The traumatizing of Isabel Jade...

Sounds like a horror film. It's not--not when two sweet babies are involved. I want to update about my 19 month old because she is doing SO many things that I want to write down and remember, but I also want to talk about her reaction to us bringing home a new baby. And here is that little tidbit:

As I mentioned in my birth story post, due to the NICU thing and our quick release from the hospital, Isabel didn't get to meet her sister until we were home with her. She had come to the hospital with my sister just moments after Eva was born, but it was too late--they had already taken Eva back. So I was excited to let Isabel see her. I was even a little cranky about my Dad running all over the state of Arkansas with Isabel instead of bringing her home on my timeline, but I got over that pretty quick. Haha. Anyway, Isabel came home and when we got her to focus long enough to see that there was a baby in the room, she came and looked at her, said "baby" a few times and then went on about her business. It wasn't quite the ordeal I had anticipated. Lol. So, here I am thinking that Isabel is just too young and sort of indifferent about it all. Wrong. As the days went on, Isabel would literally say the word "baby" at LEAST 20 times a day. That is probably an understatement. She got obsessed with the fact that there was a baby in the house and she also wanted to kiss her head over and over again, several times a day. It was all nice reactions, there didn't seem to be any jealousy or anything negative, but at the same time I was worried that she was so fixated on the baby that it was affecting her little mind. She would wake up in the morning and first word out of her mouth would be "baby". Her naptime was cut in half and I swear it's because she was dreaming about the baby and waking up. She spent the night with my parents one night and had a big, huge, meltdown which was the first time they had experienced that, and I just know it was because she was away from the baby. I started to worry that we had really messed with her head. Slowly but surely she is adjusting. Like I said, there is no jealousy or negativity, she just cannot get it out of her head that there is a baby. Every kid we see anywhere is a baby. She carries a baby doll with her 24/7 and gives it bottles and pacifiers. She still wants to kiss her multiple times a day and try to poke her head, but she is getting better each day. I hope that she will always love her baby sister and want to be around her, but MAYBE take it down a notch or two. :)

Isabel stats:

I really won't know exact height and weight again until her 2 year checkup unless we have to go to the doctor for another reason. I will try to weigh her at home before I update again, but my estimate is about 23 lbs. She was 22.9 at her 18 month checkup.
She takes one nap a day for about 1.5-2 hours and goes to bed around 8-8:30 pm. She normally wakes up around 7:30 am. I'm thankful for this. We have had phases where the sleeping was not so great.

Favorite foods: applesauce, string cheese, crackers, raisins, yogurt covered raisins, MILK, oatmeal, bananas, spaghetti, chicken penne pasta, hot dogs, cereal, green beans, mac-n-cheese, fruit snacks, etc. Honestly, she likes just about everything.

Favorite toys: ELMO anything. Seriously on a big Elmo kick right now. Baby dolls, shopping cart, books, stickers, anything that sings or makes noise (we seem to have a lot of this), her baby doll's pack n play, buckets of any kind. We have like 12 Halloween buckets and she loves to carry them around and put stuff in them. Same goes for Easter baskets. WHY do we have so many of these? lol

She says a lot of words. She basically repeats anything that is easy enough for her to say. I know there is no way I can list them all and not forget something, but here are several new phrases & words "Oh no!", "Uh oh", "I want dat", "ELMO!!!" "Elmo on dat" (meaning turn Elmo videos on my Kindle Fire which she has recently taken over), "boots", "shoes", "pee pee", "stinky", "eyes", "nose", "arm", "purple", "blue", "green", "goose", "boobies" (sigh), "baby bath" and so many more!

She still loves baths and being outside. She is still throwing the occasional temper tantrum and they are INTENSE! She is learning about timeouts and being swatted on the rear end. She loves to give kisses and hugs, but has recently stopped letting her daddy hold her before bedtime. She'd rather just be put in bed and that makes her daddy sad!!!

She still has such a funny personality! Such a joy to our lives!

We are so excited about Christmas this year with our feisty little toddler (and baby too).