18 Months Pictures

We had pictures taken of Tessa for her 18 month milestone. Enjoy!

18 Months

Tessa is turning 18 months shortly. It's fun to watch her grow and change. In the last 6 months her biggest development has been how talkative she has become. She can say a handful of words, knows a few signs, can make a few animal sounds, and has become really good at communicating though pointing, etc.

I feel like when you only know a handful of words, the words known can be telling so I'll share the words she knows. They include: hi, bye, ball, book, bath, dog, kitty, shoes, mom, dada, hat, bottle, that, bubbles, diaper, juice, and probably a few other words I'm forgetting. She's even said a two word sentence: "Dad ball" (David was holding a ball).

As far as signs she knows she'll regularly sign water, more, milk, bed, cat, bye/hi, cheese, and all done. She can sign many more signs when we go through sign language books together but she doesn't sign them in regular conversation. She knows the animal sounds and can say them for the following animals: dog, cat, cow, bug, and snake. Then she can also identify several body parts including toes, feet, nose, eyes, and mouth. She loves to point out the eyes on her stuffed animals and then touch her own eyes and mom's or dad's eyes.

The other big change is that Tessa finally has teeth. She got her first tooth at 15 months and in the matter of a few weeks three more came in. She now has the top two front teeth and bottom two front teeth. I thought we'd be able to sing "All I want for Christmas is my 2 front teeth", but her teeth eventually did come in before Christmas.

Here is a rather current picture showing off her four front teeth.

One of her favorite activities is reading. She'll read books on her own and will request books be read to her. She has a handful of favorite books that she'll ask to be read to her again and again. She also enjoys coloring and just in general playing with her toys. She has a fairly short attention span though so she'll pull out a toy and play with it for only a few seconds and then want to pull out another and repeat.

Since it's been so long since I've last added a post I thought I'd go back and post pictures from the last few months.

Our cutie in her birthday girl shirt.

Here we are visiting Antelope Island. Tessa loves hanging out outdoors.

It was neat to see the buffalo and fun to wade in the Salt Lake. It's been harder lately to get outside now with the weather being as cold as it has been, but we still go out for short walks and play outside occasionally.

Here Tessa is enjoying playing outdoors at a small, traveling carnival.
 

 

Here we are outside the new house under construction.

Here Tessa is enjoying playing in the new neighborhood.

Tessa loves helping!

Tessa enjoyed fun activities with her cousin Ashton! We went to the aquarium as well as BYU campus. Tessa loved feeding the ducks at the duck pond!

This summer, we also went to the state fair. Tessa enjoyed seeing the animals. Here she is showing off her climbing skills. She loves to climb. She'll even request that we get out the step ladder so she can climb it.

Tessa can't get enough of playing outside.

In preparation for moving and selling our home, we finally had to get the balloon down from the top of the upper cabinets in the kitchen that has been there since her cousin Megan's first birthday. Tessa enjoyed playing with it for a second but it rapidly deflated upsetting her.

With the weather getting colder we've been spending more time at one of Tessa's favorite places, Cabela's. She loves seeing the taxidermy animals there.

Here Tessa is enjoying yummy pie at Thanksgiving.

Here we are enjoying the natural history museum.

Tessa has really come to enjoy riding the ponies at Thanksgiving Point. She used to be frightened of riding them but now she'll ride the ponies for up to 5 minutes at a time.

We enjoyed some fun Christmas festivities this season.

Tessa loves seeing Christmas lights so we took her to temple square. She seemed to enjoy it. They had a nativity scene set up. Tessa liked pointing out the animals in it.

We took Tessa to see the ice sculptors and the reindeer at Thanksgiving Point. She had a fun time looking at the reindeer.

Tessa got the hang of decorating a gingerbread house pretty quickly. There were probably more candies eaten than made it onto the house but that's why people decorate gingerbread houses anyway, right? It was a lot of fun and I think we've discovered a new family tradition.

Christmas morning! Tessa took all day opening her presents. She would open one and then want to play with it. I think the last present was literally opened at 5:30 at night.

When my family came into town over Christmas, we went to the Nickelcade. Tessa liked the little merry go round.

Then in probably the biggest news since we last posted, we found out that Tessa is going to be a big sister. Here we are taking a belly shot with the fruit to show the baby's size. Tessa is also for some reason showing off a sock.

And finally here is a recent picture of Tessa showing how long her hair has been getting. Sometimes she looks so grown up it surprises me. She has been growing so fast. We sure love our girly.