callista at eighteen months.

Oh, this pretty daughter.  She is such a joy.

She's already 18 months old?! She looks just as confounded by this as I am.

She is on the move lately, motoring around like she owns the place.  She is the favorite of all of her siblings, and I will often go on the hunt for her, to find her squirrelled away with one or more of the older kids, playing house or reading books.  They fight over the privilege of getting to play with her.  Likewise, she loves them back - she loves getting to help tuck Rocco in for nap; she'll reach her arm through the bar of his crib, rub his head, tilt her head to one side, and babble soothingly at him.  If anyone is hurt or crying (and in a family our size, someone is always hurt or crying), she loves rubbing and patting their back to help console them.

On the flip side, she is an absolute destructo.  She is into everything, all the time, always.  I do not remember any of the rest of my kids being quite like this.  She somehow always has a contraband crayon in one hand, and a board book in the other hand.  Defacement and pillaging number among her top joys.

Because she plays hard, she sleeps hard.  She is still taking two naps each day - the rest of the kids had all dropped their morning naps by 16 months, but not Callista.  She is fully committed to recharging her batteries for the maelstrom she intends to inflict once she's awake.  When I lay her down, she likes to have a paci in her mouth, and a Wubbanub in each hand, to rub in her ears.  Such an adorable little weirdo.

She hates baths.  She hates having her diaper changed (and I hate changing it - she's got some tummy issues we're needing to resolve, and she often does serious damage to the diapers, clothing, changing pads, bedding, humans, and air quality in her general vicinity).  The only way I can get her to lay still while I change her is to give her a small, decorative gold snail that sits on her shelf, and even that's not foolproof.  That poor snail has seen some stuff.

The one thing she does love is eating.  This girl can pack it away.  Three eggs for breakfast is standard fare; she'll eat a whole can of tuna by herself without batting an eyelash.  (Though, when she's dissatisfied with the service, or the food, or the ambiance, or anything else, she'll let us know by throwing every single last bit of food on the floor with wild swipes of her arm and loud shrieks.  It's sure endearing.)

She is not afraid to voice her displeasure.

She can say a few words at this point - "Mama," "Dada," "Baby," "Bubble," "Yeah," "Hi," and "Neh neh neh neh neh" ("No no no no no") are all regulars, in addition to the nonstop conversational-sounding babble she produces.  (She even wakes up around 4 a.m. each morning, just to talk to herself for a bit.)  We also asked her to say "Wahoo!" the other day, and she threw her arm up in the air without prompting, and nonchalantly went, "Weh."  Like, "yeah, yeah, yeah, wahoo and whatever."

She got a toy for Christmas that plays classical music, and she holds it as tightly to her face as she can possibly get it in order to listen.  She then either stands stock-still, mesmerized, or she goes nutso and starts dancing.  My favorite of her dances is when she waggles her funny little pointer finger around like a maniac while swaying back and forth.

She hates wearing shoes or socks.  She loves doing exercises with her older siblings.  She loves sitting backwards on the bottom step of the kitchen stool, using the top step as a toddler-sized table.  She loves pretending to take imaginary food out of containers to "eat" it or pretend to feed it to everyone around her.

She is such a blessing to us, and I'm excited to see her become a big sister soon.  It's hard to imagine as she still seems so tiny (not only is she the current 'baby' of the family, but she's also literally tiny, swimming in her 12-month clothing), but I know once we bring the new baby home, she will seem so huge.  I'm taking these last few months to just bask in the glow of her littleness!