baker bree | 19 + 20 months

20 months!

we are merely months away from counting in whole years rather than months.  as much as I wish time to slow, cease, crawl, and basically stop all together, this age/stage we are in has been a lot of fun with her.  I remember this time with the twins to be just as fun, but with two growing and changing at the same time it was easy to miss the tiny moments that I'm living with Baker as we speak.  that girl has this personality that I just cant get enough of right now.  she is incredibly happy.. and walks up to me with just the most GIANT smile on her face and the moment we meet eyes she squeals out an elaborate "HI!!"

I just cant.  she's everything, you guys.

her expressions and mannerisms make my entire day.

her surprised face and a simple raise of her eyebrows, wrinkle of her nose, or silly crooked toothy grin.
at 24 pounds this girl continues to grown length wise and not really change a ton in weight over the last several months.  size 12-18 month clothes fit her best, but we are slowly incorporating the 18-24 mo sizes for length in pants.  

Baker has developed quite the appetite and I love that she loves food.
it was such a battle with her older sisters and for it to come freely for Baker saves me a lot of distress surrounding meal times.

Baker will most always try anything we put in front of her.. as long as she's not cutting teeth or not feeling well she will hoover her entire meal.  refusing to eat is the very first sign we see when Baker isn't feeling well.
while this isn't a typical meal for Baker, this picture still makes me chuckle because sometimes you just don't know what we want to eat.. so we choose it all..
am I right?

new favorite foods this month: 
hot dogs, (carnation instant breakfast) chocolate milk, cutie oranges, string cheese, pizza, chicken, tilapia, fish sticks, rice, beans, tortilla, scrambled eggs..

and she just recently surprised me at our favorite Mexican food spot with her impressive chip 'n dipping skills.

Baker's typical meal schedule at 20 months:

breakfast (8am)

(at home): oatmeal + peanut butter; 8oz whole milk and 1/2 packet carnation instant breakfast 

(on the go): carnation + whole milk + banana bread

snack (10am)

dry cereal or crackers (goldfish)

lunch (11:30-12:30pm)

english muffin or sprouted toast with peanut butter + fruit pouch

NAP (12 or 1pm --> 3:30-4pm)

after nap snack

popcorn or peanut butter crackers

dinner (6pm)

baked chicken nuggets or fish + string cheese + strawberries + yogurt

before bed (7pm)

8oz whole milk + 1/2 packet carnation instant breakfast

Baker's hair has gotten SO long and reminds me the most of Jolie's hair in growth and texture at this age.  we often have to clip back her bangs or toss the little baby hairs on top of her head into a pony to keep them out of her face while she plays away.

Baker's vocabulary can no longer be limited to a simple short list.  

she says new things every day, half of which I don't even know where they came from.  

new words + phrases: 

Parker, Jolie, thirsty, "I dont know?!", "eat! eat!", buh-bye, show (referring to TV), "HEY!!" highchair, shoes, stinky, "EW, nasty!"(usually in reference to her diapers..which by the way brings me to tears in laughter when she starts saying it over and over), "ouch!", diaper, door, Oscar, candy (that didnt take long..), no, "lets go!", "where'd it go?", choo-choo, "SO cute!!", baby, dog, elephant, lion, apple, orange, milk, outside, paci..

speaking of the paci.. we are no where near giving that thing up.  Baker has about 4700 pacifiers she must sleep with and then proceed to collect before getting out of her crib in the morning or after nap. to be honest, I am in no huge rush to wean her off the pacifier.  she hands it over freely when we ask for it and therefore doesn't have it in her mouth 24/7.  Parker was 2.5 yrs before we cut the paci, so I feel like we have some time!  

Baker sleeps like a champ.  usually 12-14 hours at night (7pm-8:30am) and her nap during the day is always about 2-2.5 hours. she goes down without a fight and when she wakes there is always a period of time (usually about 30-45 minutes) that she lays awake chattering and playing in her crib before we go get her up.  I've learned (the hard way) that even though she's awake she's not ready to get up right away!  she is the opposite of her sisters and hasnt attempted to climb out of her crib, so.. you know.. bars for life.

many-a-times Baker screams her little head off when she doesn't get her way.. the big sister girls don't mess with her much or get in her way for this reason.

I had to go back and look when we started time out and discipline with the twins to remind myself how long I should let this sort of sassy behavior go on before its time to be corrected.  don't get me wrong- she is freaking adorable, but she can test me/us.  the all too familiar look on her face when she's being defiant.  the same look Parks used to give me.

..head cocked, low eyes, raised eyebrows, and that bottom lip popped out.
OH, but the best part is the dramatic walk/stomp away with her arms straight to her side to find someplace (soft) to plop face first onto.  usually its the dog bed or pile of blankets in the corner of the living room.  never straight to the floor.  have to save face, you know:)

she knows exactly what she is doing. and its SO HARD to not bust out laughing.

not to mention that her favorite phrase of all time is 'NO'.
Baker is obsessed with TV.   I want to watch a "showwww!" sounds just like Parker and Jolie.  her shows usually fall under the category of: Backyardigans, Mickey Mouse, or Bubble Guppies. she will also sort of pay attention to really anything on the television but for her to sit and watch an entire 24 minutes it has to be one of those three.

eye patching update 
we went to the ophthalmologist last month to check on Baker's eyes and if there has been any improvement with the patching we have been working on for the last several months.  the great news: her weak eye has definitely become stronger.

