Life With Cora : 15 Months

This age has been so fun!  In the last couple months since Cora's first birthday, she has mastered walking, been to the beach for the first time, taste tested tons of new foods, and gone on multiple trips to the zoo, spent hours exploring outside, and developed a small verbal and signing vocabulary.  She is fiercely independent and loves walking around the house playing with her toys and the dog.  Whenever Cora finds Clove laying on the ground, she always cuddles up like the dog is her own personal lounge chair.  She does the same thing with my parent's dog and I always count my blessings that we have such child-friendly dogs in our lives.

We go on a walk almost every evening.  I walk the dog and she walks along with us looking at all of the sticks on the ground.  She always picks up sticks, rocks, and leaves to carry around.  I love how she is always so proud of finding a rock that fits perfectly in her hand, or a stick that is the right size, or a lonely leaf that she can hold.  She'll pick up the leaf/stick/rock and hold it up to me with a giant smile on her face.  The walks are slow, but I love seeing her excitement over the small pieces of nature, the trees as the blow in the wind, and the stray cats that cross our path.

One of Cora's new 'tricks' is to pucker up her lips for a kiss and wait for the recipient to get really close. Right when you're about to kiss her, she leans back with a huge smile on her face and starts laughing at you.  She has been practicing laughing and gives me the best crinkle nose giggles whenever we nurse. Her humor is really coming out and you can tell she loves to do silly things to make people laugh.

Oh, sweet Cora Jean!  You bring so much joy and laughter into our lives.  I love your sweet giggles when you do something silly to make us laugh.  I love when you give me kisses in the morning, or when I'm leaving for work, or when I get home, or when we're cuddling, or just because.  I even love your fake-out kisses and the fits of laughter that follows.  We enjoy every second with you and could not have asked for a sweeter baby.  xo-Mommy