Little Bit on Lily

I can't believe my baby girl is almost 14 months old. She is such a bright spot, always making me smile, keeping her brother on his toes, and totally demolishing my house (that I could do without). On frustrating days when I am dealing with IEP nonsense, piled on top of schooling decisions, piled on top of broken battery doors and coils, all I have to do is just pick her up and give her a cuddle. She brings me so much joy, and now more than ever, I really do believe that God gave her to us right when we needed her.

Christian is an absolutely awesome language model for her. I find that the years of speech therapy for him are completely paying off more than ever, as he was doing a Ling 6 sound check with her the other morning. Yesterday after naps, I heard him correcting her on her pronunciation of "Baby". I wish I kept as meticulous records of each spoken sound and word that she speaks as I did with Christian. Her favorite words right now are Kitty Cat, Bah-oon (Balloon), uhts at (what's that), and Uh-oh. Her receptive skills are fantastic, as she follows one-step directions such as "Go find your cup". As a family, we're exploring signing more and more, and Lily is catching on and has several little baby signs herself. She makes me so proud.

We don't have much quiet time anymore, as she is SO CLOSE to walking and is all over the place. She only takes one nap a day, so our mornings have been freed up a bit so I can go to the gym and have coffee with friends. She spends a lot of her day in the carseat, as most 2nd kids do, but she is a sport. She is my sidekick, racing to pick-up her brother at school everyday, ALWAYS greeting him with a smile. His little buddies in his class are obsessed with her. They all run up and say "It's Lily!" and she just cracks up, and I do to.

I find myself at times just staring at her, completely in awe of my beautiful girl. She is such a gift to our entire family, and I am beyond thankful for the time I get with her.