18 months

today (Mar 3, 2015), Allison is official 1 and a half years old! She's very aware of everything that goes on around and knows what to expect because of the routine that we have. For example, she knows that when one puts on their coat and/or shoes, they are heading outside. She knows that when we go in the car, we are heading someone else. She's very happy when we drop her off at school, which is such a happy thing for a parent to see.

She also picks up and remembers things pretty quickly. She can identify ducks pretty well, even if she hasn't seen that particular one before. For books that we read often (even library books), she remembers the words we say with most pages and will say those words before we do (like this book we read about dim sum and the characters "ba ba"or mei mei"). There is another book about Pandora which I read to her and she now can do or say the same things that I did when I read it to her before (like saying "tee hee" or "oh no!"). I have captured it on video and will post it. Similar effect with children songs that we listen to often, she can say some of the key words at the right time... like itsy bitsy spider or wheels on the bus or twinkle twinkle little star. It's very cool to see her grow up in this way.

lately she's been calling our phones "rice", it's so funny. "rice? rice? rice?" It's also amusing to hear her say the word "shrimp" very clearly.

The latest thing which I'm very pleased to see is that she has shown me that she can connect the words "poo poo" to the action. When I said it, she pointed to her butt. This happened yesterday and is a sign that she may be ready to start potty training (can happen as early as 18 months but average start is 2 years). Maybe this means I don't need to buy anymore diapers!

Last week, she had a cold and somehow developed an ear infection. She had elevated temperature for a whole week and had to stay home with grandma while one of us worked from home. Antibiotics in the form of a bubble gum flavored syrup had to be taken 2x a day for 10 days, 1 teaspoon each. It's been a struggle of sorts to get it into her mouth. So far it's worked when mixed with oatmeal for breakfast, and in the evening, 1x with apple sauce, 1x with flaxeed oil. other times we have had to hold her down and force it in her mouth, to which got her very upset. She'd spit it out or blow it out but eventually swallow. It's upsetting for us to have to do that to her, and I realize that is the reason why she was very contentious with us this weekend, slamming hand to table and yellow no! or hitting us. I think we've hit a new break tho because I bought this very tasty mango smoothie from the Naked brand and it's strong enough to mask the flavor of the syrup.