Julia is 22 months

Julia turned 22 months a couple days ago! She now weighs 25.2 lbs (gained almost a pound). Her length is now 33 3/4inches (grew 3/4 inch in 1 months time).

In her 21st month (April), Julia accomplished a lot. This month Julia showed signs that she was ready to use the potty. She started telling me one day, and Grandma & Aunt Joy the next day, when she had to go potty.

Julia has had her share of accidents (the first 2 weeks), but overall has been doing great. Julia has gone 7 days accident free, other than at night/naps. And for naps she has only had 2 accidents in the last 2 weeks. I am so thrilled with her that she accomplished this so fast, and before age two, especially since the new baby will be here soon.

In April, Julia learned 62 new words: airplane, arm, bagel, Bible, big, bounce, bread, butterfly, Carver (one of her friends), cheek, clap, clean, close, couch, crab, daughter (this is what she calls her baby dolls sometimes), dirt, doctor, face, fall (all fall down), food, garden, Genie, Grace (her middle name), grapes, hamburger, heart, helicopter, home, itch (says it pretty much every time she has an itch, which seems to be a lot), jumping, knee, make, monster (for Disney Pixar's Monster's Inc.), mountain, noisy, outside, popcorn, quack, rabbit, rib-bit, right (right there), sad, shadow, shake, show me, Shu Shu (for Susan Stewart), skunk, sky, smart, snail, snow, speak (she tells this to the dog), sticker, table, ta-da, Teri, there, tickle, toilet, toys, windy

Julia sings: "no monkeys jumping on the bed." She also tries to sing her abc's. It goes like this: abcd, ijk, lop

When Jeff gets home from work, sometimes she says "daddy's home," when I open the front door.

nighttime routine: Saying goodnight to Julia used to involve daddy staying in her room until she fell asleep. She hated for him to leave, but this routine needed to change. We can't stay by her side each night forever, so there were a couple difficult nights Jeff dealt with to change this. He kind of used the "Super Nanny" approach. Jeff would have to keep dragging Julia back to bed, while standing outside of her door, or keep telling her, get back in bed. After 2 nights of this going on for 1.5 hours the first night and 1/2 an hour the second night, she understood. So for 2 weeks now, after praying with her, I say goodnight, Jeff sings one song, says goodnight, leaves, and it is no longer an issue. Julia stays in bed. Jeff still reads to her each night for up to 1/2 an hour, prior to putting her down.

bedtime/nap songs: Julia's favorite song she likes daddy to sing to her is "Twinkle, twinkle little star," which she refers to as "Winkle." Julia's favorite song she likes mommy to sing is "On Top of Spaghetti." Recently Grandma was singing her this song on the phone and right after the phrase, "when somebody sneezed," Julia said "ah-choo."