Hey - let me know if you see a video of Coral below. It’s an old video (she was small!) and I’m not sure if this will work or not.
If it works then I’ll try to post more videos in the future. If it doesn’t work… back to the drawing board I guess.
Did it work?
When we took the family trip to the beach last summer Aunt Emily brought the White Stripes CD that had the song My Doorbell on it. We listened to it a lot and I decided to buy the CD. Coral and I have enjoyed listening and dancing to the song in the car - it’s lots of fun.
Last week we were driving home from day care and I was listening to NPR and talking to Coral. About halfway home she started asking for something and at first I couldn’t tell what she was saying. She started getting frustrated but then I finally realized she was saying “Doorbell!” I put on the CD and we danced all the way home. Ever since then she has asked for Doorbell at some point during the trip home.
I was thinking about this today (when she again asked for Doorbell) and I realized that I rarely called it “Doorbell” when talking to her about it. I usually just called it “our favorite song”. Of course the word “doorbell” comes up in the lyrics quite a bit but so does a couple of other phrases. I think it’s interesting that she decided to call the song Doorbell and not something else - like “Ring It.”
First, let me say that I think the below interaction was mostly just coincidence. I know Coral knows some numbers but I don’t think she really knows what they mean.
Tonight when I was getting Coral ready for bed after her bath she started pointing to some small hair clips on her shelf. She pointed and said “one!” several times. I usually give her something to play with while getting her ready just to keep her distracted.
After a minute she pointed again and said “two! two!” and I figured that since she asked so specifically I would give her another one. Right after that she pointed again and said “three!” - at this point I’m thinking this is pretty impressive. She’s asked for one, then two, and now three.
A little bit later she’s pointing again but now she was saying “two!” again. I told her she already had two. I said, “you had one, then two, and now you have three - so you already have two.” Then I asked her, “Since you already have three, what do you want?”
She thought about this for awhile - making her scrunched up face - and just when I thought she might have lost interest she shouted, “MORE!”
One, two, three…. more.
That’s right, Coral has reached another milestone. As of yesterday, Coral is 18 months old - also known as one and a half. Today we had her 18 month checkup and she checked out A-OKAY.
For her 15 month checkup we didn’t get her height/weight percentile because they measured her after we saw the doctor. This time we found out that she’s in the 90th percentile for height and a little under 75th percentile for weight - which is apparently what she was last time but is flip flopped from what she was before that. At her 12 month checkup and earlier she was in the 50th percentile for height and 75th percentile for weight - so I guess our perception that she’s taller and skinnier is accurate. Of course she still has a giant noggin - just like her dad.
She cried only when they weighed her (I cry when I get weighed too) - she was really good during the doctor’s exam. She wouldn’t show the doctor how she can walk backwards but she did do a somersault.
She dodged getting vaccine shots because she has a cold so we’ll have to go back in a couple of weeks for that. Otherwise, we’re aiming to avoid the doctor’s office until Coral’s two year checkup!
Coral likes to talk a lot in the mornings. It fun communicating with her now. This morning I got up with her around 6:15am and we were downstairs getting her yogurt and my coffee. We weren’t talking and she said quietly to me, “Mommy sleeping.”
A bit later we were in the living room and a car zoomed by. Coral looked at me with a surprised look on her face and I said, “Car!” and she replied, “Fast!”
Then I was eating my cereal and she said, “bite please” so I gave her some. Usually she eats half my breakfast so I offered her another bite a minute later. She said, “No, daddy eat.” I’m not sure why she was inclined to let me (or tell me to?) eat my own breakfast but it was nice.
While giving Chiquita a hug she commented, “Keega purring.” Then she said “patty cake” and tried to lift up Chiquita’s legs in order to play with her. That when Chiquita high tailed it out of there.
I was changing Coral’s diaper before her nap today and this is what she was saying to herself, rapid fire:
More yogurt
More yogurt
More bottle
New bottle
New bottle
Old bottle
Old bottle
Noonie mouth
Noonie mouth
Nina house
Nina house
At which point I busted out laughing. She’s been doing this a lot lately - where she kind of talks to herself. For example, we catch her doing this rendition of patty cake:
Roll it
Pat it
C
Throw it
Coral!
Our version is “Patty cake, patty cake, baker’s man. Bake me a cake as fast as you can. Roll it. Pat it. Mark it with a C. Throw it in the oven for Coral and me!”
She tries counting (”two, eight, two, eight”) and the alphabet (”c, e, f, g”) and some ring around the rosey. She’s our little chatterbox.
