Elia has this “hee haw” laugh that is completely unadulterated: “uh hyunh, uh hyunh, uh hyunh.” Not baby-like, not lady-like, more than a snort, all adorable. She often likes to cover her mouth when she laughs with the palm of a whole open hand.
It has been a magnificent month for Elia. At the beginning of the month she began saying “Julie” and “Poppop,” and almost “Grandmom.” She would repeat “merrily, merrily” during Row, Row, Row Your Boat. She was captivated at Thomas Land and would call the trains “tu-tu.” And if it were just that, we would have been happy with her progress.
Something clicked on our trip to New Orleans with Bernard and his family. She began saying “thank you” – “thu-thu” after everything you give her (especially when you are feeding her roasted and cracked watermelon seeds in the car), and most importantly she learned the word “mine,” which sounds more like an abbreviated “main.” Since then, she has become very possessive about everything, though Erin suspects that she has always been possessive, but can only now articulate it. She started to sing “ah town” from Wheels on the Bus for “all through the town,” when we sing it with her, and more impressively, will now sing “Let it go,” to herself spontaneously on her own. She sings a lot of it, but the most recognizable part is “De de doh!”
And Frozen is a funny thing (the worst thing to ever happen to parents according to a father at Curie’s birthday party), you see, Elia thinks she is Elsa too, while Curie thinks she is Anna. So Elia reaches for the same Elsa things as Curie. Also when she says “Ah-ah,” you could interpret it as “Anna,” but she is really saying “Elsa.” When we bought Curie an Elsa dress and t-shirt, we had to buy one for Elia as well; when she put on the shirt she was so proud as she pointed with both index fingers to her belly at the picture on her shirt.
Physically Elia has expanded her dancing to include bouncing with her knees as she dances. She is very musical and will sing and dance at the best times. She also has a great butt shake for “Shake it off.”We are becoming very aware of a second child attention-need thing going on. On our New Orleans trip she loved holding hands with the twins, Eleanor in particular, going so far as to call Eleanor’s name repeatedly when the twins went back to their room.
On the trip, she played with the four stuffed rabbits we brought on our trip by throwing them into the crib as a game, and most interestingly, she was the one holding the little tablet with everyone crowded around her to watch Frozen Fever and loved the attention, so much so that she cried when everyone left. She is able to watch phones and tablets without constantly hitting the screen now, and no longer sweeps food off the table when she is done eating.
Curie’s birthday was a bowling party and we took the kids to the lane to get them used to it before the party. Elia loved it both times. She loves bowling, LOVES the shoes, loves the balls, and loves the video games. She claps and laughs after pushing the ball down the ramp, then bursts into tears when it disappears at the end until the ball shows up again at the ball return and then repeats the whole process. Then again Elia likes playing peek-a-boo, whereas Curie would look at you like, “why are you covering your eyes?”
On Curie’s birthday, Erin’s parents came down and her mother took the kids out to the back to clean the backyard (we still haven’t raked last fall’s leaves) not realizing that Elia is a mosquito magnet, even more than Albert putting her on the low man position when we go out. The doctor has recommended mosquito repellant, but Erin’s mother did not know, so Elia got terrible bites on her arms legs and face. Unfortunately two bites were near her eye where there was a small cut. Despite using hydrocortizone, the next day, Curie’s birthday party day, her eye had swollen almost shut. She looked like Rocky at the end of the first and second and third movies’s fights. We took her to the pediatrician (while still getting Curie’s party going), and got two oral medications, a cortizone and an antibiotic for cellulitis. Poor Elia. The medication is working so she is fine, and she never missed a beat in her good mood. One note, we always have had to fight with Curie to take medicine, but the last time we gave Curie antibiotics, Elia wanted some too, so now that she has medicine, she will take it without hassle.
So it has been a wonderful month. Just the other day she added “yes” to her vocabulary complementing the drawn out and musical “no” she likes to say while she shakes her head. Each new word that Curie hears Curie says “Mommy! She said ‘X,’ that’s her first word!” Which is in and of itself adorable. She is experimenting with climbing stairs while holding hands, she is still scared of the vacuum, she loves taking pictures with the camera. She puts the ball in the basketball hoop, and ate Curie’s hotdog the other day, even though she is not supposed to have hot dogs yet. She loves the shower, she loves the pool, she loves washing her hands. She is so good tempered and it is wonderful to see her and Curie play together.
Bedtime for the kids goes like this. At bedtime, Erin takes Elia up to the room to nurse and sleep. Albert watches Curie, then Curie goes up and wakes up Elia accidentally, so Albert comes up and takes Elia downstairs while Curie goes to sleep. Albert and Elia watch TV together until she gets bored and she takes Albert by his thumb and drags him back upstairs to sleep with Mommy. If Mommy has no yet gotten Curie down to sleep, the process repeats itself. Anyway the point is that at some point Elia will just fall asleep at Albert’s side. She loves to rest her head on his shoulder but there are times where she simply has sidles up to Albert. This month while watching Lilo and Stitch with Daddy late in the night she simply made sure that her side was touching a part of Albert, and thus secured, closed her eyes, and fell asleep.