I realized a few weeks ago that I hadn’t posted an update on Karsten since her 1 year blog post. Call me a slacker. Since I’ll be posting one in a few weeks when Kate turns FIVE (craziness), I figured a little Karsten-update is due, along with some more recent pictures!
So… Karsten has grown a LOT since she turned one. Here she is at one…
And here she is now at 21 months…
What a difference 9 short months will make!
This girl is so sweet, and her raspy voice is the cutest. She talks in complete sentences, and knows more words than we can even count. Her big sister is a talker and we think this little one is just trying to keep up!
She smiles ALL the time, until I pull out my camera. These are the best pictures of the best because normally I get a blank face when the camera comes out. Ha!
She is a dog lover, and her favorite thing to do when we get home is to “go see the boys”. She also loves their pen, and will walk down to the woods and lock herself in their gate.
She is stubborn and strong willed, but gets her feelings hurt SO easily. A simple “no” will cause her to bust out in tears and run to you for comfort.
She loves to sing and will often break out in one of the following songs:
Jesus Loves Me
Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus
Hakunah Matata
Let It Go
Do You Want To Build A Snowman
Summer (Olaf’s Song)
Hey Good Lookin’
Rockin’ Robin
And as soon as we get in the car, she’ll say “Mookik up, please” (i.e. – music up please)
If you couldn’t tell with her song choices, Karsten is OBSESSED with Frozen. Kate loved it for quite a while and right about the time that she was starting to move on to other things, Karsten discovered the movie. Kevin and I are pretty much past our Frozen limit and if we never see the movie again, we’d be perfectly fine with it. However, Karsten walks around our house saying “I want Anna-Elsa” ALL.THE.TIME.
Disney, you knew what you were doing there. Hat’s off to you.
She is a total Mama’s girl and has gone through a major separation anxiety stage in the past 2 months. Church nursery was nearly impossible for a while, even though she had been going to the nursery since she was a few months old and knew all of the volunteers SO well. I think (and hope) we are moving past this stage, but I can’t lie, it made me feel good to know how much she loves me!
Kate never had a blanket or lovie that she was attached to, but that is not the case with Karsten. She has “bunny” and takes that stuffed animal EVERYWHERE. She even holds bunny up and faces him toward the TV so he can watch TV with her, while saying “See bunny!”
We recently had to buy a replacement bunny because she’d almost worn the original one out. He was getting threadbare and skinny. He must have been losing some stuffing! We thought for sure she wouldn’t like the new one but we were able to find the exact same bunny as before (same brand, color, size, etc). We gave it to her, and she stuck him under her arm. Then she realized he felt a little bit bigger, fluffier, and cleaner than the original one so she pulled him out and examined him all over. We told her bunny got a bath, and that seemed to do the trick. Crisis adverted.
For a one year old, she has pretty decent manners! Please and Thank You are a regular part of her vocabulary, and she remembers ma’am and sir pretty often as well. We hope this sticks around!
Karsten is normally still asleep when I leave for work in the mornings, but I do get to get her up on weekends. I’ll walk into her room and she will hold up bunny and say “I got Bunny! I got paci!”
And yes, she does sleep with a pacifier. This is the only time she gets the paci. I tried to take it away a few nights ago and she cried and worked herself up so much, we figured it just wasn’t worth the fight yet.
She knows her ABC’s, and can count to 20. She knows most of the months of the year, and a few of the color songs that Kate learned in preschool last year. Oh the joys of having a big sister!
She loves dress up, from head to toe. She will bring me a dress and say “put it on”, which I’ll help her do. And as soon as she gets the dress on, she will twirl around, and then stick out her toes and say “I need princess shoes”.
She knows she is one but if you ask her how old she is, she will hold up her hand and say “I’m FIVE!”. After you finish laughing at her, she’ll hold up one finger and say “I’m one.”
So for now, we’re enjoying the last 3 months of our ONE year old.
