21 Months

WORDS
Thank You - Tee tu
Bird - Beak
Honey Gram - Honey
Grampy - Bakee
Alexa (Amazon Echo) - Hedda!
Strawberry - goji
Helicoptor - Hockie

SINGING
She can carry a tune :) She sings random words to the tun of "are you sleeping", sings the ABC's with letters missing (she sings ABCD...HIJK...), sings the beginning of "row row row your boat" and "twinkle twinkle". At night she sings along with "itsy bitsy spider" and "the b-i-b-l-e".

ABC's / NUMBERS / SHAPES / COLORS
sings part of the ABC's every day, and getting the hang of it more and more every day
counts 1, 2, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10
knows what a circle is
if you ask her what color something is she says "blue"... no matter what color it actually is. She's also starting to say "purple" and "yellow".

22 Months

WORDS
Bird - beak / birdie
Yogurt - yo yo
started saying "Gemma"

ABC's (knows most, but gets them a little out of order  / skips some when she sings) / NUMBERS (can count to 10, but often leaves off 4 and/or 7) / SHAPES (knows square, circle and star) / COLORS (calls a lot of things "due" aka "blue")


23 Months
It's bittersweet to hear her start to say words correctly! She now properly says all the names of the family (no more Bakee). She's said "thank you" a few times, but is still saying "tee tu", which we love, because it's so adorable. She also says "chocolate" pretty well. Other cute things she says:

Blueberry - doji
Blanket - doji
sip please! - any time she wants a drink
Hom hom! - whenever she wants a bite of something

ABC's - getting better and better / loves to watch an ABC balloon video on youtube
NUMBERS - loves counting, getting better and better. We count the stairs, blueberries, toes, etc.
SHAPES - knows the basics
COLORS - She really knows her colors in the past week. Pink, orange, green, purple, yellow and blue

Aug 22, 2017 - Watched her first movie! It was Mary Poppins! She hadn't seemed like she'd be interested in watching an entire movie before now, but Justin wanted to show her Mary Poppins today and she was really interested! We watched it twice, and she kept saying "chim chim!" from the chim chim cherrie song.

SONGS - she loves "Yellow Submarine" and "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" by the Beatles, and "Space Oddity" by David Bowie. She asks Alexa for those songs all the time. And of course a bunch of kids songs.

2 Years
Gweneth is talking so much. She will repeat anything you say, anything she hears, and speaks in small sentences. She sings all the time and is really good with lyrics! She knows Honey Gram and Grampy live in Michigan, and that we live in California. She also has an amazing memory. She mentions stuff all the time that we talked abiut yesterday, a week ago or even months ago!

Thank You - tee tu

SONGS - all songs from Mary Poppins, "Doll in a Music Box" from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and "So long, Farewell" from The Sound of Music.

Knows her ABC's, colors, most shapes and most numbers (she tends to leave off "4" and "7").

She's recently started to want to help when getting clothes on and off, and has a dress up skirt she loves to put on all the time!

She doesn't sleep that well through the night, she generally wakes up screaming, and we have to go in and calm her down. Sometimes she wants a diapee change, sometimes she falls back asleep, like it was a nightmare. It started about a month ago, and is kind of tapering off (she used to do it a bunch during the night), and now is only doing it 1 - 2 times.

She's started to say "I love you" a lot, although she says it "I Loff you", which is adorable. She says it about all the members of the family, mommy, daddy, baby Gemma, Honey Gram, Grampy, Oma, etc. (and it's just the cutest thing), and she's also started to say it about other things, "I loff the park" "apples" and the other day, when I was making her pick up apple bites she had thrown on the floor and put them in the trash, she was like "I loff trash!". She's so funny!

She's also started to say "come on!". Just this morning she was trying to get the plug out of the iPad and she was having trouble and she was like "oh! come on!"

2 Years 2 Months
The biggest deal is that we moved Gemma in to Gweneth's room at night to sleep. The first night was insane. Gweneth screamed at the top of her lungs and ran around her crib like a boxing ring for two hours!!! It was awful. Gemma slept, but Gweneth was really thrown that she was in there, and I think she was rebelling. The second night was pretty much the same, but then the third and fourth night there was maybe three minutes of crying? And now it's fine. They're quiet before the door is shut. Gemma still gets up for a few bottles through the night, so on the last bottle we put her back in with us so that she doesn't walk up Gweneth when she wakes up for the day (Gemma gets up between 6:30 - 7, whereas Gweneth can wake up anywhere from 7 - 8:45).

