Dear Addie:
17 months. Wow! You are almost a year and a half. That's crazy. Time is just flying by. I think it would be okay if it just slowed down for a little while and let me catch up. You are constantly changing, constantly keeping me on my toes, and constantly moving. I'm fairly certain you never stop moving. Maybe that's truly the reason why you always sleep so much, you just wear yourself out from moving around ALL of the time. I wouldn't be surprised.
This last month has been a rough one for us. Your dad was gone for three weeks and you hated it. You are such a daddy's girl, and I don't think any of us realized how much of a daddy's girl until he was gone. You did fine the first week. You would ask for dada, I would tell you that he was at work and you would just accept it. But by the beginning of the second week, you would just look at me like I was lying to you. You started throwing fits. You would push me away and scream because you wanted no one but your dad. You weren't sleeping all that great. It was just a rough few weeks. But we survived. And he came back just as I promised he would. I wasn't sure how you would react to him when you saw him for the first time. But when he got off his plane and walked to us, you just stared at him. Almost scowled at him for a minute or two. You were not happy with him. But after he took you, you put your head down on his shoulder and almost immediately fell asleep. You were exactly where you wanted to be. It was adorable. And ever since you have been playing with him whenever you can. You are smiling and happy. You are sleeping better. The fits are less. Things are back as they should be around here. Our daddy's girl has her daddy back.
While your dad was gone, you started having meltdowns in the bathtub. You have always loved baths so I thought it was part of your anger that your dad was gone since he usually did bath time. But even after he got back you were still having a meltdown and trying to get out of the bathtub as quickly as possible when we actually went to wash you. It has nothing to do with the soap. You lose it when we pour water on you. I've tried everything I can think of. I've poured water on you, I've squeezed water gently on you using a washcloth, I've just got your skin wet using the washcloth. And nothing. Every method leads to you trying to get out of the bathtub and crying. I think it's just a phase, but I'm not a fan of the phase so let's move on from it and go back to loving baths.
You are currently getting more teeth again. And when you get teeth, you get a whole bunch at once. That makes things not fun because you don't feel good. Mostly you are still my happy kid, but you do go through bouts of crankiness that I can only assume are related to the teeth. However, I'm not sure how related this is to teething but you have been a bear when it comes to sleeping lately. Whenever things are out of whack and you're getting teeth, they are usually connected but not necessarily. I have no idea what's going on but you've been up and down all night for the last week. You were doing that some when your dad was gone which I expected, but since he's been back you started doing it again. No clue why. We mostly ignore you - sorry, kid - because you are just talking, squealing, giggling, playing. But I don't really want to talk to you at 1 in the morning. But that means you've been sleeping until 10 and still going down for your regular nap because you are so tired. We are stuck in a loop and it's a loop I hope you'll correct yourself soon.
You still aren't walking. You are getting closer, but still nothing yet. You can stand by yourself and I think you'll start doing that more once you figure out that you're doing and can do it. You are much bigger fan of walking now but still not there doing it solo or even just hanging on to one hand while you walk. You are too unbalanced to do it yourself. You just lean too far forward but once you learned to even out your weight you will be off and going. The question is, will you be doing it before 18 months and your next appointment? You're making me nervous, kiddo.
At 9 months, a milestone is to be able to clap. You have just started doing it. We saw you do it once or twice around 9 months but otherwise you had no interest. In the last two weeks or so you have decided you love it. You clap at everything. Stella walking by gets you clapping. When I point out something to you, you clap. Dinner time, you clap. Nothing at all is happening, you clap. You love it and you get so excited to do it every time. You aren't big on waving good-bye still but you'll get there too. You always do things in your own time when you are good and ready.
You have also started pointing recently. But not the usual form of pointing, you actually put your pointer finger and thumb together to point at things. I know what you are doing and you are pointing at everything these days. I tell you what it is and we move on. You are loving pointing because you have learned that it's a good way to communicate with me and ask for what you want. Granted, you don't always get what you want but you try anyway. At dinner now, I will ask you to eat something. You will then point to your food, pretend to pick it up, show me the food that isn't in your hand, then put it to your mouth like you are eating it. You will do that several times until we call you out on fake eating then you'll get to eating, which you are still doing awesome at and trying new things all the time (the craziest thing you love: fish - you are a weird kid!)
You are growing so quickly. You babble a lot, and there aren't too many new words on a regular basis yet but every once in awhile you say something new. Your language skills should start developing even more in the coming months. Although you are mostly speaking in babble, you are learning to communicate. You are learning through pointing, clapping, through showing emotions. And you are a trooper. You weren't happy when your daddy was gone and you didn't understand it, but you did awesome. You are so curious about the world. You study everything, take everything in. You are observing and exploring. You have definitely made life more exciting and interesting.
Sometimes I still have trouble believing that you are all ours. You are so beautiful and so smart and so curious. I look forward to when you actually figure out that you can walk and to see that excitement in your eyes when you realize what you're doing. I look forward to you learning more words and communicating verbally with us more. I look forward to you figuring more things out. You are one awesome kid, Addison. Stay that way. We love you so much.
Love, Mama
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