Morning Smile For Mommy: Happy 16th Month Birthday, Makayla!

This month, we continue to see her development predominantly in the language domain. But we are seeing growth in other areas as well.

Cognitive development:

Attention- Makayla has been demonstrating increased attention, especially during book reading. She now stays on pages of a book for longer and seems to be much more interested in books. She'll point to different objects on a book. Sometimes she'll point and tell me what she sees- most of the time, it's Elmo haha

Language development:

Receptive language- her receptive language is developing extremely quickly. Now that we're asking her to identify objects by pointing, we have been able to see just how much she actually knows. She can identify many animals. She can identify many body parts, specifically nose, eyes, ears, head, chin, feet, mouth, and belly button. She loves the song "head, shoulders, knees and toes".

Expressive language- She is pretty much capable of imitating so many words, it's no longer worth listing.

Makayla makes animal sounds; when I ask her, "What does a cow say?" she responds "moo". At the beginning of the month, she would respond "moo" for all animals, but now she knows that horses say "neigh" and sheep say "baa". She also makes a funny noise for elephant.

Her favorite word of the month is ELMO!

Nose!

Other words she says spontaneously and identifies correctly- tree, shoes, roomba (moomba), door, moon, ducky, bear bear, piggy, cheese, belly button, balloon (boon)
Numbers- when i say "one" she says "two", when I say "seven" she says "eight".
Looked at a blue kite and said "blue"
Correctly identifies the letter A
Phrases (heard once or twice)- where mommy, this way, i don't want it, what's this
She is signing more consistently and usually says the word as she is signing the word, but we have not taught her any new signs.

Socio-Emotional development:

Empathy- One day Jojo fell down and started to cry. Makayla went over to him to give him a hug.

Affection- Makayla loves to show affection. Occasionally she'll give me or someone else she's familiar with a hug without being asked. During Christmas Dinner with family, M gave cousin Christopher a hug AND kiss.. what a lucky boy!

Clinginess- Makayla is still extremely clingy. However, I think she is overall fairly outgoing so once she warms up to strangers she's pretty friendly.

Manipulation- Sometimes Makayla wants something and Raissa doesn't comply. She'll then immediately go to Raissa's mom (who is much more of a pushover).

Gross motor development:

Running- Now that she's very comfortable with walking, she's running! Looks like my marathon training is coming in handy now.

Walking backwards- She doesn't walk backwards on purpose but we have seen her pull her little car which requires her to walk backwards. She seems pretty steady when she does.

Walking in circles- This is the funniest thing to watch. One time, she was looking around the room for something. As she's searching, she's swinging her body one way, then the other. She soon realizes she had been sort of turning in circles so she smiled and proceeded to turn in circles just for fun. My mother-in-law also noticed her doing it when she was walking along the pattern on a circular rug.

Climbing- She is not actively climbing like a monkey just yet, but she seems to love climbing on chairs, especially the child-sized ones. She hasn't quite figured out how to back into a chair, but instead climbs from the front.

Fine motor development:

Buckles- M loves buckles! She loves the buckles on her high chair and on her carseat. My MIL even found a pink buckle (not attached to anything) for her to play with. She's figured out how to put the buckle together but fortunately not how to take it apart.

Iphone functions- Makayla is quite adept in using apple products. She knows how to scroll from one picture to another. Also, when she scrolls to a video clip, she touches and lets go of the play button in order to make the video play.

Physical development:

Teeth- Makayla finally sprouted her eighth tooth!! Typically teeth grow in pairs, but for some reason, she has had seven teeth for a few months now. Needless to say, we had a few restless nights this month.

Measurements- During her 15 month well-check, she measured in at 26 lbs, 7 oz; she is still well above average in weight and slightly above average in height. Overall she looks longer and leaner. Her rolls are still present but not as pronounced.

Adaptive development:

She can take off her shirt. One morning I let her hang out in her crib for a little while before getting her. I later found her in her crib with only a diaper on!