Annabel is 28 Months Old!

Creeping closer and closer to 2 1/2 years old...Annabel is 28 months old now!

And boy is she a very chatty little girl! Annabel's vocabulary continues to just explode, almost daily. And her sentences have really exploded in the last three weeks or so, too! She's really picking up on EVERYthing. Nothing gets by her! We love hearing her little voice, talking, singing songs, yakking away all day long. Super cute!

Here are some cute things we've heard lately:
"I meet you!"- This is how Annabel says, "I beat you!" whenever there is a race or competition of some sort; of course you can thank her brother for making everything a competition. So I'm maybe not loving the competition everything has become, but "meet you" just has to be the cutest misspeaking of that "I beat you!"

"Silly Mommy"- if I make a mistake or forget something, it's "silly Mommy!"

"I tease you!"- Annabel was so proud to finally find a way- and quite correctly too!- to use this phrase one morning a couple weeks ago. I was asking her if she wanted to come in the bathroom with me and she said no, so I asked if she wanted to stand outside the door while I went in and she said no, and then quickly said- "I tease you! (pointing her finger at me) In bafroom!" She was so proud of herself for "tricking" me. Again, thanks to Daniel, who teases Annabel quite mercilessly these days, "Annabel, I'm just teasing you." Of course Annabel is right there teasing him back...and boy can she!

We love "oopsie-daisy" and "uh-oh-gettios!" which she says every single time something is dropped or forgotten and such.

And oh my goodness the bargaining stage has begun- I'll say, "first we're going to do x, then we'll do y," and Annabel quickly turns that around- "First y, then x!" Diaper changing is a great example of a time she wants to switch my plan around! And even sometimes when we're shopping and I list the stores we need to go to, she'll figure out the fun ones and bargain for those first! She's good.

Annabel is also getting some more complex, but still basic, words down, too- am ("me am", today she did say "I" for the first time though!), your (in fact she even did this with a switch in perspective based on who she was talking to- to Daddy it was "Mommy's" and then she turned to me and said "your"- impressed me!), our ("our house"), had ("Daniel had"), too ("me, too" or "pasta, too"), and we also like "red, stop; green, go!"- she's got that basic concept down!

My favorite word of Annabel's is "ever!" because she says it so cutely. This word comes up all the time, mostly because she wants "big EVER!" (the biggest ever, today she gave me the "big ever hug ever day") or she wants something all the time or for a long time and such in which case she uses ever in her sentence. It's really cute to see her working out how all the words can go together. She is very deliberate in her speaking and making sentences and you can literally see her thinking what to say next. I love it! I still can't get her to say her name, though- usually she just says "me!" when you ask her what her name is! She can say the "bel" part but the "Anna" just isn't happening (closest has been "mah-bel"), although I did try Annie the other day and she got that just fine! Go figure. And though I do like that nickname (it was one of the things we liked about the name Annabel), I still want her to be and say Annabel for now!! She's still my little Annabel! And I really can't picture any other name/nickname for her, or for Daniel for that matter- nicknames were never my thing anyway.

Annabel is getting a lot of concepts down, too- starting to count a little more (working toward ten, but still skipping a few numbers or mixing them up) and even say what number comes next sometimes, holding up 1, 2, 3, or 5 fingers, starting to say lots of letter names (just repeating so far, not identifying, although thanks to her favorite library book of the month, "A is for Annabelle," she can sometimes tell what letter is next for a few of the letters- pretty impressive! and I have to say, after just now looking for a link for this book, all of the Tasha Tudor books look just darling- must put some more on our library list!), drawing circles and x's, and trying to draw other pictures and shapes (she names all of her pictures these days). Annabel is also LOVING trying to write the letter A ("A, me!!")- she tries so hard and can actually do pretty well sometimes, though it can look like an H, she does get pretty close, and like I said, she just loves trying and knowing she can do it. She also likes to try D's, too, for Daniel. She is always so thoughtful and thinking of Daniel.

In fact, when we went shopping one day, she was thinking about Daniel the whole time, "Daniel birthday, Daniel birthday, me birthday, Daniel birthday, me birthday" and so on. She's so cute and just loves her brother, even though they tease each other quite a bit. They love to sit outside and eat lunch together. And they often get along best when I'm not around- like when they're outside playing and I'm cleaning up inside, they're doing great, and then the minute I step outside and they see me, they start the show of bickering! Can't win. Still, they do love each other so much and they have a lot of fun together.  We have to read in Daniel's room every night before going to Annabel's room- it's our routine now and she loves that extra Daniel time.

Annabel still loves to draw, do puzzles, play games, and read books- those are by far her most frequent choices of activities. Her attention span is still pretty short, as in she still doesn't really watch much TV (which is totally fine with me) because she just doesn't want to sit and do that, that's just not interesting to her and not something she wants to sit and do. She'll watch bits and pieces here and there- Mickey, Curious George, and lately she discovered Dora at the library and loves our latest DVD rental with Dora in it, but beyond a few minutes here and there of those favorites, she really could care less about watching TV. She's the same way on the computer or tablet- she wants to watch things, she gets excited, but she doesn't stick with anything on there- thus her choosiness and short attention span. But, give her crayons and paper, or a dry erase marker and marker book, her water pen books, a pile of puzzles, or a pile of books and she'll do them "ever"! In fact, one of my favorites times of the day is in the morning when Annabel will sit in our bathroom and just read and read and read while I shower- it's so sweet to just watch her, I could just stare at her all day.

Annabel has also really started to pretend a ton more lately, too. This helps with playing with Daniel, too. He really likes this advance in playing with Annabel, I can tell. She's so cute about pretending, too- she pretends to have a picnic with pretend Delilah and Asher, pulling food out from her pretend backpack which is still on her back, and just watching her explain and talk and pulling things out and putting pretend things down and so on is so cute. She also loves to pretend to shop!! I love this, too!

The cutest thing Annabel pretends is literally having conversations on her toy phone- and I do mean conversations. She will just chat away and you can hear her making plans, asking questions, waiting for responses, and so on- it really is quite complex and super cute! I haven't been able to catch a video of it because of course the minute she sees me and/or the camera she stops. One time Annabel called the toy store and told them she wanted "all pink toys"- she's too funny!

(Oh- and speaking of pretending, we're going to pretend this post was on time (I'm NEVER late with these monthly posts, and I'm even going to redo the date so it looks on time, that's how neurotic I am!). Wednesday was just a super busy day, as was the rest of the week for that matter (it is Saturday now!) and I didn't even have time to do her Minnie picture that day, so Ben did it for me that night after dinner (and yes, my OCD tendencies almost made me retake this picture because Minnie is on the wrong side of Annabel! Gah! I'm sure you totally noticed, too! But hey, this is the real us and Ben did get a cute picture!). So just pretend with me.)

Anyway, Annabel is just such a sweet little girl, always hugging us, giving us kisses, and wanting snuggles. She is always so thoughtful and thinking about others and always wanting to help. These days she has a very strong attachment to me, she doesn't let Daddy do a whole lot for her, though she does love her Daddy a ton of course, it's just mostly Mommy's snuggles, Mommy reads, Mommy gets her out of bed not Daddy, Mommy gets her juice, help Mommy with everything, and so on. We're rolling with it. She is two after all and quite within her rights to be stubborn and choosy and change her mind every two seconds. And of course she's got her upper molars coming in now, making her even more choosy, clingy, and easy to tears...all understandable of course! But really, Annabel is such a doll and she really shines! That smile...those eyes...melt my heart every minute of the day!