It's a Wonderful Life!: 2 years old!

Our favorite little girl has officially completed two full years of life. I remember thinking when she was around 6 months old that time seemed to be moving rather slowly and that I was doing a good job of really savoring all the special little moments and changes of her life. Now two whole years have passed, and I can't help but feel a little nostalgic thinking back to the first days, weeks, and months of her life. It really does seem like so long ago! Our Anna-girl is growing up!

The best part about age two has been her skyrocketing verbal skills. Just in the last month or so, she has started putting together three to four word sentences, and her vocabulary seems to be growing exponentially. One of my favorite phrases she says right now is "I love _____!" She says it about almost everything. ("Anna, would you like an orange?" "Yeah! I love the orange!") There are still times when I can't make out what she's trying to tell me, but most of the time she is really able to communicate exactly what she is thinking. It is so fun to hear all the things she has to say! She is also bringing to my attention phrases that I probably need to say less. I didn't realize how much I say "Oh gosh" until she started parroting, "Oh josh!" :)

In addition to words, Anna is learning lots of other new things. She can count to ten, sometimes twelve by herself. She's starting to figure out colors and usually gets green, blue, red, pink, and white correct...although if she's not sure, her default is always, "Green!" She can name tons of different animals. She knows a few shapes including star, circle, and square. She can sing her ABCs and can correctly name at least two-thirds of the letters. She loves playing with her alphabet magnets, and she points out the "Letters a Aph-bet!" on signs, t-shirts, cereal boxes, etc wherever we go. Basically, we think she's pretty smart. :)

Turning two has also brought a big streak of independence. She is definitely a strong-willed little thing. If you can't convince her to do something of her own accord, you can bet a tantrum will ensue if you make her do it anyway. Brushing her teeth is a fight every single time, as is getting her hair brushed, washing her face, and getting her nose wiped. (Notice a common theme?) She likes to do all of those things herself, but if you try to do it for her, it is the end of the world! She also sometimes decides she does not want to wear pajamas to bed. The first time, we forced her into pjs anyway, and she threw the biggest tantrum I have ever seen. Now, if she insists on wearing her clothes to bed, we just don't fight it. Pick your battles right?

We moved Anna into a "big girl" bed and new room just before Christmas. I was really worried about how she'd do with the change, but it's actually been great. We bought twin bunk beds (knowing we would need them eventually) from our neighbor, painted them white, and separated them so she has two single twin beds in her room. It's perfect because the top bunk has railing on the side so she can't roll out, and I can lie down in the other bed when she can't go to sleep on her own at night. We also painted her walls blue and a dresser white with blue knobs to match. It turned out pretty cute, and she loves her new room!

Anna continues to be a bookworm. Some of her recent favorites are The Watermelon Seed by Greg Pizzoli, the Froggy books by Jonathan London, and the Five Little Monkey series by Eileen Christelow. She loves going to the library every week for story time, where we get to learn lots of fun new songs and nursery rhymes. Here is a video of us singing one of our favorites.

Another fun thing has been watching her start to play pretend. She often pretends to be different animals, usually a puppy or a frog...she jumps and yells, "Riddit!" haha. We got her a kitchen and play food for Christmas, and she loves pretending to cook. She also got a doctor kit for Christmas, so we've been playing doctor a lot (which has been good, because she's actually been to the real doctor FOUR times in the month of January...more on that in a minute). It's also fun to watch her talk to and take care of her dolls and stuffed animals. Her two baby dolls, Rosie and Sally, sleep with her every night and usually each have to have their own blankets and get tucked in too. She also likes to change their diapers and usually has to change them first before getting her own diaper changed. Sally also gets to take a bath with Anna.

Besides her dolls, Anna's favorite toy to play with is definitely her Lego train that she got for Christmas. She loves Legos and she loves "choo choo trains" so it is basically the best toy ever. I don't think a day has passed that she hasn't played with it! She also loves building towers with blocks (or whatever is available), and she's getting pretty good at it.

So like I mentioned before, Anna has had several doctor visits this month. First was her routine 24-month check up. Anna's right foot has been slightly curved since she was born, and her doctor has been keeping an eye on it. He kept hoping it would straighten out on its own, but it hasn't, so he referred us to a pediatric orthopedist for that. Then he also discovered that she has a heart murmur and suggested we get that checked out by a cardiologist.

The pediatric orthopedist called her foot condition "metatarsus adductus" which basically means the bones of the front of the foot curve away from the back of the foot. It's actually fairly common in infants and usually corrects itself in about 90% of cases. So there's still a slight chance it could fix itself (although it's not too likely since it hasn't already). But the doctor said there's not really anything they can do for it until the bones have completely set and hardened, which isn't until age 4 or 5. At that point, if her foot is causing her any pain or keeping her from walking/running normally, they can do surgery to fix it. But if it's not really causing any problems, then we really don't have to do anything. He actually said his son had the same condition and his foot is still slightly curved, but he was able to run track and play soccer and everything, so that was encouraging to hear.

The cardiologist appointment was a bit more lengthy. He listened to her heart, then wanted to do an EKG, then an echocardiogram. She was such a champ and sat so still for all the exams, even the echo which took almost 45 minutes. Everything came back looking normal, and the doctor said the murmur wasn't anything to worry about and will probably go away after time. So that was good (but expensive!) news.

Then Anna also had a follow-up eye appointment this month. Her eyes haven't really worsened, but haven't gotten better either. We got a slightly stronger prescription in her right lens, so hopefully that will help some. Her ophthalmologist thinks she will probably end up needing another surgery, but he wants to wait another couple months to see if they'll improve with the glasses and patching.

Pretty much, we're anticipating that with all Anna's doctor bills and with the baby coming next month, we're likely going to meet our out of pocket maximum before March!

Let's see what else? Anna still loves dancing. She got some pretty dress-up skirts for her birthday and she likes to wear her "twirly skirts" when she's dancing. She also frequently asks me to put in my Zumba DVDs (even though I haven't been doing Zumba for months now) and dance along with the instructors haha.