A Mind of Her Own

As Lydia approaches two, the moments in which her little wheels are almost visibly turning are more and more entertaining for us. I am constantly boggled by the amount of things she just knows. When Elizabeth shared with us that Oliver knows his colors, I was floored. Lydia? Know colors? No way. I immediately started asking her what color various things were. Everything--I mean everything--was "boo!" (Blue) We occasionally got a "Pit!" (Pink--I think.) As I promptly began worrying that Lydia was colorblind, I had the brilliant idea to ask her to identify the red fish. She got it right! The green fish. Right again! Lydia knows her colors, she's just not able to say them independently. Crazy, right?

She has taken to two new toys: her animals and dollies. Lydia LOVES playing with her animals. She moves them around, lines them up, and even laid them down to go to sleep when it was her bedtime. It is adorable.
While at my parents' and Robin's parents' homes, Lydia had the opportunity to play with dolls. My parents still have the wooden doll cradle I played with, and Lydia loved it. I will admit that I feel very self-conscious whenever Lydia takes to something so gender-stereotypical, but I have also always been of the mindset that if she expresses interest or excitement in something, we will allow her to explore it, so dolls it is. She covers them with blankets, rocks them, attempts to swaddle them. She pats them and sings to them. (The song goes, "Hee-da, hoe-da, hee-da, hoe-da." Don't ask me.) Last night, she played with dolls for almost an hour. Seriously.

Finally, she's starting to enjoy helping us and "working" around the house. For Christmas, Great Aunt Treesuh gave Lydia a broom and dust pan. We didn't hesitate putting her to work.

Prior to this, she had asked for help putting on her apron (a gift from Grandma and Grandpa Ganser), and then brought me my apron. (As a side note, I believe everyone who works in a kitchen should have an apron. They are so useful!) As I was tying it in the front, as I usually do, she said "Bah! Bah!" Obviously, I was supposed to tie it in the back.

It took quite a while to get a cute shot of the two of us in our aprons. Somebody thought it was hilarious to make faces at Daddy during the photo session. (This was definitely not anger. She's just a ham.)