The Menace aka Chezney

 I haven't written about Chez for a while. I can't believe this varmit is 18 months and a few junk change days OK...18 months and 20 days old today. 

-We call her The Menace around here for a very special and particular reason...that is the only adjective that describes her perfectly! Chez's loves to taunt Aspyn, get into things for no good reason, walks around the house looking for something to do and all she does after you get upset with her or try to discipline her is LAUGH!!!! Oh it's so naughty...cause Tyler or I don't know how to deal with this. You can't help but laugh and then the whole "disciplining" situation as now become a lost art.I feel like the only way to describe it would be when you try and discipline her, she would flip you the bird, laugh and walk away with you just staring at her blankly not knowing what to say. You can spank her - she laughs, she bites or pulls clumps of Aspyn's hair out and you flick her hand - she just glares at you and does it again or does it to you in defense, the only thing that seems to work is put her in her bed and take every binkie in her bed away. She doesn't like that. Chez will pull Aspyn's hair - I mean clumps out. Aspyn just takes it and tries to tell me when it is happening. Aspyn is so stinkin patience and kind when Chez is bullying. She always says through her tears..I know Mom, she is still learning. It seriously breaks my heart for Aspyn to have to be the one to deal with it.

-She loves saying HOT! for either hot things or when something is cold.

-Chez's wave is the cutest thing ever. It is not the traditional up and down flip, its more side to side lazy day flap.

-She loves to give high fives and knuckles!

-She loves to feel my baby. Chez will lift up my shirt and rub or whack my belly. Then she lifts up her shirt and does the same saying "Baaaby!" 

-Chez LOVES her Grandpa Keith. She says "Bomp-pa!" whenever she sees Keith and then almost immediately will start to wink at him. 

-Keith has taught her how to wink. Her greeting to everyone is to wink at them. They don't know that she is doing it because for other people, she winks with both eyes. With Grandpa...she only winks with one eye. Every time she sees him, she just starts winking like crazy, even if it is from the other side of the room, she is winking at him. I love that they have that little thing together. It is super cute.

-She loves her binkie. As you can see from the above picture, Jessie let her have it while she was watching the kids and Chezney took it in the bath with her. 

She didn't get a nap this day and was out cold at like 6 pm while watching a show waiting for dinner. She was so tired!

-Some words Chezney says are hi, cow, puppy, pig, cracker, no!, duck, dad or da-da, mom or mommy or momma (depending on the situation or if whining is involved or I am not paying attention to her), that (to point to anything or get something), tank too (thank you), cow, when she see a herd of cows she thinks she needs to herd them so she starts yelling Hey! Hey! Hey! to get them going, shoes, boots, 

-knows the sounds of monkey, lion, pig, dog, cat, cow, lion, dinosaur, horse.

-Chez can point out on command her hair, eyes, nose, teeth, ears, belly and toes. 

-Her bottom side tooth still has never come in and it doesn't have room to come in. I think she will be missing this tooth until her permanent ones come in. Hopefully its there. 

-We often refer to her as a monkey too...when she wants something or needs something she will sound like a monkey in that squeaky little whiny grunt pointing to something she wants.

- Chez LOVES LOVES to be outside. Outside at The Field, at our house, the park...ANYWHERE!!! 

-She starts screaming and yelling when we drive into The Field. She bounces up and down and starts saying any of the animal sounds she can get out in a huff and just thinks life is great. If you do drive past The Field and don't stop however, she will cry big huge alligator tears and throws a fit. 

-She loves to walk around The Field and go check out the calves or pigs or horses. She doesn't care if it is cold, windy, rainy or snowing. She will stay has long as you let her stay. It usually isn't long enough, she usually ends up crying even if you have been there for a couple of hours.

-Chez knows when you are leaving. She will listen to the door open or close like a hawk and then watch it too if necessary. When we leave or especially Tyler will leave, she runs as fast as her little legs will go, yell for her coat is usually asking for it with her hand and grunting, will grab her boots - throw them at you and sit down on the floor and saying boot - boot!!! If Tyler leaves without her, its like a damn travesty. You would think her world was crashing in.

-Chez LOVES her boots, cause she knows what they mean.
-Chez also has this delight for taking her shoes off wherever we go. If we are in the car, they come off. If we are at someones house, they are off. This kid likes to be comfortable and takes after her Mama! We don't like shoes! 

-She loves to ride horses and watch the cows out on the range. Tyler branded with her while holding her one time, and I think the calf was bawling, so it scared her a little bit. Once i took her, she was clutching onto me for dear life and panting like get me away from this! The next time we went branding, she wasn't too excited about it either. She sat on a calf just fine, but having the babies sad did something to her. 

-this little girl is SOOO picky! She won't eat any vegetable or fruit. Sometimes she will but that is on rare occasion. If someone asks me if she will eat it, I just says lets try it. With Aspyn I had a pretty good grasp on what she would eat and knew what she would and wouldn't. With this one, I have no idea. I try pineapple one day and she spits it out, but the next day if Aspyn is eating it...she will eat it. She is more likely to try fruit than a veggie. She hates all veggies except she will eat a potatoes.She loves any kind of pasta and she is pretty good about eating meat. It is a new meal for us every time. She is a pretty good experimenter with more adult foods than Aspyn ever was. Maybe because I didn't think Aspyn would try it,so I made an entire meal for Aspyn when she was little and I definitely don't do that with Chez. She eats what we eat. She used to LOVE oatmeal and I tried to not always give it to her...but now she refuses the stuff. Oops.

- Chez is wanting her independence with food. She wants to feed herself and sit at the big table with us. It is a challenge because she is just messier and it takes longer, but I am trying to think that we have to do this sometime, so I am trying to have my patience with it. Tyler's patience...not soo great!

