For the longest time, Kaia did not take to any of her stuffed animals. Over her 23 months of existence, she’s been gifted endless stuffed animals, including a life-sized teddy bear, which is still vacuum-sealed and in its original wrapping in the closet. We’ve exposed her to a number of them, but she’s never really seemed to care about them. She kind of looks at them and then plays with something else, whether it’s a book, a jar, a lid, or another toy she has. The couple exceptions are the stuffed animals that are battery operated and sing or play peekaboo, or Babar, which is her stuffed elephant that has a few parts that either make sounds/noise or squeak depending on where you touch or squeeze it. Randomly the other night when I was putting her to bed, she grabbed Peter Rabbit off the book shelf and took it to bed with her. I laid her baby blanket over her, and she snuggled under the blanket with Peter Rabbit and said, “okay, bye bye! Wan an!” I guess that was a cue that she wanted me to leave, so I told her good night, wan an, and I left the room and closed the door. I wasn’t sure if she’d really fall asleep on her own given that she usually needs one of us to stay there with her until she falls asleep. But somehow, it worked. And it’s now worked three nights in a row. The last two nights, she asked for four other stuffed animals to accompany her to bed, as well. And she didn’t need me to stay with her until she fell asleep. It was incredible.

I love seeing her interact with her Peter Rabbit and her stuffed animals. She tells them to do things like “sit up” and “lie down,” and she even wants Peter Rabbit there at breakfast with her. Chris wouldn’t let her have Peter Rabbit on her food tray given it would be a mess, so he told her that Peter Rabbit would “watch” her eat. And she happily agreed. It’s too adorable. I just love these moments and how she is developing. This age is truly precious… but I suppose I’ve said that about every other stage to date. I just love being Pookster’s mummy.

My Kaia is most definitely like her dad. She is stubborn and always wants what she wants. This especially goes for having her hand held. She absolutely HATES it, especially while walking. Randomly, though, she will ask to hold our hand while she’s in her stroller, and it’s really cute. Other times, she will insist on walking and holding just Daddy’s hand. She is Daddy’s girl – no doubt about that.

The last couple of nights, she’s been unusually needy at bedtime. After reading, she will refuse to fall asleep unless she is on top of me or very close to one of us. It’s been very endearing, but also extremely inconvenient given I have things in the kitchen I needed to get done, plus some work emails I had to finish. But then tonight, she did the cutest thing: while I was singing her to sleep, suddenly out of nowhere, she said, “Hold my hand?” And then she grabbed my hand and held it as she drifted off to sleep.

The days can be long, but the weeks are always so short. I really do cherish these moments with my sweet Kaia Pookie. I still cannot believe she is almost 23 months old and turning 2 years old next month. Her mere existence has filled my heart with so much love and joy that I had never even previously fathomed. I do hope that I can continue to be good to her and treat her how I always wished I could have been treated as a growing child.

Tonight, after reading some books together, I put Kaia to bed. As per usual, she asked for her blanket, then immediately insisted on “mummy blanket!” She refuses to have her blanket on her unless Mummy also has a blanket on her, too. So we’ve gotten into that rhythm together. Then, out of nowhere, as I was singing and rubbing her back, she declared, “Lie down Mummy! Lie down Mummy!” But I was already lying down. And so what I think she was trying to say is that she “wanted to lie down on mummy” because she immediately rolled over and landed on my chest. But she’s so long and big now that her body goes all the way down to my thigh. And of course, her stomach was resting against my bladder, so while I didn’t really need to pee before she got on top of me, at that point, I suddenly did feel the urge to pee. Kaia rested her chest on my chest and placed her head down against my head, And so we laid with her lying on top of me. She then started sticking her fingers in my mouth, wanting me to bite on her fingers. So we played that game over and over until she was giggling uncontrollably, and finally she rolled over onto her stomach, insisted on singing songs and rolling around… until about 8:45.

Yes, it took about an hour and 45 minutes from story time to the point when she finally fell asleep. Was it tiring and a little frustrating? Of course. But in the moments of her lying on top of me, insisting on “lie down (on) Mummy!”, and playing the biting game, I relished our time together and thought, “And this, too, will pass.” Soon, she will be too big to lie on top of me; she’s already pushing it now at 25+ lbs in weight at nearly 23 months of age. Soon, she won’t want to cuddle or even willingly give me hugs and kisses. Soon, she’ll speak in grammatically correct sentence structure and speak real, full on sentences. She won’t butcher her words or pronunciation the way I love hearing now (honestly, I am still mourning the fact that she says “mango” now and not “monga.” I am also a little sad that she says “noonulle” instead of “noodie” for the word “noodle” because it is more correct than it is not). These are the little moments that never get filmed or photographed, but I genuinely love them. Chris makes fun of me, but one little thing I do every night is: I always smell Pookster’s hair as she’s sleeping. I kiss her head, then I take a deep inhale when I smell her hair. I just love her smell. I have always loved Kaia Pookie’s scent. She doesn’t have that same fresh newborn smell anymore. She also doesn’t have the baby smell. But she has an evolving smell now as a toddler where when I inhale, I know she’s still my sweet baby. And no matter how big she gets, my sweet baby she will always be.