19 months old

Miss Kiya is officially 19 months old today. I can hardly believe it. My little Peanut looks like such a big girl.

Here are some things the fabulous Miss Kiya has learned in the last month:

1) To use a cup holder. She places her sippy cup in the cup holder on the high chair and in the car. We have come a long way from her sippy cup throwing days :)

2) She has learned 5 almost 6 animal sounds. She can do cow, sheep, dog, cat, lion and we are teaching her snake :)

3) She has learned to say "yes" or "yeah" in response to questions. We don't get no all the time anymore which is so nice. And she is using it in the right context too.

4) When we ask Kiya if she is sassy, she responds with "sassy". So cute and so true.

5) She learned a little girl's name in daycare, Kylie. The sad part is that little girl is aging out of the room next week. Think she can say Donovan...that's the boy that is replacing Kylie.

6) She is learning how to pull up her pants. She can't quite get it but she is close.

7) She is learning (slowly) how to ask nicely for her music or a book. She has heard her CD's so much that she anticipates which song is up next or will ask for certain songs. Example: if she is clapping her hands she wants "If you're happy and you know it" and if she says "oe oe oe" she wants "Old MacDonald had a farm".

8) She has kicked a ball.

9) She has started asking, "What's this?"

10) Kiya has always been fascinated with garbage trucks but she can accurately point to the garbage truck in a puzzle my MIL gave her.

11) She is really quite good at brushing her teeth. I still help A LOT but she really likes to do it.

12) At bedtime, she gives us both hugs and kisses and then points to her crib.

13) She has learned to climb up the slide :)

14) She has decided that the big kids playground is way more fun than the little kids playground. She likes the big slides. Even the big curvy slides. She is such a daredevil.

So as you can see Miss Kiya is busy, busy learning new things all the time. We are so proud of her and all she has accomplished. We can't wait to see what she does next. We are hoping it is walk but you know we can't force her we can only encourage her. We have gotten up to 3 or 4 steps walking alone between Mom and Dad before she dives forward in a fit of laughter. Oh silly girl....we shall see what the ortho doc thinks tomorrow.

Kiya's First Wagon ride

That laugh is just the best sound EVER!

Summer Fun in pictures

This isn't really a summer fun picture but really, can she get any cuter?

Since we aren't doing swim lessons, I brought out the kiddie pool...

I am pretty sure she is loving it :)

Yep, she is having a blast...

In fact she had so much fun that after 45 minutes, it was time to go inside and I am pretty sure the entire neighborhood heard her scream.

Birth to 3 visits again

So it has been 1 year since our initial evaluations with Birth to 3. To refresh your memory, Kiya at that time only qualified for speech therapy. At 7 months of age, she showed a 36% delay in her speech. We opted to not pursue therapy at that time and go with a wait and see approach. We always felt that in a year we would have Kiya re-evaluated so here we are.

I had called them with concerns about Kiya not walking independently yet and her speech. Kiya has been replacing the letter m in her words with the letter b. So Mommy is Bobby, Moo is Boo etc. She still says the letter m in words like yummy and vroom so it was just weird.

We had our initial screening this morning. The evaluator asked a bunch of questions and just watched Kiya play and scream. Kiya wasn't in the best of moods this morning.

The questions covered Kiya's speech and communication, fine motor skills, gross motor skills and problem solving skills. The goal by asking the questions was to determine if there were areas in Kiya's development that needed some additional attention.

Based on observation and the answers I gave, the evaluator determined that Kiya is slightly above average in speech and problem solving skills. In fine motor she was well above average and as to be expected her gross motor skills fell short of average. So we fully expected that.

So now what? Well, I will be waiting to hear from an Early Education teacher and a physical therapist to set up a more thorough screening. From there we will determine if Kiya qualifies for services.

Yes, Kiya has been seeing a PT already. However, we were seeing her maybe once a month and we were focusing on her neck muscle issue and her back issue. Sure her walking came up but it doesn't appear to be a concern for our current therapist. My mommy instincts told me to get another opinion. So hence we called Birth to 3.

We shall see what lies ahead. I do feel Kiya is very close to walking on her own. She did take 2-3 steps between Dave and I last night all on her own so we are going to keep working on that. Kiya does tend to roll inward on her ankles and turn her right foot out so between our Birth to 3 screening and our appointment with the Peds Ortho doctor we are hoping to get some answers and some things to work on to improve this.

Wordless Wednesday

The verdict is in and....

WE ARE DONE...with swim lessons that is. I have decided to listen to my mommy instincts on this one. It is not in anyway productive for us to both go to something we hate. It is not good for Mommy and Kiya bonding time.

She liked the songs, being tossed in the air, splashing in the water and believe it or not sticking her whole head under water. Yes she is quite the daredevil. She hated the structure, the "jumping" in, the life vests and I am pretty sure she wasn't a fan of the teacher either.

Kiya wanted to just sit and splash and play in the water. We have a kiddie pool at home and that is how we will spend the warm days of summer.

I think she was just too young for that kind of structure. I don't want her to hate water and that is my fear that forcing her to be miserable will result in her not liking the water at all. So we aren't going to ruin a good thing.

I guess part of me thought this might happen. Kiya is an independent girl. She likes what she likes, how she likes it and there isn't much that can change that. I signed up because she loved water so much...oh well we will wait until she is closer to 3 likely to try again.

We did sign her up for another 2 weeks in the middle of July but will not be attending those either. We paid in advance and there is no refund but my quality alone time with Kiya is more important than the $60 we paid for lessons. We can spend that time doing things she loves and strengthening our Mommy/daughter bond. Life is way too short and Kiya is growing up way too fast. I want both of us to enjoy our time together.

Pictures

Here is some proof that Miss Kiya doesn't hate water. She just hates swim lessons. That water was FREEZING cold and when we first put her in she was not happy. We took her out to just play with the water and then after awhile we put her back in and she loved it. Cold water or not the kid loved being in the pool. So much so that when we took her out because she was shivering so much she got very mad.

Nothing is better than watching Kiya smile and laugh. Only to be beat maybe by her new found singing abilities. She has always been a singer but now that she knows a lot more words it is even cuter. For example, she still loves Ring Around Rosie and can now sing the Ashes Ashes we all fall down part. However when Kiya sings it, it sounds like "Asses, Asses, all all DOWN." Yes my daughter says ass instead of ash. Too cute. And she usually screams down. Truly nothing better. Our goal is to get it on tape which is challenging as Kiya is fascinated with all things electronic and either stops what she is doing or makes a grab for whatever it is you have.

We will try though as it is just too funny. I will also try to post some video from Kiya's first wagon ride. She LOVES the wagon. Being the daredevil that she is, the faster the better and lots of laughs and screaming of "weeeee" were to be heard throughout the neighborhood. Totally adorable.