Thought I would share what we did on Emsley’s birthday this year as well as do a little 2 year update since I haven’t done anything since Emsley was one. I had always intended to do an 18 month update but the months and days flew by around that time as we were getting ready for Hawaii and had just found out we were pregnant!

So here goes! To start Miss Lace’s second birthday morning off I made her some rainbow pancakes in shades of pink, purple and blue (her favourite colours). I topped them off with whip cream and sprinkles but as you can see in the pics she avoided the whip cream by taking the top pancake off the stack! I had put the big number 2 balloon downstairs for her to find when she woke up but unfortunately she saw it to be an “S” rather than a 2 so the birthday effect was initially lost on her. I also put 2 candles in the pancakes for her to blow out but she panicked and started to cry at the sight of them so momma got to blow them out instead. As a trade off, I decided not to rob the joy of blowing away from her and asked her to just blow on the pancakes, hence that picture below. After she settled down from witnessing the small fires, she indulged, but to my surprise, only in the blue pancakes!After breakfast, (and as per Emsley’s request) we met up with some cousins at a local splash pad/pool and played around there until lunch time.
We stopped at Booster Juice on the way home for a smoothie as they are her absolute favourite treat! The watermelon one that is out right now for August is our favourite each year and Miss Lace completely agrees with us!After nap, we gave Emsley her gifts. This year we got her this mini piano which I scored for only $50 dollars on sale (regular $200) from Indigo online! I am so happy I bought it because she absolutely LOVES it. We also got her a Corolle doll, a set of Corolle doll accessories, a white wood doll highchair and an Elsa barbie doll. This green John Deere tractor was given to her by one of her grandparents the morning of her birthday. She has a new obsession with trucks, tractors and especially steering wheels so you can see the joy in her face while playing with this one! I decided to take a few shots of Ems in her room as I knew the big girl bed was coming soon and I wanted to remember the days of the toddler bed before they were gone. We had made the switch over to the toddler bed in early July and the transition went great! No getting up after we put her down for the night, (like I completely feared), and she slept well through the night for the most, with some early wakings around 5 am which I will talk about more down below. Up until July she had been sleeping in her crib or in the Nuna when we travelled or went to the cabin. Even after we made the transition to the toddler bed she still slept great in the Nuna when we were away.

The last year has been an incredible journey overall. The terrible twos have definitely emerged at times but the growth and developmental gains that have occurred really overpower them. I absolutely love this age. I love that I can converse with her and that when I come home from work she can share all the things that she did during the day that made her happy. I love the reason and understanding that’s developing and that she truly gets what we are saying to her when we discuss things (however, it still doesn’t mean that she listens!).

She loves going out to stores, especially Homesense with me (shocking, I know, but we literally seem to know all the weekday staff so she enjoys their reactions to her presence). She likes going to Home Depot with daddy and grocery shopping with both of us. She loves walks in her stroller and will pick riding in it any day before walking to the park.

She still sleeps great. Her typical routine right now is 7-7:30 pm-6-6:30 am with a 2 hour nap in the afternoon. In early summer, with going to bed later and the sun coming up earlier she was off schedule and started to wake most days between 5 am-6 am. Her naps around that time also seemed to become shorter, I’m talking about 40 minutes on average. She was a crank and my theory is that going to bed later actually threw her off even more. When we got her back into her old routine she seemed to do a lot better. Our girl has needed her sleep since she was a newborn and that has never changed! When we did experience the early awakenings we would ask her to go back to sleep and she would try her best to lay in bed and fall asleep again for at least twenty minutes. Some days she would fall back asleep for another hour or so and other days she gave up after the twenty minute mark, which we were okay with since she had tried!

She has a great appetite and eats pretty much everything we do. She doesn’t love meat on its own, such as barbecued chicken or steak but when it’s in a sauce or mixed with a carb she’ll eat it just fine. Her favourite meals are anything with noodles but would likely pick spaghetti, great grandpa’s borscht, lentil tacos, and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches if she had her way. She still has a glass of milk before bed and in the morning and typically picks a banana or oatmeal for breakfast. She likes dry Cheerios but is not a fan of them when they are mixed in milk. She’s still on the smaller side but at her two year checkup was in the average for both height and weight which is huge! During the last year before this checkup she’s been average for weight but short (since birth) so not sure where this height all of a sudden came from!

She currently has 16 teeth and lately has been chomping on her hands so I think we shall see a few more soon. We have yet to do a Dentist trip but that will happen in the near future.

Her favourite things to do are go to parks, go for walks, shop, go out for breakfast, and during summer has been going to splash pads. She constantly asks to go back to Hawaii and I am amazed by how much she talks about it still. I figured those memories would be distant by now but instead she is always bringing things up from the trip or asking when we are going to the airport to fly there again! Mommy’s wondering the same thing Miss Lace.. 😉

Her favourite books right now are an airplane book which I had bought to prepare her for Hawaii but she still loves (I’m thinking that it reminds her of the trip?!). A book called ‘Shape of My Heart’ which I randomly picked up at Homesense around Valentine’s Day but she literally can’t get enough of it half a year later, (mommy and daddy however are real sick of it). A Zoo book I recently got her and the classic, ‘Goodnight Moon’. It’s adorable to catch her in her room reading these books aloud solely based on memory.

This last year has brought a huge increase in her vocabulary. It literally  is amazing how much she talks. She is currently stringing 7-8 words together and is always shocking us in what she knows and what she can say. She has always been social but at this age mixed with her vocabulary she is constantly saying hi when we are out and making conversation with anyone who will acknowledge her. Sometimes she is shy in new environments but after about ten minutes she is fine. She knows many songs and is always singing to us, and more recently engages in singing while accompanying herself on the piano. She absolutely loves to dance and if you watch my stories you’ll know that she isn’t embarrassed to dance all by herself in front of a crowd! She appreciates watching a live band but also loves to listen and play music in any form.

Soon she can add big sister to her resume and I am loving playing dolls and dollhouse with her as she practices taking care of her babies while playing. I know she’ll be a great big sister and I look forward to watching her grow in that area as well! I can’t believe it has already been two years with my little pumpkin and that soon we will have another little babe to add into the mix!