Retta at 18 Months

  Holy heck, how is it that Retta is now sliding on toward two?! Or should I say running full throttle at it? Little Miss is so loveable and yet SO FULL OF IT. This was the summer of just keeping her safe. Forget about clean faces and cutesy crafts and lots of photos and blog posts, this kid has been keeping me on my toes...and if she's sleeping then probably I am passed out somewhere as well, or I am drinking a glass of wine and rocking maniacally back and forth in a corner. Seriously though, when I'm not cleaning up messes or making sure she's not drowning, she is downright adorable, a real joy. She's a spitfire and yet can also be very calm and even-keeled. She's now able to put herself to bed which is a first for our offspring, so I am grateful for that. Retta has also started potty training. She loves to spend lots of time sitting (with her clothes on) on her training potty and shoving armfuls of toilet paper into the real toilet. She also just got FOUR teeth at once...she now has all her fangs just in time for Halloween. She would spend all day brushing them if I let her- she likes to chew on her toothbrush and then say "Clean?!" and have me check her teeth. She even took her first few real pedal-pushes on her tricycle the other day!


Best of all, she's had an explosion of words over the past few months, and can now pretty much copy anything anyone says. Today she spent most of the day roaming around the house saying, "hummus," and "soap." Those were the words of the day, but yesterday it was "mazing" as in amazing...and she thought everything was amazing, especially the contents of my mom's purse. Earlier this summer she would say "special" in this cute quiet whisper that made my heart melt- she would always say it with this wonder in her voice. She also started saying, "Love you!" which is a wonderful thing to hear. Her calling her sister "Ro-Ro" has given way to a full-fledged "Rowan" now and each day I am amazed at how these words get more refined, more precise in their description of what she wants. Suddenly she has the words "broken" and "scratched" and "bossy"...hmm, that last one might be related to a frequent conversation we have with the big sister. The acquisition of language is fascinating. Our favorite Retta-ism right now is that instead of saying "oopsies" when she drops something on the floor she says, "OH-PEE-SEES!" So cute. She is so much fun and I'm so proud of what a kind little compassionate baby-turned-toddler she is.

Retta Through the Months

I meant to have this made and post this back at Retta's birthday, but a lady can't do it all. So here it is a few weeks late, nonetheless cute. These month by month onesies were one of my favorite shower gifts- a fun tradition to take a photo marking each month!

Happy First Birthday Retta!

 

Happy first birthday to my sweet little baby! My oh my, where does the time go? I feel like we were just at the hospital meeting her for the first time, but somehow we've already had 365 days together. I'm pretty sure that if someone could calculate what percentage of my time has been spent staring at Retta and taking in her cuteness over that time period, the results would be staggering. I've been trying to soak up every moment of this time of smallness that I can because with Rowan I've already learned how fleeting it can be. My relationship with Retta has taken me by surprise because before she was born I loved Rowan so deeply and completely that I couldn't imagine having room in my heart to love another child in the same way. I remember as a kid when I'd get jealous of my brother and ask my mom the irritating question, "Who do you love more, me or Josh?" She would always say, "I love you both the same." I thought this was a ridiculous answer. How could she love us EXACTLY the same? I knew she was just trying to cover her bases and appease both of us. Now as a mother of two, I'm not so sure. Like I said, I've been blown away by my capacity to fall in love all over again with darling little girl # 2. Each daughter has such a distinct yet sweet personality and I can no longer imagine my life without either of them. Every night as we gather around the dinner table and I see Aaron across from me and our two daughters balancing us out on either side, I think something along the lines of, "Ah, all is just how it should be, now we are complete." We were so so happy when our family was just three, but I love that now Rowan has a sibling, and that we are simultaneously enjoying the preschool and the baby/toddler stage. 

Retta is such a loving, snuggly little girl, quiet and easy going a lot of the time, yet recently getting in touch with her inner firecracker too. She has a mean set of pipes and can bellow and squeal at a shocking volume and she's quickly learning that loud = attention, which is unfortunate for our eardrums. Watching her yell hi and bye repeatedly into my cell phone never fails to crack me up though, so I figure happy loud is better than sad-screaming loud. One of the things I find most endearing about her in this moment is her new obsession with baby dolls and how she loves to rock them and hold them and rub the baby's back. It is so sweet to see that nurturing behavior at a young age. Most of the birthday photos below involve her interacting with her new baby in some way. The baby took center stage at her party-- she wouldn't let it out of her sight and didn't want to open her other gifts because she was so entranced with it. I especially love the picture of the baby covered in slobber--it shows how loved this thing is. We had a great brunch party with the grandparents, with a spectacular cake smooshing display by our **gulp** toddler. I am so thankful for my happy, healthy one year old and all the joy that she brings to our lives. I can't wait to see what the next year brings.

 

pumpkin apple cake

the birthday girl

the fam

BABY!!!

baby love

because she's baby crazy, retta also got a softer baby doll to snuggle in her crib from my parents...she's trying to decide if this one's going to pass muster

doing her first puzzle...spoiler alert: all the pieces are round, so you can't get it wrong

mini baby cake, baked using an empty tuna can for a cake pan

checking out her cake with grammie

"hello cake. where have you been all my life?!"

oh yeah...

gettin' into it

offering thanks to the cake gods

seeing if it will bounce

...and we have achieved destruction

sharing with her sister

this pretty much sums up her party

too many kisses

all tired out

Milestone: Retta's First Steps!

As reported in my earlier post, Retta took her first steps on March 6th, and then yesterday she started taking 5 or 6 steps to actually resemble walking! She is quite proud of her new skill, and it's fun to watch her excitement when she manages to cover a bit of distance while being vertical. Here are my best attempts at capturing these firsts!

I think this was officially her 2nd step...didn't have my camera ready in time for the first one! That is a snail figurine in mouth, something she insists on carrying around lately, like a security blanket.

 

 

 

Tooling around with her walker

This is fun!!

Retta at 11 Months

Retta has actually been 11 months for a while now- next week she will turn 1, but before I miss the chance I wanted to post some pictures from this month and note some major developments happening with the little miss. Retta's big news is that on March 6th she took her first steps! She has been practicing each day since and can now take a few steps in a row when she decides she wants to try. She's cruising all around the house with her walker toy, and she's finally mastered the oh-so-adorable gesture of blowing kisses. She's also become much more conversational and now says "baby, hi, bye, up, book, cat, Nana, and Ro-Ro" (for Rowan). She's waving and loudly yelling to everyone in public now, "HI! HI! BYE! BYE! BYES! BYES!" It's so cute. I had forgotten how much I love this age. Seeing her communicating more and more each day is rewarding, and somewhat offsets the fact that I retrieved cat food from her mouth 6 times this morning and washed her hands several times for the misdemeanor of playing with the toilet seat while my back was turned.