14 months

I am just crazy about this girl. Each stage is my favorite with Madeline. I love her so much and I just can’t get enough of her! (except at night…) I love her smell, her laugh, her vibrant blue, almond eyes, her crazy hair, her little jokes, her games, her soft, squishy skin, her tender touches and snuggles, her open mouth kisses, her hugs, and her observant and curious mind. She pays such close attention to detail and catches on to things quickly, which is a good and a bad thing. I love her sense of beat and rhythm. She has started to spin in circles when she dances with her hands up in the air. It is the cutest thing. Madeline loooooooves kids and babies. I find it so funny that she knows what a baby is. Any time she sees a picture, video, or a real baby, she points and smiles, and folds her arms and starts to rock the baby and will pat her arms with her chubby little fingers. She gives little kids lots of hugs and attention. She just loves them!

Madeline weighs approx 25 or more lbs and is taller than all of her little peers at church that are a few months older/younger. She has two teeth on bottom and two on top that are about halfway through. The teeth adjacent the two on top and bottom are about to poke through the gums. I love when she wrinkles her nose and you can see those silly top teeth. She makes the BEST faces. They are just hilarious. Especially the stink face. I’m just like, what are you thinking right now? And sometimes when she laughs she covers her mouth. So cute.

Every night before Madeline goes to bed, we go into her room and say prayer. She folds her arms for about ten seconds and then she’s over it. And a few times, we’ve gotten her ready for bed and we are finishing up a few things here and there around the house and I’ll walk into her room and she sits down and folds her arms. It melts me. She knows that’s what’s supposed to happen next before she gets to nurse and go to bed.

Madeline is starting to throw more tantrums when she doesn’t get what she wants or I take something away from her. She throws herself to the floor and if I try to pick her up she goes limp.

She had her 2nd Halloween, which I will blog about next.

She went to see her first movie in the movie theater. Madeline and I went to go see “Meet the Mormons” with my parents. It was a short movie so I thought she’d be okay, but it was just not short enough. She doesn’t have a very long attention span yet, so she was anxious to get up and explore. Our first mistake was getting there in time to watch the previews. She was captivated by the big, bright screen for the first 30 min, and I thought, wow, this is great, she’s just sitting quietly on my lap and is watching the big screen. And just as I was thinking that, it was over. But we were only 15 min into the movie…. cause the other 15 min was previews. So I gave her some snacks, let her play with Grandma, and then Grandpa, and some toys. Luckily, there were only 3 other people in the theater and we knew all of them. So we walked up the steps and hung out at the top of the tiny room. And then she had a little spill on the steps and got a carpet scrape on her nose. So we went out in the theater hallway and I let her run around. Then I went back in and let her play around in the walkway into the theater, but she just wanted to go back out and explore the big hallway. But I wanted to stay inside so I could at least hear/watch the movie! So I missed the last 20 min or so of the movie. Oh well. We tried! And we won’t do it again for a loooooong time!

She loves to explore outside and look for birds and smell the flowers. I love watching her tromp around in her big girl sneakers. I love how she is understanding so much more. I love how I can tell her to go get her water or paci, or books, or turn off the light, or get shoes, etc. She understands so much. But she’s not saying a thing. A few times she has said dada, and she kiiiiiiiind of said, “okay google”. Kind of. The story with that: Nathan kept saying over and over Okay google to look something up and she made the exact same noise as okay google. She did it a couple times and even a few times after that. I was like noooo way! I don’t know if she really was or not, but it sure sounded like it. She makes the sounds of dada, mama, etc, but doesn’t ever use them as real words. Hopefully soon!

Madeline had a terrible cold and was horribly congested. It was terrible and horrible. Neither one of us got any sleep. She could hardly breath and she would wake up gasping for air. It was so sad. There wasn’t much that I could do. I tried the hot, steamy shower, and the humidifier, and the saline nose spray, and the nose frida. But nothing eased it. And if it did, it was only for a moment. Until she cried and it made it activate again. The nose frida was like the worst torture for her. I felt so bad, but I wanted so desperately to suck that snot out. I had Nathan try to hold her head and body down, as I tried to get that thing to her nose and suck. But we failed. And she was acting like we were about to chop her nose off or something. It was so sad. So at night, I ended up just holding her, reclined back in the chair, so that she was upright a bit and I could be there when she was choking on her mucous. But then that started a terrible habit for her. She started to get better, but would NOT go down in her crib. She wanted to snuggle with mommy all night long. But mommy wanted to sleep in her bed! So it’s still a struggle…

About that sleep thing. I ended up making a pricey phone call to sleep specialist and told her all my woes and pleaded for help. I’ve had a few patients tell me about this lady and say she is magical and amazing and she will help. So I set up and appointment to talk to her over the phone. She gave me a lot of good advice and help, but it’s going to be a lot of work and I’m nervous about it. I don’t know why I feel nervous about it. It’s not bad, it’s not like she said, just put her in her crib and shut the door and ignore her the rest of the night. It’s more working out Madeline’s self soothing muscles that she’s never worked out before. So it will be hard at first. But we will ease into it, and I’m praying she will catch on quickly. She’s a very smart girl and I know she will get the hang of it sooner or later.

Such a little person!!

I’ve had those bins there forever trying to go through her clothes and get rid of the small ones. They need to go back in the garage, but Madeline made this her little nook and I don’t want to move them! One day, she just went over in there and just hung out forever. It was adorable. Now she loves having her own little spot.

She was turning that onesie over and over and was so focused on it.

This was when Madeline was sick. It was rough. We spent a lot of time in our jammies.

I tried so hard to get a picture of those little teeth!

Madeline’s favorite spot.