Green pepper and onion love *EDIT*

Just some stuff about Ari (now with bold-print, for those of you who prefer the Cliff's Notes version). I'm going to add a small disclaimer: I am not trying to brag and be all "Look, my kid is the smartest kid since the invention of kids!" I just want to keep a record of what she's doing/saying/learning. For all I know, this is all within the limits of "normal"--I mean, this is my first kid, so what do I know?

Tony and I did a quick count the other day, and realized that Ari easily knows about 100 different words. Some of her latest ones are "color" ("cuh-rurr"), "balloon" ("boon"), and "shower" (she actually says this one really clearly). She's also learned a few new body parts, one of them being "cheeks." And it's not enough for her to point at just one cheek--she has to show you both. (Same rule applies to eyes and ears, too--if you ask her where your ears are, she has to stick a finger in each ear before she's done.)

But more amazing than that to me is the way she is learning the meanings behind these words. I mean, it's one thing for her to know that our 2 dogs are dogs--but for her to realize that other dogs (even ones that look completely different than Sasha and Ivan) are also dogs is a pretty big step. She loves all the fish in Finding Nemo, but she also knows that her bath toys are fish, that pictures in a book are fish, that an image on her sippy cup is a fish. In the car the other day, I suddenly heard her yelling, "Color, color!" Knowing she didn't have any crayons or paper, I turned to see what she was talking about. One of the tags on her Taggies blanket had a picture of a crayon on it, which she was pointing at.

She is even starting to learn more abstract concepts in relation to words--for example, hot and cold. Tony taught her "cold" by using snow as an example, and of course we use the word "hot" in reference to stoves, heaters and anything else she's not supposed to touch. I was walking with her the other night, and when a stiff breeze blew right in her face, she announced, "Cold." And I really think she knew what she meant. Tony swears her heard her say the word "happy" the other day when she saw a picture in a magazine of a woman smiling.

She is in love with animals right now, and is getting pretty good at knowing her animal sounds. Her default animal sound is "woof"--meaning that if you ask her what sound an animal makes and she doesn't know or doesn't stop to think about it, her reflexive reply is "woof." But right now, she knows dogs say "woof," cats say "meow" (which she says as "mow" [rhymes with "wow"] in this sweet, high-pitched tone), sheep say "baa," cows say "moo," and lions and tigers say "roar." I've been teaching her that birds say "tweet" but her usual reply is something like "caw" (again in the high-pitched tone). I had no clue where she got that from until Tony told me that she knows ducks say "quack" and that she pronounces "quack" like "caw" sometimes. So I'm not sure if she's saying "quack" or if she thinks she's making something up.

She has a book full of animals--wild animals, farm animals, and household pets--that was a gift from my aunt, and she adores this book. I swear she "reads" it every day, happily pointing out the animals she knows. And then we in turn are attempting to teach her the ones she doesn't yet know. Though I'm not at all surprised she's still having a little trouble with ones like "chimpanzee" and "chameleon." (I am resisting the temptation to take the easy way out by just telling her to say "monkey" or "lizard.")

We also find her saying words that we have yet to decipher. The latest one is something like "ka" or "kye" and we are baffled as to its meaning. It sounds a lot like the word "kite" to us, but to our knowledge she's never seen a kite or had one pointed out to her by us, so who knows. It means something to her--that much is obvious. There are moments where she'll ramble on in her own little language. It's almost like she's talking to herself, because she usually does it when she's absorbed in something, rather than speaking directly to a person. You can hear her voice rise and fall, you hear just about every vowel sound and vowel combination, yet you can't decipher more than one or 2 words in the whole speech.

She's started speaking in small sentences--typical ones like "Bye, Mommy" or "Hi, Daddy" as well as more unusual ones like "I touch it!" and "I color!" We've been stringing together 2-word sentences for her to repeat after us, to help her learn how to put words together.

She seems to recognize herself in pictures now, but she calls herself "you." Which makes sense, since that's what we say to her ("It's you!"). We've been trying to teach her her own name, by adding, "That's Ari" but she doesn't seem to be catching on to that one yet (not on her own anyway). But anytime she sees the picture of herself that is the wallpaper on our laptop, she points and happily yells, "You!"

Kristin brought Nick over to play in the playground with Ari yesterday, and when Ari discovered a ratty little tennis-ball-sized ball lying on the ground, they started a rousing game of catch on their own. Ari made a few attempts before she figured out how to throw it correctly--she would cock her arm behind her head, but then end up dropping the ball right before she flung her arm forward, so that the ball dropped behind her. Even once she figured out how to get the ball to go forward, she kept releasing it too early, so there wasn't much power behind it. On the other hand, Nick was able to throw hard--and long. They spent several minutes throwing the ball back and forth--Ari would throw it just a foot or 2 with her girly little throw, Nick would chuck it well past her, and Ari would happily chase after it to start the whole routine again.

It's just amazing to me that she's becoming such a little person now--so self-sufficient, so independent, so good at communicating. I know I probably sound like I'm sad about it, but I'm really not. Sure, sometimes I miss the days when she would take 2 naps every day, or when I knew I could put her in a spot and she would stay put, but I am enjoying watching her grow up. It's so thrilling and humbling at the same time to know that I have had a part in teaching her some of these things she knows.

We had pizza for dinner last night, and she turned up her nose at Tony's sausage pizza in favor of my green pepper and onion one. And I couldn't help but feel a surge of "that's my girl!" pride. (And besides that, I'm happy to have found another person in my circle of friends/family that likes the same kind of pizza I do.) I think right now, that is my favorite thing about being a mom--seeing little flashes and glimpses of myself in her. Even if it is something as inconsequential and harmless as an affinity for green-pepper-and-onion pizza.

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EDIT: Written several days ago (just forgot to post, but it seems to fit here)...

With about a half-hour to kill before bedtime, I chose to do something I rarely do--I put a movie on for Ari. No, not Nemo--she needs to branch out. Instead, I selected Enchanted, thinking she'd probably love the animation at the beginning. She started chanting, "Eat, eat, eat" as the movie began, so I cut up some watermelon for her. While I was doing that, the Disney logo appeared on the screen and she changed her chanting to "Mee-mo, Mee-mo, Mee-mo!"

She sat in her princess chair, and I pulled up some rug right beside her. I offered to hold the bowl for her, but she insisted on holding it herself, and did a commendable job holding it upright and eating from it while keeping her eyes glued to the TV. She was as enamored with the movie as I had hoped, joyously pointing out horsies, birds (why she doesn't say "birdie," I don't know), and "Belle" (right now, every Disney princess is "Belle," and I can't blame her--names like "Cinderella" are a mouthful, and "Giselle" does sound an awful lot like "Belle").

I refilled her watermelon bowl a couple times, and each time, she returned happily to her chair, munching away and drinking in the lush animation on the TV screen. Then suddenly, she stood up. Her eyes never left the screen as she shuffled a few steps to her left, backed up until her heels made contact with my legs, and gently set herself down in my lap, all while still managing to not spill her watermelon or miss a second of the movie. And she stayed there, quite content, turning up to look at me every so often with commentary on the movie or just a smile.

I kissed her on the head, closed my eyes for a moment, and thought to myself, This. This is what I dreamed of when I found out I was having a daughter.