OK, let’s do this again! January was another whirlwind with you. They’re all whirlwinds. Every day, every hour. Time has never moved so quickly as when I became your mom.

This month we enrolled you in gymnastics! It was a Christmas gift from Papa Jerry and Grandma Pam. You absolutely love it. On Thursday mornings we start psyching you up for our big adventure that night. When I ask you where we’re going you announce “Gy-Na-Tics!” I like to ask you what we’ll do there and you tell me “bounce! jump! swing! bubbles!”, all of which is true. On a grander scale, you walk on the balance beams, you slide down slides, you race up the ramp and jump into the foam pit. At the end of class you chase bubbles around the room squealing in a way that tells me you’ve never in your life been happier. My favorite part of our Thursday gymnastics class is that daddy goes with us, and we all grab dinner at Chipotle before we go.

We try to get you out of the house daily. Being winter, it’s not like we can always go outside to play; although the warm weather this year has afforded us a lot of days for walks and trips to the park. I’ll ask you if you want to go anywhere and you’ll tell me “shopping! I like it Target!” And to that I say – my work here is done!

My new obsession is checking on you before I go to bed at night. It used to wake you up, so I left you alone. But now you sleep through it, or if you do wake up it doesn’t bother you. Every single night you’re in a different twisted position with limbs here, fuzzies there, and hair all over. It’s incredibly endearing. I noticed a few nights in a row that you weren’t under your fuzzy but instead had it wadded up in a ball under your head. Girl needs a pillow! I shopped everywhere for a little Paisley-sized pillow, and eventually found what we needed at a fabric store. You’re thrilled. You feel like a really big deal. Now, I only find you sleeping on your pillow, under your blanket, and you insist on taking it to “mama’s bed” every morning.

You like hanging out in my office. You’ll squeal with excitement, “mama’s office!” You know where I keep all of the Sharpies and help yourself to them. Fortunately I have tons of boxes in there and you know you can color on them freely. You’re a big fan of stickers, so you rarely leave my office without requesting one of the DietsInReview.com stickers sitting on the bookshelf. We also have a keyboard that sits behind the couch in the living room, for some reason. You’ll grab my hands and practically drag me back there saying “Work! work!” You love standing back there banging on the keyboard, especially if I type on it with you. This is work to you; it makes me laugh to think that you think I just mindlessly pound on this little keys for hours a day. You get that it’s important though, and feel like a big deal that you get to work too. Sometimes we’ll play “find the letter,” I’ll announce a letter, like H, and you scan the keys very carefully until find it and then press it.

You’re sneaky. A sneaky little bug. It’s not malicious, but it is mildly mischievous. For instance, before bed the other night I saw you chewing something. I asked what it was. You pointed, turned your head and told me “I eat daddy chock-it!” I followed your direction and there on the table was a plate with 24-hour-old brownie crumbs. Awesome. He and I laughed so hard and you just kept chewing like it was the most normal thing in the world.

The last time I was regularly writing these letters to you was in September, and at that time I made a modest list of the single words that you were saying. You’ve blown that list out of the water. You say full, complete sentences and carry on conversations with us. It would be easier to tell you what you don’t say rather than try to capture your incredible vocabulary here. Some favorite phrases include:

See yater mama/daddy

Daddy I need my baby please

I not; I not to

Love you too

Thank you much

Movie titles: Beauty Belle, Woody Buzz, Bungle (Jungle Book), Kingy (Lion King)

When you ask me to stand up, you actually want me to sit up

I sad; I crying

I a short baby

You’re hard to look at sometimes, my brain has trouble wrapping around what it is I see. You’re this teeny tiny girl (you haven’t gained a pound in three months but you keep getting taller) with this great big independent, silly, funny personality. You’re not a baby any more. I’m trying to convince myself to realize this. I’ve got 90 days until you turn 2, so there’s time to keep pretending like you’re a baby. But we both know I’m just lying to myself.

Love you bug-

Mama