14 Months Old

The months feel like they're passing as quickly as a day does! Ellison sure is turning into a toddler. She's really picking up speed cruising around on those legs more and more every day, pushes her high chair around the house, makes "meals" in her kitchen with her dad, constantly imitates our actions, dances all the time, and is really working hard at her speech & vocabulary. She still has an incredible fondness for babies, too. She has these little flash cards with letters & pictures on them, and there's a card with the picture of a baby (a real one). She won't let it out of her hand once she finds it, repeats "baby" over and over, and even holds the card to her chest with both arms and turns side to side like she's cradling it! It's the sweetest thing. We're starting to notice what a little "horder" (?sp) she is. She loves collecting a bunch of things and fits as many as she can in her hand & just holds them (like a stack of foam letters), or she'll collect objects and put them in a pile all in between her legs as she sits. She started even doing it with her stuffed animals on her changing table - as I was changing her diaper, she kept requesting yet another stuffed animal be handed to her until she had all 5 smashed in her arms like a giant hug.
Ellison unfortunately marked her 14 month birthday by coming down with a nasty cold. She still plays like a doll - you'd never know she's sick, but she's not getting real restful sleep. Daddy felt so bad for her yesterday that he let her have her morning nap in his arms. That, and he & I are both suckers for holding Ellison. She's also starting to realize that her dad can't bear to hear her cries of protest if she doesn't want to be put down in her crib at first! Guess I'm gonna have to be the bad guy here...

Ellison had had enough of the birthday photos...