Nora at 15 months

Two things I had sort of forgotten about 15-month-olds:
1) They are so stinkin' cute!
2) They are so stinkin' messy!

Nora is 15 months old and she is on the go. All day, every day she is about her business, doing the serious work of babies: emptying the recycle bin, emptying the cupboards and drawers, pulling books off the bookshelf, drawing on the walls with markers.

But the cuteness makes up for the messes. Don't you think?

She can be quite outgoing. Tonight we went out to eat, and she made friends with the people in the booth directly across from us, both of the booths kitty-corner from us, and the booth on either side of us. Not an easy feat considering the tall booth backs. But she won them over with her smile, her wave, and in one case some vigorous head nodding.

She hadn't liked reading books at all. I was feeling a little panicky, because how can one of MY children not like reading? But she's turned a corner and all of a sudden will bring me books to read to her and object loudly when the book is closed. Her favorites right now are Goodnight Moon; Bedtime Peekaboo; and Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes. 

She packs away the food and is not picky at all. I can usually count on her to eat dinner even when the other kids are turning up their noses at it. Even so, she is still a bit of a peanut, small in both height and weight categories. She's still in her infant car seat (and hating it) while we wait for her to hit that 20 pound mark so she can move up to the next one.

She says a few words. Her first word was "uh-oh."
Now she also says:
Da-da,
Mama (though sometimes I'm not quite sure if she's just saying it or if she knows it refers to me),
head,
nose (this may explain why she likes Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes so much),
she also makes a few animal sounds (moo, meow, woof, and the cutest little roar ever).

She can navigate the few stairs we have around our house. But I wouldn't trust her by herself with a full flight of stairs. She walks (started right at a year) and is somewhat enamored with walking backwards, which I find quite funny at times. She is turning into a climber, which I do not find funny at all.

Right around 4:00 most days she gets extremely fussy (and hungry) and this makes getting dinner ready challenging. But I've gotten good at listening to crying kids, so I can deal with it. :-) Of course, she is probably the loudest of the three, because she has to be to have any chance of attention at all. Ah… the life of the third-born.

She is mostly happy, loves a good adventure, and tries to keep up with the big kids. As you can tell, we're pretty smitten with her.