I sound like a broken record, I know, but Zoe is at a super fun age. She’s always running around and smiling, playing make-believe games, imitating us, and saying and waving “hi” to people around her. (She’s particularly fond of little kids in strollers, but no one is really excluded from her greetings.) She talks all the time, and it’s common for her to spit out long sentences in “toddlerlese” and then nod her head up and down, as if to say, “I’m right,” or “I told you so.” (We always respond to her, and it really feels like we’re engaged in actual conversation.) She also says a lot of real words; in the past month alone, she’s said for the first time the words blue, book, ball, cheese, nose, night-night, please and Pop Pop.

Zoe seems to learn new things, and new ways to communicate, every day. She recently grabbed a diaper and plunked herself on the floor to let us know it was time to be changed. (And now she routinely gets a diaper or wipes when we ask her, “Should we change your diaper?”) As another example, she now knows how to identify several body parts – nose, mouth, eyes, hair and her favorite, the bellybutton – and happily points to whichever one we say.

As for playtime, some of Zoe’s favorite things are dancing (she usually sways or bounces up and down while squatting), clapping her hands, and pretending she’s feeding Q or me from one of her little dishes. Her stuffed dog and cell phones (play or real) are still her favorite play-things, and she’s grown increasingly fond of her set of seven stacking dishes. She’ll sit for long stretches of time and put – on her own – one dish into another.

At any given moment, Zoe would prefer to run around and play than to cuddle and give “kissies” – but she does have her affectionate side. She often comes up to us and hugs our legs, as toddlers like to do. And recently she started wrapping her arms around her dad’s neck (giving him a neck hug) when he’s holding her. (Needless to say, this practically makes us melt.)

In terms of physical things, Zoe’s hair is getting curlier, her eyes remain a blue-ish grey, and she has a total of eight teeth. (Two bottom ones recently popped through.) She looks more like a little girl each day.

-M

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 23rd, 2008 at 8:00 am and is filed under 19.Sixteen to 17 months. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.