Gweneth is talking up a storm! She's so cute, and seems to absorb everything we say and everything she hears. She repeats so much stuff and remembers so much stuff. She asked me to draw a picture of Honey Gram, so I did, and I drew her holding Gweneth and Gemma, and I said "and she hugs them all the time!" and Gweneth looks up at me and goes, really serious "and kiss!" She does all kinds of things like that, adding on and remembering things we're supposed to say. She's very observant.

She still says "Tee tu" for thank you, which is so cute. She's so good with "please" and "thank you", she almost always says it.

SONGS - she's been singing almost all the lyrics to "So Long, Farewell" from "Sound of Music", as well as "Doe a Deer", and of course all the Mary Poppins classics. She's obsessed, she asks to listen to them every day.

TV - She loves Peppa Pig. That's the main thing she asks for. She also likes to watch Dancing with the Stars with me, and it's super cute, because she'll try and do the same dance moves.

2 Years 2 Months
She is speaking so well! Saying full sentences, and repeating everything she hears. She loves to say "sounds like fun", "you okay?" and says "thank you" instead of "tee tu". She's saying "Alexa" more clear now, and Alexa recognizes her about half the time. We've had crickets in our apartment, so I showed her some cricket videos, so she often talks about "cripets", and asks Daddy to get them.

She loves trying to dress herself, and putting on her little tutus. She had also started undressing herself during every single nap and messing up her sheets. Thanks to a tip from a friend, we found that putting her in a onsie pajama, but turning it around so the zipper was in the back, she now can't undress when we're not in the room!

She loves Gemma, and they crack up together. The play together constantly, but Gweneth does hit her randomly.

2 Years 5 Months
She's a chatter box, and her little voice is so cute!!! She says and does the funniest things. She loves to talk to Alexa (and Alexa actually recognizes when she says "Alexa" and will play some of the songs she suggests). She still loves to dance, and sing. Gweneth and Gemma have the sweetest relationship and seem to really enjoy being together. They crack each other up, and Gweneth is usually really sweet to her (giving her kisses, making sure she has a bottle when she's crying, saying she's "precious"). She does often take away toys she has, and hits her.

Favorite Movies
The Lion King & Frozen (she sings "Can You Feel the Love Tonight so cute)

Favorite TV Shows
Daniel Tiger, Fraggles, Thomas & Peppa Pig

Words
She says most words correctly, but she still says "Hum hum!" every time she sees us eating something she wants a bite of!

March 27, 2018 (2 years 6 months)
Crawled out of her crib and into Gemma's. She's been able to get out of her crib for a while, but never did it because we told her only mommy or daddy could get her out. Then twice this week during the day while we were in there, she climbed out while playing. But a few days ago I heard them both wake up. I looked at the monitor and didn't see Gweneth in her crib. I looked at Gemma's monitor and saw Gweneth's legs going over the bars! I went into their room and they were both giggling her Gemma's crib and playing with her mobile! It was so cute!

April 2018 (2 years 7 months)
She speaks so well and is so smart! She remembers everything we tell her, and uses words like "interesting" and "well done!". She's still obsessed with Disney movies, knowing every single lyric to every song, and a lot of the lines. The current rotation of movies that she requests is: The Lion King, Frozen, Beauty and the Beast, Bambi, 101 Dalmatians, Moana and Pocahontis. And the live action movies she loves are Sound of Music, Mary Poppins and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. She has Alexa play The Lion King soundtrack and the Frozen soundtrack almost daily, along with "Hand Clap" by Fitz and the Tantrums and "Happy" by Pharell Williams. She's obsessed with the zoo and the carousel. She mentions it non-stop, saying she wants to ride Mufasa (the lion), Nala (the lioness) or the Ba-Graff (that's how she says Giraffe) on the carousal. We go about once a week. She's also talking about a bike non-stop. Almost daily she'll say "we have to get my pink bicycle and my pink helmet at the store!".

June 2018 (2 years 9 months)
Peed in the potty! She's been asking to use her potty on and off for the past few weeks. We've helped her use it a few times but she usually just sits there and then after a few minutes gets up. But she wanted to use it yesterday and she went! We're happy to let her go at her own pace, to be honest, diaper are so easy, and we're already changing them a million times a day for Gemma, it's not big deal to keep her in them. So, whenever she wants to transition we're good with it.

