Pearce, what have you been up to?

Pearce, you are 16 months old.  What have you been up to?  Here are some pics from my iPhone to show everyone.  Well, I can finally say you are a full time most-of-the-time-walker :)  You took your first consecutive steps all by yourself at 15 months, but it took another month for you to let go of things and walk on your own.  You still crawl a lot, but you also let go of furniture and take off on your own.  Yesterday when we came home from the grocery store, I took you out of your car seat and told you to wait by the car.  You just stood there and I got the groceries out and then I told you to follow me inside...and you did!  It was the first time you walked in with me while I carried the groceries!

  You understand so many commands.  On this day, I asked you to help me dust the shelves.  You loved "helping" me until you found the buttons on the TV and just wanted to push those over and over.  When I told you no, no, you threw a fit.  You are good at those!

You LOVE to be outside, and you HATE to be in the car :)  You always say "size" for outside and you point to the door.  I got you a baby pool and a new little chair.  You had fun playing in the pool and sitting in your chair, but you really love to just go up and down the steps.  And now you hold onto the rail and go up one by one.  You make the cutest little grunt as you go up and down.

We made homemade Popsicles last night and I couldn't wait for you to try it.  It was a HUGE mess, but you loved it!  I started off by putting this smock on you, but then I just took everything off but your diaper because it was so messy.  Oh well!  It was fun watching you.  

What else?  You can repeat or at least try to repeat a lot of words we say.  Your new favorite word is "ouchie."  You have gotten lots of scrapes on your knees from being outside and you also have some mosquito bites from a mosquito that must have been in your room!  That thing went to town on your sweet little knees :(  The bites have provided lots of entertainment for you, though.  Yesterday we were at the grocery store and several people stopped to say hi to you and you immediately pointed to your knees and said "Ouchie."   

When you are in your bed, I hear you talking to yourself.  You go through names that you know. It's so funny!  You have started a VERY clingy stage.  There are sometimes that we are sitting playing and you will just come over to me and grab me around my neck and you want me to just hold you.  If I try to put you down or just sit you next to me, you hold on tight.  I don't want you to be scared to do things on your own, so sometimes I have to just put you down and you will cry and cling to my leg, but then you are o.k.  I did love this the other day, though.....we were sitting in Daddy's chair, and you just sat on me but kept looking at me and talking to me and then you would lay your head down on me and hug me.  LOVED that!!

You made Daddy laugh really hard the other day.  When he came home from work, he asked what we had done that day.  I said, "Oh Daddy, Pearce cried because I wouldn't let him..." (I can't remember what it was you were crying about).  And then daddy said "Oh no, Pearce did you cry?"  And then you did this fake cry....it was so funny because you hadn't done that before!  Now we can say "Pearce cry" and you will do your fake cry.  You do something new every day it seems like.  I love you so much.  You are the sweetest, most fun little thing!