-Chez does have quite the sweet tooth. Anytime the pantry door is open, she will be right in it yelling at the bowl That! That! until you get something for her. 

-If she needs a drink while eating, she won't take one bite until she gets a drink. It is quite funny that she is so particular. 
-She HATES her high chair. She won't eat ONE bite if you put her in it. She wants to sit up or stand up on the big chairs like us. I hate it cause she is still too little...but I guess she will learn. 

- Weight at 18 months was 19.9 pounds (1.2 percentile)

-Height at 18 months was just under 30 inches. (40th percentile)

-The doctor didn't seem to be concerned about her small-ness. He just said try and fatten her up, but she will most likely be a small petite girl. 

- Chez has found that head butting is the fun thing to do and will just head butt you for no reason and then laugh. 

-She LOVES to wrestle and rarely will cry when tangled up and hurting. She just goes with the flow and pounces on rolls onto anything that she can. She squeals with delight and has so much fun. 

-If you said bath during any moment of the day, that kid will start running towards the bathroom trying to rip off her shirt. She LOVES the bath. Hands down favorite time or activity of the day. 

-Chez does bruise more readily than Aspyn ever did. She still has a battle wound on her forehead from slamming into the door. She seems to be injured more than Aspyn ever was...like the typical toddler injuries.

-Chez laughs easily. She loves to talk, scream and is quite the shatter box. She is more likely to do this at our home only but will on the occasion if she feels comfortable at the home or place we are at. In the car going on a ride. If it is bumpy, she will hum so her voice bounces with the different bumps and such. But if she thinks something is funny, she will laugh and give you a big ol belly laugh...esp if you are trying to discipline her. 

-She still has a love relationship for her hair. She will find brushes to brush her hair, stroke her hair with her finger, find my ponytail and let it pass through her hands. She LOVES her hair. s

-On Valentines Day, she just busted out a somersault. We didn't even know she knew how. She has obviously been watching Aspyn and took note. We were so surprised, but she did it like a champ the first time and hasn't stopped since. 

-Anytime music starts to play any where, she squats close into sitting position and starts pulsing. She will swing her arms around and twirl too. She loves to dance with her big sister!

This is seriously her typical look. This is her glare that we get all the time. Whether she is excited, happy, sad or mad. This is what we get.

This is her surprised astonished look. She was in a phase there for awhile that she would do it for everything. She would gasp ooooh! with it and give the look. I am glad I got it on camera.

- She is not a great napper. Chez is the lightest sleeper in the history of the earth. Aspyn can be as quiet as is only possible for a 3 1/2 year old, but its still not good enough. Chez will wake up on a dime. She does sleep at LEAST 10-12 hours every night. I would say she starting sleeping through the night SOLID at 18 months. It has been TERRIBLE...but I think we are finally in the clear. 

-Chez HATES to go to bed. Tyler always holds her and they sit together for awhile in the lazy boy. When he goes to get up, she starts crying and yelling, throwing herself back at the chair and pointing at the chair. She HATES to be laid down and know that she is missing the party outside. But once you get her in her room, she stops crying. Once you lay her down, you don't hear a peep from her until the next morning. 

-  Chezney can throw some amazing fits. She screams and cries and rolls on the floor and hits anything she can possibly touch. It is amazing. If she doesn't want to sit close to you, she will push you away and scowl at your until you move away from her. She is always push and flapping her hands to try and get you away from her. She likes to flip back if you are holding her. She just does pretty much ANYTHING to let you know she is NOT pleased. 

- When she doesn't want something or she doesn't' want someone to hold her for example, she will lift her shoulder that is closest to the object almost to her chin and roll it back with a scowl on her face to say no. She is so ornery. 

- Also, when she doesn't want to listen to you or she pretends that she can't hear you....she will close her eyes and look away with her eyes still closed as if her eyes are closed so she can't hear you. She will close her eyes and turn her head as far away from you as possible. When you are done talking to her, she very slowly turns her head back towards you as she opens her eyes ever so carefully. Then if she sees you are still staring at her, she will turn her head again, but keep her eyes open and look at you from the very very very corner of her eye just to see if you still are talking to her.

- So as much as the above sentences seem like she doesn't listen...she is a dang good listener. If you ask her to do something or pick something up, she will do it. Now of course, she isn't always perfect and if she decides she doesn't want too - she won't. But she is pretty pretty good. She loves to pick up and help clean up. She has learned Mom's OCD's and will make sure all the doors are shut if one gets left open. She will put her shoes back up on the shelf if they have fallen down.  

- Chez is experimenting with going down the stairs face forward walking down them. She will walk down them if there is something really really sturdy to hold onto. If not, she will try one stair and then decide it's too scary, turns around and just glides down the stairs...she doesn't do one at a time...she glides over the top of the edges and slides down. It is funny to watch her but when she first started to do it...I thought she was falling down and it scared me!! 

- Chezney started walking when we were in Las Vegas while Taylor and Stacy had her. It made me sad because I didn't see her first crawling steps or her first real walking steps. I mean we did with the walking, because she started taking a few steps from me to Tyler, or a few steps away from the couch on her own before chickening out and falling down the day or two before we left, but I knew she would be walking when we got home. Sure enough! Chez was walking. I think having Palmer and Aspyn around seeing that everyone was walking and this was the cool thing to do was what pushed her over the edge. When we went to pick her up and she walked from the living room to the front door, I nearly cried! It was bitter sweet that she wasn't a baby anymore and for me it just happened over night practically. She was 14 months.

We love this small fry and wouldn't trade this feisty, stubborn, fun, goofy, cute Menace for the world!!! So glad she is apart of this crazy family.