Several posts...

Some of JoElle's other favorite words are "milk- she finally started saying it instead of signing it- flower, water, (Aunt) Ana, Tandi, Jesus, Amen, socks, shoes, teeth, up, down, hello, mine, book, please, eat, more, bath, trash, rocks, and hot.
She said "Grandad" on July 16th and several weeks before she started saying "Nanny or Nene" for Granny and she also puts her hand to her ear like she is talking on the phone because she talks to Granny on the phone a lot!
Back in the beginning of June/end of May she started saying some of these words: flippers, scissors, mow, color, potty, Wal-Mart, Pampers, and no (she finally picked up on no, but hasn't used it since (May 30th). She said (Uncle) Aaron (June 6th).
The weekend of June 3rd, Nana took JoElle outside while Daddy was mowing, and JoElle pointed at Daddy and said "Daddy mow!"
She also likes to ask "What is that?" and when you tell her, she tries so hard to repeat you!

June 7, 2006 JoElle said a new word today at school: "Pampers!"
Ms. Stacy told me that JoElle saw another baby's wipes with the word "Pampers" on it, and so she pointed at it and said "Pampers!"
I don't know how she knows this stuff??? We don't even USE Pampers, we use Huggies!
At VBS tonight, JoElle learned a song that says "Jesus loves me,me, me" and she pointed to herself and said "me, me me!" She enjoys singing and dancing. JoElle knows we always say prayers before eating, too. She loves to say "Amen!" and throw her hands up in the air.

June 6, 2006 JoElle has so much energy! We have been at VBS this week- I am leading a first grade group and JoElle is participating in her own preschool VBS. When I picked her up, she was running around the room, giggling and screaming in delight!
Can you believe that they told me "JoElle is very outgoing!" No, not JoElle????!???!! Hehe.
JoElle is really growing up, I know it's inevitable, but she looks so much like a big kid now, her language is exploding, she feels remorse when she does something she shouldn't have...
Yesterday, I was trying to give her some more to eat and she told me "No more!" I had to laugh.
Today was school picture day, beach scene, I can't wait to see how they come out!

JoElle last weighed in at 22 lbs on May 30th (16 months), then a month later she was almost 23 lbs. I can't even believe how many words she was saying at 16 months old! She loves to talk and learn new words. I have lost track of how many words she says, it was over 50 spoken words sometime in May, she had a language explosion in May.
By the end of July, she was starting to puts words together to make sentences, especially "I want milk and I want water."
The week of July 11th, her favorite word is march. She loves to march around the house. She knows how to put her hands behind her back and march in a line! It is cute....

May 30, 2006
JoElle says over 50 words clearly at home, at school she has even more in her vocab, but they forget to tell me!! We can't keep up with this girl, she loves talking!
Words she started saying at 16 months: (Aunt) Ana, Tandi, no, mine, flower, water, bath, scissors, potty, teeth, socks, shoes, down, book, more, bath, trash, color, airplane, Jesus, Amen.
Every day she learns a new word or two or more...she has had a language explosion this past month.
Some of her previous words from the past several months are: baby, row row, night night, bubbles, Dada and Mama, hi, bye, that, uh-oh, wow, ball, duck, quack quack, roar, Bible, diaper, light, eye and eyes, mouth, hug, bear, blue, red, yellow, knock knock, up, what, is, car, Nana forGrandma and nana for banana, and bop (for pop), mouth, milk, moon.
JoElle points to her teeth and says "teeth" and points to her mouth and says "mouth." She can almost say bird, still sounds like "bir" She is still trying to say "fish" She almost has this one! JoElle finally mastered "Up" for us to pick her up.
On Saturday, March 18, 2006 JoElle was pointing at her clock in her room and she turned to me and asked me "What is this?" I couldn't believe it! She is trying to put words together into sentences and she is good at repeating what people tell her to say.
JoElle also signs over 15 words to us: milk, eat, more, all done, hello, bubbles, bath, car, light, bird, duck, happy, night night, airplane, monkey, and drink! She is also putting two spoken or two signed words together. She says "Hi Dada" and signs "more (to) eat" and "all done eat(ing)" It is so cool, she learned her first sign "milk" when she was 9 months old, then she learned three signs all during the week that she turned 1.
We quit learing new signs since she is talking so much, but she still uses the ones that she knows.

