Norah has been amazing lately, just sweet and funny and cheerful and easy. She has definitely hit the “language explosion” phase–she has been a great talker for a long time, but now it seems like she is learning words hand over fist. She’ll just pull out some amazing word that we didn’t even know she knew, like “adventure” or “project” or “shower.” She can almost always make herself understood (”More. Please. Milk.”). If you do something for her, like zip up her sweatshirt or hand her a cup of water, and say “How’s that?” she’ll say “Better.” With this adorably perfect diction.

She had her 18-month checkup on Friday, and of course I always wish she were a little less shy with the doctor and showed off all the great things she can do, but, predictably, he was pleased with her anyway. She weighs 27 pounds, so her weight gain is really slowing down (she’s weighed 26 pounds since the 12-month visit), but she is making up for it in height. She is 33 inches–which puts her in the 90th percentile for girls her age. I knew this already from doing stuff with my moms’ group–she is taller than a lot of the 2-year-olds. Lucky girl.

A few little stories from the last week or so:

Norah is fascinated by lawn mowing. She loves to sit on the screen porch and watch Brian when he mows, and anytime she hears one of the neighbors start up a lawnmower she perks up and says “Mow.” So the other day when I was making dinner, I turned around and she was pushing her little pink plastic lawn chair across the kitchen floor in front of her, saying “Mow. Fast. Kitchen. Busy.”

If you ask her what her last name is, she will say “Fen-ding.” It’s rare that you’ll get her to say her first name, but when she does, she calls herself “Ra-ra.”

The other day, Yvonne was standing at the kitchen sink doing the lunch dishes, and Norah came up behind her, wrapped her arms around Yvonne’s legs, and said “Love.”