ask questions like that.

I asked Mrs. Sutton, she looked at me like I was crazy and said no. After a few days of thinking about it some more, I decided to ask Mrs. Alva. Mrs. Alva works with the kids in the transition room. That room contains works to prepare them for primary and a lot of them are left-right based to prepare them to read. Today I asked her and she looked at me like I was crazy too. She said no and then I explained my reasoning. She agreed that the transition room is set up that way, but said it is all unconscious for the kids.

I have no idea where the left one came from now!

18 months old

Kayden just had her 18 month check up. She is way ahead of the curve on most developmental things. For example, the doctor asked if she had five words. She probably has 500 words! She's already using two word sentences and frequently uses three syllable words. Gross motor skills continue to be advanced...we'll thank big sister's influence for that. The only developmental "concern" was sleep. Kayden continues to believe that she needs less sleep than Keeley (or any other kiddo her age for that matter). The pedi said there wasn't a whole lot we could do to really change that since we already have her on a schedule with bedtime routines and have already tried adjusting the times to see if that would help. She is just really, really stubborn when it comes to sleep. Actually, she is just really strong-willed in general.

Her stats:
Weight - 25lb (59%) - she stood on the big girl scale for the first time!
Length - 33inches (84%)

She continues to eat well, albeit completely different food than Keeley. She requests eggs for almost every meal and refuses to eat most fruit. She'll gladly eat a chick fil a kids meal and especially enjoys the chicken. This morning when we went to play, I got some chicken minis figuring she couldn't possibly be hungry - she'd just had a big breakfast and a clif bar in the car. She wanted my food though. I tried to give her an entire mini, she handed it back and said "no bread. chicken." If she sees you eating something or senses that you might be thinking about eating, she'll approach you and say "want some".

There is no climbing obstacle too big or too scary for her. Her full on tantrums are lessening a bit, but we still get the flailing, screaming, writhing ones occasionally. She can carry on for quite sometime if she's so inclined. She did it today for 40 minutes because she asked for Kelly and I said he was at work. The only thing that calmed her down was Keeley waking up. (Keeley actually told me Kayden woke her up with all the screaming...)

Overall though, she is a very joyful, strong-willed child.

Here she is dancing to the Christmas music from that decoration behind her. You'll notice she's completely off the ground. She likes to dance!
Dancing for Keeley before we decorated the Christmas tree.

Christmas Decorating

While I'm not sure it was a wise decision this year, we did do some tree decorating. So far, any unsupervised time has led to multiple ornaments being taken off the tree by one little Kayden. The girls enjoyed it though and it makes me smile how they decorate.

First, they insisted on wearing their reindeer pjs that Grandma got them. They wear these every night and most nap times (they are getting washed a lot). Keeley also needed to wear her holiday hat from Grandma. She insists on wearing this most of the time.



Kayden staring at a pig ornament that she now loves to take off the tree and chew on.
Comparing ornaments
"hanging" an ornament by Keeley's clump of ornaments.

Admiring their handy work. You'll notice the clump is missing. Kayden kept taking them off one at a time.

Giggles

I'm thankful for many things. Giggles from my girls certainly top the list!

Reading Time

Keeley really, really loves to read. In fact, some days I'm not sure she does anything but read after she gets home from school. Before naps and before bed each night we read several books. Usually we go through little stints of reading the same 5 books each time before we cycle to another set of books. When she was younger and the books were simpler, reading the same books for several nights in a row was very tiresome. Now, however, it is tolerable until she fixates on something - having to show me the lady bug's eyes that are closed, or a butterfly, etc. on the same page EVERY time. We went through a phase recently where she kept saying "you skipped a page" when we turned past the title page without reading. Kelly taught her what that page was and now she will tell you "that's the title page, we don't have to read it." Very cute and very matter of fact.

Last night, she and I were reading "Bedtime for Button" for the millionth time this month. Toward the end, the line in the book said "he fell fast asleep." I was tired and I missed the word "fast" and simply said "he fell asleep." Keeley took her paci out, looked up at me and said "fast, it says fast". How did she remember that? And why did she care?!!!

I will readily admit that I used to skip pages in books to hurry things along and sometimes I would even paraphrase the pages if I didn't want to read the whole thing. That clearly doesn't work anymore!

Thanksgiving!

This year we went down to Houston for Thanksgiving. My Gramma and Grampa (Grossmama and Grosspapa to the girls) live there along with two of my mom's siblings and lots, and lots of cousins. The girls had so much fun at Nichole's house (thank you for hosting) and I loved getting to spend so much time with the family. Here are some highlights.

The Culhane girls and the Madison girls. I love the looks on the faces of the big sisters.
Why Keeley is licking her lips is beyond me since she didn't really eat any of her food.

Kayden giving a "what?" look at the picture taker (taking after her big sister I think!)

They were both saving room for dad's pie :-)
Cuddling with Oma in the best chair ever!
Playing outside with Grosspapa and the cousins. Grosspapa gave the best pushes on this roller coaster!
Taking care of the baby.
Grocery shopping with the babies
And, my favorite thing about this trip, Kayden adopted Ben.
This is Nichole's husband and Kayden decided that he needed to read to her. She plopped down next to him and just kept handing her books. You can tell he didn't mind too much! How cute are they! (and, yes, that is chocolate cake on Kayden's face. She is enthusiastic about everything in life)

Bike-a-Thon

Keeley's school has an annual bike-a-thon to raise funds. The kids collect pledges and then ride their bikes for the day. It is a hugely fun event. All the kids look forward to it, there are special shirts made for it, and tons of parents come out to cheer on their kiddo and help with the event. I was amazed at the parental turn-out!

Kelly volunteered to help out all morning. Keeley was so excited her dad was going to be there! Kayden and I picked up the snacks for the riders (bananas and water) and then I was going to help out as long as I could. Kayden wanted none of that and Keeley wanted me to hold her when she saw me. That meant I didn't stay long, but I did get to cheer for her for a minute at least! Because Kelly was volunteering on the course and I had to leave, we didn't get too many pictures. Here are a few:

Ms. Alva leading Keeley and some of the other toddlers out to their special toddler course.
Keeley checking out her feet.

Keeley checking out Owen.

There was some drama, of course. That is to be expected with a bunch of toddlers. When Keeley got off her bike to come see me, Owen got on her bike and that temporarily upset her. Apparently though, she then decided Chloe's bike was the one to ride and rode it the rest of the time!

Because the toddlers were in their own special area, they got to ride as long as they wanted. That ended up being 1.5 hours! Keeley came home so tired and slept until just past 4 - that's a 3.5 hour nap!!!

It was a big success and I look forward to having two little riders next year!