Juliet: 18(ish) Months

I feel a little bit guilty that Libby has such a huge archive of blog posts, photos, baby books, etc. to look back on one day, and Juliet has very little in comparison. I've been meaning to do an 18-month update on Juliet (like I did for Libby), but here she is, all of almost-20 months old, and I'm finally now getting around to it.

Everyone tells you (and I think you kind of understand from just regular life experience) that no two kids are the same. Even if said kids are raised by the same parents, in the same house, with the same rules. But when you actually have a second kid and get to live this little nugget of wisdom out, its an entirely crazy, confusing, entertaining experience.

Juliet is so different from Libby. And truly, we wouldn't have it any other way. I adore seeing their individual personalities develop and discovering what fun elements they each can contribute to our family dynamic.

At 18 (I mean, 20...) months, I would describe Juliet as adventurous, curious, fearless, busy, physical and silly. My sister would probably use the word "bat$hit," but I prefer to put a positive spin on things.

Juliet is the kid who climbs anything and everything and then yells, "Fall!" with a huge grin on her face before attempting to jump off. She can kick and throw a ball with skills that genuinely impress Coach Gliss sometimes. She runs everywhere. She is the reason they made child locks for cabinets (even though I've yet to install any). She dances at every chance she gets. She won't keep a hairbow in for the life of her.

She loves to brush her teeth and would stand at the sink yelling, "Teeth! Wa-wa!" for hours if I let her. She loves Elmo and Daniel Tiger and says "Hot dog!" every time she sees Mickey Mouse. She is an insane eater. She snacks all. the. time. Particular favorites are cheese, fruit pouches, and hummus. She loves baby dolls and babies and assumes any child riding in a shopping cart is an infant ("Mama! Baby! Wah, wah.")

She loves football. She brings us the remote and requests football on a daily basis. When football is on TV, she actually watches it. When she spots the Sunday paper, she points and yells "Football!" until we give her the sports section. Her favorite shirts to wear are her football sweatshirts. She can identify a helmet, a tackle and a touchdown.

She adores Libby and tries to keep up with her all the time, but is a total brute and is always the first (and oftentimes only) one to push, hit or pull hair.

She keeps us laughing by "singing" songs, dancing naked and making announcements and greetings to everyone within ear shot ("Mama! Moon!," "Dada! Moon!," "Mimi! Moon!," "Pop Pop! Moon!")

She is everything we had no idea we were missing.