May 26, 2006 JoElle is learning how to use her potty
I got her a potty today and she was so excited to sit on it, that she actually used it! She was so suprised, she looked at me like "what was that?"
Then she wanted to go potty every few minutes. Every time shes uses the restroom in her diaper she tells us, so I figured it was time for her to start learning...I know she is still fairly young, but she is interested.

May 18th, 2006 JoElle is sleeping in her big girl bed now!
We switched her crib to a toddler bed because she kept wanting to climb into her crib and I was tired of lifting her! She got so excited that she can climb in and out on her own!
But since she doesn't have a rail, I put our couch cushion next to her bed in case she rolls out...sure enough, she rolls out almost every night and lays on her blankets on the floor! She looks so comfy too on the floor! I guess eventually she will learn not to roll out. So far, in almost two weeks, she went two nights without rolling out !!!

May 6, 2006 Mayfest time!
We went to Mayfest at Trinity Park in Ft. Worth today with Uncle Aaron. When we got there it rained on us, but Daddy and JoElle shot hoops in the rain anyways! We saw our friends Trinity with her mom, Natalie, and her dad, Anthony; they were on their way out as we were coming in. Trinity is several months younger than JoElle, but she is much bigger than JoElle! She kept wanting to touch JoElle, very sweet!
It brought back memories from when we were kids and our parents took us to Mayfest, we would build stuff with the nails and wood they have in the kids area, race big wheels, make impressions of our hands, play in the sand, make sand art, eat funnel cakes and sausage...
JoElle made impressions of her hands in plaster for us, she liked the feel of it between her fingers and wanted to do it again. Uncle Aaron helped me with it; he held it in the sun so it could dry because it was still a little rainy. JoElle got her name written for her in Taiwenese; she got a butterfly painted on her face (it got smeared several minutes later by her hand!), we made a bird feeder out of peanut butter and bird seend, then Daddy let JoElle watch some kids doing gymnastics while my brother and I made Happy Sacks (balloons with sand) for my employees on my team--we all kinda get stressed out at times ya know?
I bought a funnel cake becuase JoElle was asking for milk (she was probably just hungry and the first thing that came to her mind was milk); she devoured it and had powdered sugar all over her face, hands and clothes. She especially liked to eat the sugar....
We watched a duck race, that was fun! We watched some kids dancing on stage; JoElle was bobbing her head a bit, then waving and saying hi to some guy standing next to us; he thought it was cute and turned to his wife to show her JoElle was saying hi to him!
At home, JoElle was letting Uncle Aaron hold her like a baby; so she started saying "baby!" in reference to herself. This is the first time she has ever called herself a baby :) Did I mention how much she loves for him to tickle her??? She laughs hysterically...

May 2, 2006
JoElle helped me mix up some pumpkin bread; this was the first time she has been able to help me cook. We had lots of fun. She was very interested in mixing up the gooey mixture, she held the spoon and I helped her mix. Then I let her eat off the spoon, which she really enjoyed, checked out the pics of her eating the batter!!

April 23, 2006 Happy Birthday Cousin Elena!
Cousin Elena turned 1 year old today, Happy First Birthday! We celebrated her birthday with her this evening, we ate cake, played with her balloons, then played with her new toys! Lots of fun.
This afternoon we discovered that JoElle knows the sounds of a ton of animals (all that time spent watching World Animals and Neighborhood Animal Baby Einstein DVDs...!)
I asked her "What sound does a dog make?" and she said "woof woof." She also can tell you the sounds of a cat, elephant, lion, bear, tiger, giraffe (don't ask, it's on the video!), cow, duck and probably some more, I can't remember.
One of her fave things to do now is to put her babies to bed, she loves to cover them up with blankets, give them their play bottle, pat them on the back, tell them "night night", then kiss them. It is the sweetest thing, she is in training to be a big sister one day (key word is ONE day, not yet!)
JoElle got to take a bath with me today in the big tub, she had a great time splashing around, catching bubbles, and trying to swim.
Physically, JoElle learned how to walk backwards last week. She loves to walk backwards now, it's pretty funny! She can ALMOST jump; when you tell her to jump, she squats down really low and then springs up (without actually getting off the floor!).
Her top canine teeth are about to break through..then we will be done with all her teeth until her 2 year old molars come in!
JoElle will give kisses now, when I tell her to give Daddy or me kisses she will come give you a big kiss.
She is still really attached to me and loves to say Mama all the time, in fact she called my brother "Mama" yesterday ! JoElle loves Uncle Aaron so much.
I am excited, we have a new cousin on the way.......more about that later! We think JoElle will have another girl cousin!!