Letters to Bella: 19 Months

Dear Bella,

You are now 19 months old.
Since I was so late with your 18 months letter, it didn't make sense to do a full recap on what you are up to right now. But then I had the (brilliant, if I do say so myself) idea of capturing a lot of what you say and do during the day. So I took the time to jot down your Bella-isms for one day and I'm so glad I did. I will love looking at this letter in the future and reminiscing about these fun days together.

Stuff Bella Says:

• [Enthusiastic voice] "Daddy funny!" [Immediately followed by quieter, less enthusiastic voice] "Mommy funny, too."

• I was singing the Star Spangled Banner to you in a hearty, patriotic voice [read: obnoxious] and you yelled, "Too loud!", followed by, "No sank you!"

• As we drove in the car this morning you kept bringing up "Mommy shower!" "Bring towel." You were remembering when you handed me my towel this morning. I love this kind of peek into your mind. What made you think of it a few hours later?

• You refer to yourself as baby: "Baby pick up", "Baby get", "Baby put", Baby hold", etc. (You do know your name is Bella, though. "Bey-ya")

• In the early afternoon you declared it was time to draw with a "Draw baby!" (meaning you, the baby, wanted to draw), "Draw this!" (pronounced Draw Dis!), and finally "Draw poopie!" You love drawing poopie. Always your first request on every fresh sheet of paper. We even included one on Grandma's birthday card.

• When your hands got really messy with food at lunch you said "Dirty, dirty! Hands dirty. Wipe, wipe! "

• It started raining today and you looked out the window and said, "Waterfall!"

• You were playing with your gigantic stuffed tiger and said "Don't fall Tiger!" (Tiger pronounced Tigee), proceeded to knock him over and then yelled "Boom!"

• As I was rocking you in the glider before naptime I was gently stroking your hair. I absentmindedly stopped. You looked up at me and said, "Mommy pet too hair." (Still learning 'too' placement and meaning in sentences.) Later in the evening you said something similar to Daddy.

• Right after a diaper change you took off running in the loop around the couch and ottoman. As you ran you kept squealing, "Happy!" "Naked!" (pronounced nakee) "Run!" "Happy!"

• Several hours later your daddy was changing you before bedtime. I could hear you on the monitor. You were telling him "Run fast! Run nakee!" When I got upstairs your daddy was confused about why you were talking about running naked.

• We were looking at some pictures in a blog and you were naming the things you saw (chair, door, stairs). We got to one of a man drilling a hole in cement, which intrigued you since you've seen a similar picture in your Richard Scary book. I explained it as drilling, not specifying WHO was drilling. We moved on to the next picture, but you said "See man drill." I was pretty amazed at that sentence you put together.

• You are getting quite bossy-pants when it comes to what you want me to do. In a very short two minute span you had me: "Mommy up!" "Mommy run fast!" "Mommy crawl!" "Mommy sit down!" "Mommy play game!"

• You said "Thank you" (Sank you) when we handed you your sippy cup of water at dinner. (!!)

PS - You are now 2 feet, 8 inches (awesome) and just over 26 pounds, putting you at the 70th and 75th percentiles, respectively. Slimming down, cupcake.