Tracey Ann -- 15 Months

I missed posting what she was up to a 14 months... maybe this will be an every-other month update.

But, at 15 months, Tracy Ann is:

• Walking exclusively.  She now walks anywhere and everywhere and is on the verge of running.  When she tries to run, she sort of prances a few steps and then falls.  She can walk on all terrain, with shoes or socks or barefoot.  She can now step over things when necessary and rarely looses her balance.  March 6 is officially the day when she really got the hang of walking. 

• TALKING.  That's right -- her first words were on April 11.  She looked at our cat, Lexie, and said, "Lex... Meow".  Since then she's begun saying, "dog (duc)", "yes (les)", "cracker (cack)", "book (ook)", "daddy" (aa-eee), "no" (na-na-na), "teeth" (tee)
• Signing -- the last time, I gave an update, I said she was signing "milk", "more", "food", "all done", "up", "help", "sleepy", and she blows kisses, which are also "thank you."  Now, in addition to those signs, she signs "dog", "lion", "cracker", "daddy", "mama", "papa", "grammie", "elephant", "please", "banana", "cheese", "book", "brushing teeth", "orange", "fish".  We have really seen he language explode in the last month.

• Still breastfeeding anywhere between once and three-times a day -- usually in the evening, middle of the night, and morning

• Still LOVES brushing her teeth -- in fact, she walks in to the bath room, signs "brushing teeth" and says "teeth" 4-8 times a day.  We now have tooth brushes scattered around the house because she walks and brushes her teeth and then eventually leaves the tooth brush somewhere.

• She loves to be outside, and really loves to pick up small rocks while outside -- sometimes she carries them around, and sometimes she puts them in her mouth

• She loves baths and showers... and showers that turn into baths, and she doesn't mind water on her face -- in fact, just yesterday, she tried to pour a cup of water over her own head after Daddy had done it a few times to rinse the soap out of her hair

• She watches everything we do and tries to copy it -- just last Sunday, we were singing in church and I had one of my hands raised, and she watched me for awhile, and then raised her hand just like mine

• She loves to laugh and smile

• She doesn't like being told "no" and has even had a few toddler temper tantrums in the past few months

• We spent our first night away from Tracey Ann when she was just 14 months old, and she did wonderfully spending the night at our nanny's house

• *Update* This was posted a few hours ago, and then I woke up this morning and realized I had completely forgotten a new big thing in Tracey Ann's world -- she LOVES music!  In the past month or so, she has started to notice when music plays, and she will clap, dance, and nod her head along.  It is absolutely adorable.  If she is in another room and then hears music playing, she will scamper to the room where the music is in order to smile and clap along.

• She also LOVES to read.  We have read books with her since she was young, but we never had a set reading time everyday, like we probably should have.  Nevertheless, this little girl LOVES to read.  She will often sit up in her crib either before falling asleep or after she wakes up just flipping through the two books that are in her crib.  Its also one of her favorite things to do during the daytime.  If she's not actually reading a book, she's probably playing with the books in another way.  It is so wonderful to see.