February Stuff

I have decided that maybe a recap of the month's events would be a good thing to put on the blog. Let's see if I can keep that going for a while…

So February events for Alli:

We went sledding in Forest Lakes over the weekend of Feb. 12-14. There was a *ton* of snow! We were so excited to take her down the hill, after all, she loves going fast in the wagon and every other thing she does. But the snow gave her a different want. OUT! She wanted nothing to do with the snow. She *hated* it. Don't set her down in it. Don't put her hand near it. Don't make her sit on a sled on it. Ugh. What a bummer. By the end of our two days of snow play, we got her to go down the hill with us a couple of times (about 10 feet of total travel distance each time) and she cried the entire time down every trip! We also made her walk in the snow, which she cried the whole time as well. Maybe next year she will see the fun of playing in snow…

The one thing I've noticed as a big change for her is she's starting to wake up happy. Instead of crying to get us to grab her, she's finally yelling "MOMMY". We enjoy that much better. And every now and then she just stays in her room quietly and we realize she's awake because Bagheera wanders in and we hear her talking to him. :) That is an *extra special* morning.

We have had to learn a lot about discipline lately. She definitely is hitting the 2's and wants her independence. There are choices we don't agree with though and since she doesn't seem to listen to reason (yet), we have to discipline. We do try to tell her why - she's a smart kid, so at some point she's going to understand it.

She plays several different video games on her iPhone (daddy's old phone). "Itsy Bitsy Spider", "Wheels on the Bus", "Hatch", "Peekaboo Barn" and "ABC Animals". But now we don't start the games for her, we just hand her the phone and she knows how to turn it on, get into the interface, and pick the game of her choice. Yikes!!

Alli is also quite the parrot. And now that she's reaching 2, we hear "no" a lot more. It's really cute though. You say something like "Alli, do you want to kiss Bagheera?" And she'll say "No, no kiss Bagheera". It's always "No, no" whatever you said. I've had her say some ridiculous things, so I know she doesn't mean "no", she's just reciting. It does get a little trying though if we are trying to figure out what she wants!

Oh, one other thing that I would love to document. Marcie's youngest is a year older than Alli. His name is Gage. The interaction between the two of them is just adorable. Gage answers the door in the morning when Alli arrives and he is always very excited. Likewise, Alli is always excited to see Gage. It's so cute to watch them talk to each other in the morning. The other day, Alli was at home playing with a phone. Her standard phrase when she plays is "Hello? Hi. Blah, blah, blah. Ok, bye." Clearly my conversations must take that pattern. But then she threw in a new one… "Hello? Hi Gage. Blah, blah, blah. Bye". Awwwww, she's calling Gage!! :D

And as for the toilet thing? Yea, that was a fad. She doesn't even want to sit on the toilet anymore. Oh well. When she's ready...