we try to patch her once/day for about 2 hours and really focus that around time she is going to be playing and really using her fine motor skills to really work that eye and hopefully improve it's strength all together.  not so awesome news: her strong eye has started to pull a little bit.  we noticed it a couple months ago and then really started to question if we were patching the correct eye or not!  the eye doctor said that it is very common for the stronger eye to become weak with consistent patching.  SO.. we are patching both eyes for now.  alternating about every other day to allow both eyes to get the muscle work they need.  we go back to the ophthalmologist in April and we hope he will tell us that we are done done done patching for good.  it isn't a terrible hassle to do it and Baker really doesn't mind it at all, but just remembering to get it done is sometimes a struggle on those super full and busy days!

other news.. Baker got tubes!
ear tubes, that is.
lets rewind about 6 months ago when she got her first really bad (albeit down right terrible) ear infection. we did the typical round of antibiotics and was back in the pediatrician's office just a couple weeks later with another infection.  we continued this cycle for about 3-4 months and then a monster of an infection took over her little head and I thought she would never rid of it.  we ended up doing the super strong rocephin shots to finally clear up her baby ears and thankfully the $300 shots did the trick.. although she still had some fluid in both ears, the fluid wasn't inflamed or infected.  we had the first conversation of putting tubes in her ears and we quickly shut it down as we weren't totally ready for it.. yet.  I was interested in other forms of treatment and had heard of other families avoiding this process all together, so I was interested in getting details of before we just jumped to the conclusion that she needed tubes.
fast forward to two weeks ago.. Baker woke with her hair matted across her cheeks and her ear draining pretty badly.  Jordan mentioned that he thought she had an infection and after the weekend of tears and waking through the night that we had just been through I agreed that we needed to get her into the pedi to check it out.
ruptured ear drums x 2.  the pressure and infection was so bad that it ruptured her little ears.
I didn't even know. I was horrified and really freaked out and the conversation of tubes came up again.  we were ready.  it all happened so quickly and we were in and out our evaluation appointment with our amazing ENT, Dr. Patel.  after doing a hearing test we discovered that Baker has some pretty significant hearing loss due to the constant fluid in her ears.. infected or not that fluid was causing the most trouble for her and we needed to get rid of it ASAP.
we scheduled her tubes for that next week.. we wanted to get this in before baby brother was born and  I was relieved that Dr. Patel was on board with our time crunch:)

 we were the first surgery that morning and as they prepped our sweet girl for the (literally) 15 minute procedure neither one of us could hold back the tears.  they took her back and both Jordan and I broke down.  the twins never ever really went to the doctor other than for their well visits up to the age of 2, so our tiny Baker girl having all this trouble was heartbreaking.
she came out of anesthesia very confused and sobbing/thrashing/screaming uncontrollably.  the nurse reassured us that this kind of reaction was normal and common.  she could hardly keep her eyes open or manage her movements, so I finally just held her tight to make her feel as secure and I knew how and got her to rest for a few minutes before we were sent on our way.

 after we got home it took me a bit to finally get her to eat or drink anything. she was still pretty uptight and I am fairly certain her throat was sore from the way she acted when she would take a tiny sip of water.. and I am positive her head was hurting because she kept putting her hands over her eyes and on the bridge of her nose.  she needed a nap.  I laid her down and she slept for about 6 hours.  I was in and out of her room checking on her and she was sound asleep.  after nap she was like a brand new girl!  her happy little upbeat self again.

I took her to get a special drink for a treat and she sucked it down in about a minute flat! whew.  getting back to normal and I was so relieved.  it was the longest day ever. but honestly the "recovery" has been a piece of cake! everyone told me that the recovery would be short and sweet and I was thankful that this proved to be true:)
her vocabulary is already changing and growing and her words are triple what the twins had at this age.  we are eager and excited to see how these tubes further improve her annunciation and simply adding more words to the mix!  since her surgery, many things are startling her. things that would have never bothered her before.  we have a train that passes the house about 17 times/day and she got really freaked out by the horn the first time she heard it.  tears were falling and I couldn't help but think that she was hearing it truly for the first time.  after the hearing test and seeing how she's improved since the tubes have been place, it is very clear that she had a hearing level as we do if we were under water.. lots of muffled sounds!  with everything coming through as they should she is surprised multiple times a day of how clear she can hear now!

a very common procedure and a very common positive result.. but something I never thought to have to deal with.  just goes to show that this parenting gig continues to change as we go.

Baker loves to dance and sing, clap her hands, and twirl around like there is no tomorrow.  she surprises me everyday with the things she picks up on simply because she has a couple of older siblings to follow around, learn from, and play copy-cat to.  I'll never forget watching Baker cover her eyes and count to 10 just as her sisters do when they play hide and seek.. Baker wants so badly to be in on the action and I'm very thankful Parker and Jolie include her with most everything.
we have another daddy's girl in the house.  Baker is 100% her daddy's daughter and she adores him!  such a little helper, she follows her dad around just under his feet to offer him whatever "help" he might need.  Jordan has been spending so much time building the twins' bunk beds these last several weeks and she has been all over it with him.  

hiding his nails + screws.. unplugging his drill, toddling over the 2x4's and just in the way all together.  but Jordan couldn't ask for anything more.  he loves it. his girls are his entire world and Baker fits in just perfectly.

so much change in you this month, sweetest Baker Bree.

..and we are the lucky ones that have gotten to watch it all unfold. 

 we couldn't be more proud of you for how you've developed, molded, and changed in the last couple months. 

I never want to forget you at this age, Baker Bree.

you are such a sweet little helper, the most goofy sister of the three, and the greatest companion in my day.. I know your daddy would have to agree

I adore you precious. 

and I love you with my whole heart, boo.