She's ready for a big girl bed. She's been getting out of her crib for months now. And it's no big deal, she does it really well so we didn't see the point of putting her in a bed. But lately she's been jumping around at night and hitting her head (nothing too crazy, but still) on the crib, so we figure a big girl bed is in order. I thought I'd be sentimental about her moving out of her crib, but it's so fun to watch her be independent and love doing things on her own. We'll probably transition her to a big girl bed in a few weeks.

She's still obsessed with Disney movies and Peppa Pig. They seem to spark her imagination like crazy. She quotes lines from the movies all day long, sings almost every song, all day, getting lines right (and some wrong! so cute) and sings pretty much on tune. Her current obsession is The Little Mermaid, and she loves pretending that she's "turning into a human".

August 2018 (2 years 11 months)
She knows all her lowercase letters now! She's been in a big girl bed for one month exactly (her first night in a big girl bed was at Honey Gram and Grampy's, July 10th). She's done great. I thought I'd be sad to see her out of her crib, but it seemed so perfect and she was so ready for it, it was a natural move. She'll ask to use the potty every couple days. And she always goes and is always very proud of herself. She is singing and dancing so much, she is so funny and has such a huge vocabulary. The other night when we were all in their room getting them ready for bed, Justin told her something to do and she put a Peppa Pig shoe box lid on her head and said "Ay Ay Captain!" and laughed.

September 2018
Gweneth is more defiant than ever! And so mischievous. When we shut the door after putting them to bed, it's only seconds before Gweneth is up turning the light on and running around the room. Last week she managed to pull on a cord getting a screw loose from the ceiling, and dropping to the ground. She then unplugged the baby monitor and when we walked in, she was sticking the screw in the outlet, with Gemma laughing in her crib! We were freaking out, that was so dangerous! A few days ago we went to IKEA. We were in the warehouse part, and she started climbing the large shelves! She was on the second one (about 6 feet up) and trying to figure out how to get to the third. I was able to get her down before she got any higher (she did that twice!). She was crying last night after we put them down. I went in to see her holding her head saying that her dresser hit it. I tried to explain that it was bed time, and she shouldn't be jumping into her dresser.

Her vocabulary is amazing and she speaks so grown up. She's also taking a lot of things we say and using them on us. She's told me "I'm not asking you, I'm telling you", "Gweneth and Gemma are in charge" and "I'm the parent". She also likes to make up her own language.

She loves to dress up. She puts on at least one princess dress a day, along with a crown. She can put her own hair in a ponytail, which we're pretty impressed with.

She sings all the time and loves to dance. We started her in a little dance class. She wasn't really into the structure of it (having to stand in a line and listen to a teacher), but she really wanted to dance. She sat on my lap for the first 10 minutes and when she finally joined the line she seemed like she was having a great time. But a few minutes in she sat down on the ground. When the teacher told her she couldn't do that, she started to cry and we left. I told the teacher we'd sit and watch and hopefully she'll join in.

Gweneth and Gemma have more and more fun together every day. She has a whole bunch of names for Gemma like "Quewy, Kooey, Haven". She quotes movie song lyrics to her all the time. Gemma is usually happy to follow her around and go along with whatever. Gweneth does hit and push her a lot.

Potty Training
She's been using the potty on and off now for about a month. After her 3rd birthday we'll probably start more of a schedule.

January 2019
Gweneth is now a big sister of two siblings! She doesn't pay too much attention to Baby Liam, but when she does she's very sweet. Saying "good morning" or helping hold a bottle.

Knows her entire alphabet uppercase and lowercase
Is great at counting (counts to 30 and sometimes more)
Knows her days of the week

We took a break from potty training. She was going when we put her on the potty, but she'd never tell us when she had to go.

She still loves dressing up and is currently obsessed with Star Wars. She wants to be Princess Leia all the time. She has me do her hair in those buns. She listens to Star Wars music all the time (even during her naps).

March 2019
Gweneth is loving Baby Liam. She likes to lay next to him and hug him, and Liam likes it, too. He always smiles.

- Knows lower case alphabet
- Can count to 30 easy, and above with a bit of help
- Knows days of the week

She dresses up almost every day, and wears her princess dresses almost everywhere we go.

July 2019 (3 years 10 months)
Gweneth is actually starting to use the potty. She's pooping in the potty almost every time. She's still peeing in her diaper a lot, but is asking to use the potty here and there for that. She's using a pull up, which she's super excited about.

She's super helpful and will clean up really well if you ask her to.

July 23
Potty training - Gweneth is pooping and peeing in the potty almost every time. It seems as though she's going every 10 minutes. She's super excited to go, and loves wearing a pull up.